at a lower, more anecdotal level, of course. You talk to people and listen to what they say and you get a sense of what's in the air, the Zeitgeist, if you like. It doesn't mean its necessarily going to happen, or that anyone is actually planning it, but the idea is loose and being batted around. It is being savored, and repeated with variations and embellishments--even a sense of inevitability and anticipation. You get the impression that only a spark is needed to ignite the mixture. They are fantasizing about civil war, or perhaps, their own little American Holocaust. And they are looking forward to it.

I can almost hear them now; "We didn't want to do it, but they made us do it. We had to do it. It's all their fault. They didn't give us any choice." Its the same rationale domestic abusers use after they beat their wives, or that serial killers give after mutilating their victims.