Nothing to see here

The thing is, you guys don’t follow the Internet the way I do. That is my big takeaway from today’s J6 hearing; that and checking off my insurrectionist Members of Congress pardon request bingo card (surprised that Boebert and Cawthorn weren’t on the list but I got the rest–just like Oscar night). 

As much as I am absorbed in the hearings (and I am completely absorbed in the hearings), I’m also consumed with anxiety and dread. I never realized how much of my identity is entwined with the idea of being American, but it is. If America no longer exists, I don’t know who I am anymore, and I don’t know who my friends and family are anymore, either. My son wants to visit Texas A&M as a possible college to attend. I don’t want him to go there, not just because it’s so far away from Maryland (it is too far away from Maryland) but because I think that civil war is a real and looming threat, and I don’t want my son on the wrong side of the frontier when it happens. 

I’m really not kidding. 

*****

Well that was yesterday, before shit got real, meaning really real with today’s Roe v. Wade decision. My husband and all of my Catholic friends are texting me, thinking that I must be so happy about this decision and I suppose I would be if I thought for one second that it had anything to do at all with respect for the sanctity of human life but it doesn’t. 

In a pro-life country, 19 children in Texas would be enjoying their summer vacations right now. Or maybe they’d be suffering and complaining through summer school. Or maybe they’d be a little bored. But they’d be alive. 

I don’t wish any harm on any of the Justices, nor on any of the Republican leadership. But it occurs to me, as I read of security concerns arising from the reaction to this decision, that they should all receive exactly the same protection that they would afford to public schoolchildren. Armed teachers should be dispatched to the homes of Justices Kavanaugh, Barrett, Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch. House Members and Senators who feel threatened should be offered the same protection. The timing couldn’t be better, really. Local school districts are on vacation for the summer, and teachers might welcome the chance to earn extra income. Recruit some teachers, issue handguns and assault rifles, train the teachers thoroughly (an hour or so should be sufficient) and dispatch them to the homes of our distinguished public servants to stand guard against all enemies and invaders. Everyone will feel much safer, I’m sure. Good guys with guns and all that. 

But let's not be ridiculous, K? There’s nothing to worry about. They won’t re-institute a poll tax, or take voting rights away from women and minorities. They definitely won’t overturn Brown v. Board of Education or Loving v. Virginia or Griswold v. Connecticut. No reason to get all worked up. No reason to be hysterical about all this. It’ll all be fine.