And things are good, and have been good: Gay rights are expanding across the country, Creationism has been defeated for the time being in Texass, and most importantly, Obama was elected.
So why am I writing?
Well, as things are getting good for us, there is usually a virulent strain of revolutionary conservatism that is terrified of what we're doing. It was around since the beginning of the aftermath of the election, and while most people were cheering, there were more people buying guns and stocking up on survivalist supplies. It started with Rush Limbaugh's "I want Obama to fail" shenanigans, but now things are getting more serious in church. The NOM (as in "Om nom nom" ( '< . . ." or National Organization of/for Marriage, produced a Two-Minutes Hate against gay marriage "Oh NO! I have to sit here while my children learn in school that gay marriage is OK!", and Glenn Beck plays with Jenga to illustrate how people should be terrified of Os- I'm sorry, Obama. We used to be afraid of Osama, but we let him go. It's Obama they're afraid of, because he presents a huge threat to their ideology. Don't be fooled: Conservatism is not minimal government. The only deregulation they practice is economic; dont think for a second that they are at all concerned with individualism or the Constitution.
Aren't conservatives doing what we were doing during the Bush years? At first glance, there are similarities. But if one looks more closely, the problems during the Bush years were very real and very close to the lives of individual human beings, from the PATRIOT Acts and stem cell bans, and Bush's reckless cowboyism that completely disconnected us with the rest of the world. What could the conservatives possibly be afraid of? Their economic stability. Do you think Glenn Beck or Bill O'Really really cares about the middle or lower classes? Not at all. Faux Populi. If they did, they would be kicked off Fox News faster than Ted Haggard out of New Life Church. They aren't really afraid for this country, they are simply terrified of losing their (enormous, possibly illegal (earned through nefarious business practices), and possibly unearned) wealth.
The conservative doctrine treats corporations as human beings: That [corporations] are granted life and liberty, at the expense of real people. Libertarianism poses an equal and similar issue. This country learned in the 19th century up to the1950s that economic deregulation was contradictory to individual success and satisfaction, from the dystopias of Upton Sinclair and Andrew Carnegie's factory conditions, to munitions factories during WW1 and WW2, workers rights need to be balanced with the needs of corporate executives. Economic deregulation does not guarantee the rights of workers, it eliminates them and allows the corporations to do whatever they please to the people who work for them.
Paul Krugman wrote today that the "[Insani]"Tea Parties (as the brilliantly snarky Rachel Maddow took them) were conceived by the "usual suspects" (conservative "think" tanks), and tore out all of the authenticity that these Tea Parties (tea, crumpets, 6-year-old girls, and teddy bears!) seemed to hold as "grassroots" movements. No, Krugman calls them Astro-Turf movements, movements that have formed not from the bottom up, but from the top down: Fox News has been "aggressively" promoting these Tea Parties, and the rich hold tea parties that cost $500 a seat. Is that grassroots? I dont think so.
What were we doing during the Bush years? Well, I was reading dystopian novels, and watching as James Dobson excercised his insidious influence over public policy, as we preemptively attacked Iraq, as New Orleans became New Atlantis, as Creationists, armed with the overconfidence that their man was the President, steamrolled across the country, putting false warnings on science textbooks; I watched as John McCain chose Manchurian candidate Sarah Palin as his runningmate, who was everything conservatives like in a woman.
We watched as gas prices rose to between $4 and $5/gallon, as scientists and politicians proposed plans to cease global warming that went ignored by the President, who often tampered with scientific reports that contradicted his beliefs. We watched our moral credentials burn to ash after Abu Ghraib, as a White House official disclosed the identity of an undercover agent for retribution for contradicting doctored Bush intelligence on Iraq.
Obama approved a no-nonsense Navy SEALS operation to save the captain of that cargo ship. Could Bush dare to say the same?
