There Is No Goddamned Frog In The Water.

Want to know if someone’s nuts? Well, I have an absolutely infallible test. It works every time. It is, I guarantee you, 100% accurate.

1. Engage test subject in conversation.
2. Bring up the topic of politics.
3. Listen carefully. If they ever, ever, ever use the words “slippery slope,” “frog in the water,” “thin end of the wedge,” “foot in the door,” or any other phrase describing the concept of gradual desensitization and infiltration by sinister forces, back away slowly and call 911. 

Because the person to whom you are speaking is completely, utterly, probably irredeemably and incurably bug-fucking, stark-raving bonkers. 

The whole concept of the “slippery slope” is one that I wish I could rip out of the collective American psyche, and I wouldn’t be gentle about it, either. I’d carve it out with a scalpel. Or, failing that, a chainsaw. I say “American,” because I genuinely do not believe that any other nationality out there—with the possible exception of the Germans in 1933—is as susceptible to such an asinine concept as we Americans. Frankly, I can’t understand why we are. We’re not stupid. If we were, we wouldn’t be as successful as we are. But for some reason, we’re suckers for the “Frog in the Water” idea. 

The concept, by the way, is utter bullshit. And let me tell you why. Because it implies the existence of a baleful and malevolent conspiracy.

Whenever anyone uses any of the phrases denoting the concept, it implies that there actually is a sinister group of people out there who have a Master Plan. And they’re working in concert to delude the public into quietly going along with this sinister Master Plan, not noticing anything, until BAM... it’s too late and we're all fucked. Gotcha. 

That’s Conspiracy Theory. Plain and simple. And Conspiracy Theory, regardless of who the purported conspirators are*, is insane. As is anyone who believes it. Conspiracy Theory is invariably wrong because it's based on two faulty premises: one, that human beings are smart enough to come up with a Grand Plan. And two, that they have the discipline to stick with it long enough to actually accomplish it.

You show me one successful conspiracy in the history of humankind. Just one. French Revolution? Don’t make me laugh. Russian Revolution? Nazi Revolution? Establishment of the State of Israel? Not one of those was a conspiracy. The conspirators, such as they were, were pretty damn open about what they planned to do. Adolf Hitler published a book detailing precisely what it was he had in mind. So did Theodor Herzl. The Bolsheviks published newspapers. Not just one, a whole bunch of them. So did the Jacobins.

I’d also point out that every one of those undertakings was riven with dissent. Far from being pulled off by a tightly unified band of conspirators, most revolutionary undertakings lurch wildly back and forth, tugged hither and yon by those who hold one opinion and those who hold others, and when the event DOES actually take place, it’s usually by accident.

And when it does happen, it shocks the living shit out of the people who were trying to get it to happen. We’ll never know now, but I bet you dollars to doughnuts that after the Twin Towers were hit, no one was more surprised than Osama. 

Americans, however, buy conspiracy theory hook, line and sinker. I’m truly not sure why this is. I suspect it’s because that, with all the flaws in its execution since 1776 and our tendency toward oligarchy, we were the first actual working democracy since Athens. And deep down, we actually want someone to be running our lives for us.

Whatever the reason, Americans on both sides of the political divide are equally susceptible to the Froggie in the Water Fallacy. And cynical operators on both sides of the political divide shamelessly, and disgustingly, exploit the gullibility of their fellow Americans. Here are three examples.

Boiled Toad One: Gun Control Will Land You in ObamAuschwitz.

The boiled toad here is a pretty simple one. If we let those Comm’nist Faggot Lib’rals exercise one, even jest oooooooooone lil’ ol’ lim’tation on our God-given, Sec’nd ‘Mendment guar’nteed rights to defend ourselves, they’ll take our guns away and force us into FEMA-run concentration camps!

Okay, this is just horseshit that flies directly in the face of common sense. Anyone who’s ever watched “Swamp People” knows how deeply ingrained guns are in American culture. And, at the risk of horrifying my fellow Liberals (and go fuck yourselves anyhow. I’m not a Liberal. I’m a goddamned fire-breathing dyed-in-the-wool full-fledged fire-breathing Radical. I spit on your pansy-assed Liberalism), that’s probably not a bad thing.

