re: #177 palomino

Have you got a specific date in mind when it’s acceptable to criticize Cre: #161 SanFranciscoZionist

I’m talking about a larger cultural trend. Most Americans would probably see WWII as the last time the nation was truly united for any length of time. Back then the population of the US was one-third what it is today. The white and Christian populations were much larger proportionally. And most minorities, along with gays and women, had little voice in the public debate. The facade of unity could be maintained.

But now the toothpaste is out of the tube, and minorities will no longer shut up and cower in fear. Thus, the conservative white backlash that began in the 50s and has been exemplified most clearly by the gop’s disgusting southern strategy. You say you’re hopeful that things can improve.

Based on the last 50 years, why do you believe that? The US is currently more fractured along religious, social, ethnic, racial lines than at most points in its history. And the imminent demographic changes don’t bode well in terms of the right wanting to hold hands with everyone and rejoice in ALL of us being real Americans.

Ignore the ‘things can improve’ part. Maybe things can’t improve. Maybe the country is hopelessly divided, the slimy politics of the Southern Strategy will end us all, and the American experiment is over. We may end up breaking into six squabbling balkanized chunks and building walls between them. It could happen.

I still plan to criticize religious bigotry, disingenous othering, and general dumbass behavior as I see it.

Schweitzer is playing the same damn game Huckabee played when he commented ‘offhand’ that he thought Mormons believed that Jesus and Satan were brothers. Why should I give him a pass on that? Because it might scare some voters off Romney?

I’m sure Harry Reid has ancestors who were polygamists. Would it have been fair game for Sharron Angle to target him for that? (Not ‘would she have, if she thought it would help’. She would have. But we would have called her out for it.)