The Big Picture – 
By Glynn Wilson – 

What if it could possibly be true that we have more in common than we think, and the partisan divide in America is a man made wedge fed by corrupt politicians on both sides and a media that thrives on “conflict” as a so-called news value? Not just a social value, but a capitalist value.

Newspapers, radio, television news and now even news websites thrive economically by getting traffic from running stories full of controversy, where two opposing sides are at each others’ throats.

There is no doubt that how stories are framed influences how people think about them, and that inherent personal biases drive where people come down on issues.

I am not naive enough to think I can solve the partisan divide in America, as one politician after another has vowed to do if only the voters would send them to Washington.

George W. Bush campaigned on this, and to help in that campaign, Karl Rove came up with the term “compassionate conservatism.” We all saw how well that worked out.

Barack Obama ran a campaign about hope, and won the presidency in 2008 in part because of it. But since the country was still too divided mainly over race and then who should pay for health care, the government or private companies, we ended up even more divided than before.

Donald Trump even had the gall to claim only he could unite America, and we see how that played out. Once again, we are even more divided than ever.

As you all know by now, I am in a way in survival mode, running from global warming and climate change in summer in a media camper van. But I do not consider myself to be a “preppier” or a survivalist, per se. The family friendly way to frame it is that I am traveling around to see the country and planning for a retirement where I get to spend lots of time outdoors in nature. It just so happens that I chose the area around Washington, D.C., because there is news here I think it’s important to cover.

But as I sit here on an absolutely beautiful autumn day in a Maryland campground, where I can see the changing fall colors out my sun window as I sit inside and sip coffee and write — sort of the best of both worlds if you will — I think a new perspective is dawning on me. Please bear with me as I flesh out this philosophical argument.

The Washington Post ran a news feature on Friday about a so-called survivalist ranch in Virginia where “survivalists” are on one hand prepping for all kinds of physical threats and economic disasters, yet on the other, just enjoying a nice vacation in the George Washington National Forest.

I shared the link on Facebook and posed the question: “If the issue is framed as ‘prepping for survival in the event of a disaster,’ it’s considered laughable and crazy. If it’s a government official on mainstream TV saying, ‘prepare for a hurricane,’ it’s perfectly sane and acceptable.”

So which is it? Or is it both?

You probably have hippie environmentalist friends like I do who have moved away from cities and now live on organic farms “off the grid” so to speak, with their simple houses powered by solar panels and windmills. Many no longer eat meat and live on vegetables and fruit, preferably locally grown.

To liberals this is perfectly acceptable, and even the ones who still have to commute to work and live in the suburbs look longingly at these folks, wishing they could do the same. Conservatives laugh at this. Where are your guns, they must wonder.

Likewise many conservatives who are still in the daily grind of commuting to work from the suburbs look at these “peppers” and some wish they could do the same, and may in fact go that way in retirement.

So what is the real difference between these two groups?

They both see corruption in government and society ruining human existence, compounding perceived and real threats to human health and security. They both enjoy living out in natural settings away from the hustle and bustle of modern life. They are both preparing to survive even if some of the technical mechanisms of modern society fail, whether it’s the power grid, the banking system, or if all the means of modern warfare we have developed are unleashed somehow onto innocent civilian populations.

Is it such a stretch to think that weapons of mass destruction might in fact one day be misused by mad men? It’s already happening all over the world. It happened here on September 11, 2001, an event which still has psychological consequences on us today.

New York suffered rolling power blackouts this summer, and the power company is already shutting down the grid for weeks at a time to prevent starting wildfires in California. Were those people ready with generators and such? It doesn’t look so crazy there now.

I recently received a friend request on Facebook from an old acquaintance I knew growing up at church and school. I won’t name him here, but he is of the “conservative” variety, who doesn’t seem to like the federal government much even though he made a career for himself working for the State Department.

When I asked why he friended me now, his first excuse was: “Always open to monitoring the opposition.” Not long after that in our conversation on Facebook Messenger, he said: “The Deep State exists and it’s bigger than both of us.”

