Fortunately, the United States, even at its most extreme, has been a moderate nation with a radical philosophy. Our middle class is our bedrock: erode that, and we're in trouble.

When one looks at the history of revolution, the United States went through all the classic stages, but our Red period was more Pink (the exile of the Tories, though some were killed by mobs, was nothing like the Terrors of other revolutions) and our White reaction was more Grey (the call for King George Washington, the Hamiltonian impulse to centralize, the failed Federalist attempt to declare political opponents enemies of the state).

The closest we came to true civic collapse was the Civil War, which, tellingly, was ideology-driven at bottom and involved the Transcendentalists, the nineteenth-century version of the idealist Flower Children.

Our other serious conflicts -- populists vs. capitalists, nativists vs. immigrants, and so forth -- where large groups were at odds are substantially based on economic advantage and advancement. Our more vivid reform explosions -- temperance and Prohibition, the Progressive era reforms, the Civil Rights movement, and so forth -- were based on principle, but cut across economic and regional lines, and so were less destabilizing and more an opportunity for the country to redefine itself.

Our current situation is another ideology-driven conflict, but it also has serious economic advantage and advancement issues hiding under its skirts. I find this troubling.

The Right-wing ideologues are pushing an agenda that they are trying to define as "true Americanism", which in itself is frighteningly wrong-headed. The radical philosophy that forms the basis for the American Experiment is that everyone is free to think and speak as he pleases, and that that is the basis for America. The "true American" stance supports the Experiment only if the thoughts and speech fall within a certain set of criteria, which the "true American" will define. Hence the accusations of treason when faced with opposition.

At the same time, those who already have economic advantages are receiving more of the same, while the civic debt payable by all of us mounts.

We have faced crises of similar scope before, and not fallen to dictatorship. This is due to the moderating influence of American society, which worships its principles and fudges on its practice.

I am actually tempted, in my more sanguine moments, to withdraw entirely to the natural state of liberal citizens, which would be employed in the helping professions and basically nagging people into works of charity (cf. Dickens), and affecting my local community from the political bottom up. If the Right is allowed to have its way, and the Left reverts to what it has been before it basically had control of the Federal government from FDR until the middle of the Reagan Administration (yes, even under Nixon), the Right will collapse under the weight of its own self-importance. As the Left is in the process of doing.

The great danger is two-fold: We have an ideological battle with a foreign power, though not a foreign state as such, that is being used by Right-wing ideologues to demonize those not like them. This weakens our political community because it's increasingly difficult to have a civil conversation. We are also in the middle of another economic struggle, wherein those with economic power are trying to make sure they keep it, and those without economic power are beginning to wake up to this. That kind of stuggle undermines the stabilizing bedrock of our economic community, which is what has kept us a moderate nation even as our radical Experiment continues.

Add one more: The community that we have always depended on to keep us sane is changing. Do we know our neighbors? It used to be that we were sometimes too close, but people were protected by the fact that it's difficult to attack someone you've known for years, especially if you're likely to have to explain it to his mother, whom you've also known for years. Now, in our only very recently mobile society, those kinds of human connections are more difficult to maintain. We need them. They keep us from shooting each other. They make us recognize the good in people whose political opinions or economic status are different from our own.

I live in a very conservative area. The people in this community know that I'm not a political conservative, and this sometimes rankles. But they also know me personally, and I do believe they would defend and support me against attack by extremists because of that. In fact, they have already. What concerns me the most is that, unlike me, most people are known only in their little tribes and are not public figures. What will protect them?

We shop online, we talk only to those with our phone numbers, we see only the people we work with. We need to rebuild our communities.

Regards--
Mary Anne