You Say You Want a Revolution? Well. You know.

When Jerad and Amanda Miller cried "Revolution!" and let slip the dogs of something less than war, they had a plan, of sorts.

Kelley Fielder lived next door to the Millers and called them her “best friends.” She said she didn’t know they were “that crazy.”

She was holding documents for the couple that included detailed plans to take over a courthouse and execute public officials. The file box full of documents, along with three empty rifle cases and an empty box for handcuffs, were confiscated by investigators during a search of Fielder’s apartment.

The reported plans by the killers to take over a courthouse prompted officials at the Regional Justice Center to adopt “a heightened state of security,” with added personnel and “other measures,” according to Court Information Officer Mary Ann Price. She declined to say how many additional marshals were added to the courthouse detail or give any information about extra steps that had been taken, saying “part of our preparedness is not giving out a lot of details.”

These were definitely some very busy jackasses. They apparently went all in for Cliven Bundy, but the militia rejected Jerad because he was a convicted felon. He pointed out, sensibly enough, that by threatening BLM officers with guns, they all were kind of felonious, really. Jerad Miller also posted at Infowars, and interestingly enough, Alex Jones is now maintaining that the couple is definitely a false flag. Well if that's the case, then Jones must realize he was infiltrated years ago, and everybody just better take anything they read there, of all places, with a grain of salt, huh?

Of course, maybe my brand of flippancy is a little out of place. See, I don't think these were crazy people. I don't. They weren't out of their heads, psychotic, disassociated and illogical. They were stupid people saturated with an ethos that told them that shedding the blood of tyrants was patriotism, and they saw law enforcement as tyrants, and there we are. Jerad Miller's rant at Infowars regarding his and his spouse's rights post-drug bust actually makes sense, in a way.

But what they missed is, cops aren't the enemy. Politicians might sometimes be dumb, corrupt, and concupiscent, but they aren't the enemy. (Shit, you can vote the fuckers out if they are evidently egregious, in theory if not in practice--and why don't we practice that, more?) Those police officers had families and were just taking time off the job to have lunch. These misguided murderous dopes were barking up the wrong tree.

The enemies, I think, of what I would call "The Good", are ignorance and alienation, and boy, these young people were soaking in it. Conspiracy theories and paranoia have a kind of viral tendency to hijack healthy minds, and folks like Alex Jones and a not-inconsiderable element within the right blogosphere (WND, Newsmax?) seem to egg it on. They ask, "Who do you believe--your lying eyes, or our immanently plausible 'reliable (and unnamed) sources'?" And the next thing you know, your family and old friends are "sheeple" because they don't see your particular monsters. But Jerad and Amanda saw monsters, all right.

When Amanda shot her husband and then herself, I wonder if she was the monster she saw?  I guess we won't ever really know that. But even though I'm marking this down in my mind as a senseless tragedy, I get it. They were misled. And they were murderous and dumb. But I still have to point a crooked little finger at the toxic bullshit they were soaking in. Because I know there are people who churn that stuff out--and I'd be damned if they believe all of it. Or even care if people act on it. And their indifference disgusts me.