Chicken Little visited mariner this morning; he was concerned about the following clip from Nate Silver’s newsletter (fivethirtyeight.com):

“A public opinion poll conducted by Ipsos found that a plurality — 43 percent — of Republicans agreed that “the president should have the authority to close news outlets engaged in bad behavior.” Twenty-three percent of Republicans agreed that “President Trump should close down mainstream news outlets, like CNN, The Washington Post and The New York Times.” [Daily Beast]”

The gap between conservatives and liberals is no longer a gap. It is a dangerous, sprawling chasm. One expects some defensive reflex from conservatives as a conservative cycle comes to an end but what bothers mariner is the lack of thought in our American discourse. Our opinions are founded entirely on stressed emotions.

Chicken Little sees a striking similarity to Egypt, Greece, Argentina, and even Israel/Palestine. These nations are in the midst of economic and cultural change; violence, death, massive property damage and the collapse of the relationship between the people and their government causes great travesty. Even more scary is the US makes sure as many people as possible are armed with weapons. Dare we think that any day now the electorate will use those firearms on each other?

Aside from physical harm, the ethos of the American Dream is disappearing among those who espouse it most. What happened to free press, free speech and the right of every citizen to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

Chicken Little dug out his single shot air rifle and loaded it just in case.

Ancient Mariner