Bloomberg, LaPierre and the Void

By ROSS DOUTHAT NY TIMES

 

FOR a week after the Newtown shooting, the conversation was dominated by the self-righteous certainties of the American center-left. In print and on the airwaves, the chorus was nearly universal: the only possible response to Adam Lanza’s rampage was an immediate crusade for gun control, the necessary firearm restrictions were all self-evident, and anyone who doubted their efficacy had the blood of children on his hands.       

The leading gun control chorister was Michael Bloomberg, and this was fitting, because on a range of issues New York’s mayor has become the de facto spokesman for the self-consciously centrist liberalism of the Acela Corridor elite. Like so many members of that class, Bloomberg combines immense talent with immense provincialism: his view of American politics is basically the famous New Yorker cover showing Manhattan’s West Side overshadowing the world, and his bedrock assumption is that the liberal paternalism with which New York is governed can and should be a model for the nation as a whole.

It’s an assumption that cries out to be challenged by a thoughtful center-right. If you look at the specific proposals being offered by Bloomberg and others, some just look like reruns of assault weapon regulations that had no obvious effect the last time they were tried. Others still might have an impact on gun violence, but only at a cost: the popular idea of cracking down hard on illegal handguns, for instance, would probably involve “stop and frisk” on a huge scale, and might throw more young men in prison at a time when our incarceration rates are already too high.

But instead of a kind of skepticism and sifting from conservatives, after a week of liberal self-righteousness the spotlight passed instead to ... Wayne LaPierre. And no Stephen Colbert parody of conservatism could match the National Rifle Association spokesman’s performance on Friday morning.

It wasn’t so much that LaPierre’s performance made no concession whatsoever on gun restrictions or gun safety — that was to be expected. It was that he launched into a rambling diatribe against an absurdly wide array of targets, blaming everything from media sensationalism to “gun-free schools” signs to ’90s-vintage nihilism like “Natural Born Killers” for the Newtown tragedy. Then he proposed, as an alternative to the liberal heavy-handedness of gun control, something equally heavy-handed — a cop in every school, to be paid for by that right-wing old reliable, cuts to foreign aid.

Unfortunately for our country, the Bloomberg versus LaPierre contrast is basically all of American politics today. Our society is divided between an ascendant center-left that’s far too confident in its own rigor and righteousness and a conservatism that’s marched into an ideological cul-de-sac and is currently battering its head against the wall.

The entire Obama era has been shaped by this conflict, and not for the good. On issue after issue, debate after debate, there is a near-unified establishment view of what the government should do, and then a furious right-wing reaction to this consensus that offers no real policy alternative at all.

The establishment view is interventionist, corporatist and culturally liberal. It thinks that issues like health care and climate change and immigration are best worked out through comprehensive bills drawn up by enlightened officials working hand in glove with business interests. It regards sexual liberty as sacrosanct, and other liberties — from the freedoms of churches to the rights of gun owners — as negotiable at best. It thinks that the elite should pay slightly higher taxes, and everyone else should give up guns, SUVs and Big Gulps and live more like, well, Manhattanites. It allows the president an entirely free hand overseas, and takes the Bush-Obama continuities in foreign policy for granted.

The right-wing view is embittered, paranoid and confused. It opposes anything the establishment supports but doesn’t know what it wants to do instead. (Defund government or protect Medicare? Break up the banks or deregulate them? Send more troops to Libya or don’t get involved? Protect our liberties or put our schools on lockdown?) Sometimes the right’s “just say no” approach holds the establishment at bay — as on climate change and immigration, to date. But sometimes, as the House Republicans are demonstrating in the budget showdown, it makes the eventual defeat that much more sweeping.

What’s missing, meanwhile, are real alternatives — not only conservative, but left-wing as well. On national security, the left has essentially disappeared, sitting on its hands while President Obama embraces powers every bit as imperial as those his predecessor claimed. On economic issues, the Occupy Wall Street movement passed on the chance to actually advance an anticorporate agenda in favor of consciousness raising and theoretical self-gratification.

As for a conservatism with a serious program, and a real understanding of the challenges facing America today — well, hopefully it will surface by the 2016 presidential campaign. Till then, it’s the hubris of Bloomberg versus the humbug of LaPierre. Merry Christmas, America.

I invite you to follow me on Twitter at twitter.com/DouthatNYT

Weirdness in San Francisco.

 

Actual Craigslist ad MFM (18) 2 Dec 2012

 

Hello my name is eridan ampora I am a wwell not exactly a human but i am a troll from a place called alternia. I am looking for lovve you see my girlfriend left me for this POOR EXCUSE OF A TROLL NAMED SOLLUX... oh cod wwhat havve I done please forgivve me for bein so rude over this odd place called craigslist i did not mean to be so rude. Any wway i enjoy anyfin that has to do wwith wwater i also enjoy to make fish puns. I am really quite lonley I have no friends no girlfriend or boyfriend i am just one vvery lonley troll i am lookin for anything specificlly a maesprite a moirail wwould be nice also i guess or maybe a kissmesses. Anywway I am the oh so amazing prince of heart that means i wwill kill you wwith my oh so amazin looks and amazin personality I am a prince as you all should know. In my spare time i like to kill land dwwellers as my ancesters before me havve done I do quite wwell with killing anything that harms me. If please do send me a message somehoww i havve no idea of howw you humans do this sort of communication stuff its rather quite wweird to me I wwill posst some picture of myself please do enjoy and men please control your bone bulges actually please don't i need those oh so amazing things you human males have in the front i think they call them peni or somefin i'd lovve to see one in person one day

 

Christopher Walken: 'No matter who I play, it's me'

Sean O'Hagen The Guardian (London)

 

 

 

 

He has spent his life creating memorable and menacing characters. The actor tells Sean O'Hagan why he hates horses, loves Hollywood's honesty and won't leave his hotel in London

It was Mickey Rourke who came closest to capturing Christopher Walken's singular aura. "You were always like this strange being from another place," Rourke told Walken when the two came together recently for a feature in Interview magazine. "There was something 'outer space' about you."

