Thursday, September 12, 2002

SHOULD'VE MENTIONED in yesterday's installment the two most bizarre spectacle on yesterday's all-day, almost-every-channel memorial marathon. The No. 1 most bizarre sight was eminently predictable: The merchandising of gaudy flag-ribbon trinkets, bald-eagle collector plates and such on the shopping channels. The No. 2 most bizarre spectacle was much more unexpected: ESPN senior announcer Chris Berman reciting from the Gettysburg Address between inninngs of a Yankees-Red Sox baseball game.

posted by clark 9:14 AM

Wednesday, September 11, 2002

TODAY WE ARE ALL SURVIVORS.

Survivors of the hype. Survivors of the tears, real and crocodile. Survivors of the merchandising. Survivors of the self-serving politician pontifications.

And, so far, at least most of us are survivors of the war against freedom being conducted in freedom's name.

Richard Nixon was often described as running an "imperial presidency." The current thief of the presidency is running an imperial presidency that would lack only the imperial pomp and grey-flannel style of the Nixon era. He is a president who wants to be dictator, and who is trying to transform this nation into a dictatorship.

But it wouldn't be the fascist dictatorship my anarchist pals always rant about. The U.S. Right-Wing Conspiracy (hereafter "RWC") has a simpler style in mind--the Latin American dictatorship model, in which a hired stooge runs a brutally authoritarian regime on behalf of the 500 families that own everything in the country. One stooge can be replaced by another, but the underlying power structure remains.

I know someone who likes to explain the human condition as a struggle between a "love-based reality" and a "fear-based reality." I would argue there are many other bases for people's individual zeitgeists; but the "fear-based" concept works in this case. The RWC thrives on spreading fear, and "terrorism" is just about the most exploitable fear-object you can find.

So we've been inundated with piece-by-piece assaults on our rights and freedoms, and accusations of treason against anyone who dares question these assaults. You've got any number of pro-corporate, anti-environment, and anti-labor power plays promoted under the new excuses.

But you also have activists, webloggers, pundits, ordinary folk, and even a few politicians speaking out against the ongoing coup-in-process. This is the true resiliant, never-say-die Spirit of America. These, not the RWC demagogues, are the real patriots. If more of us can join this fight for real freedom, we can stand a decent chance of both defending our country and of having a country worth defending.

posted by clark 6:27 PM

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