Never On Sunday

Good god.

A movement underway to create a state-sponsored (that’s “state” as in “one of the fifty states”) but privately recruited, privately armed, and privately trained militia to resist federal law. Militia movements are nothing new, nor unique to Oklahoma, but open talk of official backing chills the blood. Of course, the state of Oklahoma already has a militia in place: the National Guard. But apparently the National Guard is insufficiently committed to the notion that people—well, a certain kind of people—should be allowed to ignore laws they really don’t like.

I take protestations that “it’s not a far-right crazy plan or anything like that” as a direct admission that the initiative is precisely that. Also, terrifyingly, a direct parallel to the SA: a violent populist movement, backed by ultra-conservative interests willing to unleash them rather than release their grip on power simply because of a few elections.