By Loren Adams, 10 July 2011
America is scarred by a prominent fault-line. It’s been
there since the nation’s birth. Geographically, it follows the Potomac and Ohio
Rivers, tracks roughly the 32nd parallel, then drops to the Rio
Grande east of New Mexico. Conversely, the great divide cannot be simplified as
purely geographic, for it cuts through households in all 50 states. On the
other hand, the Blue-Red state schism resembles the Blue-Gray split 150-years before.
The Old Confederacy has risen again in the 21st, and you can see it clearly
displayed on election night maps.
Yet it’s more complex. The divide is also apparent between
religious bodies. Fundamentalist denominations are on one side; mainline
denominations on the other. Traditional class warfare also plays a dynamic on
the fault-line; the “have’s” (and those that identify with the rich ‘cause they
want to be also) are principally on the red team while the “have-not’s” (and
those that empathize with the poor and middle class) are on the blue.
At this time in U.S. history, the divide is widening again
to dangerous levels, and there are several factors contributing: Political
polarization, income disparity, unemployment, homelessness, unfair global trade
agreements that re-sanction slave labor, the “dumbing-down” of society,
corporate takeover of media and elections, and burgeoning religious movements identifying
with the affluent in contradiction to original doctrine.
And at the heart of the great divide is the modern
Republican Party. Its political operatives made a conscious decision three
decades ago to win at any cost, including compromising traditional values that
moderated our political system to civility and accepted standards of discourse.
No longer is there a conscience to constrain; all tactics are on-the-table. As
part of the conscious decision to include the unconscionable, the GOP has
embraced deceit, fear, greed, and hate as part of its fabric. The composition
is damaging to the nation as a whole, not just the party, and they care not.
All that matters is objective; winning is the only thing that counts. The end
justifies the means.
Nixon coined the new political reality that widened the gap,
“Southern Strategy.” He and many other politicians recognized the passing of
Civil Rights legislation in the mid-60s would lead to the end of Democratic
domination over the Old South. Republicans quickly moved to fill the vacuum by
converting former Dixiecrats and Klansmen into the
GOP. The process is practically complete after 46 years.
“[The far right cannot] discount the fact that sitting in
their parlor is the Ku Klux Klan, the American Nazi Party, every racist group
in the United States and not a few of some Fascist orders that have scrambled
their way up from the sewers to a position of new respectability.” – Rod Serling, 1964 Los Angeles Times
This is America’s curse, her fault-line. Canada’s may be the
French and English gap, Britain has its Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales;
India is divided by the traditional caste system; and China is plagued by its
Tibet and Taiwan. In perspective, nearly every country has a fault-line that,
if inflated, could resuscitate civil strife.
But America’s curse now seems more inflamed due to calculated
Republican strategy, as mentioned.
America’s curse is the same for all fading empires –
destructive division. Rome fell from within, not from
without. History tells us more Romans died during the decaying period
from domestic disputes and religious rivalries than from outside barbarians.
The scene was neighbor against neighbor; kin vs. kin. In addition, the distant
provinces became more detached from Rome over centuries.
Internal decay is far more lethal than external. Invaders
are usually stopped at the gate. But only when an empire is defeated internally
may external forces penetrate to finish the job. Of course, Rome’s fall was
over a period of centuries, plus the Western Empire fell nearly a thousand
years before the Eastern. If only America could be so lucky.
I see the Republican Party [with all its tentacles and
artificially spawned groups] as America’s curse – its decadence. Republicans
are always demonizing Democrats, I realize. But I actually believe Republicans
are the element of the nation’s decay. Nothing good for the country can be
passed because Republicans stand in the way. Their immaturity blocks everything
America needs to recover, and if they don’t get their way in concentrating
wealth into their rich friends’ hands, they throw childish tantrums –
literally.
The Republican curse is like a method of Roman torture
whereby a rotting corpse is strapped to a healthy person’s body until the decomposing
excrement and bacteria infects the living tissue and the healthy individual
succumbs to a slow, torturous death. The dead body is the GOP and the living
human – carrying around the weight of the decaying body while at the same
time attempting to survive and provide necessities to sustain that existence
– is the nation.
Admittedly, this is a grotesque metaphor of the current
condition. But the end justifies the description. Aren’t we dying as a nation
because the Republican Party – with its obsession with guns, violence,
wars, myths, fear and hate – is tied to our backs? Somehow we can’t rid
ourselves of their influence; neither can we escape to another planet. We’re
married to the mob and tortured forever.
The Nazis Party, with its nasty little prejudices and cultic
myths, was Germany’s dead corpse strapped to its back. Republicans are ours.