I’m not saying that we need guns. But we have them, and, properly taught, used, and regulated, I don’t see why we shouldn’t. We have cars. They kill more people than guns do every year, by a very wide margin. And if, God forbid, someone ever pulls the Giant Plug at the North Pole and we lose electricity forever (as I firmly believe will happen), we might very well need to shoot our own food and defend ourselves. Or if the Zombie Apocalypse ever happens (as I firmly believe will happen), we’ll need something besides a baseball bat to kill those undead sons of bitches.

Exhibit A for why we shouldn't (completely) outlaw guns. Besides, you  don't need Teflon-coated cop-killer bullets to kill a zombie. That's just overkill. 

Fact is, no matter how you feel about them, we’re just never, ever going to get rid of them, and I for one don’t think we should.

However.

My brother is a self-described gun nut. He has a Glock 9, a sawed-off shotgun, and an AK-47. He likes to buy produce—watermelons, cantaloupes, muskmelons, anything big enough to draw a bead on, really—and go out in the desert (he lives in Vegas) and shoot them. And he’ll be the first one to tell you that he shouldn’t have them. “I don’t need an assault rifle, JP,” he tells me. “And I definitely shouldn’t be able to waltz right into a gun shop in Vegas, and five minutes later, walk out with one of these things.”

Outlawing Teflon-coated, armor-piercing cop-killer bullets, 50-round magazines, and assault rifles will not, regardless of what those black-hearted fuckers at the NRA tell you, result in Uncle Buddy’s hunting rifle being taken away by the jackbooted Gestapo-thugs of our Kenyan-born president. Nor will having to wait for two weeks while A) you’re sobering up, cooling down, or being forced to actually think for a minute before you do something stupid, and B) a nice thorough background check to determine whether you’re the kind of person who can responsibly handle a gun is conducted.

The Brady Bill wasn’t about taking your guns away. It was about making you wait a bit before you actually got your hands on one. It wasn’t part of a sinister conspiracy, it was common sense. But you’d never guess that judging by the fuss the NRA jackoffs kicked up. And they convinced us that this was, cue the ominous music and the deep, sinister voice, “Just the beginning, muah-hah-hah-hah-hah-hah!”

And instead of the cooling off period, we got Gabrielle Giffords, her staffer, and a nine year old girl. Dead. Because some fucking conspiracy-crazed nutjob who shouldn’t have been able to buy a screwdriver got his hands on an assault rifle with a magazine big enough to wipe out a small town. 

Boiled Frog Two. Abortion.

I just happen to be pro-life. I’ll explain why, with all the nuances and subtleties of my thoughts on the subject, in a subsequent blog post, God willing and the creek don’t rise. But in spite of the fact that I do consider a fetus to be a person—kind of, sort of—I don’t think that ought to seriously compromise my contention that late-term partial birth abortion is a completely fucking barbaric and disgusting process that ought to be outlawed.

But just try mentioning this in the circles in which I generally move, and you’d think I’d suggested that black people ought to be rounded up and sent back south to pick cotton.

“How dare you!” my fellow Progressives gasp in horror, their glasses of shiraz trembling in their hands. “Why... how DARE you! Take away a woman’s right to choose? Why, you... you Christian!”

Well, I’m not a Christian. Nor am I suggesting that Roe v. Wade be overturned. Nor do I think abortions ought to be outlawed—not for the first trimester, anyhow. I’m all about a woman’s right to choose. But Jesus... come on. Partial-birth abortion is, plain and simple, monstrous. And outlawing it is not, once more for emphasis, NOT, going to result in Roe v. Wade being overturned. Nor is it going to result in women being stripped of their rights to higher education, the vote, and to screw whomever, whenever, and however, they want. Outlawing the messy slaughter of a viable human being by sawing its head off and sucking its brains out—and yes, I’m sorry, that’s precisely what the procedure entails. Call a spade a damned spade—will not result in the end of reproductive freedom. It just isn’t.

And yet, once again, the alarmniks exploit Americans’ tendency toward conspiracy theory by boiling toads and summoning up the bogeyman of the Patriarchy and its gruesome attendants from Al Qaeda country—Honor Killings, Clitorectomies, and Forced Child Marriage.