Though Walken, now 69, has mellowed somewhat since he first crossed paths with Rourke on Michael Cimino's ill-fated epic, Heaven's Gate, in 1980, that description still seems apt. It's to do with his sense of detachment: the odd mix of preternatural calm and underlying menace that he exudes onscreen. Like the late Dennis Hopper, but in a more understated way, Walken has spent the best part of his career playing extreme characters of one kind or another, while also seeming to play himself.

"I can see why people might confuse me with my roles," he says, when I speak to him at his house in rural Connecticut, where he lives with his wife, Georgianne, a casting director. "Early on, I played one or two disturbed people and I guess I must have been good at it, because it stuck. But, you know, I'm a regular guy. I stay home a lot, I make an effort to keep a distance from the whole social thing, the openings, the parties. I try to live in a calm way."

For all that, he has just spent several days at home without electricity, following Hurricane Sandy's destructive surge. Though the power has now been restored, you sense he has taken Sandy's disruptive presence almost as a personal affront. He won't, he says, be travelling to England to attend the premiere of Seven Psychopaths, the Martin McDonagh-directed film in which he stars alongside Colin Farrell and Sam Rockwell. "I don't like flying at the best of times," he says. "And as I get older, I like it less and less. I don't much like driving either. I prefer to be driven. And, when I'm in London, I don't even like walking on the street. I can never get used to looking the right way when I cross the street. When we're over there, I always say to my wife, 'Stay in the hotel. Don't go out there. It's too dangerous.'"

He sounds, I venture, like a milder version of his onscreen self. Unperturbed, he tells me he also has a fear of horses. "The last time I did a movie that needed a horse, I said: 'If it moves, I'm out of here.' The worst thing is, they know when you're afraid and act up accordingly. I've had them run off on me. Horses I do not like."

A clip from Seven Psychopaths Link to this video

In Seven Psychopaths, there is a dog or two and a bunny rabbit, but no horses. It is a Tarantinoesque film that operates on the edge of absurdity, a place where Walken feels entirely at home. He plays Hans, a charming scammer who makes a lucrative living stealing pet pooches in Los Angeles's richer neighbourhoods, then, after a reward has been posted, returning them to their grateful owners.

"I like Hans," he says, revealingly. "He's an interesting guy. His back story is pretty bumpy and you've got to get that across somehow. He's a watcher, a listener. A lot of the movie, he's listening to the other guys. He's very by himself. Interior. He doesn't relate." Walken is effusive in his praise for McDonagh, a director who, he says, "is generous enough to write big chunks of dialogue. I come from theatre and I relish that." (The two have worked together before, when Walken starred in his play, A Behanding in Spokane, on Broadway in 2010.)

Walken's oddly unplaceable voice is, of course, another key component of his onscreen otherness. Alongside the stare, it has informed several memorable roles since his breakthrough, Oscar-winning performance as a traumatised American soldier in Cimino's The Deer Hunter in 1978. He has played a psychic in David Cronenberg's The Dead Zone, a Bond villain in A View to a Kill, an utterly amoral father in the criminally overlooked At Close Range, a ruthless drug dealer in Abel Ferrara's King of New York, a mobster opposite Dennis Hopper in True Romance and a headless horseman in Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow.

"I play disturbed people a lot, but always with a bit of distance or tongue-in-cheek," says Walken. "Most of the villains I play are essentially harmless." One of the exceptions is Robert, the British-Italian bar owner in Paul Schrader's 1990 adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel, The Comfort of Strangers. "That guy got to me. I couldn't put my finger on why, but he did. I didn't want him hanging around and, for a while after the film wrapped, I couldn't get rid of him."

Christopher Walken talks about A Late Quartet Link to this video

Now, in another soon-to-be-released film, A Late Quartet, Walken finally gets to play a regular guy: a classical cellist diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease. It is a well-mannered film about artistic ambition in which he still manages to look menacing even while playing the quiet bits in a Beethoven sonata. Recently, when asked how he approached playing the cello in character, he replied: "I'm never in character." Is he, then, playing slight variations on himself every time he makes a film? "In one way, yes. No matter what character I'm playing, it's me. I'm the only person in my life that I can refer to. I have a wife, I have friends, but it's essentially me. There are actors who can transform themselves, famously so, but I'm not one of them. There's a crucial difference between an actor and a performer. I'm essentially a performer. That's where I came from. That's what I know. That's what I do."

How, then, does he actually prepare for a role? "Well, it's not something I could fully articulate," he says, "but basically I prepare in the same way every time. I take the script, I stand in my kitchen and I quietly mumble it to myself. Over and over." Is he being serious? "Oh yes. See, I keep doing that until I hear something in there. I was trained as a dancer and that stuck with me, so I'm essentially looking for a rhythm. For me, acting is all to do with rhythm. When I figure stuff out, it has to do with finding the rhythm. Always."

Walken grew up in Astoria, Queens, the kind of second-generation, melting-pot neighbourhood that has long since vanished in New York. He once told an interviewer he "grew up listening to people speaking broken English… and I probably speak English almost as a second language." This may be the real key to his strange, almost stilted, delivery, alongside the fact that he made an early decision as an actor to wilfully disregard punctuation when reading his lines, a quirk that he guessed rightly would set him apart.

"You ever been to Astoria?" he asks. "Even today, it's kind of exotic. Middle Eastern. When I was growing up, it was Italians, Irish, Jews, Russians, all living together. The kids I knew had parents who came from somewhere else. And everybody spoke their own language at home and at work. My father was a baker and he spoke German in the bakery. My mother was Glaswegian and she never lost her accent. Ever."

As a child, he says, he was surrounded by people who had found their vocation in life early on. "My father was one of nine brothers and sisters. Three were priests, three were nuns and three were bakers. I could have been a baker, but my mum had a thing about show business. She was good looking, a little flamboyant. She would have loved to have been a performer, but she was raising a family. I guess I absorbed her ambition."

Alongside his brothers, Kenneth and Glenn, Walken learned how to perform on live television variety shows in the 1950s, appearing regularly on The Colgate Comedy Hour. "I started performing when I was five years old. We weren't child actors – we were used as furniture. But all my education came from that world and it was all good. You learned to conquer nerves. You learned to think on your feet. If you messed up, there was no correcting it. You dealt with the embarrassment. It was a completely unique apprenticeship."

