I know you've read this before but ... Michele Bachmann? Really?
Is the GOP so completely bereft of viable Presidential candidates that Michele Bachmann can gain traction? Has the forest of Republican leadership been so decimated that no one with serious Presidential timber seems likely to emerge? Must the circus that is the Republican party seek their standard bearer from the clown car? Will the Party of Lincoln choose to be represented by a woman who's command of the facts makes George W. Bush look like Henry Kissinger?Forget Barack Obama, at this rate the Republicans couldn't beat Jimmy Carter.
You know you're in trouble when the best thing you can say about your candidate is that she didn't make a complete fool of herself during a debate. Being able to dress yourself and not swallowing your microphone shouldn't be enough to get you a four year gig at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. John McCain might not know how many houses he owns but he was lucid much of the time and showed a reasonable grasp of the issues in 2008. Michele Bachmann appears to be garnering considerable praise for simply not drooling on herself. Having not bungled her lines during this her first skirmish with adults, the entire world seemed ready to ignore her previous difficulties with geography, American History and with who was born where. (In spite of the best efforts of Ed Rollins and a coterie of handlers, Ms. Bachmann couldn't resist trumpeting proudly that she and John Wayne were both born in Waterloo, Iowa. She may have been, The Duke was not.)
But seriously, Presidential contenders shouldn't be judged on their gaffes. No one can be error- free when reporters and cameras dog your every movement. Still, Michele's proclamation that the Founding Fathers were committed to the eradication of slavery was made during a prepared speech. Someone had to write those words down and Ms. Bachmann had to be confident enough in their accuracy to speak them publicly. A candidate may be forgiven for a mistake made while bouncing from a plane to a waiting limo but to actually prepare blatant falsehoods for public consumption shows either an appalling lack of respect for your audience or sheer ignorance.
Ms. Bachmann was asked to address her earlier comment about the Founding Fathers "working tirelessly to end slavery". Her response to George Stephenopoulos was as follows:
Bachmann: "Well you know what’s marvelous is that in this country and under our constitution, we have the ability when we recognize that something is wrong to change it. And that’s what we did in our country. We changed it. We no longer have slavery. That’s a good thing. And what our Constitution has done for our nation is to give us the basis of freedom unparalleled in the rest of the world."
Given the current climate in the GOP Ms. Bachmann will, no doubt, be given high marks for proclaiming the abolition of slavery as "a good thing". There will also be universal conservative condemnation of George Stephenopoulos for his "gotcha" questioning. (A similar vicious question ensnared Sweet Sarah just weeks ago. The Question? "What have you learned during your trip to New England?" Clearly the liberal press will stop at nothing.)
Is it too much trouble for politicians to say "I screwed up. I conflated John Adams, a Founding Father opposed to slavery and John Quincy Adams a later President, who did work to have slavery abolished." How hard is that? This is America. We forgave Bill Clinton for getting a hummer from an intern in the Oval Office. We forgave Michael Vick (granted, a much tougher sell). We even forgave Coke for New Coke. However, we expect you to admit your transgressions. (Sarah Palin merely looked stupid when she tried to rewrite history.)
No one seriously thinks that someone as addled and dogmatic as Michele Bachmann could actually be elected President. Success in early polls is usually symptomatic of voter disaffection.
Nevertheless, the election of GWB (twice, for Christ's sake) should be a cautionary tale regarding the contrary nature of the electorate. That fact combined with the quiet, systematic attempt being made in several GOP-controlled states to disqualify a substantial portion of the electorate, makes 2012 a toss-up regardless of who the GOP sends into the arena. So, en guarde America! We have nothing to fear except maybe a woman who thinks creationism and evolution are "theories" right up there with gravity and the molecular adhesiveness of liquids.
Sneaky liberal question of the day" Did the Founding Fathers believe in gravity and how many worked to abolish it?"
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Sunday, June 26, 2011
...or should we listen when the Catholic Church says gay marriage is a perversion?