Again, can we take off the tinfoil hat, exercise a little common sense, and admit that there’s no slippery slope in the offing?

Boiled Toad Three: The Sticky Icky Icky Will Reduce Your Life to a Bit Part in “Spun.”

For Christ’s sake, let’s legalize dope already. Go Green. Free Mary Jane. Smoke Up. Embrace Buddah-ism. Admit the Need for Weed. Pack the pipe, fire up the bong, spark the bowl, flame on fattie, anoint the joint, admit Cheech and Chong Ain’t Wrong, and let’s... just... legalize... dope.

And to any nitwits—and yes, that’s what you are—on the other side who oppose it, the facts are in.

1. Marijuana has not been linked to any health hazards. It’s not a neurotoxin, like alcohol (which is legal). It doesn’t contain carcinogens, like tobacco (which is legal).
2. No one has ever overdosed on marijuana. Because it’s not possible.
3. There is no evidence—none whatsoever—that marijuana is, in any way, a gateway drug.
4. Marijuana is really, really good for you if you have cancer. Or glaucoma. Or any of a number of other horrific diseases.

Face facts, folks. MJ is good stuff. It’s a hell of a lot better for you than liquor, for example. It’s better for society. When’s the last time you ever heard of anyone getting elevated and going home to beat their wife and kids? When’s the last time you heard of a broken-bottle fight breaking out at a Phil Lesh and Friends concert? When’s the last time you heard of a carful of teenagers wrapping itself around a telephone pole because the driver’d been toking?

It simply doesn’t happen. It just doesn’t.

Our asinine drug policy is what keeps our prisons full, putting zillions of your tax dollars into the hands of private corporations (who hire lobbyists to keep MJ illegal so that they can KEEP the prisons full, and thus charge your elected representatives more of your money. Sorry if that sounded conspiracy-theoryish. But it’s true).

It’s what finances the drug lords who sell the actual bad stuff, like heroin, crack, and crystal meth.

It drains our local, state, and federal governments of much-needed money that’s used to fight a “drug war,” and deprives them of a potential fuckload of tax revenue.

It actually makes it easier for kids to get it, not harder. I’m serious about that. Every high school kid in America knows a dealer. Hell, at the age of 40, I know three of them. Every kid in America, regardless of whatever school he or she attends, can get his or her hands on a dimebag in a New York minute. Alcohol, on the other hand, is a hell of a lot tougher to get. If it wasn’t, we wouldn’t have such timeless comedies as “Superbad” and “Teen Wolf.” Alcohol is tougher to get for one simple reason: it’s legal. And, thus, regulated. Which means that, instead of visiting my Uncle Louie of blessed memory, olov hasholem, him being the guy who knew how to brew his own beer, make his own wine, and triple-distill his own slivovitz, Michael J. Fox and McLovin had to go to a liquor store. Where they got carded. And cinematic hilarity and hi-jinks ensued.

But just let any elected official except Ron Paul say, “Oh, fuck it, let’s just legalize it already,” and here come the Toad Boilers in full force, shrieking that said elected official is probably Pablo Escobar’s bitch, and that legalizing dope is the First Step toward Hooking Our Kids On Hard Drugs and the Dissolution of Traditional Society and Probably The End of Civilization, and that From Legalizing Dope, It’s Only About Three Inches Down the Slippery Slope Toward Armageddon!

God Almighty. Wouldn’t it be refreshing if we could shake off our collective psychosis, take off our collective tinfoil hat, and say, “You know what, there really isn’t a Slippery Slope behind Door #3. We have common sense. We have the ability to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and lunatics without hacking the Second Amendment out of the Bill of Rights. We have the ability to legalize, regulate, and control a completely non-toxic substance without putting a crack pipe in the mouth of every toddler in America. And we have the ability to stop a truly horrifying process without chaining every woman to a stove while her husband beats the shit out of her, don’t we? Really? Don’t we?”