　

As a teenager, he trained as a dancer at the Professional Children's School in New York, which he later described as "being in that movie where the guy gets stranded on a planet of women", and on graduating he was presented with his diploma by the famous stripper Gypsy Rose Lee. (Decades later, he showed off his moves on Fatboy Slim's "Weapon of Choice" video.) Aged 16, he toured with a travelling circus as a trainee lion-tamer: "It was just too good to pass up." He co-starred in several successful Broadway musicals in the 1960s, including West Side Story and Best Foot Forward, in which he played opposite Liza Minnelli, and in 1966 he landed a supporting role as King Phillip in a Broadway production of The Lion in Winter. The prospect of this made him so fearful he was fired on the first night because of his palpable nervousness; reprieved, he went on to win rave reviews.

Walken, then, was a show business veteran when he was offered the part of Colonel Nick Chevotarevich in The Deer Hunter. "Most of the big things that happened in my life I never saw coming," he says. "The Deer Hunter was like that. I was dancing in a musical and somebody said: 'They're auditioning for a film just down the street, why don't you go along?' So I went along and it changed my life. People often ask me about choices. I don't make choices; I just take the next good thing that comes along. That was another of those terrific accidents." The rest is history, albeit of a singularly offbeat type.

Recently, Walken's name made tabloid headlines when Los Angeles detectives announced they were reopening the case of Natalie Wood's death by drowning some, 30 years ago. Walken was a guest of Wood and her husband, Robert Wagner, on their yacht, Splendour, on the night she fell into the sea. The original verdict of accidental death has been challenged by the boat's captain in a recent memoir and Walken may be called as a witness. He has declined to talk about the tragedy, save for a New York Times interview in 1992, when he said: "For me the only response for years was silence. I just wanted to turn my back on the vulgarity of what was said and printed… I just decided to have some dignity afterward and be quiet." That is still the case.

I ask him if he has any regrets. "No. Things have worked out better than I expected, perhaps because I didn't expect things to be good. I didn't really have any aspirations. I'm lazy. I don't chase stuff. I'm pretty realistic about what my possibilities are and I know my limitations. I'm not much of a panic person, so I don't get too stressed if a job doesn't come along for a while. I try to live in a calm way. It's stopped me from getting an ulcer."

How has he survived in the cut-throat, hyper-ambitious world of Hollywood? "Well, you know, I've always found it to be an honest place. They either want you for a role or they don't. It's pretty simple. People talk about Hollywood being this place where you can never get straight answers, but my experience is the opposite. If they don't want you, it's very clear."

What's the worst thing about his job? "Learning lines, for sure. I don't know how people learn their lines quickly. It's always been a tedious, agonising chore for me. I hate it. It takes me ages to know my lines. I just wish I could do movies with cue cards. That way, it's easy. Not lazy, but easy. You know what? I wish I could live my whole life with cue cards. I really do."

Seven Psychopaths is released on 5 December

 

 

If Every U.S. State Declared War Against the Others, Which Would Win?

By Quora Contributor SLATE

                      

 

This question originally appeared on Quora. It was taken from Quora's "hypothetical battles" topic, where readers "can ask questions and get answer on fighting that wouldn't likely or ever happen in real life."
Answer by Jon Davis, veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, sergeant in the U.S. Marine Corps:

These are the accounts of the Second American Civil War, also known as the Wars of Reunification and the American Warring States Period.

After the breakup, many wondered which states would come out in control of the power void created by the dissolution of the United States. There were many with little chance against several of the larger more powerful states. The states in possession of a large population, predisposition for military (i.e.) military bases, and a population open to the idea of warfare fared the best. In the long term, we would look to states with self-sufficiency and long term military capabilities.

Here are the states that held the greatest strategic value from day one. They have the ability to be self-sufficient, economic strength, military strength, the will to fight, and the population to support a powerful war machine.

• California
• Texas
• New York

Others that have many of the qualities that gave them an advantage are also listed.

• Washington
• Colorado
• Illinois
• Virginia
• Florida
• Georgia

For all intents and purposes, Alaska and Hawaii ended well enough since they were so far removed from the center of the country that they never really suffer greatly nor benefit from the shattering.

 

Day 12: "It's getting scary. My mom said we are going back to Oklahoma to stay with Grandma. The other day, my dad was yelling at some men at the door. They seemed really upset. I held Jamie. She is still little. She's scared and doesn't understand what is going on. I am scared too. There are also some boys at school who keep picking on her and calling her an "Okie." We were both raised here, but I don't really think that matters. All the other families on my street have huge one star flags hanging from their homes. I don't want to leave my house, but Mom says we have to go. The highways are packed with people. I wish things would just go back to how it was."

The Diary of Sarah Brennan

First came a period of massive migration back to the homelands. Facing the newly invented discrimination that will be created, many felt the need to go back to their own people. While the individual states retained all military assets, they couldn't control the individuals who fight. A Texas Marine stationed in California would not fight for California. A soldier in New York would not fight against her home in Virginia, and a sailor in Houston would not fight against his home state of Florida. The warriors returned to their home states, and the states had to re-consider that when they measured troop strength of their new nations. Ultimately, they measured troop strength by how much of the population would return home.

After the migrations, rough approximations left the states even, additionally, the balance of foreign nationals changed. At some point, there was a migration of people back to their non-United States homeland. Over the next several months, many from the North migrated to Canada and in the South to Mexico and South America. Millions of Latinos fled back South to the safety of their families and away from the looming danger of the war.

Day 42: "Citizens of California are advised to stay away from the Mexican Border. In response to the resent surge of immigrants back to Mexico, authorities out of Mexico City have closed the border, and agents from Tijuana are now manning armed sentries posted along the border. There have been scattered reports of refugees attempting to storm the gates being shot by soldiers on the Mexico side. It has also been communicated that the No-Mans land will be mined within the week, and that Mexico will not be allowing any non Mexican immigrants to enter the country from this point forward. Once again, we strongly advise all those wishing to leave the country to stay in their homes."
Jennifer Aranda - Channel 14 News

The war was little more than a very tenuous peace for several months. The new nations were mostly focused on the re-consolidating of their forces and trying for quick grabs at resources that were easy to hold. Alliances were beginning to form as some of the smaller states sought to ally with known powers in the region.