After all, who would know more about perverts than the Catholic Church? They run the pedophile academy.
Truly, I would give anything to be able to ignore the Catholic Church and their gang of pedophile-enabling ostriches who think rock and roll causes men to fondle little boys. I would love to just chuckle at the false conclusions that imagine the collapse of civilization in any action that runs contrary to Church dogma. Honestly, it's amazing that the cult of hubris that brought the world the Crusades, the destruction of civilizations throughout South America and the Inquisition would have the colossal gall to pontificate on the potential harm of gay marriage. After the Church's befriending of Hitler and Mussolini at the expense of Europe's Jews and the systematic, century-long torture of Ireland's youth, you might expect a little modesty. Perhaps a retreat to a retreat. No such luck.
Five minutes after the New York State Senate approved the gay marriage amendment, New York's archbishop Timothy Dolan was ominously predicting dogs and cats sleeping together. "You think it's going to stop with this? You think bigamists aren't going to want their rights to marry?" The good bishop went on to rant about men wanting to marry their sisters but no one was listening by then. At least he stopped short of the fears expressed by former Senator Rick Santorum or Bill O'Reilly (both Catholics) who were confident that people marrying their domestic animals was the next logical step. (Santorum clearly had his eye on a fetching presidential elephant.)
Where is Rome during all this hysteria? Where are the cool deliberate members of the Curia to calmly lay out the Church's view? "We in the House of Celibacy are opposed to any wedding that doesn't involve one man and one woman. (Exceptions include nuns who 'marry' themselves to Christ.) We uphold this teaching even though we can find no passage in the New Testament that shines any light on how Christ felt about gays. We, as a religious institution however, have no control over how non-members spend their time. If gay people want to marry, ponce around in thongs and drink sidecars, that's none of our affair."
Instead, Rome allows publicity-seekers like Archbishop Dolan to blog and release statements condemning the actions of people over whom they have no authority. Why does the CC give a fig what gay people do? You would think that an organization rife with pedophiles and their enablers would tend to their own knitting. New York State law does not compel Catholic priests to perform gay marriages. (New York State law does compel bishops to report cases of child abuse and molestation but so far none have done so.)
The institution that is the Catholic Church has never gotten over the loss of its temporal power after the Reformation. It can't stand being relegated to the same public status as boutique religions like Jews and Druids. They would welcome state-sponsored religion, as long as it was theirs. They watch Evangelical Christians elect God-squaders to office in Iowa and Texas and they seethe. Even in countries like Italy and Ireland no one is listening to orders from the Holy See any more. The Church's attempts to prevent the sale of birth control pills and its efforts to prohibit divorce (both crimes against women) have crumbled in recent years. European Catholics haven't lost faith, they've simply lost faith in a Church that never appears to be looking out for the faithful. "Thou shalt cover your ass at all times" is the new eleventh commandment.
The Wall Street Journal carried an op-ed from the leader of the National Organization for Marriage (read hetero marriage) Maggie Gallagher (Irish Catholic). Ms. Gallagher devoted the entire column to affirming that when gay marriage is put to a vote, it is always defeated. At no time does she propose a single reason why anyone should oppose gay marriage or what harm it does. Her entire argument is that courts and legislatures as well as all media have a perverted liberal bias and that the people know best. Fortunately, the "people" weren't consulted prior to the Emancipation Proclamation. The "people" were excluded from participating in the "Loving vs Virginia" case in 1967 which finally allowed blacks to marry whites. The "people" want the borders closed but they also want cheap produce. The "people" love capital punishment but rarely support it when the "best people" are accused. The "people" hate welfare but love Medicare. The "people" hate taxes but love their police and fire depts. We elect legislators to protect us from the tyranny of the majority. Courts and government bodies encourage the angels of our better nature.
