Do bring out the champagne November 13, 2006
I REMEMBER AGAIN TIME MAGAZINE’S excellent tribute to Martin Luther King in its year 2000 issue about the 100 most influential persons of the 20th century. It noted the irony that King was much revered by the black community in the United States, with many buildings, parks and streets named after him, but not by the larger white community. Yet King’s contributions were not just to his race, they were to his nation.
If King hadn’t come along, the essay said, America would never have had the moral ascendancy to lead the world. Without King, the United States would have looked hypocritical lecturing the world about the virtues of egalitarianism.
The US elections last week made me remember this. They perform a function not unlike King’s contributions to America. If these elections hadn’t come along, the United States would never be able again to claim a moral ascendancy to lead the world. For the tyrannical orders that breed terrorism, which that country has been fulminating against, would have been matched iron-fist for iron-fist by the thuggish rule of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and cabal.
If the last elections hadn’t come along, or produced the kind of results that they did, the United States would have looked hypocritical, if not ridiculous, trying to build a democracy in Iraq—it’s ridiculous enough as it is, the proposition that democracy can fly on the wings of a gratuitous occupation—given that it can’t even build, or keep, one in its own shores. There was barely anything recognizable in the democracy bequeathed by Thomas Jefferson and King in the landscape that had arisen after 9/11. It was a landscape bleaker than the one that presented itself in Ground Zero, the twisted dreams and shattered hopes being far more horrifying than the rubble and debris that lay at the heart of New York.
For some time now, I had begun to wonder if Americans had not become like Filipinos in their ability to tolerate patent oppression. For some time now, I had begun to wonder if Americans had not become like Filipinos in the ease with which they could be manipulated by Fox TV and cowed by the threats of the Homeland Security Act. I still could not believe that Bush won a second term notwithstanding the ineptness of John Kerry. Surely anyone, or any creature in the vast animal kingdom, was better than Bush? A couple of months ago, in the gathering of Filipino-Americans in Hawaii, many Republican Filipinos—oh yes, there are such things, but then you also have Filipinos who believe in GMA—were predicting confidently they would spring a surprise and crush the Democrats at the polls. The way things were in America, I wasn’t so sure they wouldn’t.
The outcome was magnificent in that light. It wasn’t just a rout of Bush's hordes, it was a wipeout. It had People Power written all over it, albeit one wrought through the vote. If this had been a parliamentary system, the prime minister would have promptly resigned. You can’t find a more complete rejection, both houses of Congress now in the hands of the Democrats. Bush isn’t just a lame duck, he’s a dead duck.
I am particularly glad that, as the commentators have pointed out, the Iraq War—or “Occupation,” which it really is—was at the core of the elections. For the first time in a long time, Americans voted not on the basis of self-interest but on the basis of principle. For the first time in a long time, Americans voted not on the basis of who could provide them with jobs and security but on what America was all about and could be again.
The result of that is not just a victory of, by, and for the Democrats in America. It is a victory of, by, and for democrats around the world. It’s a good reminder that tyranny, however seemingly impregnable, however seemingly interminable, has to end sometime, if people wake up to it and want to do something about it. The tempting comparison is with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, the two people who shoved America into the Dark Side, and who eventually slunk away in disgrace. The temptation is especially strong because the cause of both debacles is an unjust war, one that showed America at its bullying worst. The Iraq War is the Vietnam War, however that idiot Rumsfeld continues to say Americans never understood it. He is the only one who never understood it, or the harm it has wreaked not just upon the world but upon his country. He is the only one who never saw how hubris always ends not with a bang but with a whimper.
But the more appropriate comparison is with the McCarthy period in the United States, when a minor politician (like Bush) who had more ambition than brains, more lust for power than lust for life, caused an Iron Curtain to fall upon America comparable to that of the then Soviet Union. Who in the 1950s became the most powerful and feared political figure, capable of ruining people’s lives—particularly those of artists. No one thought Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist witch hunts—comparable to Bush’s anti-terrorist witch hunts— would end as fast as they did. Everyone thought they would go on and on.
They did end, just as dramatically, and McCarthy slunk away in disgrace. Few Americans remember him now. A few years from now, many Americans will also probably say, “George who?”
I don’t know about you but I'm bringing out the wine, in lieu of the champagne, and—gout notwithstanding—getting drunk. All is right with the world again.