The first of what we would call real battles was mostly when some of the regional powers overtook manly unmanned installations or take over now abandoned Federal assets.

Day 63: "We are gathered here today as the inheritors of a lost legacy. Our nation has been lost to shattering and disarray. For that reason, it is our duty to bring back our house to a structure undivided. When we arrived in the District, we found it empty and abandoned. The monuments to our civilization watched silently over the broken halls of our once proud Capitol. We came to the District to bring back order. We have done this deed, and now it is our charge to bring back the greatness of America and return her to her proud place of honor... We will do these things, and we will do the others because we are a great people. We are Americans. We are VIRGINIANS!"

Inauguration speech of President Anthony Stokes

 

The first real occupation attempts happened when attempts were made to secure more assets.

The Republic of Texas sought to gain strategic advantages in the Central United States. To do this, they sought to gain two strategic assets. The first was control of Whiteman AFB, the home of the B-2 bomber program. The base was easily secured, and the most coveted military bomber in the world was now in the hands of the Republic of Texas. The next was control of Colorado and her military installations of great value. Then finally was access to the Mississippi River. Two main offenses took place to do just that. The First Battle of New Orleans involved a massive force occupying the city to claim it as a port and artery for future engagements. In Colorado, they met stiff resistance as many of the Texas military were unfamiliar with Mountain warfare. Colorado's major bases fell quickly since Colorado enjoys the smallest force to fight back the Texans, but they adapted an unconventional warfare stance that kept the Texans on edge for months. Still, at this point the mission behind taking Colorado had been achieved -- control over its military bases and strategic assets. The insurgency does however slow down the growth of Texas.

New York pushed Northward. They pushed to claim all of New England and the food wealth they will need to supply their people now that resources from the Midwest are no longer available. The take over is mostly peaceful as many of the states have large, but mostly non-military populations. They encountered problems when large groups of refugees tried to flee to Canada and rioting ensued.

Illinois was calm. The Midwest Alliance grew steadily by seeking to secure the Great Lakes. They were able to take Ohio through a few fierce, but brief encounters. They also took on Minnesota and the mouth of the Mississippi River.

The West coast was now controlled by the two main powers -- California with its seat of power in San Francisco and The North East Union, centered in Seattle. California gained support and took control of all the states West of the Continental Divide and South of the Union. The North East Union pushed as far as Wyoming.

In the South, Georgia gained strength as Alabama and South Carolina joined. The leadership of Georgia advocated a return to confederalism as fanatics gain headway among the people. The Neo-Confederacy movement takes root and spreads throughout the Old South and rekindles a sense of unity among the states who engaged on the side of the Confederacy during the First United States Civil War. Peacefully, they are able to convince Mississippi and Tennessee to also join. The growth of Confederate States put an ever growing pressure on Florida as it slipped into isolation.

Virginia took on the mantle of the Restored United States. They assumed the moral responsibility for reunification, and by taking Washington, they were able to secure much of the federal assets and infrastructure available to the country before the collapse. They then commanded many ships and weapons housed overseas that weren't lost during the first two months of disarray. They began to gather support among the neighboring states and press their advantages -- intelligence, military strength, and the symbolic leadership they held by holding D.C. One strategic advantage they wished to push was their economy. While the rest of the former United States was in complete economic disarray, Virginian's consistent use of the dollar provided a stability that others didn't have. They wished to solidify this with control of the nation's gold supply housed in a crossroads what was now a very desperate strategic region. After they peacefully brokered a treaty with Kentucky, they received an attack on Fort Knox from forces located in Indiana.

 

Day 112: "When we arrived at Knox, we received heavy resistance from the defenders. Their fire was, for the most part, inaccurate, and they lacked unit cohesion, so we found ourselves at an advantage. Not that we are much better off. We received intel that their units were something of a haphazard array of whatever Marine, Sailor, Soldier, or Airmen came out of the woodwork, and they just threw them together and called it a unit, much like our own. Still they were professional warfighters. We were lucky they hadn't yet made it to secure the fort yet. Back to Knox. We were able to take the base. The fact was that the Kentucky defenders were mostly woodsmen and good-ol-boys from the South. More a militia reliving stories of the Old South than an army, but they fought like wild dogs. After a few hours, their main line broke and they retreated back towards the center of the state. About halfway through the day, we were able to break into the main buildings where the gold was supposed to be stored. Easily, it would be safe to say we were surprised at what we found. We arrived to find bloodstains in the main hallways and leading into the vaultroom. The trail faded and we see that the vaults are all completely empty. Every last bar, every last ounce is gone. All that is left are red stains all over the room and bullet holes riddling the walls that look like they could have happened months ago. Those hicks didn't even know they were guarding a giant empty building. Now the big question we are left is...'So where is the gold?'"
Log of Lt Col. Thomas Scott 2nd Raider Battalion Midwestern Alliance.

 

At that time, the nations were coming together in larger groups. They had access to larger populations to support military strength, economic power to reach out and fund the state, food sources, and leadership.

In the West, states along the coast received the most fighting. Washington began bombing San Francisco from the air to try and decapitate what had become the center of California's leadership. Retaliation strikes from combined naval and air forces severally weakened Portland, Tacoma, and Seattle. California launched a two pronged attack by sending in land forces up Interstate Highway 5 and Marines to attack from the North. Their mission was to enter Washington through the Salish Sea and secure Mt. Vernon, preventing escape of enemy forces. The Marines were by and large undetected and completed their mission successfully. The Californian army received shelling on their movement near the town of Cresswell, Oregon. They retreated back to the nearby town of Cottage Grove and secured the Airport there. Now, a temporary air base had been established and sorties began taking place, allowing for the immediate deployment of troops to the defending town of Eugene. Casualties were high, but once Eugene was secured, the way was open to take Portland.