The legislature of New York State did the "people" a favor. Maggie Gallagher, Archbishop Dolan and every other member of the faithful who finds gay marriage offensive will now have to find something else to hate. Ms. Gallagher could devote her time to helping battered women, especially Muslim women, escape abusive relationships. As for the Archbishop of New York well, he might blog on why, after 2,000 years of Catholicism, women are still relegated to second-class status; why nuns are treated as little more that chambermaids; why the priesthood is still a male-only club? But mostly, he can explain why an institution like the Catholic Church, with its bloody and abusive past, continues to use fuzzy doctrine as a cudgel to deny people basic civil rights? That includes not just the right to marry but the right to be spared the attentions of pedophiles.
Truly, I would give anything to be able to ignore the Catholic Church and their gang of pedophile-enabling ostriches who think rock and roll causes men to fondle little boys. I would love to just chuckle at the false conclusions that imagine the collapse of civilization in any action that runs contrary to Church dogma. Honestly, it's amazing that the cult of hubris that brought the world the Crusades, the destruction of civilizations throughout South America and the Inquisition would have the colossal gall to pontificate on the potential harm of gay marriage. After the Church's befriending of Hitler and Mussolini at the expense of Europe's Jews and the systematic, century-long torture of Ireland's youth, you might expect a little modesty. Perhaps a retreat to a retreat. No such luck.
Five minutes after the New York State Senate approved the gay marriage amendment, New York's archbishop Timothy Dolan was ominously predicting dogs and cats sleeping together. "You think it's going to stop with this? You think bigamists aren't going to want their rights to marry?" The good bishop went on to rant about men wanting to marry their sisters but no one was listening by then. At least he stopped short of the fears expressed by former Senator Rick Santorum or Bill O'Reilly (both Catholics) who were confident that people marrying their domestic animals was the next logical step. (Santorum clearly had his eye on a fetching presidential elephant.)
Where is Rome during all this hysteria? Where are the cool deliberate members of the Curia to calmly lay out the Church's view? "We in the House of Celibacy are opposed to any wedding that doesn't involve one man and one woman. (Exceptions include nuns who 'marry' themselves to Christ.) We uphold this teaching even though we can find no passage in the New Testament that shines any light on how Christ felt about gays. We, as a religious institution however, have no control over how non-members spend their time. If gay people want to marry, ponce around in thongs and drink sidecars, that's none of our affair."
Instead, Rome allows publicity-seekers like Archbishop Dolan to blog and release statements condemning the actions of people over whom they have no authority. Why does the CC give a fig what gay people do? You would think that an organization rife with pedophiles and their enablers would tend to their own knitting. New York State law does not compel Catholic priests to perform gay marriages. (New York State law does compel bishops to report cases of child abuse and molestation but so far none have done so.)
The institution that is the Catholic Church has never gotten over the loss of its temporal power after the Reformation. It can't stand being relegated to the same public status as boutique religions like Jews and Druids. They would welcome state-sponsored religion, as long as it was theirs. They watch Evangelical Christians elect God-squaders to office in Iowa and Texas and they seethe. Even in countries like Italy and Ireland no one is listening to orders from the Holy See any more. The Church's attempts to prevent the sale of birth control pills and its efforts to prohibit divorce (both crimes against women) have crumbled in recent years. European Catholics haven't lost faith, they've simply lost faith in a Church that never appears to be looking out for the faithful. "Thou shalt cover your ass at all times" is the new eleventh commandment.
The Wall Street Journal carried an op-ed from the leader of the National Organization for Marriage (read hetero marriage) Maggie Gallagher (Irish Catholic). Ms. Gallagher devoted the entire column to affirming that when gay marriage is put to a vote, it is always defeated. At no time does she propose a single reason why anyone should oppose gay marriage or what harm it does. Her entire argument is that courts and legislatures as well as all media have a perverted liberal bias and that the people know best. Fortunately, the "people" weren't consulted prior to the Emancipation Proclamation. The "people" were excluded from participating in the "Loving vs Virginia" case in 1967 which finally allowed blacks to marry whites. The "people" want the borders closed but they also want cheap produce. The "people" love capital punishment but rarely support it when the "best people" are accused. The "people" hate welfare but love Medicare. The "people" hate taxes but love their police and fire depts. We elect legislators to protect us from the tyranny of the majority. Courts and government bodies encourage the angels of our better nature.
