On yesterday's date in 1775, poorly-armed militiamen assembled on local village greens to contest the British assault on the thirteen colonies which soon would declare themselves to be the United States of America. An unknown militia member fired the "shot heard 'round the world" and with the ensuing battles of Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, thus began the bloody eight-year struggle for American independence.
218 years later, on April 19, 1993, federal agents smashed their way into the so-called Branch Davidian complex near Waco, Texas. Fires destroyed the compound, ending a 51-day siege. Dozens of people, including children and crazed sect leader David Koresh, were killed. Coupled with an assault in northern Idaho on Ruby Ridge in 1992, this act of government impudence against Koresh's fanaticism inspired new groups of right-wing militiamen to organize and plan anti-government "revolutions" of their own.
Two years later Timothy McVeigh decided to use violence against his fellow citizens and his own government -- one he was convinced had become dangerously toxic -- and on yesterday's date in 1995, his truck bomb destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people. Nineteen children in the building's basement day care center were blown to pieces to satisfy McVeigh's deranged political beliefs
Fifteen years later we are again living in an extremely tense political environment. Teabaggers, Birthers, Deathers, White Supremacist groups and others successfully brainwashed by the right-wing media and its denizens at Fox "News" and numerous neo-Fascist web sites are encouraging anti-government, anti-American, anti-Obama activity. Some are calling for armed revolution and their rhetoric is as hysterical as it is preposterous and drenched in ignorance. Rallying with misspelled signs and dangling Tetley Tea bags from their bonnets, they wildly claim that the government must be overthrown because our President is a socialist/communist/Marxist/Hitlerite non-citizen from Kenya who wants to redistribute the wealth by taking your paycheck and giving it to his personal (Black) friends; force you to get health insurance you don't want; order you to work side by side with homosexuals whom you may be forced to marry; enroll your children in "government" schools that are secret indoctrination centers to promote his commie/Nazi agenda; take your guns and ban sport fishing; levy a tax on wheelchairs, march granny to a suicide center, and force women into Burkas as he imposes Islamic Sharia law in American courts. Such a busy, busy man, this president.
Ironic, isn't it? When a real, unelected crime family ten years ago illegally assumed presidential power, occupied the Oval Office and systemically eroded our privacy rights and our civil liberties, began destroying what "President" George W. Bush called "that goddam piece of paper" -- the U.S. Constitution -- failed to stop a terrorist attack on NYC and Washington, D.C., shrugged off the valid concerns of the rest of the world about his impending and illegal invasion of Iraq, created false "evidence" against that nation to justify his oil grab, and lead us into two bloody and expensive wars the silence from self-styled "patriots" was deafening. Bush's never-ending oil wars have drained our economy, alienated our former allies, and continues to kill and maim our troops as well as hundreds of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. His bailout of the worst of the predatory corporate banks, his turning our budget surpluses into massive deficits, his creation of new levels of Big Government (like the Dept. of Homeland Security) were actions taken in an apparent political vacuum. For eight years not a peep, not a sound, not a whimper from the Teabagger- types regarding any of Bush's criminal or irresponsible acts.
The real, tangible, verified criminal activity perpetrated daily against America during the Bush years was okay with them (Bush may have been a world class criminal, but he was White! Obama, for god's sake, is Black!). It's the absurd trumped-up nonsense they now have spoon fed to them about President Obama that they find outrageous and cause for Revolution! Yee-Haw! Their wet nurse - the one feeding them this nonsense -- is the hydra-headed beast known as Rush/Beck/Hannity/Malkin/Coulter/Palin, etc., etc, etc.
No wonder the Dynamic Ditzes Bachmann/Palin are hitting the Bagger circuit, blazing across middle America (where the true patriots live), decked in leather and lace, coiffed and painted, screeching in bilious hi-pitched harmony at their lemming-like fans about the action necessary when a government becomes "hostile" to its citizens. (Lookie - there's them brunettes on the teee veee again . . . Which should we do first, Maude? Slit our wrists in solidarity against health care reform, or start extracting the nitrogen from the crop fertilizer?) Too bad these two haven't thought of recruiting Ann Coulter for the propaganda tour; they need a Farrah to balance out the screwball Kate and Jaclyn action. Call 'em " (Mister) Charlie's Demons."
What these homegrown, teabag-dangling, domestic terrorists may be plotting next should be the central focus of the FBI, as the number of militia groups has increased over 150% since Obama was elected in 2008 (draw your own conclusions). We must be prepared as these dangerous anniversaries converge and the woods become ever more congested with beer-bellied "militia" boys and their spandex-encased female auxiliaries hopping about pretending to be at war with . . . who? what? Oh, right. The Gummint!!!!! And that Scary Black Man!!
Also notable on this date in revolutionary history -- 4/19/2005 to be exact -- Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger of Germany was elected pope in the first Papal conclave of the new millennium, taking the name Benedict XVI. His new name, however, did not erase the fact that while Archbishop in Germany he ignored repeated verbal and written warnings about the serial crimes perpetrated against innocent children by a pedophilic priest under Ratzinger's service. Time will tell if this act will inspire the thousands of known abuse victims to organize a revolt against this ancient religious organization that has for centuries allowed children of both sexes to be systemically raped, brutalized, and traumatized while turning an un-Christ-like blind eye and deaf ear to their horrific suffering.