I was reading an article last night that talked about family estrangement. The whole idea of estrangement has always been foreign to me. Certainly, there are some family members that you talk to more than others. Obviously, there is a natural dividing line between family we would consider to be close and family that is extended beyond what is reasonable to expect a regular connection with. The folks talking about family estrangement aren’t really talking about that.

In particular, the article I read was focused more on the relationship between adult children and their parents. According to one article, as many as one and four Americans and one in five Europeans reports they are estranged from at least one family member. Again, I’m not sure how that is defined. The focus of the articles seemed to be on parent/child relationships but even that figure in Europe seems high much less the U.S. figure.

Estrangement is a unique thing. It means ties are severed forever. They become persona non grata and that just seems like an extreme measure. Yet, it is not difficult to see why it is on the rise. The politics of the last five or so years have gone from bad to downright frightening. I can’t relate in my own family and yet my wife is estranged from some of her extended family. It has always been the case as long as I’ve known her and as far as I know it isn’t political in nature.

Everyone likes to put this at the door of one man and I suppose that seems natural enough. Yet, that cannot account for the fact that this is happening in Europe as well. I have no idea if it is happening on other continents as well. I suppose that research would be easy enough. There has always been tension between the generations. Go back far enough and you will see quotes about how the new generation just doesn’t get it. They’ve become soft. They’ve become entitled. They’ve become fill in the blank. At any point in history they could have been talking about our own generation.

So, it isn’t that either. Our daughter honestly feels like things will get better when her generation takes over. They weren’t the ones to muck it up. I had to point out that Generation X says that about the Baby Boomers. Yet, enough of us (Generation X) are in positions of power that we now get to own whatever it is that has gone wrong. I also had to point out that the people in her classes that she calls idiots, jackasses, and whatever else will some day be in charge.

Again, that’s all natural and has always been there. This is something else entirely. This is finding out that someone in your family has become so vile and so toxic that we cannot associate with them anymore. I suppose we could say they’ve become that which we loathe, but chances are they always were that and we didn’t notice. Chances are we even saw it and told ourselves we could live with it before. It’s just another brick in the walls that divide us and goodness knows if those walls will ever be torn down.

Yeah, MAGA Mom and Gun Dad aren’t going anywhere. It’s like the Republican Revolution came home to rest.

Okay, it’s time for Friday Fun.

Fox News Began its War on Christmas this week and wants you to know that Joe and Jill Biden are throwing away money like it’s cheap perfume at a CPAC convention.

Here ya go.

Here’s the fun part.  You fill in the blank in the comments section. Wrong answers only, please.

The Trump White House did not have this wasteful expense because  ______.

The funny thing about fear is that it is all a part of the same conversation. Women are afraid that their rights will be taken away after 48 years and that is the big news item of the day. Protesters from the summer and before were finally standing up to rogue law enforcement forcing people of color to live in fear of their lives when they encounter law enforcement. The fear I’m thinking of today is a lot closer to home.

It’s sad when you see that fear first hand. It’s heartbreaking when you see it in your own children. Our daughter’s school had a couple of days of bomb threats this week. Social media is doing what it does and managed to spread all kinds of rumors about what might happen. So, more than half the school decided to stay home yesterday. The principal said those absences would be excused. She obviously understood the impulse.

My wife and I sat there as our daughter cried when we discussed her coming to school today. We left it up to her. Forcing her to go seemed somehow cruel. Yet, she talked a long time about the guilt of avoiding a possible event. It didn’t make sense and yet it made perfect sense. She decided to go and yet the fear she is feeling is unavoidable. We can only hope it dissipates before it becomes a permanent thing.

The source of this fear is the same. The abortion ban, Rittenhouse, our hometown domestic terrorist, rogue law enforcement, and isolated gun nuts all look the same. They are all virtually the same. None of them look like the people they want you to fear. They all look like the people pointing the finger. Funny how that all works out. No one knows the identity of the kid making threats at the school, but the good money says it’s a white male. It almost always is.

Animal behavior can teach us a lot. We have a 100 pound Rottweiler, 16 pound ginger cat, and a ten pound tabby cat at home. The tabby cat has an overactive sense of fear. She somehow channels that fear and turns it into rage as she lashes out at the other two. The dog doesn’t want to be within ten feet of her. Here is this huge and physically imposing animal cowering in fear of something one-tenth his size. I’m sure there’s a metaphor in there somewhere.

Perhaps it’s personification instead. A relatively small group of people are so activated by fear that they induce real terror in the rest of us. We often expect them to look in the mirror and attack the reflection. The opportunists among them somehow manage to take a fear they created and turn around and offer protection from it. When you see it happening in general it makes you angry. When you see it happening to your own family it breaks your heart. When you see a little jackass using the exact same tactics as one of the two major political parties it makes you incredibly sad. The monsters are indeed hiding under the bed and they are pointing the fingers at everyone else. I guess it’s time to sleep with the light on.

A jackass at my daughter’s school has decided to call in bomb threats on two consecutive days. The local police are on the case. The sheriff’s office is on the case. The FBI is on the case. I’m sure every teacher and principal are studying the voice on the other line to see if they can identify him. There are all kinds of silly rumors as to why this kid is doing this. The answer is simple. He wants others to feel afraid because that somehow gives him power.

Calling in terroristic threats is a felony. This kid will be found and it won’t be pretty when they do. However, that knowledge in the background hit me when I heard an Eva Guzman ad again this morning. She is running for attorney general in Texas. She will presumably have to go through Ken Paxton and the infamous Louie Gohmert. You have to try really hard to out-slime those two.

Guzman’s ads tell us that she will tackle the immigration problem as attorney general. The only thing is that she doesn’t call it a problem. She calls it an invasion. As you might suspect, she also goes into the other stereotypes and misconceptions about them stealing our resources, committing crimes, and coming after you and your grandchildren. Democratic policies are making it worse and we are at a crossroads.

Except we aren’t. Illegal immigration is not a growing problem. Illegal immigrants are not committing crimes at the same rate. It is illegal for them to collect social security. It is illegal for them to get welfare. Hell, it is illegal for them to work at all. So, what exactly are we doing here? These ads are long on emotion. They want you to feel afraid. They want you to feel angry. They want you to hate. They just aren’t all that long on facts. Facts don’t help them. Facts just get in the way of a good story.

The 64,000 pound elephant in the room hits you squarely across the chest when you realize that Eva Guzman (and those like her) are using the exact same tactics as that kid calling in a bomb threat. The reality of Guzman’s threats are about as valid as the boy’s threats. There’s no bomb. There’s no invasion. The world isn’t going to hell in a ham basket because someone came across the border or because a boy decided to become a girl or vice versa. Oh, it might be going to hell alright, but it won’t be because of any of those things.

The hell we fear is a hell of our own creation. It was one that spins out of our fear. It is one that comes from the notion of life as a zero sum game where everything someone else gets is something that we don’t. It’s a fear where we point at people that aren’t like us and turn their desire just to exist into an existential threat to our humanity and culture. Be afraid. Be very afraid and while you’re at it why don’t you try on this hate for size. It fits you well.

So here’s what she said the crying angry guy told her about abortion.

“We talked about whether he considered Roe to be settled law. He said that he agreed with what Justice Roberts said at his nomination hearing, in which he said that it was settled law.”

Yeah, Kavanaugh made it very clear today that Collins is either a liar or exceptionally stoopid.