In “The Emerging Third-World US,” (http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_francis__080225_the_emerging_third_w.htm)Francis Ferguson, using confirmable data, paints what I believe is an extraordinarily likely scene; ugly without question, but really ugly nonetheless.

Francis Ferguson is, or used to be, an econ prof, and thus speaks with some authority. But I don’t care about his bona fides, and neither should anyone else. Neither a professorship, nor any other degree, nor even a high school diploma, are, or should be, prerequisites en route to grasping what the good professor is espousing. Let me rail at all that is necessary, but which anecdotally seems horribly absent in Americans, ages 2 through 102.

Remember Robert Dinero’s great 4 line Taxi Driver inquiry, “You talkin’ to me?”   

YEAH! I’M TALKIN’ TO YOU! Just like this Bud, this one’s for YOU!

All that is necessary to understand what the hell has been going on in America, and what Ferguson was talking about, is for folks to take it upon themselves to have at least as much interest in their own circumstances, and that of their progeny, as they do in, say, some dumb-assed football game or television program that will have zero impact on their lives. If Tom Brady had never been born, besides his friends, those in his family and those in the New England area who directly drawn an income as a consequence of his participation in professional football, or if Dr. Phil or Oprah or Desperate Housewives were not on the air, would the cost of living be less or the monthly income smaller (what during the Carter administration was dubbed the “misery index)?

In other words, there is no law requiring that anyone be ignorant of basic, rather uncomplicated principles of economics or the structure of American government or American and world history. And all that’s needed for any of that is some excess desire to be just a little informed, the strength in either a thumb or finger to click off the TV remote (or keep it on, just change the station to C-SPAN), and the ability to read.

Two examples what I’m referring to when I suggest an underlying criminal — or, should be criminal; capital offense and I’d gladly serve as the hangman — ignorance in the American electorate.

One.

I reside during the winter in a senior park in Palm Springs. A few days ago I heard one mid-60s woman tell another mid-60s woman how her 18-year-old grandson had “this flag.” It had a diagonal blue cross inlaid with white stars, all against a red background.

I interjected, “It’s the “stars and bars.”

“Well, I think” she paused momentarily, “it’s the Confederate flag,” the woman replied.

Clearly, in her high school history class, she had somehow missed the fact the two are synonymous. (Synonymous, for those who didn’t pass English, means they mean the same thing.)

“How, why . . .” I was stunned, “why would anyone want such a symbol? Doesn’t he know what that flag means today? It’s code. Bigotry, like . . . if you’re African-American, ‘ya-all not wanted hih-ah boy. See, we-ah got this hih noose, call it a rope necktie. Heh, heh . . . now . . . ah . . . wah doan ya-all liv wilst ya-all kin? Know whut Ahm sayin’ to yih boy?’”

“Well, I don’t think he knows that — it was just a souvenir from Louisiana.”

 For starters, I don’t buy it that her grandson didn’t know. My speculation is that she doesn’t know her grandson any better than she does American history.

Two.

(For all who may not be aware, C-SPAN’s Washington Journal viewer call-in program airs from 7:00 AM to 10:00 AM, Eastern time. I live in the Pacific time-zone.)

From her voice, my guess is she was late-middle age, and was definitely from the South. “Ah couldn’t vote fer no one whut dint swear his oath on the Bible. An’ Barak Obama, see-ins he’s a Muzlim in all . . . he don’t war no flag, or salute the ‘Merican flag er nuthin’, an’ I heerd he refused to say the Pledge Allegiance. An thet’s uhl whut Ah gots ta say.”

What makes this so incredible and supportive of my anecdotal suppositions concerning the dearth of information that inheres in the American electorate is that this anecdote is not the least atypical of calls that frequently reach the air from viewers who, one might suppose, are among the best informed.

And why I rail as I do is because being reasonably informed today is so darned easy. And what Professor Ferguson was opining was not some difficult-to-understand, arcane PhD thesis. But very few, I would wager, are aware, and of those who are, fewer still even care.

My position is well known in the camp. Just because someone smiles and is rather pleasant  and goes to church regularly does not make that person either a good person or one I choose to associate with. Either their ignorance or their identification with the GOP makes of them as much my enemy as any foreign despot. If they are willing to toss my sons and any grandchildren I might someday have through them, or any others who may be disadvantaged, off the train, and more and more are becoming so as a direct result of GOP policies they endorsed, how are they not my enemy? And being my enemy, why should I abide them gracefully? Moreover, why should I not respond openly to them, with the hostility they have generated, as I would anyone deserving of being loathed?