But that would entail actually using that common sense. And really, it’s just so much easier—and let’s admit it, more fun and profitable—to believe that the Bad Guys are secretly in control, pulling the puppet strings. Just ask that certifiable nutcase and conspiracy theorist Mel Gibson. He actually got a pretty good movie out of believing in Conspiracy Theory.

    

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* Some of the more popular include the Jews, the Freemasons, the Jesuits, the Rosicrucians, the Liberals, the atheists, Bolsheviks, Evangelicals, homosexuals, the Gnomes of Zurich, Al Qaeda, Zionists, the CIA, the Bilderbergers, the Trilateral Commission, the Bavarian Illuminati, aliens... there are simply too many to count. And they’re all baloney. Except for the Oil Lobby. Now that’s a REAL conspiracy. 

Incontrovertible Proof That Sarah Palin Is A Slightly More Bangable Version of Genghis Khan.

For some strange reason that I still, twenty years later, do not fully understand, I, after college, went to graduate school to study Russian Literature. This was perhaps the stupidest decision ever made. It turned me into the least salable person on the planet.

            Nonetheless, incorrigible optimist that I am, I don’t (entirely) regret it. Studying Russian stuff at least got me to Russia for a year (where, praise be, I finally had sex. I was, am, and forever shall be a massive geek, but in the Land of Geeks—which Russia was at that time—the least geeky is the biggest stud out there), which was a good time (for many reasons, not necessarily only the one mntioned in the first set of parentheses in this sentence). And it actually taught me a bunch of things that, while they have never, ever, ever once come in useful or had any practical application ever, are still cool things that are worth knowing.

            Here’s one of them.

            A good pal of mine teaches political science in Illinois, and asked me to come and deliver a four-hour lecture on Russian history to his class last March. It sounded like a good time (I may have mentioned that I was, am, and forever shall be a huge geek) so I busted out some old grad school books, and started putting this lecture together. And in doing so, I ran across a book I hadn’t thought of in years.  

            The book was Professor Stuart Legg’s “The Barbarians of Asia.” I recommend it. It’s a lot of fun and packed chock-full with a bunch of fun facts, like...  

Genghis (Chingiz) Khan, who turned heartland tensions to his own advantage in the 12th century,. 

• The Mongols made a drink called kumiss out of horse blood, horse urine, and fermented mare’s milk.
• The Mongols invented stirrups, which gave them a distinct strategic advantage over everyone else.
• The Mongols wore silk underwear. I know, it sounds a little—um—gosh, how shall I put this delicately—queer. But it was actually smart. Since silk doesn’t tear, and since arrows spin in mid-air, the arrow just bunched up the silk around it, but it didn’t puncture the skin. Cool, no? Who knew wearing ladies’ underwear protects you from arrow wounds?

      Okay, so most of the fun facts are about the Mongols. But they’re still fun facts.

            Anyhow, fun facts aside, Legg posits a very, very interesting theory of human history.

            He divides all humanity into those who dwell in the heartland, and those who dwell in the coastal regions, or what he calls the littorals.

            Now, the people in the littorals generally do okay. Ships sail into their harbors from all over the planet, bearing new ideas, new technologies, new foods, goods, and all kinds of stuff that enriches the lives of the inhabitants. And the littorals are rich. All the goods and products of the heartland flow to the littorals so that they can be bought and sold. This generates a lot of wealth for the littoral regions. Basically, all the wealth of the country flows toward the coasts.

            Now, in the heartlands, things stagnate. All the wealth flows out—very little flows back in. The people there aren’t exposed to new things very often, if ever. And over time, economic and psychological pressures, resentments, etc., etc., build up, until finally, the heartlanders have had enough. They hop on their horses and head toward the coasts with blood in their eyes and heads full of hell.

            They wreak havoc for a while, but eventually, they get absorbed into littoral population. And the cycle starts all over again.

            Now, it sounds a little cockamamie, I grant you that. Human history as a cycle of conflicts between inland hillbillies and coastal city slickers is... well, it’s tough to swallow.

But if you know anything about Russian history, it’s a little hard to argue with. The parade of peoples who have washed over Russia for four thousand years—Scyths, Huns, Sarmatians, Avars, Khazars, Bulgars, Magyars, Jurchets, Keraits, Cumans, Petchenegs, Mongols, and Turks—all add credence to Professor Legg’s theory.