The legislature of New York State did the "people" a favor. Maggie Gallagher, Archbishop Dolan and every other member of the faithful who finds gay marriage offensive will now have to find something else to hate. Ms. Gallagher could devote her time to helping battered women, especially Muslim women, escape abusive relationships. As for the Archbishop of New York well, he might blog on why, after 2,000 years of Catholicism, women are still relegated to second-class status; why nuns are treated as little more that chambermaids; why the priesthood is still a male-only club? But mostly, he can explain why an institution like the Catholic Church, with its bloody and abusive past, continues to use fuzzy doctrine as a cudgel to deny people basic civil rights? That includes not just the right to marry but the right to be spared the attentions of pedophiles.
Saturday, June 25, 2011
...or would we all have been better off if the tech revolution ended with the invention of the electric can opener?
So, I know it's not all about me but I'm sure I'm not alone. I now officially own more technology than I can:
1) appreciate
2) repair
3) master
4) justify owning
5) pay for
Really! Thanks to the wizards of Silicon Valley I can now download music into everything but my pencil sharpener (Memo to me: check for availability of isharpeners.) Except I don't want nor need to hear Lady Gaga belting out "Born This Way" from devices primarily intended to make toast or iron my shirts. I now have four different devices that can navigate me, turn by turn, to the nearest frozen yogurt store in forty-three different languages or four English dialects. I'm considering setting all of them at once. It will be like getting directions from the chorus of Cats.
These complaints no doubt qualify me for a one way trip to the cranky old geezers home. (Second memo to me: check to see if the GPS in my ipad will take me to an assisted living center.) Nevertheless it can't be crazy to expect my cell phone to be a cell phone and not a miniature Wall Street Journal or a portable repository for Angry Birds. Yes, it is occasionally helpful to be able to locate a Chinese restaurant in lower Manhattan from the back of a southbound cab in Midtown. However this delightful little app is of limited use to a farmer in Duluth. (Third memo to me: Find out if farmers use a GPS device to learn which field is wheat and which is corn.)
Once upon a time life was simple. I had a phone book at home, a Rolodex at work and a small pocket directory for travel. That simple system has been replaced by a "contacts" lists in nine different devices and, as usual, the information I need is never in the device I have with me. I may not be able to locate the phone number of my dermatologist but I'm quite sure that, given the launch codes, I could detonate a nuclear device over Pakistan while seated on a Metro North train bound for White Plains.
The other price being paid for all this high tech wizardry is the price being paid for all this high tech wizardry. I used to pay a phone bill for phone service. The arrangement with Ma Bell (God, I'm old) was simple: I pay a bill, she made sure I had a dial tone when I picked up my receiver (Oh for Christ's sake, look it up!) . My current phone bill, encompassing one land line, two mobile lines, text, and Internet access is now higher than the rent on my first apartment. The land line and the cell services are listed on the same bill but serviced by different companies...with the same name. The Internet service is a different carrier and the ipad bills through a credit card I foolishly gave to Apple itunes. I'm considering calling Congressman Paul Ryan for help in cutting wasteful spending.
