As we close in on the 10th anniversary of our national, idiotic swerve into terror incognita, a land where fear was the currency used to buy off rationality, I'm reminded of the dots that weren't "connected" prior to the attacks. It allowed a handful of zealots to luck into a trifecta of suicidal glory, which allowed a different handful of zealots to luck into an opportunity to pursue their own suicidal vision of American extremism.
We are, I'm afraid, deep into a new period, when a different set of dots are not being connected, today intentionally, by the interests of the current profit-centered paradigm, which is in its own way, suicidal. And these dots could lead to a different, even worse kind of extremism, when the pattern cannot be ignored, and the public demands Something Must Be Done.
We ignore the pattern early, at our peril. We've seen the killer drought and fires of Texas and East Africa, the floods of Vermont and Pakistan, and bevvies of hurricanes erupting like popcorn.
We've seen a rowboat reach the magnetic North Pole, a week ago. We've seen stark before/after pictures of Greenland's melt. We see the bluefin tuna being fished to oblivion, while the bodies of top marine mammals are rife with flame retardants.
And yet they're each depicted as one-offs, waeird science, strange Nature... as if it's not part of an overall downward spiral whose endpoints we can, in fact, begin to imagine, but pretend otherwise. The snideniers are in accidental league with the corporate spinners, who are in accidental league with the Tea Party, and the trifecta is looking good again.
When John Huntsman actually looks promising, because "even as a Republican" he treats science as if it's, well y'know, reality-based -- and yet, because of that, he's at the back of the pack.... well, some days I just despair for our future.
Other days, when I've got my zen on, I just shake my head and laugh.