The bizarre events surrounding the bathroom battle between the state of North Carolina and the United States have the whiff of Sarajevo in 1914.  Who knew Europe would collapse into the first world war in human history over the assassination of an obscure archduke?  Will an obscure fight over bathroom use by transgenders in North Carolina be viewed in the rear window of history as the event that set off the looming war between the American people and their own government?

The "ground," the term for the battlefield used by General Robert E Lee in a previous civil war, has been chosen for the Battle of the Bathrooms – federal court.  The righteous General  Loretta Lynch, attorney general of the United States, has taken to the field with zeal to lead the Federals from the front.  Her opening salvo was a shrill letter demanding that the state of North Carolina rescind N.C. House Bill 2 or face legal action and the withdrawal of federal funding to public schools and universities.

In other words, she threatened and extorted a sovereign state over a bizarre issue that is claimed to apply specifically to so-called "transgenders," a miniscule percentage of the population.  One statewide study in California estimates the "trans" percentage to be 0.1 of the population.

The state's HB2 law states, rather logically, that your sex is legally identified by what is written on your birth certificate.  The purpose of HB2 was to supersede a local Charlotte, N.C. ordinance empowering people to use male and female bathroom facilities of their choice, based only on their proclivity toward one sex or another.

The letter infuriated N.C.'s governor and legislature on several levels, including the insulting demand that the state reply in three working days, obviously an act of war in itself.  Cornered and angry, the state fought back with a lawsuit, claiming that the Obama regime had overreached its authority – and hey, while the Feds are at it, would they please define who, or what, is what in the federal sexual identification handbook?

General Lynch struck back with a rambling, incoherent national television address.  She described the North Carolina  law – that women and men use specific bathroom facilities – as the same as separate "White" and "Colored" restrooms in the South over 60 years ago.  The general must be demented with fog of war syndrome by associating totally disconnected situations – the preposterous fight over bathroom use and the world-changing battle against racial injustice.  The tirade was an underhanded ploy suggesting just how deranged this whole mess is, including the mental stability of the "transgender community."

By her actions and words, she escalated what had been a skirmish into total war.  Canceled concerts and conventions and business relocations have taken their toll.  Even Itzak Pearlman pulled out of a concert with the N.C. Symphony, citing HB2 as the reason.  He probably was not informed that the issue is about men striding into female facilities with no consequences and applies only to state property and public schools and universities.

Speaking of universities, North Carolina has experience dealing with the fabrications and misinformation that are part of a battle with the feds.  In 1977, the Department of Health Education & Welfare (now defunct), under Jimmy Carter's administration, threatened to sue the UNC system of 14 colleges and universities (now 17) for failure to reach out to recruit minorities.

The question was, why pick on UNC, a paragon of higher education "progress," including hiring a chancellor for minority enrollment, outreach to recruit disadvantaged applicants, and remedial courses for students accepted by affirmative action?  Compared to its sister Southern university systems, HEW should have been congratulating rather than excoriating UNC's adherence to the new federally enforced paradigm of racial revenge in the South.

The war between UNC and HEW stretched on for ten years, accompanied by incessant criticism of UNC in the local media for committing a crime no one could identify.  Today, it's the same sad story.  The media have taken the side of the DOJ against their own leaders and readers with no interest in fairly representing the facts of the issue.  The DOJ is using harsh rhetoric to criticize the people of North Carolina – just as HEW belittled the UNC university system – in order to demand they ramp up outreach to transgenders.

One evening in the HEW battle, UNC's leading negotiator woke up before dawn prompted by a thought: HEW is not telling me what it wants.  That's why the struggle continued, even when UNC agreed to and implemented their demands.

He flew to Washington without contacting the HEW staff he had worked with for a decade.  Wheels down at National Airport, he called the HEW crowd and said, I need to meet with you – right now.  The meeting was convened, and the UNC V.P. asked point-blank: why aren't you telling me what you really want?

After a  few moments of silence, the HEW person in charge said, we want you to move entire departments and schools from UNC and N.C. State University to predominately black campuses in the system.  Stunned, the UNC representative said, go ahead and sue.  The people of North Carolina will never agree.  HEW dropped the threat of a lawsuit and faded away.

The people will never agree to allow boys in the girls' room in lower school or college, or men in the women's rooms.  It's called chivalry, a notion the DOJ doesn't get.