Bringing a Gun to a Town Meeting

Incredible item in today's news about the New Hampshire man who brought a loaded gun to a town hall meeting Obama was holding on health care. Chris Mathews had the guy on Hardball and it was informative to hear him rattle on about our loss of freedoms, the right to bear arms, etc. He apparently was making a point about our supposed "loss of freedoms", but it is hard to make any sense of his blatherings.

Also on the news are items about the disruptive behavior of right-wing nuts at various other town hall meetings which Senators are trying to have. The anger is palpable, but anger at what? That is not clear.

The most enlightening fact to come out about contemporary American politics is the "birther movement", in which people question whether Obama has the right to be President because they disagree that he was born in this country. The striking stat here is that when you break it down by region, you find that most people in the South doubt Obama's birth info, while the vast majority in all other sections of the country believe he does have the birth credentials to be President. This is more enlightening than any other piece of info to come out in recent years. What it tells us is how wrong Lincoln was in not allowing the South to secede. Had Lincoln allowed secession, we would be able to have a country which has a chance at going forward into the 21st century with some progressive, humane policies, instead of being controlled by the right wing.