| "And so once again my dear Johnny, my dear friend, And so once again you are fightin' us all And when I ask you why, You raise your sticks and cry, and I fall. Oh, my friend How did you come To trade the fiddle for the drum." -Joni Mitchell The explosive Hezbullah-Israeli war hardened the nipples of the American right. I already knew that the Hannitys, Limbaughs and Coulters are psychopaths born into a time when they could profit it by it, like Goebbels. Still, I was shocked at how they salivated with bloodlust, at the prospect of all-out war. Limbaugh was giddy at the thought of Lebanese civilian casualties. How much Viagara is he taking? While walking downtown past the Episcopal church toward the library, I listened to rabid right wing pundits on the radio tripping over each other, like teen horndogs who learn the hot new girl in school is on the pill, to be the first to declare the conflict "World War III." They hungered for apocalypse. The church bells chimed but I ducked into the library for my sanctuary. Squinty-eyed thugs have claimed the cross as their own. I assume it's appeal is not as an icon of faith, but as a means of torture, which is their turf. They want to thrust liberty down the throats of every country in the world, providing they elect candidates approved by Dick Cheney. "The British are Coming!" Cried Jesus as His Donkey Entered Jerusalem. First they stole the flag. Now they're hunkered down and squatting in our churches. They turned Jesus into a Founding Father. The original 13 colonies were governed by the apostles. Jesus himself walked out onto Boston Harbor to toss the first crate of tea overboard. King George demanded the head of John the Baptist. In the recent Kansas revival of "Jesus Christ, Superstar," it is Betsy Ross who sings, "I Don't Know How to Love Him." I'm not talking about Christians who actually live their faith as illustrated in the Peter Scholtes' hymn that goes, "They will know we are Christians by our love." They live the words of St. Francis of Assisi: "Preach the gospel at all times. If necessary, use words." (A quote amended by Fox News, "if necessary, use facts.") My biggest act of faith in years was trying to believe George W. Bush's assertion that he is a Christian. The only evidence is that he says so. Since the beginning, Americans shined their shoes and went to church without making an opera out of it. But this president's "fishers of men" navigate swift boats. Most are self-deluded pretenders to faith, and some are out-and-out shysters. For Faith Tyrants, religion is an easy-fitting suit of clothes to pretty up their bigotry and insecurity, and to make their hatred seem endorsed by the biggest celebrity of them all. "Hi, I'm God, and I'm 100% against wasting tax money on Head Start." Their favorite Biblical word isn't love. It's smite. Ask Max Cleland, John McCain, Paul O'Neill, Valerie Plame, Cindy Sheehan, Joseph Wilson, Richard A. Clarke, or Jack Murtha, for starters. If you've got the stomach, Google collateral damage + Iraq. We're led by a man (a "child president," said Hunter S. Thompson,) who makes decisions based on gut and faith. Not bad characteristics, but without intellect, mayonnaise minus bread. In trying to seem assured, he's cocky. Faced with reporter's questions, he jokes like a dorky, old school, wing-tipped salesman, rambles, changes the subject till he stumbles toward his memorized talking points, blathers on, then before anyone can ask a follow-up question, takes the next question. In his book, The Importance of Being Foolish: How to Think Like Jesus, Brennan Manning writes, "The insecure Christian is so uncertain about his own identity that he has to assert himself all the time, gripped as he is by a fear that in listening to others or surrendering an opinion he may lose a part of his shaky identity." This behavior goes beyond religion. It accurately describes the president's punchy, fidgety, impatient appearance among world leaders at last month's G8 summit. His kindergarden-like summation of every enemy he doesn't understand as one who "hates liberty" is another example. For his insecurities, thousands are dead and the rest of us don't feel so good, either. So I Ducked into the Library, Safe Among the Many Books Rather than Shackled by Their One. My first job was washing windows in my two-room hometown library. I got the job because I hung out there all the time. My favorite spot was the Biography Room, a celebration of fame, accomplishment, of brilliant and tragic lives that touched holiness and stooped to the sordid. Side by side they stood: Barnum, Berra, Bombeck, Clemens, Cousy, Curie, Davis Jr., DeGaulle, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Kefauver, Lenin, Linkletter, Lincoln, Mather, Namath, Paulsen, Poe, Raleigh, Roosevelt, Skelton, Steinbeck, Truman, Tubman, Van Gogh, Washington, Ziegfield. And of course, the New Testament is a biography from four points of view. Mary Cable wrote, "The best biographies leave their readers with a sense of having all but entered into a second life and of having come to known another human being in some ways better than he knows himself." Learning about other lives is listening. And listening always makes one worldlier. Listening leads to understanding, which is the basis for solutions, which is necessary for peace. The current administration doesn't listen, certainly not to opposing viewpoints, but not even to the people on their own team who respectfully speak truth to power. Not to Colin Powell, who said if you take over Iraq, you own it. Not to the generals who just last week said Iraq is on the brink of civil war. We are led by a man who maligns biography by misreading Christ's and by surrounding himself with syncophants who blab a fictional, glorified version of his own back to him. |
| PAH! |
| by Mark Morelli |
| Overdue |