Common Ground Fair, September 2006, handout

The other day while thinking about guns I looked up the Second Amendment. It says, “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” I’m not a Supreme Court Justice, but I think that means we can keep guns in case we need to serve in the militia. And I interpret serve in the militia to mean a license to shoot folks from away who swagger into St. George and try to impose their form of government on me. How do you feel about that? Do Maine people still need guns in their homes, loaded and ready to repel invaders? Of course you will remember that when Hitler went into Poland and Denmark and Holland, all those young boys, his troops if you will, didn’t think of themselves as invaders --- Hitler’s young boys had been raised and trained to believe that they were liberating forces. Like almost every invading army that has ever walked the planet, their job was to get those shoulders back and get in there and free those poor oppressed people. During the early 1940s a very common word was “propaganda.” I heard it all the time. I didn’t know what propaganda meant, but I knew that it had something to do with the war. Any adult who has read a comprehensive history book realizes that propaganda is an integral component of all wars. So --- you don’t have to read too many history books before you realize that any foreign troops marching into St. George would have been told, long before they left home, that they were liberating forces. That’s the way these things have to work. If young boys can’t be convinced that they are an important part of a noble cause in a far away land, seeing a few friends picked off while swimming butt-naked in the Long Cove quarry might discourage a few of the brighter ones. Even those who came here seeking cultural enrichment might think of a more congenial place to find it. Imagine how surprised all those innocent young boys would be, arriving here, expecting a warm welcome by the general populace once they freed us from our oppressive town manager and wicked governor, only to find so many of us sniping away at them from behind every stone wall and tree. In their young one-track minds, it naturally follows that anyone who doesn’t welcome them must be a fanatical insurgent who has to be hunted down and shot like a rat. They weren’t told that The Second Amendment gives us the right to defend our families, our homes, our way of life and that we will jolly well do it. They are young. They can’t realize that no matter how bad things might be here, we really don’t appreciate liberators from away who kill our friends and family while shooting their way into town with a promise to set us free. I’ve been thinking about this for weeks, and I must admit that if St. George were occupied by foreign troops, I’d hesitate to break out the glass with my gun barrel and shoot at them from my living room window. They only do that in cowboy movies. When the Concord patriots shot at the British soldiers from their homes, the soldiers went inside and put all the men to death. I’ve learned from history, so I’d be more likely to sit around a smoldering fire out in the woods, eating horsemeat with my neighbors, while figuring out how to pick them off one at a time. My high school history teacher, Mr. Honeywell, used to say, “No doubt about it.” No doubt about it: Blasting away at unwanted occupying forces from behind stone walls and trees is a time honored American tradition, established by our gritty ancestors who didn’t like being bullied. Yes, there might have a been a few wimps or moderates who initially didn’t care if it went one way or the other, but every time the British killed another fanatical patriot, a dozen or so of his indifferent friends and relatives were nudged over the line and reached for their muskets. Now that all the smoke and dust has settled, everyone agrees that King George III wasn’t all that clever. The only prudent thing he did for the British was to hire Hessian soldiers to take some of the fire. I wish I hadn’t looked up the Second Amendment because I don't have time to consider all of the attendant ramifications. Chris Faye ought to write a novel about how you and I would react if Maine were invaded. Sandra Dickson might illustrate it --- if she could bring herself to paint a dead horse.
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You will remember that in George Orwell’s 1984, even the most common every-day act became a political statement. But you, of course, realize that any common every-day act can be interpreted as political commentary.

The other day Marsha said,
“Get rid of that tube of toothpaste. I’ve squeezed it and pounded on it and I can’t get any more out of it.”

I said, “There are those who can.”

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While reading in my Encyclopedia Britannica about Salvatore Quasimodo, who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1959, I also learned that Fascism is a radical totalitarian political philosophy that combines elements of corporatism, extreme nationalism, anti-liberalism, militarism and authoritarianism. Unfortunately, Fascism is much like streptococcus bacilli: most of us don’t even know it when we see it and even specialists in the field might quibble over a comprehensive definition.

Because I have recently not only been forced to take off my shoes before boarding a plane but have been patted down to strip me of my toothpaste and bag balm --- arguably meaningless symbolic gestures implemented to acclimate a population to mindless obedience --- I read further, hoping to learn to identify Fascism and thereby determine if it could be gaining a foothold in this land of the free and the home of the brave. This is what I read.

Around 1921 an Italian Prime Minister named Giolitti permitted the usual government influence on elections by corruption. This gave Mussolini and his fledgling fascists a slight edge and they immediately attacked Giolitti for his support of the League of Nations (a world government organization) and for his belief in the methods of parliamentary democracy. Gradually building up a nationwide party organization containing extreme undesirables, the Fascists nearly always had more money than their opponents and moved with greater ruthlessness, although, at every step, Mussolini claimed to be the defender of law and order.

The industrialists were naturally in sympathy with a movement that stood for lower wages and fat, padded contracts. Although the economy had improved it was to their advantage to create the impression that without Fascism, economic breakdown was right around the corner, caused by Socialist incompetence.

The uneducated were naturally receptive to Fascist propaganda and disorderly elements on every level of society welcomed the violence and its attendant opportunity to plunder. Even then, it was not the strength of the Fascists that assured their success but the disorganization and silence of their opponents in the intellectual community. Owners of small Italian businesses discovered only much later that handing over power to people who claimed to be protecting their country with murder and openly proclaimed their contempt of parliamentary institutions would cost them and their country dear.

For years there was no overt establishment of dictatorship. Only gradually were old ways and old institutions changed and nothing was done abruptly that might alarm people or make them realize that a revolution had taken place. The wealthy were courted by cutting their taxes. For permission to become rich and corrupt the gerarchi supported their leader’s irresponsible decisions. The inefficiency and graft of his department heads were accepted as inevitable.

When an Italian was killed by bandits in the Balkans, Mussolini and other indignant, patriotic profit-seeking Italians had their long-hoped-for excuse to go to war.

To his credit, until they strung him up by the heels, Mussolini’s self confidence never waned and he continued to have a pathetic trust in his own powers of intuition, even after plunging his country into that disastrous war for which he was obviously so unprepared.

As you know, the Encyclopedia Britannica is a fat volume, there is much more in there about the rise of Fascism in Italy, but a continuation and refining of my studies would be no more than an unproductive, academic exercise. Because --- in reading the few paragraphs above, you can see that nothing that I have written there could suggest a parallel between the rise of Fascism in Italy in the 1920s and what is happening in our country today.

You may sleep well tonight. It simply couldn’t happen here.
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http://www.thehumblefarmer.com/