The Road to Splitsville MAGA CLOWNS SEEK DEATH FOR SELVES, OTHERS

The Newsletter for Subscribers to THE SPLIT

Yeah, yeah, everybody is talking about the news of the moment—Biden steps down; Kamala’s support is immediate and overwhelming; Trump is now the old man out and, among other things, desperate to avoid having to debate her; MAGA is losing what it adorably thinks of as its “mind.” But that’s getting play, and ink, and follows, and whatever, all over the place. So instead, we’re going to focus intently on a question nobody is asking. And getta loada how profound and philosophical and wise it sounds.

A split may require a civil war, but must a civil war require a split? Is being on the Road to Splitsville the same as being on the Road to Civilwarsville?

Of course, by “split” we mean (as we know you know), the separation of the blue states and the red states into two separate nations. Cf. the split in The Split. There are two ways this can come about.

The first is the mutually-agreed-upon decision to call it quits. Think of it as an amicable divorce. Such is the nature of the split in The Split. One faction says to-may-to. The other says to-mah-to. They call the whole thing off.

The other way one country can mitosis-ize itself into two involves the unilateral act of saying “fuck this, we’re out of here,” i.e., secession: One faction wants to leave; the Federal government says the geo-political version of, “Not so fast,” and a war is fought between the two sides, either to consummate the separation or nullify it. This is the kind of civil war we had when we had what we call the Civil War. (NB: This is not the kind of civil war they had in the movie Civil War, in which the US shattered into four—or was it five?—factions, nobody ever really explained why, and we never found out what the result was.)

So far, so familiar. But what if we reversed the equation? What if there were a civil war, but not one motivated by one faction’s desire to sever the legal, political, and constitutional bonds that bind it to the other? Can there even be such a thing? And, if so, how might it come about, who would do what to whom, and what the fuck?

For an answer, let us explore the ominous warning recently issued by a fine public servant and unbelievable putz serving in the Ohio State Senate. His name is George Lang, and this past Monday, per Raw Story, he warned

if Republicans lose the 2024 presidential election, “it’s going to take a civil war to save the country — and it will be saved.”

(NB: We’re not sure if the video plays properly on the Raw Story site. It did on Monday, but…)

This dire/stupid warning was uttered at a rally in Middletown, OH, on the occasion of a “hometown rally” by J.D. Vance, the soulless, tech-bro monarchist chosen by orange-spackled, sundowning GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump to run as his vice-president. It was Vance’s first solo appearance as veep candidate, and he distinguished himself by making a “joke” (that Democrats think drinking a Diet Mountain Dew is “racist”) that three people laughed at and no one understood. It took only that one appearance for Vance to cement his reputation for being as clueless about and tone-deaf to his audience as Jeb “Please Clap” Bush. For pundits to begin circulating rumors that Trump was beginning to regret his choice was but the work of a moment.

Now, on the one hand, “we’re headed for a civil war” has become a Republican crackpot cliché, much beloved and bandied about by hotheads, empty-heads, and cabbage heads on the right. But it differs significantly from Sen. Lang’s ultimatum. “We’re headed for a civil war” implies an impersonal, and inevitable, playing-out of mutual hostility. That “we” includes blue and red, left and right. The prediction has about it a whiff of physics; matter and anti-matter are on a collision course that cannot be stopped and will result in catastrophe.

Which, like, bummer.

Lang’s scenario—and meaning--is different. If, in 1861, Abraham Lincoln had said, “It’s going to take a civil war to save the country,” we would judge that he was correct. But his civil war happened in the context of a) the Confederacy creating itself, and then b) seceding from the union.

Lang doesn’t have, or need, such stage-setting. Lincoln’s version of that line would have arrived as a sigh of resignation. Lang’s comes as a threat. “It’s going to take a civil war” implies an elective procedure, something conducted (however regretfully or with insane relish) by a subjective agent acting on purpose. We recently noted that, pace Marjorie Taylor Greene’s call for a “national divorce,” many on the fascist/Christian theocratic right don’t want a split. They want to take over the entire US. Lang’s comment arrives in that context.

But, of course, it’s more than a threat. It’s a primo slice of crazy pizza, a batshit piece of bellicose hyperbole, issued from one brain-rotted MAGA nudnik to a roomful of others. It would nice if someone—a political reporter; a historian; a smart sixth grader—sat down with State Senator Lang and explored these and other issues:

1.   Who is going to participate in this “civil war”? Who will be the contending parties?

2.   Since it will be triggered by the Republicans losing the election this November—a result which seems a fuck-ton more probable than it did a week ago—when will it begin? Where? What will the Republican forces consist of, and whom will they attack?

3.   How will it be fought? How will the Republican army, with its 300 million hand guns and rifles, contend with the tanks, jets, bombs, missiles, soldiers, drones, naval forces, guns and rifles, and technological superiority (for instance, satellites that can read the serial number of the AR-15 you’re openly carrying; drones that recognize your face before blasting it off) of the armed forces of the USA?

4.   What are the stakes? What will the winner acquire and achieve? If (by definition) the Democrats have won the election, and the Republicans somehow win the civil war, what will be the geo-political/constitutional ramifications? Will the winning side technically still even be the United States of America? If not, then what?

5.   What should be the fate of the losing side?

6.   How, if one half of the nation illegally attacks the other half for having legitimately won a presidential election, can causing the mass death and destruction of war be called “saving the country”?

7.   Will you, Ohio State Senator George Lang, take up arms for your sacred, or whatever it is, cause? Are you willing to die for Donald Trump?

There are other questions. You may have some yourself. And it’s possible we’re taking this idiot too seriously. But don’t laugh. Or, rather, do laugh, but first note that it’s talk like this that inspires the lunatics of the right. Many innocent Black people have been killed by brain-poisoned renegades who, having heard and read about it for years, hoped to “spark a race war.” It is exactly this sort of thing—citing “a civil war” and announcing “retribution” and noting that “the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants” that inspires the desperate would-be heroes (or suicides) of the fringe to act out, start shooting, and cause real tragedy.

 It is entirely possible that Lang meant his reckless/fatuous comment as nothing more than political campaign grandstanding, a catchy way to introduce a local celebrity pol. If so, then that’s because, like so much of MAGA, he’s a jerk. Most jerks are harmless. But especially now, if things go as they appear they’re going to go, the foot soldiers and officers of Trump’s army of orcs are going to get increasingly frustrated and enraged. By the middle of November, with Trump having lost, there may be more than one seething “patriot” who has heard this provoking language once too often, and is ready to start his own private civil war.

Better, we think, to be on the Road to Splitsville.