The Power of Pride
America and the 7 Deadly Sins
by Alan Bisbort

July 31, 2006 – Hartford (apj.us) – The bumper stickers read “The Power of Pride” with the blue letters following the red and white contours of an unfurled American flag. That’s all the bumper stickers say. But what are they really saying? What makes the bearers of this sticker so proud?

That the nation is in the hands of the most hated man on the planet, who has dragged America’s good name through the mud, a stain that will take two generations to remove, if indeed it can be removed?

That America is always right, even when she’s wrong?

Or that America is proud even when the government behaves in ways that collectively shame us?

On the other hand, maybe the people who put it on their cars don’t think about it, or much of anything, at all. Chances are they have a child or a loved one in uniform and this sticker is their hedge against their being harmed, a charm to ward off evil spirits. Nearly 3,000 American families know that feeling, tens of thousands more are coming to grips with loved ones wounded in body in spirit. And many more will experience that unimaginable pain before we are rid of the cancer in the White House and Congress.

In that case, one can understand their need to believe that the Liar in Chief and his inner circle of sociopaths, megalomaniacs and enablers are actually competent, decent, honest leaders and that what they do in their nation’s name is something about which they can take pride. Their power of denial is almost as strong as their power of pride.

Eventually that denial—when they realize they’ve been lied to, their children murdered under false pretenses—will break and all hell will be loosed. The recent ugliness in Lebanon, which America did nothing to prevent or, once started, to stop, will likely have only two major impacts, both bad: Many more Americans are going to die in the Middle East and the price of oil will rise to unprecedented levels, causing financial ruin to millions of Americans while the Republican Elite, their portfolios stuffed with petroleum and defense industry stock, will line their pockets.

Still, though the power of denial is one thing, the power of pride baffles me. Pride in small doses can be a good thing—taking pride in your work, your appearance, etc.—as long as it’s not the overriding part of your personality. I confess to a certain amount of pride when I’ve written something that raises the blood pressure of even one right-winger, gotten him so worked up that he suffers a wave of anxiety, usually relieved by penning an anonymous personal threat to me or calling my house and hanging up when I answer. Likewise, my dog feels pride, I suppose, when he’s evacuated a particularly large amount of solid fecal matter in the hated neighbor’s yard. And so on.

But, no, since you asked, I am not swelled with pride about America. I do not feel that “Power of Pride,” nor do I think pride is warranted right now. Just for the record—and to preempt all those pride-swollen self-appointed patriots who will take exception with this—I did feel pride for my nation at one time. I grew up, the son, grandson and nephew of decorated U.S. Army colonels, feeling that my country was a beacon of freedom to the world. The happiest days of my childhood were spent on American military bases around the world. It might indeed be that experience that has made me more sensitive to America’s failings. As Neil Young sings on his extraordinary new album Living With War: “America is beautiful but she’s got an ugly side.”

I’ve now lived long enough to realize why Pride (aka superbia or hubris) is one of the Seven Deadly Sins, along with gluttony, greed, lust, envy, anger, sloth. (Imagine someone with a bumper sticker that reads “The Power of Sloth” or “The Joy of Envy”).

Pride is, however, the all-powerful sin. It, in fact, has been called “the father of all sins.” Gluttony, for example, is thought of as pride in one’s consumption; Envy is a craving for the pride of others; Sloth is the sin of those too proud to consider anything new; Anger takes pride in violence; Greed takes pride in possessions and money; Lust takes pride in sexual consumption or the desire, usually unconsummated, for same.

According to the Bible (Proverbs 6: 16-19), God was clear on this score: “These six things doth the Lord hate; yea, seven are an abomination unto him: a proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.”

While many definitions of pride have been tendered, Dante’s might be the best of all, and the one that most accurately describes America’s current excess, embodied by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the various assorted pundits of the mainstream press: “love of self perverted to hatred and contempt for one’s neighbor.”

Dante believed that Pride was the root of all sins. Thus, in the Purgatorio, he showed how all souls must be purged of that sin first. Then, they suffer diminishing horrors and punishments for the other six deadly sins. How, then, can there not be a space in Hell already reserved for Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Hannity, O’Reilley, Matthews, Hume, Lieberman, Lott, et al, after their “Shock and awe” campaign amounted to the Nazis’ preemptive Blitzkrieg campaigns against Poland, Belgium, Denmark, the Netherlands and France? Or the announcement of “Mission accomplished” when the mission had not even been named? Or “Enduring freedom” for a country—no, an entire region—now reduced to total chaos? All of these are terms of overweening pride.

America’s sin of Pride, its worship of the Power of Pride, has had predictable results. The Pew Global Attitudes Project, which interviewed 93,000 people in 50 countries over the past four years, has shown the rest of the world hates the United States now and the taint of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, et al., has now “trickled down” to the rest of us. Regardless of how we feel about these criminals in power, simply because we are Americans we are hated almost equally by Europeans, Asians and Arabs.

As the Times of London reported, “Majorities around the world think Americans are greedy, violent and rude, and fewer than half in countries such as Poland, Spain, Canada, China and Russia think Americans are honest…Few analysts expect more than marginal improvements, short of another Sept. 11. The dislike is accelerating among youth. The problem…is Americans, not just [President] Bush. In increasing numbers, people around the globe resent U.S. power and wealth and reject specific actions such as the occupation of Iraq and the campaign against democratically elected Palestinian leaders…America’s image problem is pervasive, deep and perhaps permanent, analysts say, an inevitable outcome of being the world's only superpower.”

The Power of Pride has pissed away 230 years of American history.

Heckuva job, Bushy!

Alan Bisbort is a columnist for the Hartford Advocate. His book, "'When You Read This They Will Have Killed Me': The Life and Redemption of Caryl Chessman, Whose Execution Shook America," will be published this fall by Carroll & Graf.

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