The United States of America has been a gonzo, berserk nation from its inception, an unlikely an amalgam as ever pullulated up from planet earth, with silk stockinged bewigged delegates from the slave states of South Carolina and Virginia (Edward Rutledge, Thomas Jefferson) joining dowdy, disgruntled New Englanders (John Adams) along with Benjamin Franklin, to establish a half slave nation which claimed to be a beacon of liberty, and which did, indeed inspire others (the French most immediately) to realize that even if there is a God in Heaven, He likely did not actually anoint a mere mortal to be a king.
 |
| This America, Man! |
Looking at developments in their own countries and in the world Sinclair Lewis and George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair) wrote parables which proved to be both prescient and illuminating. Lewis's novel and then stage play depicted the rise of a Hitler/Huey Long like figure who played on American prejudices and gullibility to seize power.
Orwell once said he'd like his tombstone to read, "Damn you all to Hell! I told you this would happen!"
Mad Dog has thought fascism would not take hold outside the South, where it has been in place since the 18th century, simply because the rest of the country was too self absorbed, complacent and ignorant to actually bother embracing the mind control necessary to a fascist state.
But now, we see masked goon squads, trundling people off into unmarked vans in broad daylight. So, Mad Dog asks, how are we any different from Russia, Venezuela, Brazil or El Salvador?
 |
| No Baklava. Home Address is Public |
When asked why sheriffs from Rockingham County who now assist ICE agents in abducting people from their work sites or automobiles, the New Hampshire's finest replied that police are now subject to "doxing" and they and their families are at risk from "the cartels," and so the police are afraid and must be allowed to beat, subdue and even kill their prey for fear...fear of what?
 |
| We Hang Together or We Hang Separately |
Mad Dog asked what doxing is and was told it meant publishing on social media the telephone numbers, home addresses and other identifiers publicly.
Which reminded Mad Dog of the conversation he once had with the CEO of Portsmouth Hospital, in Portsmouth New Hampshire. Mad Dog said he was glad to finally meet her because he could not find her name on any of the printed media, on the hospital website or even at the reception desk in the hospital and when he asked where her office was, the man behind the counter asked, "What do you need to know for?"
 |
| If You Can Find Me |
She explained she did not want anyone to know who she was--outside of the hospital staff--because she feared getting hate mail and who knows what else? This was fifteen years ago, well before doxxing or shootings of CEO's of health insurance companies.
I stared at her thinking: If you are THAT afraid, maybe you should not BE the CEO. After all, isn't that why we pay CEO's the big bucks, because they are willing to take the responsibility? (Of course, all this was long before that United Health Care CEO got shot.) But really, if you are going to be a CEO, or a cop, shouldn't that entail a certain risk? What's next, soldiers and sailors and marines wearing masks?
Eventually, the CEO was fired for not meeting budgets and the CEO functions transferred to the Hospital Corporation of America in Nashville, Tennessee, where presumably the managers in power would be safe.
 |
| No Hiding From His Enemies |
Taken to it's logical extreme, this might mean our next candidates for Congress, for the Presidency may simply identify themselves by numbers or some sort of social media tag, "MAGAMAN" or "Super Sleuth" or "Ultra Kool Dude." And police walking a beat? Forget about it. Police will cruise around in airconditioned Hum Vees totally garbed up in body armor and equipped with robots to pluck likely looking suspects off the streets.
Remember when police in New York did "stop and frisk" for any suspicious looking (i.e. dark skinned) young males walking down the street, claiming that technique had made crime drop? Then, when the actual data was examined it turned out crime had dropped years before stop and frisk and after stop and frisk was outlawed, crime dropped further.
 |
| Buy Your Badge on Line |
So, yes, it CAN happen here.
Already has.
 |
| Where's His Baklava? |
We are just too complacent and preoccupied with getting the kids to day care and camp and with watching the Red Sox and the girls displaying on the Sea Wall to notice.
