The (Next) American Civil War: The Fire Next Time

Ruminant With A View

by Elizabeth Boleman-Herring

“[“The Last Word”’s Lawrence] O’Donnell then turned to an email which he said came from a friend of his who used Planned Parenthood. He read the email out from his Blackberry, and as he did so, his hands, and his voice, started shaking with emotion. The friend’s email recounted her dire financial straits and history of medical illnesses. Planned Parenthood, she wrote, was the place she went for her birth control and her cancer screenings, and through them, she said, she was able to get multiple mammograms. “It’s terrifying to think that with lack of funds, millions of women would not have access to this kind of care,” the friend wrote. “I can’t imagine what I would do without Planned Parenthood. Talking about what they do is part of your job right now . . . please yell some sense into these people.” —quote from story from “The Huffington Post” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/08/lawrence-odonnell-tears-planned-parenthood-government-shutdown_n_846953.html)

“Stop just a second,” [Glenn] Beck chimed in. “Hookers? Who? Who depends on Planned Parenthood?” He then imitated the woman, who said she had an abortion. “I’ve got 400 abortions that I have to have!” said Beck. “I have to have these children aborted!” —quote from story by Aliyah Shahid, of NYDailyNews.com (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2011/04/12/2011-04-12_glenn_beck_suggests_only_hookers_use_planned_parenthood_jabs_lawrence_odonnell_f.html?r=news/politics)

TEANECK New Jersey—(Weekly Hubris)—4/18/11—Make no mistake: the coming War Between the States will be anything but civil.

At present, we are experiencing a Civil War of Words, for the most part, though I am sure the families of Representative Gabby Giffords, as well as the late, much-lamented Dr. George Tiller would disagree. For them, the shooting war has already begun, and they have wounds, some mortal, to prove it.

But, for the most part, the rest of us are at war in the living rooms and barber shops and grocery store parking lots of our nation; roughly 50 percent of us pitted hook, line and sinker against the other 50 percent. We’re fighting The Second American Civil War: The Prequel. Right here and now. And I believe, Americans being Americans, and having one big trait in common—violence—the War of Words will escalate, sooner or later.

And it’s the Republicans against the Democrats, this time around, as opposed to the South against the North. It’s Red (states) against Blue (states) now, rather than Grey against Blue. And there are figures and data I might cite to document this bald-faced premise of mine but, in this short column, I’m more interested in expressing one educated woman’s take on the state of the Union.

In brief, it sucks.

In essence, I do not believe the center will hold.

In the final analysis, I believe this country should split in two, and I know on which side I’m going to enlist.

However, the fisticuffs may not break out in earnest in my own short lifetime, though I do not see a “United,” in any way, “States” in the history books of the 22^nd century.

As I watched Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC’s political analysis program, “The Last Word,” this past week, I was only a bit surprised to see him tear up while reading an e-mail from a woman viewer who, if the Republicans have their way, will no longer have access to affordable health care (PAP smears, mammograms, contraception, etc.) through Planned Parenthood. I wasn’t surprised at all to hear Arch-Right-Wing-Nut-Job Glenn Beck subsequently ridicule O’Donnell, as well as his viewer, by postulating that only “hookers” use Planned Parenthood, and then, only for multiple abortions.

Glenn Beck should be culled from our common herd now. There is no doubt in my mind.

Having adopted a path of non-violence, I am sorely taxed by such villains as Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly and everyone on the payroll of Rupert Murdoch. I have Gandhi in my heart but, alas, Smith & Wesson in my spleen. What’s a woman to do?

I thought, for reasons of clarity, that I’d draw up two columns, and describe, in doing so, how the two hostile camps will divide.

First, to get the stuff, and folks, who turn my stomach, out of the way first, I will describe for you the Red Camp:

They perceive themselves as wealthy, even if they’re currently dirt-poor. In their mirrors, if they don’t see the actual Koch brothers, they have faith that, someday soon, they will.

