THE GREAT DIVIDE: THE POLITICAL LEFT AND POLITICAL RIGHT WAGE A MODERN-DAY CIVIL WAR FOR THE AMERICAN SOUL.

During the American Civil War, there were no fence sitters. Every American chose a side. In the border States, especially, brother fought against brother and father fought against son. Foreign nations stayed out of the fray, perceiving the war as an internal matter between two sides—each with its own needs, its own perspective, its own interpretation of the relation between the Federal Government to the States.“It was therefore much to the chagrin of United States President Abraham Lincoln when, in 1861, near the outset of the American Civil War, the British government recognized the belligerency of the Confederate States that had unilaterally seceded from the Union. This recognition caused the British to be neutral in the domestic American conflict and to aid neither the rebels nor the government.” “The Concept of Belligerency in International Law,” 166 Mil. L. Rev. 109, 114, December 2000, by  Lieutenant Colonel Yair M. Lootsteen, Israel Defense Forces (IDF). Arguably, Americans are headed toward outright civil war today. Granted, this present state of civil unrest has not devolved into actual armed conflict—at least not yet. But, in an important respect the situation existent in our Nation today bespeaks civil unrest as pronounced as that which led to the American Civil War. The outcome of this present day civil unrest will shape the future contours of our Nation as assuredly as the outcome of the American Civil War had shaped the contours of our Nation once Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses S. Grant, in 1865.As use of the words ‘Yankee’ and ‘Rebel’ served, effectively, as colloquial expressions and shorthand descriptors for the opposing sides of the American Civil War, we see, today, as well, use of expressions, such as ‘Liberal Left’ and ‘Conservative Right’ bandied about in the media as shorthand descriptors for the two opposing sides in the modern American conflict. The terminology in use today, simplistic as it is, does underscore a clear, explicit, categorical, demarcation between two sides, in clear and perpetual opposition. As with the American Civil War, there are no fence sitters in this modern day civil war, even as many Americans proclaim themselves, ostensibly, to be independent, taking no side in this period of civil unrest.Through time, each side’s political, social, and economic philosophies have solidified. There is no debate. There can be none. Any attempt at compromise is impossible. Each side holds resolutely to one of two irreconcilable, mutually incompatible positions, representing two polar opposite ideological strains within the American polity. And, every American has a stake in the outcome of this present day state of nascent civil war.Transpiring today is more than mere “Culture War.” Americans are locked in mortal, internecine combat. The differences are stark and are readily perceived on multiple fronts. The outcome will change the very structure of the United States, as an independent sovereign Nation, forever.Each side views the Nation’s institutions from a different ideological perspective. Each side views the relationship of individual to Government and the relationship of one individual to another in a different light, even attaching a different meaning to the notion of ‘citizen.’ One major point of contention—an incipient and inevitable flashpoint that defines and clarifies the two sides—concerns how each side perceives the U.S. Constitution and, especially, how each side perceives the rights and liberties codified in the Nation’s Bill of Rights.Liberals view the Bill of Rights as a set of man-made rules—constructs, contrivances, subject to modification and de facto repeal, as time and circumstance dictate, not unlike any Congressional Statute. Conservatives, though, view the Bill of Rights as natural law, intrinsic to each American citizen, fundamental and inalienable, therefore immutable; not man-made, and, so, superior to Congressional Statute, never subject to modification, much less perfunctory rejection.Liberals view the freedom of speech clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as subject to constraint and modification on the basis of emotional impact to particular groups. Censorship is condoned if the purpose is to spare the feelings of groups. Conservatives view the freedom of speech clause as demanding full expression, consistent with high Court rulings. Censorship is to be avoided. Liberals play the game of “Identity Politics.” Conservatives do not.Liberals view the right of the people to keep and bear arms, as codified in the Second Amendment, as  archaic—to be ignored or to be statutorily constrained. Conservatives view the right of the people to keep and bear arms as pertinent today as at the founding of the Republic. The right of the people to keep and bear arms is absolutely fundamental to the autonomy of the American citizen and essential to the preservation of a free Republic, as the framers of the U.S. Constitution envisioned.There are other marked differences between The Liberal Left and the Conservative Right. The Liberal Left views moral acts from the standpoint of the impact of behavior on society as a whole. Personal intent and motivation behind one’s actions is considered irrelevant. The Liberal Left defines the moral good as maximizing utility for the greatest number of people. That ethical perspective detrimentally affects the rights and liberties of the individual. The Conservative Right, on the other hand, views morally good acts and morally wrong acts from the standpoint of a person’s intent. Maximizing utility for the multitude never outweighs the needs and interests of the individual.Liberals espouse a policy of open and porous borders, reflecting the idea that the notion of ‘citizen of the United States’ is essentially redundant in an increasingly globalized world. And they see the expression, ‘citizen of the United States,’ in the near future, as becoming essentially meaningless. For liberals, the people of any Country are deemed merely “citizens of the world,” and therefore free to emigrate to any nation at will. Liberals wish to see naturalization