My great and dear light at the end of the tunnel, Deborah over at Monster in Your Closet, reminded me today there are many ways to look at a problem, many angles to hold a prism to the light. When she wrote about panic attacks in the air here I burst out laughing, I remember well feeling exactly the same panic at wheels up. What I was really thinking about while reading her piece though is why I have not touched my fingers to my keyboard, why I haven’t wanted to write for weeks. I considered why what I have been thinking hasn’t been making its way from my brain to my blog. My normal righteous indignation has hidden under a tree, whimpered and cringed from the light of day like a beaten dog.

Here is the thing; this nation is descending into a morass of ignorance and no ignorance is not bliss, not by any stretch of any imagination or any measurement, we are growing stupider and we seem to like it that way. I am finally at a loss for words; I finally after all these long years am without the language necessary to say what is needed. I must admit to not understanding the people of this nation any longer. There was a time I understood, I even believed there was a necessity for both sides of the aisle to exist, it kept us all honest. Elyse over at FiftyFourandaHalf just today reminded me of that not so distant past in her piece on the suicide of Thomas Schweich, a contender for the office of governor in the not so great state of Missouri. I was reminded, once upon a time more than half my family were staunch members of the GOP, yet they were not Racist, or against public education, or against public assistance, or against Social Security, or against immigration; nor were they ignorant of the Constitution and what it really said about Guns or Religion.

I am without words, truly. I remember arguing with my father over the dinner table about real issues of the day he was a staunch Republican by the way nearly his entire life, he bled the party line of fiscal conservativism, he could not understand how he could produce such a hippie, such a ‘blasted Liberal, dammit’. The one thing about my father was he saw clearly and he hated across the board; he hated LBJ, Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton and Bush Jr with equal intensity and all for different reasons. He voted for Barack Obama and was very proud of that vote.

Today, those members of my family who retain their GOP card do so without any real understanding of what the party truly stands for. When called to the table to defend the latest horror story, the latest idiocy, the latest dumbass thing to come out of the mouths of those who would rule, they cannot do so only relying upon the sound bites, they picked along the way to defend their position in Right Wing LaLa land. When presented with facts they sniff and rock back, scramble for purchase on the quicksand of their position.

We get what we deserve, whether it is the government we deserve or otherwise. This time we truly did get what we deserve, those of us who wanted more and better we stayed home in droves. What did we think; others would pick up the slack of our apathy? We listened to those who said we wouldn’t go to the polls and thought to ourselves, well it is a lost cause so why bother; we stayed home. That is exactly what they were hoping for and they won.

Ignorant really; GOP majority in the House and the Senate, the ability to make the next two years sheer hell for this nation and this President and we sat on our asses and handed it to them through our apathy. The absolute genius of it is astounding and we fell for it, not for the first time even we know the game and we fall for it every single time. This time though, we are going to pay and pay big, it is our fault and we should be ashamed of ourselves. We handed the keys to the nation to a bunch of low intellect know-nothing, bought and paid for members of the extremist coalition who are intent on destroying the nation and handing the remains to those who would rule without the will of the people.

Congratulations citizens of America, you have finally succeeded in showing your true nature and intent. What you really want is to be second class citizens of the world, ruled by those who don’t give a damn if you live or die, if your children are ignorant so long as you have them for their wars, if you live in poverty so long as you labor for their benefit you will be given enough to drag your azz to their crumbling factories for another day and when you are too old to do that, better hope someone loves you enough to take you in, cause there won’t be a safety net left to catch you ass.

All I can think is, rise up before it is too late. Do not allow this once great dream of a free nation to crumble at the feet of your apathy. Look around; do not allow what little progress we made toward unity be destroyed by the hate and fear of a shrinking minority. Rise up and look around, stand up and take back the power we own as citizens. Stand up and demand accountability of those in public office, whether they are elected officials, bureaucrats or the Police.

Honestly, look around and ask yourself is this the country you want? If the answer is no, what are you willing to do to change it?