It can happen again, and be even worse.

The above picture was censored for years. What would the public have thought if it knew that thousands of people were being herded up on the West Coast and sent to prison camps without due process of law? The United States Government had considered these pictures too inflammatory for public viewing until they were unearthed from the National Archives in 2006.  

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Most people don't know that Japanese food was as common as Chinese food in the USA (at least on the West Coast) until World War 2.  But, after Pearl Harbor Day, our government had a ready made excuse to strip everything of value from law abiding people and deny them their basic human rights.

Could this happen again?  Of course!

We now have a president elect (at the time this blog entry was written) who has expressed a desire to force Muslims to register themselves with the Federal Government, so that the government could do what it wants after the next terrorist disaster.  This is dangerous. This is the same president elect wants to put limits on 1st Amendment freedoms for the rest of us.  Can you imagine what would happen if Alec Baldwin did a Saturday Night Live sketch that offended someone who had the power to incarcerate people without due process of law?

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We live in a culture where people live in fear.  They pick and chose their news sources to conform to the way they imagine the world as being, and not as it really is. So their biases are confirmed and strengthened.  Recently, one self appointed "examiner" went to a pizzeria to examine reports of a Child Abuse ring in the Pizza Parlor, associated with some high level Democrats.  The problem, is that this jerk opened fire on people, triggered by fake news. This person acted as a self appointed police force without any hard facts, and put people's lives at risk.

Of course, I have posted the BBC links to the real story, and have shown only the tip of an iceberg.  Fake news is being disseminated, and people believe it.  Although this was not done by OUR government this time, it has happened in the past, and will happen in the future.  Thankfully, services such as Google and Facebook recognize the need to use Artificial Intelligence to filter out this misinformation. But it's not enough.  People inclined to believe in conspiracy theories will do so no matter what facts are presented to them. They can't afford to challenge their beliefs. As the Archie Bunker character noted, "My dad was this way.  How could this man be wrong?" When one is taught that right is wrong and wrong is right, how can a person come to a rational interpretation of the facts?

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The other night, I started to have a conversation with a woman I consider a moderate. I had posed the idea that Liberals should give up opposition to 2nd Amendment rights.  Instead of opposition, Liberals should advocate that every law abiding person be required to own a gun AND to practice using it on a regular basis.  My idea was to make it possible for people living in Blue States to resist being intimidated by those living in Red States, if we came close to having a second Civil War. She was horrified, as she realizes that we need gun regulation based on population density, and not arbitrary geographic boundaries.  So this line of thought ("Should we increase the risk of violence in cities, so that we can protect ourselves in a war between rural and urban areas?") got shut down for a while, as it triggers great intellectual discomfort among liberals and moderates who live near big cities.  

This is a big problem.  How does one fight back against an armed opponent?  Should we be taking butter knives to gun fights?  This is an issue that Liberals must tackle, both as a metaphor, and as a literal statement.  Liberals have to become serious in defending their rights - even if that defense has to use tactics which Liberals find abhorrent.  

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Life is all about risk management.  People (by instinct) want to eliminate each and every risk in their lives.  When they can't cope with what life puts before them, they give up hope then make big mistakes.  Sadly, enough people gave up hope and chose someone who could be a tyrant.  They have put their faith in the wrong things, and now the piper will be paid. These will not be pleasant times for most of us, and I hope we finally learn to see through the fog and act a little more rationally 2 and 4 years down the road.

Throwing a "Monkey Wrench" into the system.

The American people have spoken, and they have thrown a big monkey wrench into the system.  Should this have been seen beforehand?  Yes!  But there are many tired voters, people tired of having their views ignored, people tired of changes that don't benefit them, people tired of an elite which doesn't care for America first.  And it is these voters who have chosen to take a dose of "Fuckitall" instead of letting someone like Hillary run this country.

As much as I think these people were making a big mistake, I think the common person has a real grudge against the elites. And I can't blame them much for voting for someone who spoke their language, used their metaphors, and echoed what they feel are the "real" truths in life - regardless of how little these so-called truths are based in reality.  This happened in Central Europe during the 1920's and 1930's, and it could happen here to the same disastrous affect - if we don't wake up, and listen to the alienated people who live in both rural and urban areas.

Sadly, I feel that Trump is not qualified for the job he has at hand.  But he is what we got now.  Supposedly, he was very surprised to find out how large a staff he and his minions must appoint in the next 2 months. At least, Trump has demoted Chris Christie even further, so that Trump is able to keep his distance from "Bridgegate" as much as possible.  (No, Trump had no hand in that debacle.  But why should he get his reputation prematurely tarnished by association with his former chief of transition?)