Thus, even if dirt-poor, they’re adamant about providing tax breaks for the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans. They’ll support, in great, Red droves, any legislation that benefits the rich, and rich corporations, though voting in such legislation is the moral equivalent of shooting themselves in the feet.

They give lip-service to abstinence, as the best form of birth control, even if their own daughters were knocked up, out of wedlock, in their teens. They abhor contraception and abortion as “anti-life,” and are hell-bent upon sending unwillingly pregnant women (even rape victims) back to the back-alley storefronts of illegal abortionists.

They are against government regulation of such lethal industries as coal mining, deep-water offshore drilling, and the folks who brought us Three Mile Island, the nuclear power cabal. In addition, they believe Global Climate Change is a myth, and want no government regulation of CO2 emissions, or any other facet of our environment. Many, many of them believe Man and the dinosaurs co-existed on Planet Earth, and that the Rapture is, in fact, going to happen any day now. (Sometimes I believe the Right Wing in this country has no concept of the past or future tenses.)

The New Reds hate all Blacks, Hispanics, Gays, recent immigrants and, not to put too fine a point on it, women. They especially hate Obama and, even if they had his long-form birth certificate tattooed on their broad, French-fry-fed American butts, they’d still believe he was born in Kenya, and is still a Muslim.

They support “The American Empire” and, thus, endless wars in Muslim lands.

They would reduce or eradicate what they term as “entitlements,” meaning Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. If school-children are too poor to afford one decent meal, at school, a day, the hell with them.

If you are poor, old, sick or young in this country, you are perceived as not fully human, in their books. If you can’t “pull your own weight,” or “pull yourself up by your own boot-straps,” well, then, too bad.

The New Reds like guns. Lots of guns, and lots of ammo. They want to be able to take their guns everywhere with them, even the college classroom. (Due to this, they just might win the next War Between the States, as the Democrats are not busily arming themselves at present.)

The Far Right conflate Church and State. They don’t see a problem. Theirs is one nation under a specifically Christian God. If you’re an atheist, you’re persona non grata. Likewise, if you’re a Muslim or Buddhist or Hindu or Sikh, etc., etc.

They all watch Fox News. All the time.

They find Sarah Palin’s illiteracy “refreshing.”

They suspect the worst of anyone born in or living in a major metropolitan area. For the Reds, “rural” is good; “urban” is bad.

There is no music for them but Country & Western, and they don’t think there’s a thing wrong with the Grammy’s. They think music’s improved in their lifetimes.

Few of them, except the filthy-rich 1 percent, have passports. The rest of the world is “them”; and they’d rather stay put right here.

The New Reds think insurance companies are fine just where they are, between Americans and their doctors. They’re against a Single Payer Health Plan.

And, finally, the Republican Right contains, within it, like a heart of darkness, an even more radically loony element: The Tea Party. And The Tea Party is growing by leaps and bounds. Already, it is the tail that wags the Red dog.

On the other hand, there are the Democrats, the “New Blues.”

They are, largely, urban, and concentrated on the nation’s West and East coasts. They may not be well educated, but they support better and higher education for themselves, their children and their fellow-countrymen. They do not find suspect the educated elite of our nation, or of the world, for that matter: they respect minds greater than theirs when they encounter them. They aspire to elect leaders wiser and brighter than they, themselves; not politicians they perceive to be “just like them, no better or worse.”

The New Blues believe that the wealthiest members of society should cough up their fair share of tax revenues, and that the laws “W” instituted to protect millionaires and billionaires from fair taxation should be wiped from the law books.

Democrats believe, for the most part, in a woman’s right to choose; and in the sanctity of a woman’s relationship with her own doctors. They do not believe insurance companies should have a seat in the examining room.

The New Blues are apt to support Gay Marriage, and fully accept those of other religions and ethnicities living in their country as equals under the law. While they deplore illegal immigration, they feel those who employ illegals should be penalized, and a way forward be created for the children of “illegals” long resident in this country.

