by Tequila Mockingbird
Los Angeles, CA (The Hollywood Times) 10/29/25 – America was never just a country—it was a product launch. From the first handshake deals over stolen land to the latest corporate merger of dreams and data, this land of liberty has always been a marketplace of illusions. We pledge allegiance to the brand, not the flag, and our patriotism comes pre-packaged with a discount code. Every idea, every revolution, every drop of rebellion gets trademarked the moment it touches the air. We buy our freedom on credit and call it democracy.
The auctioneers stand behind marble podiums and televised debates; their gavels shaped like microphones. Billionaires outbid philosophers, and truth goes to the one with the largest ad budget. The people—those same beautiful, broke, brilliant people—are told to compete in a game they can’t afford to play. We scroll, we vote with our clicks, we sell our attention for pennies to keep the algorithm alive. The Constitution wasn’t written in disappearing ink—but the small print sure was.
Somewhere in the static, the poets and dreamers whisper their counteroffers. They trade in vision, not venture capital. They speak in tongues of honesty, empathy, and art—the currencies that can’t be mined or monetized. They remind us that the richest soil in America isn’t under Wall Street; it’s in the hearts that refuse to sell out. You can’t buy a revolution; you have to become it.
So yes, America might be up for auction—but the soul of it? That’s not on the block yet. That’s in the hands of the storytellers, the rebels, the everyday visionaries who still believe in something wilder than profit: the power of a voice that can’t be bought.
