Weekend Edition – October 29, 2010

Halloween approaches and that is the time for children and the young of heart of make believe. The midterm elections approach on November 2nd with signs that Fright Night can still be avoided:

Boot Camp
Recently in Kentucky a supporter of G.O.Tea Party senatorial candidate Rand Paul was videotaped pressing his foot on the head of a woman who had presumably not drunk the G.O.Tea. The woman’s glasses were crushed and she suffered a concussion.

The big footed miscreant’s explanation was that he was a “big guy” and couldn’t bend down to restrain her. And that is why he used his foot. And while the symbolism of the moment is inescapable, we are still waiting for someone from the Rand Paul camp to, at the very least; disavow the actions of this Kentucky Stomper.

It looks like we will be waiting for a long, long time.

Shake me, wake me……
The political pundits of every stripe and color predict a G.O.Tea Party avalanche on November 2nd. While Meg Whitman’s millions will not win her the gubernatorial election in California, Sharron Angle’s mindlessness has her substantially ahead of Harry Reid.

Carl Paladino’s anger may not win him the governor’s mansion in Albany but President Obama’s former senate seat in Illinois is in serious jeopardy.

It may be useful to ask at what point this “change” take place. Less than two years ago this country was celebrating the breathtaking spectacle of a young, progressive African American becoming President of the United States with the promise of transformative change that would benefit all Americans.

At what point did ignorance trump knowledge and insight? At what point did it become acceptable to run for the United States Congress (Rich Iott from Ohio) with an acknowledged practice of dressing up in Nazi S.S. uniforms.

At what point did a G.O.Tea Party candidate office (Jon Runyan of New Jersey) state without fear of criticism or retribution that his favorite Supreme Court decision was Dred Scott (that is the one which held that no black man had rights that a white man need respect).

These anecdotal nightmares are just the tip of the iceberg. There are over 750 G.O.Tea Party candidates for Congress and state legislatures that are on record as being against any kind of energy reform initiatives – the kind of legislation that might make this country less reliant on fossil fuels and……..oh yes, help save the environment of this planet.

Steven Thrasher in his September 29, 2010 Village Voice article “White America Has Lost Its Mind” http://www.villagevoice.com/2010-09-29/news/white-america-has-lost-its-mind/ identifies the point as a few minutes after noon on January 20, 2009 when Barack Obama was inaugurated as President of the United States.

It is hard to believe, however, that all of this bile and anger and stupidity and self-destructive dumbness metastasized so quickly.

These poisonous wellsprings disguised as patriotic crusades to “take back America” have been around all along. Perhaps the Obama inauguration motivated some aspects of the right wing of the right wing to come forward, but the madness has been around us for a long time.
How long it will stay with us is now the question.

A Question?
Assuming a worst case scenario on November 2nd, the G.O.Tea Party will take full control of the House of Representatives and will also effectively control any legislative initiatives that take place in the Senate.

Continuing with this nightmare, there will be governors and attorneys general and state legislators throughout the country who have also drunk the G.O.Tea and will be railing against the “leftist Marxist” in the White House.

We will see efforts to repeal the recently passed healthcare bill as well as the financial regulatory reform legislation. Environmental initiatives will be gutted and President Obama will be checkmated on any move to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan.

In just a few years we will see the economy of this country rocked like never before with the standard of living diminished for all except the very rich. Ignorant American children will graduate from high school believing that creationism is a scientific theory and the continued deterioration of this country’s national security will continue due to mindless military incursions in the name of some unknowable war on terror.

In just a few years your children will ask you what did you do to prevent this catastrophic scenario. Especially when you could see it coming.

What will your answer be?

(Try to) have a great weekend and DON’T FORGET TO VOTE!

Silence of the Lambs and the Donkeys and the Elephants

I thought that a mildly interesting research project might entail finding the origins of using animals as the symbols for political parties in the United States. It turns out that the Democratic donkey and the Republican elephant as party symbols can be traced to the work of the 19th century cartoonist Thomas Nast.

There were no focus groups, no branding sessions, and no strategic plan. Nast thought it was amusing to cast the Democrats and Republicans in this anthropomorphic light and the labels stuck.

These days we refer to “Red” states and “Blue” states and the right wing of the right wing conservatives and liberals. But sometimes it’s a good idea to go back to the zoo and the barnyard, and this just may be one of those times.

Sound bites and megabytes have been consumed by the billions in the commentary over the proposed construction of an Islamic cultural center in Lower Manhattan. It is not a mosque even though CNN, the New York Times and many other mainstream outlets refer to it in such an erroneous fashion. Which begs the question, so what if it were a mosque? But I digress.

Although this center has been in the planning for over a year, during the past month the attacks against its construction have gone from nattering and chattering to white hot incendiary rhetoric. Battle lines have been drawn although it is not clear who is the enemy.

To listen to Newt Gingrich, The Man Who Would Be President proclaiming that the Islamic center being built near the site of the World Trade Center is akin to building a Nazi memorial near a Jewish concentration camp. It should be noted that such foul and hateful language by the pseudo-intellectual Gingrich is permitted by the First Amendment to the Constitution, the same First Amendment that grants freedom of religion.

However, although one can freely speak, the First Amendment does not confer immunity from criticism. So I wonder at the relative silence of the Republican elephants as they listen to one of their leaders invoke such hateful imagery, stoking the already smoldering fires of prejudice and discrimination with barely disguised glowing embers of rage already in every corner and every precinct of this country.

Where are the Republican elephants with a voice of reason? Where are the Republicans with a sense of decency and respect for this country who are willing to tell Newt Gingrich to stop surfing in the sewers of indecent and disgusting public discourse?

And rather than demonstrating the leadership that ostensibly is a part of the job description of Democratic Majority Leader, Senator Harry Reid proclaimed that he would prefer that the “mosque” be built somewhere other than in such proximity to the World Trade Center because its presence offends the sensibilities of some.

Aside from the fact that there are already two mosques near the World Trade Center site, mosques that have been in continuous operation since 9/11, one has to wonder about these mysterious “sensibilities” that must be protected at all costs, even at the cost of denying Constitutional rights to some American citizens.

After all, the screeching, braying and caterwauling crowds that cursed and spat at the black school children who integrated a high school in Little Rock, Arkansas were clearly expressing their offended “sensibilities” to the nearness of black people. While the black students had a “right” to attend that school, one can imagine that it certainly would have been more convenient to observe and respect those “sensibilities”.

And so, rather than demonstrate leadership, the Democratic donkeys have largely been silent or have brayed in favor of the perceived majority. We have heard too many shameful statements affirming the right of Muslims to build the center but questioning the “wisdom” of building the Islamic center at the lawfully selected location of their choice.

Of course, if rights are to be doled out based upon the will of the majority, there will be few of us with many rights at the end of the day. The right of an arrested person to remain silent would never pass a national majority vote today. I don’t think that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 would either. One wonders what the Democratic donkeys might bray if these items came to a vote this very day.

Today it is the construction of an Islamic cultural center that is the target of hate and senseless prejudice. Tomorrow it might be gay men and women who wish to marry. And next week it might be you or me. It is axiomatic that hate is insatiable and the more that it consumes the more it will consume.

These days it is not only the lambs that are silent.