For the most part, I do not worry much about Trump yet.  It will be hard for him to dismantle Obamacare without a major backlash.  Even Obama himself was uncomfortable with the individual mandate, but was shown that insurance would cost much less for old people because the insurance pool would contain enough healthy young people to offset the cost of providing care to old people.  He will not be able to overturn Roe v. Wade without the cooperation of the "Blue States" - and this is unlikely to happen anytime soon.  He will find it hard to unwind many of the treaties we have enacted, and his military advisors will likely keep him from using the codes in the "Biscuit" with the "Football" an aide carries with him at all times.  But there are people who have legitimate fears, most of whom are poor, and are in populations marginalized in "Red States" - such as gays, lesbians, and transgender folk. With a Vice President like Pence, I have good cause to worry.

With things the way they are now, I'm tempted to utter the simple phrase:

"Houston, we have a problem."

All we have to go on are the lies of our president elect, and the lessons of history.  Yet, there's a part of me that believes that our founding fathers may have thought someone like this would be elected president, and held the belief that honorable men would strip this man from power if he went too far.  If he does go too far, I hope that my faith in the founding fathers forethought still holds true.

The collision of Church and State

Sadly, we're seeing in some of the "Red States" a push to break down the wall that separates Church and State. Although many of the people think this to be a good idea, saying that "if we go back to God's word, then all will be right with the world", history has shown this idea to be the furthest from the truth. 

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If one looked at Europe before the "Peace of Westphalia",  one would see a collection of European states fighting each other, with people being expelled from their homelands because they did not worship in the same church as the princes that rules their principalities. This was not a stable situation, and it was not good for the princes nor was it good for their subjects. 


According to Wikipedia, the main tenets of the Peace of Westphalia were:

• All parties would recognize the Peace of Augsburg of 1555, in which each prince would have the right to determine the religion of his own state, the options being Catholicism, Lutheranism, and now Calvinism (the principle of cuius regio, eius religio) 
• Christians living in principalities where their denomination was not the established church were guaranteed the right to practice their faith in public during allotted hours and in private at their will. 
• General recognition of the exclusive sovereignty of each party over its lands, people, and agents abroad, and responsibility for the warlike acts of any of its citizens or agents. Issuance of unrestricted letters of marque and reprisal to privateers was forbidden.

Over the long term, the associated treaties that defined this peace helped define the nation-state we know today. People could worship in their own churches - even though the crown may be associated with a different religious sect. Europe stumbled into a policy which would reduce the risk of sectarian violence between Christian sects.  


Undoubtedly, the well educated among our Founding Fathers were aware of these treaties, and wanted to make sure that the fledgling United States would not have religious wars between the states. The 1st amendment to the US Constitution reads:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

As a result, religious sects had to market themselves as this country grew Westward. Often, the first church in a community gained most of the parishioners - but this was not a hard and fast rule. Later immigration might result in new churches being built for people who belong to different sects, and we had relative peace. (I choose to skip over the persecution of the Mormons for now, as it is a notable exception to this trend.)


Even now, in most areas outside the "Bible Belt" most people don't care what church, temple, or mosque their neighbors belong to. Sadly, in the "Bible Belt", there is a large number of people who believe that they should roll back America to the "good old days" where traditional Christianity was the default religion - as if the 1950's were great for all of America. These people judge others based on their conformity to tradition, claiming that these cultural norms are defined by God - and punishing those people who don't follow these norms.  Challenges to any authority are squelched - even when the person in authority is corrupt and self serving.


We see people trying to use fear of God to control others, such as this post that God will destroy America if the Supreme Court rules in favor of Same Sex Marriage equality. Why do they fear this change?  I know of no traditional marriage which has been harmed by two people of the same sex getting married.  The answer, as I see it, is that people in cultures (or subcultures) where tradition is valued very highly do not have adequate skills to cope with and manage the unknown. So instead, these people try to use both secular law and pseudo-religious dogma as their tools to keep others in line with tradition. 


Some traditional cultures, such as the Amish, simply shun those who do not follow the group's edicts regarding following tradition and associated behaviors. But the Amish also allow for their children to make a "knowledgeable" decision, giving them time to learn about the outside world before committing to the Amish tradition. Contrast this with the Hasidim, who do their damnedest to make sure that their population is as ignorant as possible about the outside world as a whole. But it's not my intent to bad mouth people from traditional cultures, as it is to make note of a line between an informed decision and a decision made out of ignorance and fear.


Years ago, Southerners used religion as an excuse to preserve slavery. Now, the social dysfunction once limited to the South has infected other states - and is being used to deny rights to a new class of people.  Although I am a straight male, I feel that I must stand up for the Gays and Lesbians in our community. If I don't help them defend their rights, who will be there to protect mine when I need help?