Day 234: "I don't know what the Army is doing. We have been here holding the Canadian border for days, and the Army still isn't made it past Eugene. Just get it out. Burn the city to the ground. Mow them down. Just do your damn job. It's us or them. Make it happen for God's sake."
Private First Class Anthony Sullivan - 1st Californian Marine Regiment

In the East, the Restored United States was desperately in need of sound military strategy and allies. They had now become completely surrounded by enemy states. Such a solution came through the plan brought about by one General David Meznick. The Meznick doctrine called for the destruction of strategic economic assets in the North to weaken their ability to make war. The greatest of these were the attacks on the infrastructure of the Great Lakes' shipping system. With the locks destroyed and Erie canal in ruins, shipping between Chicago and the outside world had ended. New York was also cut from its most valuable resource, which was the hope of once again shipping America's goods to the rest of the world after the war. This maneuver had massive consequences to the region. Now deprived of many of their shipping lanes, the Midwest Alliance began to break as food and other supplies were unable to reach the people. Riots in Chicago began to erupt as the people accused the government of corruption, which for all purposes was true. Seeing the coming of the end, much of the Chicago legislature slipped out in the night and booked passage on private planes out to Montreal. Left without leadership and provisions, the Alliance crumbled. Its resources became split between the Texas Republic and Restored United States with what was now known as the New England Union claiming Ohio.

In the South, tensions between Florida and the Neo-Confederates had reach their zenith. Troops had taken Tallahassee and were dug in along the Jacksonville-Gainesville Line. Florida was desperate. In a deal made in Houston, Florida agreed to join Texas if it was free to maintain its sovereignty in exchange for military support. With this, Florida and the forces staged in New Orleans attacked. The Jacksonville-Gainesville line was pushed back. Floridian forces moved with speed to besiege Atlanta as Texas occupied the city of Montgomery, Alabama. Texas and Florida forces converged on Atlanta and the siege went on for another month. No one really knows what led to the succeeding events, but a fire broke out in the city. Reports blame Texas shelling or Floridian sabotage, but most official accounts believe that it originated in an apartment complex where a family had been prying up floorboards to burn for heat. The fire spread to the rest of the neighborhood and, lacking their emergency infrastructure, parts of the city were overcome as the rest began to go into disarray. Texas forces secured the major areas of the city while Florida troops took charge of the relief effort for escaping refugees.

The next hundred days were among the most peaceful of the war.

The lines between the Republic of Texas and the Californian Union of Democratic States were now amassing troops and solidifying their positions. The Northeastern cites were in the processes of being rebuilt after California gained control, as were the cities of Montgomery and Atlanta. Old forces of the losing states' armies were redistributed to victor nations. Texas held a tenuous peace with the Restored United States as they erected fortifications along the 36th parallel and western side of the Mississippi. California and Texas began building in unison a mass of fortifications on either side of the Continental Divide. Texas also enjoyed use of the river, as shipping lanes now connected everything from the Midwest to the Carolinas. This eased the growing concerns of food shortage and redeployment of men.

Most of the fighting was centered between the Restored United States (RUS) and New England Union (NEU). Control of Ohio and Pennsylvania exchanged hands a few times as the region sought stability. The war reached a turning point when a New York based flotilla made a decisive push to take Washington D.C.; in response a nuclear device was used on the fleet and all the ships, sailors and Marines on that mission were lost. The first active use of nuclear weapon in more than half a century sent waves through the warring nation states. Other nations of the world grew terrified as they waited for the NEU's strategy. The worst fears came to pass when a weapon was exploded in Washington D.C., bringing down the powerbase of the Restored United States. Alarms across the world rang out as the RUS gathered itself and prepared to launch retaliatory strikes along the Eastern Seaboard. Before this came to pass, a message from New York City came, initiating their surrender. The device had been set by a rogue general from New York. Fearing it's own impending annihilation, New York City seceded from the Northeast to become its own independent city-state. The rest of New England issued their surrender and joined the Restored United States without incident. The Capitol was moved to Philadelphia.

 

Day 647: "I can't believe Washington's gone. I mean what are we even fighting for? There is nothing left that was the same. I swear I am starting to feel like all we are are animals trying to survive, fighting over the scraps of our fathers. We all knew it was over when D.C. got smoked, but at least that didn't happen. Many of the men are still sure that NYC planned this out. Leave the rest to fight over the charred out ashes while they run from it all. I just don't know what to think. Now we are inheriting the Northeast and all its problems. They better be ready. Now Texas has us to the West and South along Carolina. Two years this has been going on and for what? I don't know how long we keep this going."
Log of Col. Thomas Scott 1st Marine Regiment Restored United States.

During the next year, the war reached a standstill. Maneuvers and deployments mounted the full force of all three nations. Tensions mounted as the borders grew more and more defended.

Texas forces were spread thin. They held the most land, the longest borders, and the least population to support its land. It was composed of the elite Texas troops, highly militant neo-confederates, thousands of independent militias and partisans, as well as millions of individuals ready to fight their own private backwoods battles.

The Restored United States was a broken nation. Much of it was the remains of conquered other nations. The former state of New York was now missing its greatest assets, income from the the Midwest and international access from New York City. The Capitol had been lost. Their people were now disheartened and disillusioned. The nation they lived in was nowhere near what they were experiencing, yet they still had to survive. A new national identity was forming.

California was doing well, relatively speaking. Though there was damage done to the major cities, they enjoyed a good deal of time to rebuild. Their troops were stationed along the divide. Border tensions began to build until a small town skirmish in Wyoming escalated the war to its peak.

