I'd like to know what the hacks on the American Right are referring to when they say our freedoms are being encroached upon. Whenever I hear this I consider to what extent my freedom has been reduced. I can never ever think of a single thing that the government has kept me from doing. If anything, freedom weighs too heavily.

What is it these hacks in reality lack? Or is it simply a lie, like so much of what they say? In other words, are they positing a benefice they know the hillbilly class hankers after so as to inform them of the fact that they’ve been deprived of it? Are they offering the dog a bone so as to draw him away from the barbecue where actual meats are being grilled, to draw him towards a corner of the yard from where he won’t access any real food?

Let’s assume for a minute that the Right’s simply rabble rousing. That by positing Freedom! and getting Middle America to expect that they have as much right to it as anyone else, these hacks imply that someone else (the Liberals) has deprived them of it. And if someone dares deprive the hillbillies of their freedom, the Right will protect them. The hillbillies will be made to see that someone is responsible for their lack of Freedom, for their diminution of Freedom, and it’s the Liberals! Is the Right banking on the misery of the human condition, did it identify a weakness in all of us, a spot that might be touched? After all, don’t we all want more than we have, don’t we all want to be free? Otherwise, why would a hillbilly militate against taxation of the rich when that’s the way funding might be secured for the health clinic he turns to in need?