Wow. As more and more people warn (or call for) open conflict in the Fifty States over political differences, this news comes out.
The meme is being pushed by many groups and people. And it seems to be finding new converts.
The worst poll yet, even for those advocating (not just reporting) the potential for a new internecine conflict here in the States. According to the Washington Times, 53 percent of GOP registered voters believe we ARE headed for a “new civil war” as do 39% of Democrat voters: an average of 44%.
But even more shocking to many people is that 44% of young male Democrats and 34% of young female GOP voters believe that it is right to assassinate politicians if you believe they are harming the county.
Why?
First, please remember who DID this 1,500-voter poll. The infamous Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), they who condemn anyone to the right of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as extremists and threats to the country and the world. So take the results with a salt block, please. We have no idea how the questions and choices were skewed, even if the pollster itself did things right.
But there are two reasons that often come up.
First, the divide between “right” and “left” (“conservative” and “liberal”) is supposedly growing wider on wider, on issue after issue. Examples abound: The push for transgenderism: according to one commentary I heard, as many as 25% of young elementary students (at least in public, GRTF, schools) now claim to be transgender. The manmade climate change and the actions taken to “combat” that. The freshly-rejuvenated war on guns and our right of self-defense. The slowly-growing pushback against home schooling and private schooling. The revival of calls for mandatory masking, vaccination, and even lockdowns. The push for new taxation. (It seems that the two wings of the mainstream political movements can only agree on two things: Ukraine over all/death to Russia, and ever more spending.)
Second, people are more and more prone to dehumanizing their political opponents. Just as mass murderers do not think of their victims and would-be victims as human. Just as abortionists and their helpers and supporters do not think of unborn children as human – and indeed of less worth than living non-sentient pets, livestock, and wildlife. Deal with your enemies not by persuading them of the rightness of your cause or even voting down their proposals (or taking them to court). Just threaten to beat and kill them, and then actually DO beat them up and kill them! Get them out of the way!
Together, the two items show “growing radicalization” in the American political diamond (spectrum to you all who don’t like some version of the World’s Smallest Political Quiz).
So what do we as lovers of liberty do? Prepare for the worst, work for the best. Help people to see that the REAL answer is not to seize control of the government and all its power, but to limit the power. Restrict government more and more, getting it out of people’s lives and out of promoting the positions of BOTH sides. And try to ignore government as much as possible in the meantime.
Sorry, tough tasks, eh? But we must do this or liberty perishes.
The Price of Liberty 
When Reagan canceled the Civil Service Comm and put in place the Office of Personnel Management, it went back to who kissed whos ass big to get the nice government jobs
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You will find a lot of disagreement about that – especially from people in the federal civil service before and during that era, and today. ANY system of government employment has corruption and the more positions, the more problems. Which is a strong argument about limiting (and eliminating) government power and wealth and “duties.”
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I have long considered civil (sic) war to be a bad thing. When I wrote Tipping Point (http://frankclarke.dx.am/TipPtPage.html), it was to have been “a cautionary tale”, but things have gotten very much worse than they were in 2011. I now â reluctantly â acknowledge that Mike Vanderboegh was probably right: we cannot continue in this mode, and the only plausible solution is separation. Let’s hope we can do it the way the Czech and Slovak did in 1993.
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Unfortunately, all my browsers refuse to connect to your link, telling me that there is a firewall or antivirus blocking it. Do you have an alternate URL?
We here at TPOL agree things have gotten much worse – or at least are perceived as much worse – in the past decade. We certainly cannot continue like this, but I do not see the Czech/Slovak solution as one that will be possible. Not sure that a massive pruning of the FedGov will either, but a Swiss model seems more palatable than the Soviet or Yugoslav model, which I fear we would see.
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Unfortunately, no. I suspect your security settings are set very high. Can you get to the base site, frankclarke.dx.am?
The page I cited:has a synopsis, a short excerpt, and a link to Author House, my publisher. I can send the raw text if you wish.
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That may be the case but firewall is seeming misbehaving. Would you mind sending to TPOLNathan-at-gmail.com?
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If it does happen, how many will be a part of it and how many will just stand by and watch??? Those are the true numbers. Plus the SPLC will sit back and watch the fun and ask for money
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We can assume that 9 out of 10 will TRY to just watch, unless they are in the paths of the panzers or the missiles. Of course the SPLC will do that – they’ve always been in it for the grants and the hero-worship. And their perverted joy in trying to drag down people.
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“they who condemn anyone to the right of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as extremists”
Fortunately it’s pretty hard to get to the right of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Franco and Tojo might have managed, I guess.
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Well, in the sense that most people use those labels. Popularly, anyone who believes in and promotes liberty is to their right, even though we can (and should) argue that if anything, lovers of liberty are left of that infamous duo and their kind.
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The administrative state created by Chester Arthur is the problem.
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You know, I feel bad that I had not recognized that. It was a big, big step towards an imperial government, wasn’t it? Even though it is touted as an improvement by replacing the spoils system with a “rational” civil service. But he poured the foundation on which Teddy Roosevelt and Woody Wilson began building the nightmare we have today.
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