American Politics Journal -- Postcards From The Political Laity

Postcards From The Political Laity
By Art Layman

April 29, 2002 -- I am part of the political laity.

We are the great, unwashed masses who watch in amusement, disbelief, and sometimes horror as events unfold across the globe that will be spun into history.

We watched a mean-spirited Nixon slash and burn his way into the White House, a bumbling Gerald Ford throw himself on a grenade for him, Jimmy Carter go from a reviled wussie to the best ex-president the country has ever had, Ronald Reagan declare ketchup a vegetable, Bush Sr. pull back from Hussein for his own dark reasons and seal his fate, and Clinton hounded for eight years for his poor choice of dalliances.

During all of this, we go to work, go home to our families and friends, buy pet rocks, practice our duck-and-rolls, go to discos and then try to burn them down. And we watch. We may not be up-to-date on Roger Ailes' waist size, or Clarence Thomas' video rental record, but we know idiocy when we see it, and crap when we smell it. We notice things, even when the media likes to pretend we don't.

We notice when Fearless Leader tries to cover up the mess he himself has made in the Middle East. Junior told Sharon shortly after being elected that "I will not try to force peace". Was anyone surprised that the Palestinians, after declaring "Intifada II", began to agitate against Israeli forces, and Sharon began to clamp down forcefully? Bush, like his father before him, took office with the declaration that he wasn't looking to "interfere" with what was going on in that region; for his father, it quickly turned into Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, and for Junior, it became the mess in the Middle East. Can't these guys keep their mouths shut?

We notice when Junior and Friends back a coup in Venezuela, then have to recant when it's unsuccessful. Is this guy so busy that he can't kick back with a beer and a pretzel and read a few newspapers on what's going on just to south of him? Or can he only handle one thing at a time? The evidence is mounting.

We also notice that Junior and his handlers don't really seem all that interested in achieving peace in the Middle East so much as they just want to ratchet the ol' Violence-O-Meter down to about a 9.5 so they can get everyone behind a hit on Hussein. I've never seen a guy so trigger-happy to go after his arch-enemy since we wanted Castro dead - THAT worked out really swell, don'tcha think?

We notice when Bush makes ridiculous comments, including "dead or alive", and "with us or against us." Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to have the heart to follow through anymore, since he has been unable to clarify the difference between our raining bombs on Afghanistan to get "terrorist" Osama Bin Laden, and what Israel is doing to get "Chairman" Arafat. His simple-minded philosophy doesn't seem able to incorporate the current reality, so, like the classic scenario of the robot facing a paradox, he simply bursts into flames. Or ignores it - that's always something to fall back on.

We notice the nut-jobs with which Junior has saturated his administration, guys that lock the doors and pray in the middle of their offices with the "right" people, who spend thousands of dollars to get drapes to cover up the statue of the "Spirit of Justice" -- Jesus, could that BE any more ironic? We notice when they work overtime to protect the VICE President more than the theoretical President. We notice when the REPUBLICANS seem concerned that the Attorney General might be going too far.

We notice when the same jackasses that declared, "We can support the troops without supporting the President" now cry "Traitor!" at the first mention of the Emperor's New Clothes. How has this not gotten more play in the media? I mean, I know that they're a vestige of their former selves, enough to make Edward R. Murrow spin in his grave, but how can they simply ignore that little sound-bite? We notice that, too, when every pathetic accusation against Clinton by anyone from Richard Mellon Scaife's drones to confessed liars is given huge front page play, while Bush's claims to have seen the first plane hit the World Trade Center and broken campaign "promises" months into his illegitimate presidency are completely ignored. We notice when the media decides that the most important thing to fix in their ridiculous broadcasts is the layout, instead of the cop-out.

Unfortunately, we notice some other things as well. We notice when the Democrats are so scared of high "approval" ratings that they let Junior ramrod through his own personal agenda. We notice when Democrats scurry to try to silence voices in their own party that might speak above a whisper when pointing out that a thug from Texas is merrily selling us -- and our futures -- down the river. We notice when no one from the Democrats bothers to ask the real-life Syme from Orwell's 1984, Ari Fleischer, what he means when he says that Americans need to "watch what they say". This guy is apparently willing to slash huge portions out of the American vocabulary to prop up his boss.

We notice a lot of things, but what do we do now? We already elected Al Gore President by hundreds of thousands of votes, including a majority in Florida, but watched the whole process get subverted by a corrupt Supreme Court - who the hell wanted to actually COUNT all the votes anyway? So we're waiting. We're letting the media pretend Bush still has his high approval ratings - like Daddy during the Gulf War, whose ratings dropped by 24 points after it ended. Of course, that assumes that Junior will LET the "war" end. We're watching that too.

But hey, don't blame me, I voted with the majority.