Driving south from Spokane on 395, across the part of the country shaped by a whole lot of oozing lava scoured by repeated floods into a tough land of hill and coulee, the dominant features for my next two hundred miles will be irrigation, power lines and four lanes of divided pavement--tangible testimony to a tamed land. Woody Guthrie immortalized this home of The Columbia, Grand Coulee and Bonneville Power.
I still have a hundred miles, a hard right at the Tri-Cities, and hundred more. Tonight, blasting down the lonely black hiway at 75, I feel the Conservatism leaching out of the fields and silos and rusting machinery, catching up to the car and seeping into my skin. And I try to understand. Then I start to worry. Can I catch Conservatism by osmosis? Is it contagious? Is it airborne?
Right then for some unkonwn reason I feel compelled to switch the radio dial to AM. Static, static, Spanish, static, Canadian football, static, talk radio. The pattern repeats a few times. I don't really expect to hear Thom Hartmann or Rachel Maddow, but I am an optimist so I keep hitting the search button. What else am I going to do? I get Mike Savage for about 10 minutes (Conservatism is strong in the Palouse is my only excuse.) and then a guy/gal team cracking themselves up over how the world will end if Barack HUSSEIN Obama is reelected. They were pretty cheesy and I don't know if they were a local station or out of somewhere in Utah. I did pick up some really interesting ranting from Idaho, I think. Static, static, farm report, weather, static, talk radio really clear. A strong signal. It's a commercial for gold: the only insurance against a Socialist-Communist-Obamaist future. Buy now, or don't come whining and crying to us when the economy collapses. And of course, if you're going to buy a bunch of gold you'd better buy a bunch of guns to protect it. And some camoflage clothing and some tear gas and night goggles and a whole lot of ammo--just in case. Matching jump boots and assault rifle is a must. Don't forget to home-school your kids. And a panic room is no longer just a luxury! I flash back to my army days and remember them more fondly than they ever were. Donald Trump appears in the glare of my own windshield smiling at me like some acid-induced stigmata. I find myself wondering if the guy in the White House might just be from Kenya after all. Somehow I just know I can trust The Don. Theories swirl and my eyes glaze. If the president is a Kenyan undercover, deep cover mole, I need to know. I need to tell my friends. Who can I trust? There are Muslims everywhere. I roll up the windows and turn off the outside air but the pervasive and penetraing Palouse Conservatism convinces me that Obama looks and sounds like Liev Schreiber or maybe even Raymond Shaw. The right code words might trigger a post hypnotic suggestion to do something really crazy like push hard for real health care reform or even to stop the exploratory drilling in the arctic. Aaargh! I'm not feeling well. I'm sweating. I realize I've covered 30 or 40 miles in a daze. Don't know exactly where I am. Did I miss my exit? I have cramps in my fingers from gripping the wheel. I shake my head and roll down the window to shiver at the night chill of late October. As I regain my senses a little I hear some last words about Fair and Balanced and manage with a trembling touch to switch the radio to FM. Ahhhhhh...No static. Clear and strong. Elvis Costello. I must be getting close to home.