Wyoming was now effectively existing on two sides of the divide. Many of the services and resources were split between a small segment of the Western end of the state and the rest of Wyoming. The distance from California was too great for support from San Francisco to offer the Western segment of the state. In many ways, they were fending for themselves. Near the division line were two towns, Green River and Rock Springs. Green River lay on the Western side of the state. They also held the only viable water resource between the two. Since the war began, they were able to share, but after rationing was instituted by the Republic, Rock Springs began to need more of the water. Though neither truly identified as Texan or Californian, they were now forced to abide by their laws. Rock Springs was in demand of water. Green River was forced, however, not to abide. Officers from California were sent to enforce the policy to not aid the enemy in any form. After frequently being denied, leadership of Rock Creek went to the town and make a formal request with the officers at Green River. The officers had taken over the mayoral office of the town. The officers denied again Rock Creek's request. One young man, Jeffery Irving, protested violently. A scuffle began in the office before the officers drew their side arms. Two of the men were shot and Jeffery was killed in the office of the Green River courthouse. The next day, citizens from Rock Creek came to the city and stormed the mayor's office. The two officers were barricaded in the office and requested support from a nearby base. An hour later, troops arrived in the town. They discovered the office broken into and the officers murdered. The order was given to track down the perpetrators. California troops made their way to Rock Creek.

While in town, they barricaded the main road. Where they began searching passing vehicles and taking people in for questioning. A crowd began to build. Taunts and screams let out from the crowd. The crowd became violent. A rock was thrown at the soldiers. A rifleman knocked a man to the ground with the butt of his weapon...

"Crack."

A gun shot sounded from one of the windows on Main Street. The soldier fell down beside the man on the ground. The crowd was silent and a moment of stillness seemed to roar throughout the valley.

A soldier began firing on the window; others fired at the crowd. In a moment, the entire crowd was under fire. They ran for the nearest building and anywhere for cover. As the firing stopped, the lives of dozens of men, women, and children lay frozen on the street. The detachment gathered themselves and left the town before a battle began between themselves and the townspeople. This was the Massacre of Rock Creek.

Day 812: "When we arrived most the bodies had been carried away. Some were lined along the street covered in sheets of white, stained crimson. The town was in shock as our troops began filling the streets. Mothers were screaming with anguish as old men roared for action. There was talk of many of the men leaving an hour before we arrived to handle things themselves. I don't think they know what they're getting themselves into. We won't be able to assist them. I feel for these people. I am shocked with them. They are Texas citizens now, and we let this happen. It won't go unavenged for long though. I haven't seen this many troops gathered like this since we took Atlanta. This is definitely going to be the big push we have all been waiting for to take California. All Hell is about to break loose. God protect us as we march on California."
Journal of Sgt. Alexander McAnally 33rd Texas Infantry Regiment

A massive invasion force gathered at Rock Creek. Six divisions of the Texas Army and the 1st and 3rd Marines were mobilized for the battle. In the morning, B-2s from Whiteman AFB in Missouri began strategic bombing sorties against a number of Californian Union air bases. Conventional bombing missions were also launched. Suffering the greatest were bases near Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles. Air defense was launched from bases in San Diego, LA, and Sacramento with relief forces in the North. Next came what was known as the battle over Nevada. Fighter squadrons met over the desert in many numerous engagements to gain air superiority. Texas was equipped with superior aircraft since they were only power still investing heavily in improving their local manufacturing capabilities and advancing military technology. They also had the advantage of more experienced warfighters from the wars in the East. California was heavily invested in passive defense systems scattered throughout the desert. Their missile defenses tore heavily into the Texas planes. The air battle was by far the largest air battle in history with thousands of planes involved and hundreds lost to the skies. The fighters from Texas were able to protect bombers in raising the remaining defenses in Salt Lake and Las Vegas while severely damaging others in Los Angeles, San Diego, and China Lake.

The Battle of Salt Lake began the Land War. With the region softened, Texas mobilized forces invaded Northern Utah by way of the Forward Operating Base Rock Creek and following Interstate 80. They met fierce resistance in Salt Lake city. Sniper and rifle teams were thoroughly entrenched along with machine gun nests. Five battalions of thoroughly entrenched Californian infantry were able to hold the city for three days against the overwhelming Texas forces while the air war continued over the sands of the Great American Desert. On the fourth day, a courageous day of fighting, the Californians retreated as relief troops arrived. The Texans were now dug into the hollowed out shell of the former capital of Utah. From this point, the Siege of Salt Lake lasted another three weeks.

The battle continued on. Texas reinforcements joined on day six. The battle intensified. Texas was the first to escalate. M.O.A.B. bombs were dropped and cleared away a great deal of California defenders. Texas movements quickly divided and overwhelmed the Californians. Six thousand were lost, and the Californians retreated back to Sacramento. Once Salt Lake was secured, Republic forces moved on to Las Vegas. Vegas was easily secured after the battle of Salt Lake. Republic forces gathered in the desert city preparing for the a push to Los Angeles. As the army moved out, they destroyed the Hoover dam to prevent Las Vegas from becoming a strategic point again. This caused a surge in the Colorado river that destroyed the Davis, Parker, and Imperial Dam systems as well. The region would become by modern standards a completely uninhabitable desert again.

It was then that something unexpected happened. The Restored United States attacked in an unsuspected maneuver designed to strike when the Republic and Californian Union were entangled and spread thin. General Meznick again planned out a massive attack to take out the knees from under the Republic forces. His plan was to take out the port at New Orleans and land a decisive series of blows against Texas. As Republic troops moved out to Southern Nevada, covert agents blew the dikes holding back the flood waters from the Gulf. The city, its troops, its ships, and resources were all flooded and in disarray. Air strikes and land forces were also made on the stations and bases along the Mississippi River, including Whiteman and the B-2's stationed there. Transport boats carried thousands to secure the bases along the river down to Baton Rouge. From there, bombers cleared a path through to Beaumont, TX and on to Houston. Texas Defense forces scrambled to meet the invasion. With eyes to the West, few were prepared for an attack in the heart of Texas. Reserves from Dallas and Austin raced to Houston. The battle intensified. After the destruction of New Orleans, naval forces stationed in the Atlantic maneuvered to support the Texas invasion. Without the support of the New Orleans ships at port, the Republic Navy was overcome. Naval bombardment was laid down on the defenders in Houston, paving the way for the surgical team of RUS soldiers and the wave of troops following the river. The defenses were hindered by the sea of terrified citizens fleeing Houston. As shells rained down from the sea, chaos ensued. The city was going to be lost.

With the loss of Houston imminent, Republic soldiers spread thin on two fronts, and the country severed down the spine of the Mississippi, Texas made a last desperate strike.

