Total Control - Now the Courts

It is July 4, and as I sit and type, the fireworks displays are in full bloom. Most of them are illegal, of course, but then again so was the first one - a couple hundred years ago - I suppose. We are a nation of rebels, or at least have been up to this point. I wonder what will happen to our collective "persona" if we ever drift close to - or heaven forbid into - totalitarianism.

The word has a bad ring to it, I know, but I have been thinking about it this weekend, as my teenage daughter works on a summer English project that has her looking in the paper for an article that in some way connects to the George Orwell's "1984". It has become a project within a project for her to try and find a day when the paper doesn't contain an article that has relevance to "1984".

The most recent articles have centered, of course, around the Supreme Court. Ignoring all of the hype and high drama, I think that we all know what is going to be happening in the coming weeks regarding the Supreme Court nomination that President Bush has in front of him. Nothing that he has done thus far in his presidency would lead me to believe that he will take advantage of this opportunity to unite the nation in any way, but rather to divide it further. He will surely nominate someone who will be loyal to the extreme idiology of the fundamentalist right wing in this country, and the Dems will certainly object - with the threat of filabuster - followed by Senator Frist employing the ominous "nuclear option", and changing the rules of the Senate regarding Judicial nominations.

At the end of the day, we will have ended up securing the Supreme Court fairly firmly into the hands of the extreme fundementalists who have taken control of the Republican party. These extremists will then hold either complete control or primary influence over all 3 branches of our national government, and we will have nuetered any ability of a minority party to hold sway over the proceedings or deliberations of the Senate.

Another big step toward totalitarianism, one step closer to 1984.

Will we wake up in time? Will we be able to add some balance in the next election?