The tragedy here is that, while I'm desperate to be tech savvy and oh so hip I know I'm falling behind every day. A friend asked me about Pandora and I was clueless. Fortunately a quick trip to Google and I was rescued. Nevertheless it's just a matter of time before I'm outed as an uncool Luddite. Actually it's already started. I took my laptop to the Geek Squad in Best Buy to determine why it wouldn't boot. The young man at the counter (whose cognitive memory extends back to maybe the first Iron Man movie) took one look at the computer and muttered "Wow, an IBM. I didn't know these things were still around." OK, hold on. I may not own the latest and greatest equipment but ten minutes ago IBM was the Tiffany's of computers. (Fourth memo to me: find out if Tiffany's is still the Tiffany's of anything.) Just because it didn't roll off Steve Job's assembly line this week doesn't mean the machine should be relegated to doorstop status. And anyway it's not like I asked him to repair a Victrola or a fountain pen.
Yes I know technology rocks. I guess it's cool to be able to settle any argument in a bar with a quick visit to Wikipedia from a Droid but the science has reduced the usefulness of a time-honored skill namely, making up the facts as you go along. Many a disagreement has been decided by one's ability to pull statistics directly out of one's ass. Call it bluffing, call it bullshit, manufactured facts have been the cornerstone of human interaction since history began. Michele Bachmann has built an entire political career this way. Seriously, how was Abdul the camel merchant supposed to make a decent living when a customer could Google CamelFax and discover that the camel for sale wasn't owned by a little old lady in Abbottabad. If Union Army General George McClellen possessed Google Earth in the first year of the Civil War there wouldn't have been a second year. Stalin could have learned all he needed to know about Hitler's honesty from his Facebook page and he never would have signed that non-aggression pact.
My point is that technology isn't always a good thing. How many times have you blundered into a great store while wandering lost in a new city? Conversely, how many times have you blundered into a lamppost because you were looking at a screen instead of where you were going? Chance meetings are far more likely when some chance is involved. Facts and data should never get in the way of a good story. So look up, America. You will notice that the world is in 3-D and looks amazingly like the grid in Mapquest. You'll discover that you can actually find the Grand Canyon or the St. Louis Arch without a Garmin. Florence and the Machine does not have to be the soundtrack of your every waking moment. George Lucas did not mean for Star Wars to be viewed on a screen half the size of a sheet of toilet paper. Put your mechanized world on airplane mode, vibrate and quiet. Then lock them in a railroad station locker. (Last memo: are there still lockers in railroad stations?) Rise up! You have nothing to lose but that squint, a cauliflower ear and potential brain cancer. Of course, if you get brain cancer, it would be nice to look it up on WebMD... and look up a specialist... and a hospital.... and get directions...and .................
1) appreciate
2) repair
3) master
4) justify owning
5) pay for
Really! Thanks to the wizards of Silicon Valley I can now download music into everything but my pencil sharpener (Memo to me: check for availability of isharpeners.) Except I don't want nor need to hear Lady Gaga belting out "Born This Way" from devices primarily intended to make toast or iron my shirts. I now have four different devices that can navigate me, turn by turn, to the nearest frozen yogurt store in forty-three different languages or four English dialects. I'm considering setting all of them at once. It will be like getting directions from the chorus of Cats.
These complaints no doubt qualify me for a one way trip to the cranky old geezers home. (Second memo to me: check to see if the GPS in my ipad will take me to an assisted living center.) Nevertheless it can't be crazy to expect my cell phone to be a cell phone and not a miniature Wall Street Journal or a portable repository for Angry Birds. Yes, it is occasionally helpful to be able to locate a Chinese restaurant in lower Manhattan from the back of a southbound cab in Midtown. However this delightful little app is of limited use to a farmer in Duluth. (Third memo to me: Find out if farmers use a GPS device to learn which field is wheat and which is corn.)
Once upon a time life was simple. I had a phone book at home, a Rolodex at work and a small pocket directory for travel. That simple system has been replaced by a "contacts" lists in nine different devices and, as usual, the information I need is never in the device I have with me. I may not be able to locate the phone number of my dermatologist but I'm quite sure that, given the launch codes, I could detonate a nuclear device over Pakistan while seated on a Metro North train bound for White Plains.