It is believed the first city to fall was Chicago. Boston and Philadelphia came shortly after. At the same time, San Francisco and Seattle were lost. Retaliatory strikes claimed Austin, Houston, Atlanta, and Oklahoma City. It is believed that many other cities were targeted for destruction, if not for the intervention of some unknown power.

Four high altitude nuclear devices were detonated over the former United States. These weapons showered the region with energized electrons that shorted the circuits of electrical devices in their target radius. Below is a graphic representation of what this blast did to the United States.

Most of the country fell into regions of 50 to 80% damage, however considering overlap, historians assume that the damage was at least 90% to all of the continent and all its coveted luxuries were reduced to plastic and glass. This of course didn't stop at the devices themselves, but everything networked into the infrastructure was brought down as well.

The four devices together were seen from various parts of the country. Their effects brought down all major computer systems, information networks, communication relays, and nearly all circuit based technology on the continent. There is no official record of who fired the weapons. Any logs created were probably lost in the very blast they created. Many believe that it was a last ditch effort to limit the destruction of the United States in the event of Atomic Holocaust. Some believe it was due to international intervention. The world's final discipline upon us for what we were doing. Many of the religious groups who would come from this era, believe it was the work of God, though they can't agree if it was a sign of his mercy or punishment upon a sinful nation. Whoever was responsible, the truth is that the devices probably stopped more bombs than actually went off that day, but they didn't protect anyone from the next five years. America was dark.

Day 842: "I was out on the porch catching fireflies with Jamie on the night the lights went out. We had caught a whole jar full when I saw a bright light come from the sky way far off in the North. Daddy screamed and jumped on us as he held me really close as we fell to the ground. The light grew really bright and then all of a sudden this wind crashed the field. The wind whooshed through like it was going to carry Daddy and me away. Then it went away. I looked up and the light in the sky faded away. I watched it dim until it turned to nothing. Then I looked around and realized I couldn't see anything. All the lights in the house went off. All the other houses did too. All the street lights were off and the whole town was dark. I asked Daddy what had happened. "I don't know Sweetie. We need to get back into the house before it gets too cold." I looked hard and tried to find a path back to the porch. Then I saw the light flicker on Jamie's cheek. The jar in her hand began to flicker, and I could see the fireflies coming back to life. It wasn't much, but they were only lights for miles and Jamie was all I could see."

The Diary of Sarah Brennan

 

Day 846: I don't know which is worse, the casualties we suffered at Salt Lake or the retreat back through the Sierra Nevadas. We lost the vehicles and had to go the rest of the way on foot once we reached the California border. All the trucks stopped dead and everything's gone silent. We have lost all contact with San Francisco. I am trying to keep the men going, but I honestly don't know if I am going to be able to keep any of us alive. The snow is thick and is keeping us moving at a crawl. Foraging is not providing us the food we need. We have already lost as many men trying to get back to the base as we did in the battle. My greatest fear is that the men will begin to realize where we are. I don't know why God would put me in this situation in the middle of the Donner Pass. Please don't let the men know what happened here and start to get any ideas. We are no longer being pursued. Perhaps they know how desperate we are. Please Lord, just let us make it out the pass." 
Log of Lt. Joseph Ramirez, 3rd California Infantry Regiment

After the collapse came the period historians remember as the American Dark Age.

Five years passed. With all the infrastructural losses came a loss in leadership. The cities were evacuated due to no water, food, or power coming in. Towns like Ardmore, Oklahoma became overnight metropolises, taking in the flood of humanity escaping from cities like Dallas and the ruins of Oklahoma City. A local Indian casino to the South from before the war became a refugee camp for more than 60,000 people. The Oklahomans welcomed them warmly as now there was no war. There was no Texas, nor California, and certainly no America. Now everyone was simply a survivor of the Second American Civil War.

In the chaos of the collapse, micro wars sprang up. With no government protection, towns and villages attacked one another. Local sheriffs declared themselves generals of fifty man armies. Much of the former United States fell into a feudal bid for power waging county against county and town against town. They fought battles over salt mines, water from a local creek, or farmland.

In the South, a plague swept through the countryside. Many reputable reports indicated that it happened when the controls at the CDC in Atlanta were destroyed after the bombing or from the EMP. Genocides and ethnic cleansing also scarred the landscape in Chicago, Alabama, Miami, and Los Angeles.

It was towns like Ardmore that finally brought us out of the dark. They rebuilt the agricultural backbone and got people back to work now that peace was assured through the destruction of the capacity to make war by the large nation states. Veterans gathered to provide a unified defense force for the new agrarian cultures that built themselves out of the ashes. New farms were established and refugees built homes all along the landscapes. As food became less of an issue for the people, factories began to rise again. The infrastructure began returning as power was restored, transformers were replaced, networks were brought back online. As the towns became secure and prosperous again, people moved back into the cities. Dallas, Sacramento, Columbus, and Richmond rose to become important regional powers again. The eyes of the nation looked to these cities as fears of the rekindling of the Unification wars began to surface. Old hatreds began to echo.

It was from Dallas that a movement started. One young girl led a peace movement from the heart of the former Republic of Texas.

Day 2871: "This girl in Texas is calling for us to formally end the hostilities. I don't know if I could ever trust someone from Texas again, but she was just a girl when this whole thing started. It's not like she is to blame for anything, but it is just hard to get behind someone from down there. We are tired, there isn't anything left worth fighting for. If there is anything left it would have to be that this has to end before it all happens again."

Sgt. Anthony Sullivan - California Civil Restoration Administration

 

Day 2912: "Give this girl your support. What we did was criminal. As a people, we destroyed what took great men hundreds of years to bring together. It took us less than two years to bring each other to the brink. We lost our greatest cities and our best people. Now there is one of our own calling for repentance and recompense. Pray for her strength and success."

Pastor Joseph Ramirez

 

Day 2945: "There's going to be a peace conference in New York City. They're back up and running for the most part. Hopefully we can do something good there. I will be part of the delegation from the RUS. We haven't thought of ourselves as that for years. Still, we have to go and let it be known that Columbus doesn't want anymore fighting. We are more than this collection of third world city states that are built on the breakdown of our legacies. I hope this little girl from Dallas is more than hopes and dreams."

