I just finished the latest TomDispatch blog entry entitled, "Tomgram: Stephan Salisbury, Politics in the Terrordome, 2011," which quotes a seemingly endless parade of Republican lawmakers and conservative rabble rousers who, by the evidence, have collectively lost their minds.
Seriously, if I spent as much time being scared (or claiming that I and everyone else ought to be scared and angry) as they do, my head would have exploded by now. Is that how al-Qaeda secretly intends to win, by shattering our skulls? An impressively deep strategy, if true.
It got me to thinking, though: why hasn't there been a backlash against the mass hysteria of the governing classes?
Then I remembered a very brief exchange I had with the guy who cuts my hair. He has family in other parts of the country, so I asked him if he has had occasion to run through the infamous full-body scanners at the airports. He hadn't, but added, "I say, if it helps us be safer, go ahead [and use the scanners]."
There's a good deal of controversy as to how well the scanners work, and how safe they are for frequent travelers. There are also some legitimate concerns about our privacy and how well those scanners are designed to guarantee it. But he hadn't heard any of that. His acquaintance with the controversy has been mere to the core (to borrow from Wodehouse). And that's almost certainly why we've got the circus of security hysteria we have: most of the country just isn't paying attention. It's how most people stay sane.
The upshot is, it will take a seismic upheaval to derail the national-security train as it speeds us all deeper into the Terror Zone, that shadowy place from which all that can be seen are our nightmares. Two types of people are showing us the way: the terrorists, who are laying the track (and boy, are they seeing their employment opportunities expand), and the domestic fearmongers who are pouring on the coals, eager for the power and money to be gained by playing all of us.
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