The Democrats want us out of Central Asia as soon as is practicably possible. In truth, many New Blues want our Four Endless Wars—in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Pakistan—to end now, today, forthwith. They do not believe in the creation of an American Empire. (Democrats study history, and know how, say, England’s adventures in these very arenas of war turned out.)

The Blues want to reduce military spending.

They do not see Social Security as an “entitlement”: Social Security benefits are something they paid for, they earned. Laying a hand on that money is the moral equivalent of robbery.

The Blues believe insurance companies have no business on the face of the earth. Insurance companies and lobbyists can, for the most part, go right to hell.

They feel, strongly, that we must act now, and radically, to avert the apocalypse of Climate Change. The Rapture ain’t a’comin’, but the glaciers will melt, if we all keep our heads in the sand.

The Left want more and vigilant government regulation of Wall Street, the nuclear industry, coal mining and any and all drilling for oil. They are against growing nuclear power in America: nuclear waste lives on forever, and the Democrats, unlike the Republicans, actually understand the future tense of the verb.

New Blues want a big, clear, fat, uncrossable line between Church and State.

They know that calling a corporation an “individual,” as the Right-Wing-Packed Supreme Court just did, is sheer bull-puckey.

New Blues get their news commentary from MSNBC. They like Rachel Maddow (a lesbian!), Lawrence O’Donnell and Mika Brzezinski (and her brilliant Dad, Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzezinski). To the New Blues, Sarah Palin is a bad, bad joke, as are all the talking heads of Fox News.

Michele Bachmann? You’ve got to be kidding!

New Blues put their money where their mouths are, and “go Green” for the sake of the environment. They read labels, and try to buy things Made in America, even if it means going without some cheap, Chinese product.

They know that not to better regulate firearms in this country is to court Armageddon.

The New Blues—lots and lots of them—have passports, and higher degrees not necessarily in Business.

The Democrats think supporting abstinence as a form of birth control is absurd: they well remember the raging hormones of their adolescent years, and do not expect their own kids to do any better in putting out those fires. They talk to their kids about sex, help them get birth control and, if unwanted pregnancies result despite their best efforts, counsel them that it’s often a better choice for a child to abort a child than to give birth to one.

If they are poor or middle class New Blues, they do not see the Koch brothers when they look into the mirror. The way things are going, they know that even hanging on to their status as middle-class Americans is something very much in jeopardy. They’ll pay their fair share of taxes, to nation and state, but they expect the wealthy to do the same.

And the New Blues know full well, that if the Republicans have their way vis-à-vis Wall Street, offshore drilling, coal mining, hiring illegals, destroying Social Security and Medicare, and sending us back to the 1930s in terms of women’s rights and collective bargaining . . . this great land as they conceive of it is toast . . .

. . . and they may well have to take up arms to secede from an untenable union. Unlike the war in Iraq, the coming Civil War might well be one worth fighting.

. . . and we, the New Blues, might just take both coasts, thank you.

PS I’ve just read William Dalrymple’s history of the Hindu/Muslim Delhi Mutiny of 1857, and feel I’ve been transported back in some grim time machine to a conflict very, very like that into which we blundered in Iraq, under the bumbling and dimwitted insistence of George W. The conflict between the British imperialists (of “The Company”) and the Delhiwallahs and jihadists loyal to the last Muslim Emperor of Delhi, Shah Zafar II, echoed on so many levels America’s misadventures in the Middle East and Central Asia, that I found myself sadly shaking my head. What is equally saddening for me is that I personally know no Republicans, among family or friends, intellectually curious enough to begin, let alone finish a book such as Dalrymple’s The Last Mughal. My entire nation has become unimaginably dumbed down since the 1960s. But the Republicans, by and large, are the dumbest of the dumb (if not the mutest of the mute). And they, like all who study not history, will be doomed to repeat it. May they not take me, and my Democratic brethren, along for their doomed ride.