I'm not usually a tin-foil hat paranoid wingnut. But here goes my first post at Daily Kos acting like one. Not off to a good start. But I saw all the Operation Hilarity posts. I even thought it was funny at first and signed up for it, because I live in a swing state.
Then I started doing that weird thing that people do when they have nothing else to do: thinking. Thinking about a post I wrote just a day ago about Santorum and comparing his ideal world to the world we read about in Margaret Atwood's brilliant 1985 work, "The Handmaid's Tale".
"The War on Women"
In 1985, it was speculative fiction. Then we had the election of 2000 and realized votes don't always count. Then there was Ohio in 2004. Then there were all those 'weapons of mass destruction', two wars after 9/11 and an economy collapsed. Obama was elected, and walked us back from a precipice.
Now, we have some economic growth. But dire warnings about $5/gallon gas by the summer; conflict in Syria; car bombings and assassinations; Israel and Iran and Hezzbolah; new/old rumors of gas masks being handed out in Israel.
So what makes us think Atwood's Dystopian World can't happen? Think about what demographic has all the guns in this country. These bible thumpers think Obama is the anti-christ. They really do. You think they wouldn't vote for Santorum?
Think of all the things that have happened that we never thought could or would happen. So voting for Santorum? Not a good idea, when seen through the lens of a newly-paranoid mind.
Even now, there is a all-male panel gathered to discuss the fate of women's ovaries. Think about it.
As I wrote in the above-linked blog post:
If there is no fear, then there should be. If there is no outcry, we must make one. And not as a fundraising tool, but as a real and true declaration that we will not stand for it. We will not go back. We will not allow this to happen. We will not be talked about and discussed and our rights dissected by anyone in the name of their “god”. Don’t ever think this can’t happen. Remember the surreal horror of the year 2000, and believe it can.