Sarah Palin, who turned Heartland tensions to her own advantage slightly more recently. 

                                                                                                                                                                   

            Anyone who’s spent more than four minutes in my presence since November of 2010 is aware that I’m goddamned well sick and tired of living in the Midwest. I hate it.

I shouldn’t. I was born here. I’ve lived here all my life in the Midwest. I should be used to it by now. Hell, until last year, I made a half-assed attempt to try and turn myself into a Midwestern patriot.

“Screw the coasts!” I said. “Up California’s ass, and New York can suck it, too. Go Cards! GO CARRRRRDS!!! Pass the corn on the cob!”

But then something happened. Maybe it was the six-month long Winter of ’10-’11 and the perfectly shitty spring that followed. Maybe it was the tornadoes that tore apart Joplin and Lambert International Airport. Or maybe it was a combination of a lot of factors. But at any rate, something in my head shifted.

“Hell with it,” I figured. “Why do I live here? I’m not a farmer. I hate the cold. What the hell keeps me in this goddamn backwater?”

I gave it my best shot. I really did. But the thing is, I’ve just never really felt like a Midwesterner.

When Bob Dylan rasps, “I was born very far from where I’m supposed to be, and so I’m on my way home, you know?” I get it. I really do. Me too, Bob. I’m on my way somewhere else too. I think that place is Florida. I just want to live somewhere warm and close to water.

And as I was driving from St. Louis to Peoria to lecture my pal’s students—the blood-soaked saga of Russian history churning in my brain as I stared out the window onto a big chunk of America’s heartland, a vast, flat, and desolate swath of disappearing jobs, isolation, despair, and boredom—it hit me.

Dr. Legg is spot on the money. He’s dead right about human history.

The Tea Party is the next bunch of barbarians coming out of Asia.

Don’t argue with me on this. I’ve given it a lot of thought and I genuinely think I’m right.

Think about it. The Tea Party are a pissed-off bunch of Heartland-dwellers, just brimming with resentment—some of it justified, honestly—who, for generations, have watched all the wealth of the country flowing away from them and toward the coasts.

Some people call them racists. I don’t really think they are. I know a bunch of them. They’re the nicest people in the world. They would as soon burn a cross on someone’s front lawn as they would admit to wearing silk underwear (you know, like the Mongols), and they would be absolutely horrified at the thought of lynching anyone. They might be slightly uncomfortable at the thought of their daughter having sex with a black guy, but once the grandchildren come along, they generally shrug their shoulders and figure, “Ah, fuck it. Kids are kids.”

Their politics really don’t make a lot of sense. They vote for the party of the corporations that send their jobs overseas, raise their insurance premiums, and foreclose on their houses. They’re generally poor, and yet they vote for politicians who take away social services. Their enemies are, depending on the day, “fascists” or “communists” or “socialists.”

Essentially, these people—God love ‘em, these solid salt of the earth Midwesterners, bless their lil’ cotton socks—have no coherent ideology except—EXCEPT—that they hate the Coasts.

They hate New York and they hate Hollywood. They aren’t entirely sure why. They have a vague idea that Hollywood is a drug-addled pervert-filled moral cesspit, and New York is full of rapacious bankers out to steal every last dime they own. They’re convinced, without a whole lot to go on, that everyone who ISN’T from the Heartland is a homosexual atheist abortion-having drug-sucking Communist. The people on the coasts, in the minds of Midwesterners, are a sort of vague amalgamation of everything they fear.

There isn’t any rhyme, reason, or coherence to their fears, but that shouldn’t surprise us when we realize what’s really going on. It’s just the latest manifestation of the zillion year old Heartland/Littoral tension—a conflict as old as humanity.

I was really proud of this epiphany of mine until I was out with a couple of pals and shared my theory.

One of them, who’s an attorney and who was educated by Jesuits, thought hard for a moment, took a long drag on his cigarette, and then said in his deadpan voice, “Okay, explain Texas. Has a coast—filled with hillbilly douchebags.”

            Back to the drawing board, I guess.