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Barack Obama's presidency was supposed to mark a great leap forward for the United States. But, as Omar El Akkad discovered as he travelled across America this year, the election of Donald J. Trump has turned the country against itself. Scenes from a divided nationThe college town of Oxford, Miss., is home to one of the finest bookstores in America, Square Books.
This May, its owners invited me to speak about my debut novel, about a fictional second American civil war. I wrote the book two years ago and never intended it to be about the United States in a literal way, but its publication in 2017 nonetheless coincided with the death of both irony and analogy in American public life.
Over the course of a six-month book tour that will cover almost every region of this country, I find myself fielding questions not about any allegorical merit my book may have, but whether in writing a novel in which Americans take up arms against one another I was taking a stab at predicting the future. I come to peddle the fictional to a country whose reality has leapfrogged fiction.
...
That angry, torch-wielding men feel comfortable conducting new-age Klan rallies in America in 2017 is chiefly the product of a right-wing conservatism that coddled and abetted white supremacism. But in the rebirth of open, uncoded racism in this country's public discourse, there is also evidence that mainstream American liberalism has never been particularly liberal rather, just a comfortable insularity lacquered with niceness.
One of the most infuriating things about living in America this year was watching countless well-meaning liberals point at the logical conclusion of centuries of systemic discrimination and say: "This is not us." In reality, the rise of the country's 45th President is exemplary of the most honest version of the American dream: a man who, by virtue of the colour of his skin and the magnitude of his wealth and absolutely no other qualification transformed his utter contempt for all rules of nominally decent behaviour into a limitless personal empire. The story of Donald Trump is a uniquely American story.
https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/omar-el-akkad-donald-trump-american-civil-war/article37267643/

Response to FarCenter (Original post)
Post removed
carterbob251
(33 posts)The dumbasses are a significant minority of the population. And less of them every day.
dawg
(10,777 posts)to make sure they point out how liberals are to blame, too.
Fuck no!
We aren't perfect, but we're the only hope for this nation. Not just a "comfortable insularity" - whatever the fuck that's supposed to mean.
sandensea
(22,850 posts)As they are mine.
vimeo.com/6579181
Mr.Bill
(24,906 posts)that this "limitless personal empire" has a positive net worth of one cent.
A criminal empire with a trail of lawsuits and bankruptcies may be a unique story, but to call it "American" is an insult to my country.
DemocracyMouse
(2,275 posts)....but winning the war.
Trump is indeed fanning the flames of hate, positioning the US as the only country against the Kyoto Protocol, eviscerating the EPA, shoving taxes to the wealthiest, undermining the ACA etc.
.....BUT it's a temporary set back. Flynn has flipped, Manafort's got an ankle monitor, Deutsche Bank has divulged all the money laundering accounts, and a thousand years of phone, email and video recordings are in Muellar's pocket (and duplicated for NY State which is also preparing to prosecute in case Trump tries anything stupid). Muellar holds all the cards and Trump's ratings and the Republicans along with it are in the basement. Democrats are positioned to retake the country (assuming serious effort) supported by a much longer pendulum swing which has been building since Reagan, the Recession and Occupy Wall Street. The anti-fascists have easily outnumbered the fascists in most of the protests since Trump stole the presidency. The White Supremacists cry when arrested! They are a flash in the pan and don't have the long, noble history if the civil rights movement to back them up.
And as for all those scary guns which spell "civil war" most are in the hands of a very tiny group of nutjobs and collectors who are more afraid of each other than than anything else. The National Guard easily outnumbers those with assault rifles. I think it was 10 to 1 at least.
Have courage, Democrats. Stand for our Democratic traditions. Speak calmly to your Republican neighbors and remind them that "as the citizens clash, the 1% takes the cash." (Just gently explain to them how divide and rule works)
I can't wait to go door to door, and to vote, in 2018. It's going to blow the cynics sky high. I've been looking at the big swings of history and this one is going to be a rout!
But don't get too comfortable! I'm putting a large, handmade banner on the back of my car which says:
AS CITIZENS CLASH
THE 1% TAKES THE CASH
Democracy Mouse