I don't know if it's my hormones, my brain chemicals, or if I'm picking up on the silent drumbeats of something wicked this way coming, but I feel a sense of dread.

I don't intend to go down without a fight.

Politically, it is difficult to classify me as strictly conservative or liberal. On the one hand, I believe the rampant greed of corporations is ruining not only our country, but our planet and the future of the human race. On the other, I believe traditions and long-held social rules are too easily tossed aside without a thought to the effects losing them may cause.

I'm feeling a bit squeezed in the middle. What if I think abortion is a horrible thing, but believe it is sometimes the lesser of two evils? I'm not pro-abortion, but I'm not against its existence, either. What if I am religious, but oppose the way religion is used politically? I feel pushed on both sides to either defend religion or attack it. And I have to say, neither one seems to have the slightest clue to why I believe what I believe or how I feel about it. One side seems to foam at the mouth at the slightest mention of Christianity, the other seems equally deranged if someone voices any sort of limits on it.

I resist the urge to pick a side, but I feel the pressure nonetheless: polarize or die!

Down the line, both sides seem unwilling to move from their corners. Take gay marriage. It's reasonable to say that the government can't tell religion what to do and religion can't tell government what to do. Why not divide up the two sides of marriage? People go down to the courthouse to legally bind themselves to one another, and that binding contract covers property issues and who gets to decide medical treatment and other legal stuff like that. Separately, they go to church or synagogue or mosque or temple for their religious obligations, should they have them. Why is this such a hard thing to hammer out?

Every day, I hear more about privatizing water. Yes, because it's worked so well for our other utilities. Do "we the people" own nothing? These things were considered everyone's community property at one point -- the airwaves, the natural gas, electricity. Now water? This is bullshit, people. It's a myth that business runs things better than the government. I'm not bragging about the government here, but for-profits screw up, too. And WE'RE the government! So if the government messes up, it's supposed to be OUR job to fix it. Plus, our market choices keep dwindling. When there's no competition to scare a business into performing well, they cut corners and screw the consumer. We better start paying attention and demanding better for ourselves.

This isn't about left-wing or right-wing. This is about 1 percent of our nation's population controlling the other 99 percent. And that is not how America is meant to be.