The other price being paid for all this high tech wizardry is the price being paid for all this high tech wizardry. I used to pay a phone bill for phone service. The arrangement with Ma Bell (God, I'm old) was simple: I pay a bill, she made sure I had a dial tone when I picked up my receiver (Oh for Christ's sake, look it up!) . My current phone bill, encompassing one land line, two mobile lines, text, and Internet access is now higher than the rent on my first apartment. The land line and the cell services are listed on the same bill but serviced by different companies...with the same name. The Internet service is a different carrier and the ipad bills through a credit card I foolishly gave to Apple itunes. I'm considering calling Congressman Paul Ryan for help in cutting wasteful spending.
The tragedy here is that, while I'm desperate to be tech savvy and oh so hip I know I'm falling behind every day. A friend asked me about Pandora and I was clueless. Fortunately a quick trip to Google and I was rescued. Nevertheless it's just a matter of time before I'm outed as an uncool Luddite. Actually it's already started. I took my laptop to the Geek Squad in Best Buy to determine why it wouldn't boot. The young man at the counter (whose cognitive memory extends back to maybe the first Iron Man movie) took one look at the computer and muttered "Wow, an IBM. I didn't know these things were still around." OK, hold on. I may not own the latest and greatest equipment but ten minutes ago IBM was the Tiffany's of computers. (Fourth memo to me: find out if Tiffany's is still the Tiffany's of anything.) Just because it didn't roll off Steve Job's assembly line this week doesn't mean the machine should be relegated to doorstop status. And anyway it's not like I asked him to repair a Victrola or a fountain pen.
Yes I know technology rocks. I guess it's cool to be able to settle any argument in a bar with a quick visit to Wikipedia from a Droid but the science has reduced the usefulness of a time-honored skill namely, making up the facts as you go along. Many a disagreement has been decided by one's ability to pull statistics directly out of one's ass. Call it bluffing, call it bullshit, manufactured facts have been the cornerstone of human interaction since history began. Michele Bachmann has built an entire political career this way. Seriously, how was Abdul the camel merchant supposed to make a decent living when a customer could Google CamelFax and discover that the camel for sale wasn't owned by a little old lady in Abbottabad. If Union Army General George McClellen possessed Google Earth in the first year of the Civil War there wouldn't have been a second year. Stalin could have learned all he needed to know about Hitler's honesty from his Facebook page and he never would have signed that non-aggression pact.
My point is that technology isn't always a good thing. How many times have you blundered into a great store while wandering lost in a new city? Conversely, how many times have you blundered into a lamppost because you were looking at a screen instead of where you were going? Chance meetings are far more likely when some chance is involved. Facts and data should never get in the way of a good story. So look up, America. You will notice that the world is in 3-D and looks amazingly like the grid in Mapquest. You'll discover that you can actually find the Grand Canyon or the St. Louis Arch without a Garmin. Florence and the Machine does not have to be the soundtrack of your every waking moment. George Lucas did not mean for Star Wars to be viewed on a screen half the size of a sheet of toilet paper. Put your mechanized world on airplane mode, vibrate and quiet. Then lock them in a railroad station locker. (Last memo: are there still lockers in railroad stations?) Rise up! You have nothing to lose but that squint, a cauliflower ear and potential brain cancer. Of course, if you get brain cancer, it would be nice to look it up on WebMD... and look up a specialist... and a hospital.... and get directions...and .................
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
...or does America need a civics lesson?
Yes, I know isitjustme has been silent since mid May but really, how do you top "Obama Beats Weiner"? Honestly, the only way this story gets better is if Anthony Weiner marries Anita Baker. (See what happens once you get started?) When the jokes write themselves, don't interfere.
Anyway, as the summer rolls forward, aging white Americans have mothballed their tricorn hats. During the lull, serious law makers from both parties try to hammer out a few spending cuts and raise the country's debt ceiling. The argument revolves around whether we are in this fiscal fix due to Bush's wars and his unfunded tax cuts (we are) or, because of President Obama's stimulus and bailouts (maybe so). How or why is hardly the point at this juncture. Throwing rocks at the problem isn't the same as fixing it. The unrealistic notion that the cure won't leave a bad taste is just that; unrealistic.