* * *
We can open that wine bottle together tomorrow, Nov. 14, at the Stop the Killings Bar Tour, which moves to Pier 1, Buendia, corner Roxas Boulevard, in front of the World Trade Center. Color It Red, Paolo Santos, and Pido are playing. Show starts at 9:30.
http://opinion.inq7.net/inquireropinion/columns/view_article.php?article_id=32169
If King hadn’t come along, the essay said, America would never have had the moral ascendancy to lead the world. Without King, the United States would have looked hypocritical lecturing the world about the virtues of egalitarianism.
The US elections last week made me remember this. They perform a function not unlike King’s contributions to America. If these elections hadn’t come along, the United States would never be able again to claim a moral ascendancy to lead the world. For the tyrannical orders that breed terrorism, which that country has been fulminating against, would have been matched iron-fist for iron-fist by the thuggish rule of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and cabal.
If the last elections hadn’t come along, or produced the kind of results that they did, the United States would have looked hypocritical, if not ridiculous, trying to build a democracy in Iraq—it’s ridiculous enough as it is, the proposition that democracy can fly on the wings of a gratuitous occupation—given that it can’t even build, or keep, one in its own shores. There was barely anything recognizable in the democracy bequeathed by Thomas Jefferson and King in the landscape that had arisen after 9/11. It was a landscape bleaker than the one that presented itself in Ground Zero, the twisted dreams and shattered hopes being far more horrifying than the rubble and debris that lay at the heart of New York.
For some time now, I had begun to wonder if Americans had not become like Filipinos in their ability to tolerate patent oppression. For some time now, I had begun to wonder if Americans had not become like Filipinos in the ease with which they could be manipulated by Fox TV and cowed by the threats of the Homeland Security Act. I still could not believe that Bush won a second term notwithstanding the ineptness of John Kerry. Surely anyone, or any creature in the vast animal kingdom, was better than Bush? A couple of months ago, in the gathering of Filipino-Americans in Hawaii, many Republican Filipinos—oh yes, there are such things, but then you also have Filipinos who believe in GMA—were predicting confidently they would spring a surprise and crush the Democrats at the polls. The way things were in America, I wasn’t so sure they wouldn’t.
The outcome was magnificent in that light. It wasn’t just a rout of Bush's hordes, it was a wipeout. It had People Power written all over it, albeit one wrought through the vote. If this had been a parliamentary system, the prime minister would have promptly resigned. You can’t find a more complete rejection, both houses of Congress now in the hands of the Democrats. Bush isn’t just a lame duck, he’s a dead duck.
I am particularly glad that, as the commentators have pointed out, the Iraq War—or “Occupation,” which it really is—was at the core of the elections. For the first time in a long time, Americans voted not on the basis of self-interest but on the basis of principle. For the first time in a long time, Americans voted not on the basis of who could provide them with jobs and security but on what America was all about and could be again.
The result of that is not just a victory of, by, and for the Democrats in America. It is a victory of, by, and for democrats around the world. It’s a good reminder that tyranny, however seemingly impregnable, however seemingly interminable, has to end sometime, if people wake up to it and want to do something about it. The tempting comparison is with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, the two people who shoved America into the Dark Side, and who eventually slunk away in disgrace. The temptation is especially strong because the cause of both debacles is an unjust war, one that showed America at its bullying worst. The Iraq War is the Vietnam War, however that idiot Rumsfeld continues to say Americans never understood it. He is the only one who never understood it, or the harm it has wreaked not just upon the world but upon his country. He is the only one who never saw how hubris always ends not with a bang but with a whimper.
But the more appropriate comparison is with the McCarthy period in the United States, when a minor politician (like Bush) who had more ambition than brains, more lust for power than lust for life, caused an Iron Curtain to fall upon America comparable to that of the then Soviet Union. Who in the 1950s became the most powerful and feared political figure, capable of ruining people’s lives—particularly those of artists. No one thought Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist witch hunts—comparable to Bush’s anti-terrorist witch hunts— would end as fast as they did. Everyone thought they would go on and on.
They did end, just as dramatically, and McCarthy slunk away in disgrace. Few Americans remember him now. A few years from now, many Americans will also probably say, “George who?”
I don’t know about you but I'm bringing out the wine, in lieu of the champagne, and—gout notwithstanding—getting drunk. All is right with the world again.
* * *
We can open that wine bottle together tomorrow, Nov. 14, at the Stop the Killings Bar Tour, which moves to Pier 1, Buendia, corner Roxas Boulevard, in front of the World Trade Center. Color It Red, Paolo Santos, and Pido are playing. Show starts at 9:30.
http://opinion.inq7.net/inquireropinion/columns/view_article.php?article_id=32169
posted by dqfan06 @ 3:43 AM
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