Mayor Thomas Scott of Columbus

 

Day 2953: As the much talked about New York City peace accords prepare to open, all the attention of the country is on this girl from Oklahoma. She was one of the early people to flee with her family from Texas. She, with her father, mother, and young sister, lived with family on a small farm in Southern Oklahoma. There, they survived the conscription notices for service, the bombings, The Dark, and the two year winter.

She took up work in an old cookie factory, now shelling pecans from local harvests. After the Dark, she administered relief efforts at a local Indian casino for refugees fleeing Texas after the they lost power and feared their own annihilation. She was able to gain respect and was eventually made responsible for finding the refugees work on the local farms. Thousands knew her for work and generosity. She built up relief shelters to gather together aid to the refugees and give them jobs. While still barely in her twenties, she was one of the main people responsible for the rebuilding of vital resources in Oklahoma City. When the lights came back online and grocery shelves were stocked again in Dallas, she was there. Pushed into local politics, she was a unifying force for the region.

While in Dallas, she championed a peace movement. Dallasites and Texans began to question if the war should continue, if their safety could be secured with the history of the war and Texas' role in it. She was the voice of reason in a sea of fears. She gained support from those she helped, and her message spread across lands owned by the Republic and all the way to Columbus and Sacramento.

Now leaders from across America are going to New York City and are meeting for the first time since the break-up of the United States to discuss a resolution to the failed Wars of Reunification. In her honor, the much talked about Brennan Treaty will be presented to the delegation, ratified, and hopefully pass within the week. Here's to hope and to Sarah Brennan.
Jennifer Aranda - New San Diego Union Tribune

Romney Is President

By MAUREEN DOWD NY TIMES

IT makes sense that Mitt Romney and his advisers are still gob smacked by the fact that they’re not commandeering the West Wing.

(Though, as “The Daily Show” correspondent John Oliver jested, the White House might have been one of the smaller houses Romney ever lived in.)

Team Romney has every reason to be shellshocked. Its candidate, after all, resoundingly won the election of the country he was wooing.

Mitt Romney is the president of white male America.

Maybe the group can retreat to a man cave in a Whiter House, with mahogany paneling, brown leather Chesterfields, a moose head over the fireplace, an elevator for the presidential limo, and one of those men’s club signs on the phone that reads: “Telephone Tips: ‘Just Left,’ 25 cents; ‘On His Way,’ 50 cents; ‘Not here,’ $1; ‘Who?’ $5.”

In its delusional death spiral, the white male patriarchy was so hard core, so redolent of country clubs and Cadillacs, it made little effort not to alienate women. The election had the largest gender gap in the history of the Gallup poll, with Obama winning the vote of single women by 36 percentage points.

As W.’s former aide Karen Hughes put it in Politico on Friday, “If another Republican man says anything about rape other than it is a horrific, violent crime, I want to personally cut out his tongue.”

Some Republicans conceded they were “a ‘Mad Men’ party in a ‘Modern Family’ world” (although “Mad Men” seems too louche for a candidate who doesn’t drink or smoke and who apparently dated only one woman). They also acknowledged that Romney’s strategists ran a 20th-century campaign against David Plouffe’s 21st-century one.

But the truth is, Romney was an unpalatable candidate. And shocking as it may seem, his strategists weren’t blowing smoke when they said they were going to win; they were just clueless.

Until now, Republicans and Fox News have excelled at conjuring alternate realities. But this time, they made the mistake of believing their fake world actually existed. As Fox’s Megyn Kelly said to Karl Rove on election night, when he argued against calling Ohio for Obama: “Is this just math that you do as a Republican to make yourself feel better?”

Romney and Tea Party loonies dismissed half the country as chattel and moochers who did not belong in their “traditional” America. But the more they insulted the president with birther cracks, the more they tried to force chastity belts on women, and the more they made Hispanics, blacks and gays feel like the help, the more these groups burned to prove that, knitted together, they could give the dead-enders of white male domination the boot.

The election about the economy also sounded the death knell for the Republican culture wars.

Romney was still running in an illusory country where husbands told wives how to vote, and the wives who worked had better get home in time to cook dinner. But in the real country, many wives were urging husbands not to vote for a Brylcreemed boss out of a ’50s boardroom whose party was helping to revive a 50-year-old debate over contraception.

Just like the Bushes before him, Romney tried to portray himself as more American than his Democratic opponent. But America’s gallimaufry wasn’t knuckling under to the gentry this time.

If 2008 was about exalting the One, 2012 was about the disenchanted Democratic base deciding: “We are the Ones we’ve been waiting for.”

Last time, Obama lifted up the base with his message of hope and change; this time the base lifted up Obama, with the hope he will change. He has not led the Obama army to leverage power, so now the army is leading Obama.

When the first African-American president was elected, his supporters expected dramatic changes. But Obama feared that he was such a huge change for the country to digest, it was better if other things remained status quo. Michelle played Laura Petrie, and the president was dawdling on promises. Having Joe Biden blurt out his support for gay marriage forced Obama’s hand.

The president’s record-high rate of deporting illegal immigrants infuriated Latinos. Now, on issues from loosening immigration laws to taxing the rich to gay rights to climate change to legalizing pot, the country has leapt ahead, pulling the sometimes listless and ruminating president by the hand, urging him to hurry up.

More women voted than men. Five women were newly elected to the Senate, and the number of women in the House will increase by at least three. New Hampshire will be the first state to send an all-female delegation to Congress. Live Pink or Dye.

Meanwhile, as Bill Maher said, “all the Republican men who talked about lady parts during the campaign, they all lost.”

The voters anointed a lesbian senator, and three new gay congressmen will make a total of five in January. Plus, three states voted to legalize same-sex marriage. Chad Griffin, the president of the Human Rights Campaign, told The Washington Post’s Ned Martel that gays, whose donations helped offset the Republican “super PACs,” wanted to see an openly gay cabinet secretary and an openly gay ambassador to a G-20 nation.

Bill O’Reilly said Obama’s voters wanted “stuff.” He was right. They want Barry to stop bogarting the change.