Still, the rhetoric of the last two years has brought into focus a fundamental change in the attitude of a large portion of the population. The harmless chiding of Washington made famous by the likes of Will Rogers has morphed into a poisonous hatred of all things government. Europeans understand that their leaders, for all their faults, are trying to run their countries for the well-being of all. They have an understanding that government exists for a purpose and that purpose is beneficial. Germans in the 30's looked to their leaders to extract them from a horrible depression. OK that didn't work out so well but even today Germans don't hate their government.
In an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal, Michael Barone postulates that Americans who lived through World War II had an abiding faith in government's ability to perform miracles. He feels faith was eroded in future generations because of scandals like Watergate and the Vietnam War. (While Vietnam might have convinced America that government couldn't be trusted, it's unlikely that the war protesters of 1968 are the teabaggers of 2010.) Where Mr. Barone and I part ways is his belief that the country has (correctly) decided that big government no longer works. My view is that America (read older, white rural America) has been fed a steady diet of bile from the right and has finally decided that their government is their enemy. Not just a bunch of mildly corrupt vote chasers who routinely get governing wrong but evil, sinister, fifth columnists who mean to destroy the very Country they were elected to serve.
Don't take my word for this. Ask your favorite right-winger what he or she thinks of Nancy Pelosi...but don't do it with small children within ear-shot. The kind of venomous hate directed at the former speaker is usually reserved for Osama Bin Laden. Who taught Americans to hate like that? Not Congress. They fuss and fume but the invectives are directed at policy not people. America is being systematically taught to hate its own government. The Hannitys, Becks and Limbaughs of the media have successfully indoctrinated a substantial portion of the population to believe that they are under attack. This drek was harmless enough in the Bush years because the right-wing masses could console themselves with the notion that one of their own was in the White House.
That ended with the horror of horrors: a black liberal of questionable lineage was elected President. Limbaugh must have thought he died and went to heaven. His hoard was prepared to believe almost anything about this "outsider". "He's clearly not one of us." Fox news hired every conservative with a pulse, and a few without. Roger Ailes, lord of Fox News, sent his minions to cover every gathering of disaffected white people yelling about taking back the country.
So here we are. Republicans in Congress have to be smuggled into meetings with the opposition for fear of being called traitors. Compromise, once the hallmark of intelligent government, is now a dirty word. Legislators willing to accept the bizarre notion that someone else might have an idea worth pursuing are cruising for a primary challenge in their next election. Moderates like Tim Pawlenty and even Newt Gingrich must be willing to stifle any hint of accommodation to reality. A step away from orthodoxy will draw immediate withering rebuke from the screamers in talk radio as well as mindless bomb-throwers like Sarah Palin. (Sarah doesn't really care about the Republican party. Headlines and book sales are all that matter.)
America needs a civics lesson. In his famous comic strip Pogo, Walt Kelly wrote "We have met the enemy and he is us". We have been told to fear debt, debt ceilings and deficits. Why?...we have no idea. How do we fix it?...cut spending. How?...we have no idea. We could raise taxes a little. That worked in the Clinton years. Well, good luck with that. We could cut defense spending and stop being the world's policeman. Nice idea if you can get by-in from Hannity.
The solutions, if they're out there, will come from compromise. Smart men and women will sit down and hammer out a deal that no one will love. They will then have to vote for the deal and stand up in their districts and defend being an responsible adult. Their detractors will be pundits and commentators who have never governed anything. Some of those legislators will lose but at least they did the right thing. That's a civics lesson.
