e unibus plurum

First they Ignore you
Then they Ridicule you
Then they Fight you
Then you win.

-Gandhi-
____________

So we're just wrong, wrong, wrong, says the snarky troll; wrong to blame the ugly thing that the GOP has metamorphosed into for the ugly things it says and does. After all, some prominent Liberal pundits like the Unabomer actually killed people, even though he wasn't liberal or a Democrat, but a schizophrenic conservative Luddite and therefore the deranged dogs of the GOP can't be blamed for things like humiliating cripples in the street, throwing bricks through local Democratic Party Headquarters windows, mailing condoms, gasoline soaked shredded American flags killing doctors and making hideous, disgusting comments about killing the families of Democrats. Can't blame them for planning armed demonstrations and in some cases calling for the Armed overthrow of a duly elected American government. It's not their fault. They can't be blamed for the hate campaign that ended in the blowing up of the Murrah building because some "hippies" blew some stuff up 40 years ago after all and that lets them off the hook. It's not their fault. They have no choice but to resort to thuggery and intimidation when elections don't go their way. We attempted to keep the corporate overlords from screwing the sick and we lowered the average guy's taxes with no regard for the hardship it causes Bill Gates and Warren Buffet! It's almost treason.

No, it's not their fault we're nearly as divided as we were in 1861, it's the Liberals who after all, criticized George Bush without any cause. It's only fair since Bush lost the popular vote and only won by highly questionable court interference that they should try to hound duly elected Obama out of office for being an illegitimate foreign usurper who pals around with terrorists and murdered his grandmother and plans to murder yours and to outlaw Christianity and Capitalism. Tit for tat, truth justifies lies, and you can't say Republicans are to blame. Some bad people have been Democrats, you know.

And it's the same story it was in 1861, the same question. Does the Federal Government have the right to interfere when the States deny civil rights, guaranteed or implied? Does the Federal Government have the right to free your slaves, let your wife vote, make you let minorities into your waiting room, use your drinking fountain, go to your schools? Above all lurks the question: does the Federal Government have the right to assess the general public or to regulate corporations and markets and securities and food and education to improve and maintain liberty and justice for all? The Southern answer was no and the Republican answer is no and no to the point where the current spokesman for the new Rebels tells you to quit any church that talks about social justice and Jesus be damned.

Behind that Constitutional casuistry, the religious double-think, the tenebrous cloud of irrational rage and vicious vituperation, it all comes down to that -- and to think that 600,000 men died to settle it while people get disgustingly rich and powerful bringing it all back.