Right. I called “Bullshit.”

“You mean public servants who go to work every day in government agencies for not so great salaries and live with the stress of traffic in DC , some who ride the train to work instead?”

There are people with lots of money and power who do things to influence public policy, but it’s not a conspiracy theory. There really are people who are invested in making American democracy work.

I tried to make the case to him that we are actually not on opposite sides but in fact involved in the same struggle, but he would have none of it.

“I don’t think we are really on opposite sides,” I said to him. “I think we are both in our own ways trying to save American democracy. Right?”

Apparently not. It’s Christian capitalism or the highway for some people. They may call it democracy, but what they are talking about is monarchy, or oligarchy. They are the modern descendants of one-third of the first American white people who were loyal to King George III. They are not patriots for American independence. They are traitors to the cause of liberty.

Even though many of them live on Social Security checks, in every way a “socialist” government program that was designed because elderly people were really suffering back during the Great Depression, some people become incensed by anything else that smacks of socialism. It’s as if the Republicans have been brain washing people for decades into snapping to attention to fight when that word is mentioned, like the so-called “sleepers” in science fiction movies.

Maybe it’s true. Maybe that’s what Rush Limbaugh really started back when he first got on the radio and claimed to be “the other side” to take on the “liberal media.”

Hearing that crap over and over again every day did in fact brainwash a lot of people, including many people who were my friends but are no more, and it just continued when the UK tabloid king Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes came up with the idea for Fox News. It’s not just a conservative political entertainment cable network. It was designed as a very pro-American news outfit, which is easy to dismiss by intellectual liberals as “jingoism.”

They push the anti-globalist movement just like Steve Bannon, and Trump used that in his campaign in 2020. Nevermind that we have been trading with other countries for a very long time, and benefit greatly from free trade, or at least “fair trade.” What’s the real problem with that?

The average American with barely a high school education, an IQ of 100 and a job at the Wal-Mart doesn’t know the difference, because quite frankly they have not had the chance to be exposed to bigger ideas. Fox News executives know this, and have now made billions and billions of dollars catering to this audience — all while continuing to keep us divided and fighting tooth and nail over mostly minor political disagreements.

Maybe someone should setup a peace conference, perhaps at Camp David, bringing the leaders of the “preppier” movement and some top back-to-nature environmentalists to the table. Maybe if the peppers would give up their assault rifles, and the environmentalist-socialists would accept that to make a living requires a tad bit of capitalism, there could be some agreement and we could at least on some issues bury the hatchet.

Like I’ve said before, I’m not holding my breath. Some people would rather fight to the death for their convictions than compromise just a little bit in the name of peace. Humanity seems doomed to repeat this history until we are all dead.

On the other hand, I recently had a nice chat with an African American producer for MSNBC on the United States Capitol grounds. I won’t name him either, but he said not to worry. Everything is going to be OK for the world, he said, even if Trump gets reelected in 2020.

A new Age of Aquarius is upon us, and a new enlightenment is right around the corner.

One can only hope, I guess. I’m not counting on it, and neither should you.

My retirement plan to be mobile in a camper van to escape global warming and climate change in the summer and run from cold, bad weather in winter is in fact also a survival strategy. I may end up finding some organic farms to work on too, if I can find ones where I can camp with some kind of electric power and internet access.

I doubt I will visit the survivalist camps, because those people do seem a bit crazy, and they are way too armed for their own good. Chances are some of them will end up killing themselves or each other, since the actual fact is most gun deaths are either accidental or the result of an argument that might have led to fisticuffs — if there were no guns around.

Guns in fact do kill people, often in ways not intended by the manufacturer or the gun owner.

But that does not mean in a survival situation, you should not keep a few around. I do.

So don’t tread on me, you right-wing mofos. I just might shoot back.

But I would rather see our government work, and enjoy some peace and quiet in nature. Wouldn’t you?