laws changed to recognize, exemplify, and reflect the idea that anyone who wishes to reside in the United States ought to be permitted to do so. Conservatives argue that a Sovereign Nation State—to be worthy of the name—must maintain the integrity of its borders. For Conservatives, no citizen or subject of a foreign power can legitimately stake claim to residing in the United States as a matter of legal or moral right. Conservatives maintain that Congress has sole authority, as the Constitution mandates, to determine who may emigrate to the U.S. and who may not, and to place restrictions on the number of those emigrating to this Country.The Political Left accepts--consistent with its view of the ‘Nation State’ as an archaic concept--the eventual dismantling of the United States as an independent Sovereign Nation. The Political Left sees this process as inevitable, inexorable, and irreversible. The Political Right views the dismantling of the United States as an anathema—a process, neither inevitable nor irreversible, and one to be prevented at all costs.Liberals believe in the utility and propriety of propaganda and psychological conditioning to effectuate their goals. Those who espouse Democratic liberalism, as that concept is understood and glorified, and placed into practice by the governing "elites" of the EU, do not believe in the autonomy and inviolability of the individual, and therefore do not profess concern over using the tools of propaganda to manipulate the American psyche to promote the Left’s policy goals. Americans are witnessing, in recent years, the explosive use of mind-control techniques, permitted and propagated through the Bureaucratic Deep State within the federal Government, and through the mainstream Press, and by billionaire CEOs of left-wing technological Companies, intent on promoting a socialist agenda, notwithstanding that such an agenda is inconsistent with the core values of our Nation and of our Nation’s history; inconsistent with our Constitution and system of laws; and inconsistent with the preservation of our Nation as a free Republic.Conservatives do not countenance use of propaganda or psychological conditioning to alter the mindset of the American citizenry under any circumstance. For the use of such techniques damage the individual psyche and spirit. Conservatives hold the use of such techniques to be intolerable. They view the use of such techniques as incompatible with the exercise of one’s free will. Moreover, for Conservatives, the idea that the United States can and ought to be relegated eventually to the status of a subordinate cog in a world-wide socialist federation of Western States is horrific in the very contemplation.The election of Donald Trump to the Office of President of the United States is illustrative of the battle for the soul of this Nation. Conservatives voted for Donald Trump as an act of defiance against a deviant Liberal tidal wave--a tidal wave that seeks to obliterate our Nation's core values, to shred our Nation's sacred traditions, to erase our Nation's unique and lasting history, and to reduce the population of our Country to abject servitude in docile service to an international ruling "elite." Curiously, the Political Left talks incessantly about a Constitutional crisis impacting this Nation and about the failure of Trump and the Political Right to adhere to “the rule of law.” Yet, it is abundantly clear that, although a Constitutional crisis does exist, it is one of the Political Left’s own making, starkly evidenced by, and through, the illegal appointment of a Special Counsel, Robert Mueller, whose sole purpose is to manufacture a reason to indict a duly elected, sitting President of the United States.Whether for good cause or no—and no cause whatsoever exists here for removing the U.S. President, Donald Trump, in any event—criminal indictment of a sitting President has never before occurred in our Nation, and no provision for indictment of a sitting President exists in the U.S. Constitution, and that is so for good reason: to preclude the subversion of the will of the American People by a hidden, powerful, inordinately wealthy upper class that seeks to create a Country amenable to their special, and exclusive interests. Robert Mueller’s audacious attempt to even consider compelling the U.S. President to appear before a Grand Jury is indicative of a dangerous coup d’état playing out before the American electorate by a secretive "elite."Liberals constantly maintain that the American people are a Nation governed by the rule of law. That means our Nation is to be governed by law, not by men. What the very existence of the Bureaucratic Deep State, entrenched with hundreds if not thousands of holdovers from the Obama Administration, demonstrates, though, is that We, the People, are a Nation that is consistently ruled not by law, but by men, contrary to the platitudes voiced by politicians of the Liberal Left.Americans are indeed in the midst of major civil unrest, headed toward outright civil war. How this plays out will be seen through President Trump’s ability to weather all underhanded attempts to destroy his Presidency and by the strength of those Americans who have not been deluded and are fully capable of perceiving the presence of and understanding the inherent danger presented by a ruthless, cunning and intractable foe lurking ominously in their midst.If the Political Left prevails--and as its failure to seat the devious, duplicitous, anti-American Globalist Hillary Clinton in the White House has not prevented the Political Left's efforts to dismantle a Country situated as a sovereign Nation State, but, rather, has caused the Political Left merely to redouble its  treacherous efforts to defeat the Will of a Conservative populist surge desirous of preserving a Nation founded on the sacred principles of the founding fathers, as those principles have been set in stone in the U.S. Constitution and in the Constitution's sacred Bill of Rights--socialism will rear its ugly head, and a sovereign Nation State, a free Republic, and a free people, will be well-nigh forever lost._________________________________________________Copyright © 2018 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.