Anyway, as the summer rolls forward, aging white Americans have mothballed their tricorn hats. During the lull, serious law makers from both parties try to hammer out a few spending cuts and raise the country's debt ceiling. The argument revolves around whether we are in this fiscal fix due to Bush's wars and his unfunded tax cuts (we are) or, because of President Obama's stimulus and bailouts (maybe so). How or why is hardly the point at this juncture. Throwing rocks at the problem isn't the same as fixing it. The unrealistic notion that the cure won't leave a bad taste is just that; unrealistic.
Still, the rhetoric of the last two years has brought into focus a fundamental change in the attitude of a large portion of the population. The harmless chiding of Washington made famous by the likes of Will Rogers has morphed into a poisonous hatred of all things government. Europeans understand that their leaders, for all their faults, are trying to run their countries for the well-being of all. They have an understanding that government exists for a purpose and that purpose is beneficial. Germans in the 30's looked to their leaders to extract them from a horrible depression. OK that didn't work out so well but even today Germans don't hate their government.
In an interesting article in the Wall Street Journal, Michael Barone postulates that Americans who lived through World War II had an abiding faith in government's ability to perform miracles. He feels faith was eroded in future generations because of scandals like Watergate and the Vietnam War. (While Vietnam might have convinced America that government couldn't be trusted, it's unlikely that the war protesters of 1968 are the teabaggers of 2010.) Where Mr. Barone and I part ways is his belief that the country has (correctly) decided that big government no longer works. My view is that America (read older, white rural America) has been fed a steady diet of bile from the right and has finally decided that their government is their enemy. Not just a bunch of mildly corrupt vote chasers who routinely get governing wrong but evil, sinister, fifth columnists who mean to destroy the very Country they were elected to serve.
Don't take my word for this. Ask your favorite right-winger what he or she thinks of Nancy Pelosi...but don't do it with small children within ear-shot. The kind of venomous hate directed at the former speaker is usually reserved for Osama Bin Laden. Who taught Americans to hate like that? Not Congress. They fuss and fume but the invectives are directed at policy not people. America is being systematically taught to hate its own government. The Hannitys, Becks and Limbaughs of the media have successfully indoctrinated a substantial portion of the population to believe that they are under attack. This drek was harmless enough in the Bush years because the right-wing masses could console themselves with the notion that one of their own was in the White House.
That ended with the horror of horrors: a black liberal of questionable lineage was elected President. Limbaugh must have thought he died and went to heaven. His hoard was prepared to believe almost anything about this "outsider". "He's clearly not one of us." Fox news hired every conservative with a pulse, and a few without. Roger Ailes, lord of Fox News, sent his minions to cover every gathering of disaffected white people yelling about taking back the country.
So here we are. Republicans in Congress have to be smuggled into meetings with the opposition for fear of being called traitors. Compromise, once the hallmark of intelligent government, is now a dirty word. Legislators willing to accept the bizarre notion that someone else might have an idea worth pursuing are cruising for a primary challenge in their next election. Moderates like Tim Pawlenty and even Newt Gingrich must be willing to stifle any hint of accommodation to reality. A step away from orthodoxy will draw immediate withering rebuke from the screamers in talk radio as well as mindless bomb-throwers like Sarah Palin. (Sarah doesn't really care about the Republican party. Headlines and book sales are all that matter.)
America needs a civics lesson. In his famous comic strip Pogo, Walt Kelly wrote "We have met the enemy and he is us". We have been told to fear debt, debt ceilings and deficits. Why?...we have no idea. How do we fix it?...cut spending. How?...we have no idea. We could raise taxes a little. That worked in the Clinton years. Well, good luck with that. We could cut defense spending and stop being the world's policeman. Nice idea if you can get by-in from Hannity.
The solutions, if they're out there, will come from compromise. Smart men and women will sit down and hammer out a deal that no one will love. They will then have to vote for the deal and stand up in their districts and defend being an responsible adult. Their detractors will be pundits and commentators who have never governed anything. Some of those legislators will lose but at least they did the right thing. That's a civics lesson.
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