We’re being tested. Republican politicians and pundits are busy testing the American public, trying to assess how ignorant and distracted we are. While they already have a pretty good idea, they’re determined to get a precise reading. Testing is vitally important to these people because, if the United States is to be turned into a plutocracy, our collective ignorance is an absolute necessity.

Republicans are aware that most of us don’t pay attention to stuff like history, government and public policy. They’re aware that basic facts and principles tend to elude us. Some of that stuff is trivial, some isn’t. Many don’t know that the population of the U.S. is almost 312 million, or that we have 535 congressmen and senators, or that women weren’t allowed to vote until 1920, or that state legislatures, rather than citizens, chose our U.S. senators until 1913 (with passage of the 17th amendment). Some of this stuff is trivial, some isn’t.

Republicans already know that many middle and lower middle-class Americans don’t want to raise taxes on the rich because they’ve been conditioned to believe such a move represents the redistribution of wealth, and smacks of socialism or communism. Despite the fact that Barack Obama would have been considered a “Rockefeller Republican” in 1974, people can still get away with referring to him as a “socialist.” That’s because we’re being tested.

Although many people (including billionaire Warren Buffet) think it’s eminently fair to raise taxes on the rich, many still oppose it. You ask people (I’m speaking of regular working people) if they think taxes on the rich should be raised, and a significant percentage will say no. But when you ask if they think taxes on the rich should be lowered, they will also say no.

Apparently, they believe the tax structure is perfect, and that the rich are paying exactly what they should be paying. But when you ask what that amount is — when you ask them to cite the highest tax rate — they can’t. They haven’t a clue what it is. They don’t realize that, at 35 percent, the marginal rate is the lowest it’s been in many decades, and that to be taxed at the maximum, you have to earn more than $379,150. We’re being tested.

We all remember, some time ago, hearing about that Tea Party delegate holding up a placard with the words, “Keep the government out of my Medicare!” While the irony and ignorance revealed in those words were gist for much nighttime talk show hilarity, they were also terrifying. That bizarre message revealed that we have people out there who approve of and depend upon government programs, but have no idea the government provides them.

I have a friend who describes himself as a “libertarian independent,” and who believes that there’s a good chance the 1969 moon landing was, in fact, a hoax. Although he considers himself a genuine patriot, he hates the government and believes that virtually every elected official in Washington is liar and a thief.

During a phone conversation, I pulled a prank on him. Knowing how suspicious he was of political intrigue, I invented the story that the U.S. government had a secret plan to take us off the dollar, and put us on the yuan, China’s unit of currency. I told him the plan was supposed to be top secret, but word had leaked out. He became instantly energized by this news. He was simultaneously outraged, inflamed, excited and utterly focused, as it reinforced every suspicion he’d ever had.

But when I confessed that I’d just made it up in order to demonstrate how gullible he was, my prank backfired. Instead of taking a moment to step back and re-assess his personal biases, he said it didn’t matter that I’d made it up, because “it’s something that probably is being considered anyway.” We’re being tested.

David Macaray, a Los Angeles playwright and author (It’s Never Been Easy: Essays on Modern Labor), was a former union rep. He can be reached at dmacaray@earthlink.net.

STARKVILLE, Miss (Reuters) – Mississippi’s attorney general is offering a reward for information that helps locate a convicted murderer who vanished since his release from prison earlier this month after being pardoned by former Governor Haley Barbour.

Attorney General Jim Hood, who has challenged the legality of that pardon and around 200 others Barbour made in the final days of his term, also said the files for Joseph Ozment and 19 others were missing.

Authorities began looking for Ozment after the former inmate did not appear this week at a court hearing related to the pardons. Hood has offered an unspecified cash reward for information regarding Ozment’s whereabouts, a spokeswoman for the attorney general said.

Barbour, a former Republican National Committee chairman, sparked controversy by granting 222 pardons, commutations and suspensions, generating debate about how much power a governor should have to pardon criminals convicted of serious crimes.

Barbour has defended his clemency decisions and said he was confident they were all valid and blamed political opponents for much of the controversy.

Ozment, 40, had been serving a life sentence for the 1993 robbery and shooting death of a store clerk in northwest Mississippi. He was one of five prisoners who had worked at the governor’s mansion who saw their life prison terms lifted after receiving full pardons by Barbour.

Hood is seeking to void most of the pardons granted by Barbour because not enough public notice was given in the communities where the crimes were committed. He received a court order to temporarily block the pardons.

A judge allowed the five freed men, including Ozment, to remain out of prison while the matter is pending but required them to report daily to authorities. Ozment has not done so, according to corrections officials.

Hood’s spokeswoman said the Attorney General’s Office has not received files for 20 of the people pardoned by Barbour.

Laura Hipp, Barbour’s spokeswoman, said on Thursday that all of the files related to pardons were turned over to Hood’s staff on January 11.

(Reporting By Robbie Ward; Editing By Colleen Jenkins and Cynthia Johnston)

Copyright 2012 Thomson Reuters. Click for Restrictions.

In three weeks, more than 20,000 people in the Lowcountry and across the nation have signed a petition seeking to return a 2-year-old girl to her adoptive parents on James Island.