The Revolution Will Be Televised

My wife wondered aloud, as opposed to her written musings, if our country might be on the brink of a civil war. My initial response was to use a corollary to the rule that people used to invoke when speaking of the U.S. economy: It's too big to fail. It was my assertion that it was in no one's best interest for this currently tenuous union to fail. And, to be honest, at this point, I hadn't read the day's news.
Mike Huckabee, a possible Republican presidential candidate in 2012, says the effort to allow gays and lesbians to marry is comparable to legalizing incest, polygamy and drug use. Huckabee also told college journalists last week that gay couples should not be permitted to adopt. "Children are not puppies," he said. According to Mike, not every group's interests deserve to be accommodated, if their lifestyle is outside of what he called "the ideal." So there was that.
Then there was this: Tea party leaders and some conservative members of the Oklahoma legislature say they would like to create a new volunteer militia to help defend against what they believe are improper federal infringements on state sovereignty. "Is it scary? It sure is," said tea party leader Al Gerhart of Oklahoma City, who heads an umbrella group of tea party factions called the Oklahoma Constitutional Alliance. "But when do the states stop rolling over for the federal government?" Scary indeed. Perhaps Mister Gerhart is unfamiliar with the works of Timothy McVeigh.
I suppose the bright side is that all of this frightening rhetoric is taking place out in the open. None of this is behind-closed-doors, secret society stuff. There are web sites, blogs, and an entire television network devoted to stirring things up. It's like that song by the late, great Guns 'n' Roses:
Look at the hate we're breeding
Look at the fear we're feeding
Look at the lives we're leading
The way we've always done before
It's hard to imagine Axl Rose as a prophet, I understand, but these are strange days indeed.