The Author Ends his piece with
American history is the same story told over and over again. The people Mann calls the homelanders are just the latest version of the xenophobic, fire-and-brimstone know-nothings who've been around since the dawn of the American republic. They believe -- no, they know -- that they represent the country's truest and purest spirit. The rest of us, well, some of us are full of big words. But we're starting to think they might be right.WOW!!!
So the Xenophobic, fire-and-brimstone know-nothings represent some truest and purest spirit - why yes, but is it an AMERICAN SPIRIT!!! I mean one can wander around the planet and find any collection of WackJob XenoPhobes - whether we are talking the traditional Manchu, or the players whom they ousted from the Middle Kingdom with the Change of the Mandate Of Heaven!!! We have likewise seen various XenoPhobic wackJobs in rest of Asia, the Middle East, Africa, Central and Eastern Europe.... All of whom have been in bed with which ever Chemist Offered up their alternative to 'fire and brimstone' and as equally as promiscuous with the Epistemologists who advocated that the Gnostic Gospel they were delivering could only be unravelled by the True Diviners Of Divine Divination, as was decided by the Divine Decider.
( Hum, as a nation we have seen that piece of rhetoric before, in american cultural experience.... I just can not remember right off hand who was the greatest of All American Great Deciders, EVER!!!! )
But then again, we are talking about this psuedo ruralist kultur that actually believes in the "shit kicker boots" mythology of Dubya.... That they have not been played by the simplistic gambitry of the Constitutional Gambit of the Electoral College Game.... Ah yes, that some how one can just skip over the 'thing in itself' and hold to the floating mythological moments.
Allow me to illustrate this horror another way around. I had been playing around with a Rant on the typical RadFemiNazi's like Phyllis Schaeffley, HanoiAnnie Coulter, et al, and the trajectory of "anti-feminism" in the current effort to both Install 'the church state' as well as do this in the theological context of "women must be silent in the church". I of course was going to cointerpoise Schaeffley's whine, from her Anti-ERA era, when the big Booga-Booga was "women in combat units" and the scary thot that they would get drafted if the Evil ERA were ratified as a part of the US Constitution, detailing out in plain language that which should have always been obvious about CITIZENS OF THE REPUBLIC!!!
Back in the day those were serious Booga-Booga.
But these are the modern era!!! When the DOD sold us "saving private jessica" - and it was clearly going to be the full on "made for TV" movie package. Never Mind that the DOD's PR started to fall apart unpleasantly quickly - and that yes, it really was based on the idea of a concept that could have been a part of actual historical details, sufficiently close enough to being a full Fledged DocuDrama - but then we would have needed to deal with some of those SERIOUSLY UGLY QUESTIONS - like why were girls in the combat zone to begin with???
And of course yesterday GOD ANSWERED that question. Some Wack Job on the GAC - Great American Country - music TV channel was singing his soon to be great american cuntry music hit - where, as we drag our ya-ya's to the end, past all of the so called 'christian images' and the foreclosurer on the family farms, and the Evil Liberarl Big City Politicians who do not care - we get to the TRULY HEART WRENCHING MOMENT - a man standing there holding the 'woman of his world' - while she is BOTH in UNIFORM and Holding onto her "duffle bag" - gosh, as if SHE is getting deployed, and he is going to be, well gosh, hiding here in america pretending to be one of the Great And Heroic Fighting 101st Keyboardists, becuase he really wanted to be a Great War Hero like Karl Rove, but....
Ultimately that seems to be the big city scary bit in all of this.
All of these Urban Cowboys explaining how the 'rural way of life' is suppose to be - and then working the deal to make it sound as if there is some sort of "more conservative" standard....
What americans need to work out is how exactly ARE we going to bring the actual american history back into the actual flow of american politics. Dealing with the reality as it IS, not as it would have been nicer.... That way of course does require that we get americans aware of how to read and write, and while we are at it, maybe even teach them Numbers, and perchance an awareness of say Logic, and most important, how logical fallacies are used in creating falsehoods.
Then we might want to decide if americans can aford to maintain their illusions about American History, or is it time to put down that rye mash and start dealing with the real world.
I rather doubt that I will be picking up a Copy of Welcome to the Homeland - but I can see my way clear to advocating that folks read the salon article, and start working out where DO they want to stand in the ongoing "KulturKampf" - even MORE SO, now that we have a congress that is openly offering to support the Regal Imperial Presidency!!! ESPECIALLY after the President, after much whining by his so calleed supporters, up and stabbed them in the back about the Secret Detention Facilities - and gosh, that well, yes, we are going to use information obtained by Torture, and all the rest of the Betrayal of American Cultural And MORAL Standards!!!
Americans can decide IF this is the sort of Moral Cesspool that they wish to be swiming in???
They can work out, perchance, if they are PROUD of their heritage of Armed Uprisings by Terrorists. Or do they want their Civilized America??? Do they want to get beyond merely "gaming the constitution"? Or perchance a return to an actual support for the Rule Of Law in america!!!