-Caveat Lector-
Blind, blind, blind. AALLLLLLLLLLL WWRRRROOOOOOOOONNNNNNNGGGG
On Wed, 10 Jan 2001 23:16:30 EST "Samantha L." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> -Caveat Lector-
>
> Online Journal - http://www.onlinejournal.com
>
> 01-10-01: Relativity or are Republicans evil? (Or do they just act
> that
> way?)
>
> By Michael Hammerschlag
>
> January 10, 2001 | There was a point in this terrible election where
> it
> became all clear, like a B & W photo in developer, that they were
> going to
> get away with it-that the Republicans would manage to stop the
> recount and
> force their man into the White House.. against all reason, facts, and
> fairness.
>
> That point was when Bob Dole and Christine Whitman, moderates of
> whom one
> might have expected a dollop of justice, paraded down to Florida and
> added
> their voices to the congealed impervious mass of Republicans
> parroting the
> amazing lie that humans couldn't fairly count votes . . . though we
> had
> managed quite well for 200 years. It was a betrayal of integrity, of
> honesty, of decency, that left one breathless in its audacity. Wasn't
> there one Republican who had any bedrock respect for our
> constitutional
> principles, who had any principles beyond their own party's
> self-promotion, who would publicly speak out against this
> intellectual
> violence? As in the impeachment, apparently not. A candidate that had
> campaigned on "bringing back integrity" endorsed the most cynical
> untruth
> possible, one that dwarfed Monica. Republicans mobilized every
> branch of
> government in their service- it was total war, while Democrats wrung
> their
> hands, and pundits relentless pressured the winner (by one-third
> million
> votes then) to concede.
>
> If Katherine Harris couldn't deliver Florida by her machinations
> (ordering
> supervisors to stop legitimate hand counts, throwing thousands of
> out-of-state innocent "felons" off the rolls-30 percent of all
> blacks),
> then maybe the Fl Supreme Court. or US Court of Appeals would (they
> didn't). If not them, the Florida legislature prepared to usurp
> their own
> voters; will in the most naked abuse of power we have seen in ages.
> If not
> them, the Supreme Court prepared to throw out every principle they
> espoused to cobble together a decision so shoddy that every American
> election in history would be invalidated by its application. For the
> Bushmen, losing was not an option.
>
> But if losing wasn't an option, then this wasn't an election and we
> aren't
> a democracy-which brings us back to the conundrum of preventing a
> fair
> recount. Future eons of schoolchildren will ask, "Why did people let
> this
> happen?" Simply, the Democrats didn't care enough, and the
> Republicans
> were willing to do anything to win. Add 98 million couch potatoes who
> couldn't get off theirs' to vote. And pundits just didn't like Al.
>
> Democracy and our entire electoral process rely on good will, on
> public-spirited decency far more than people realize. Election
> officials
> (which I've been a couple of times) aren't supposed to be impartial,
> indeed, they aren't allowed to be impartial-you must be a member of
> one of
> the two parties to be a poll worker. The theory is of balanced power
> and a
> passionate interest, but in practice, it often relies on people to:
> 'due
> unto others as you would have them (lest they) do unto you.' If this
> overweening principle collapses far enough, the entire system breaks
> down
> and isn't easily reconstitutable, which is why all-out political war
> is
> rightly feared by many. In this election, the Bush forces shredded
> that
> principle and demonstrated a deep contempt for democracy.
>
> If conditions had been reversed and Bush was ahead by 700 votes, do
> you
> think for one second that Gore would have opposed recounting the
> votes? He
> is such a civic stickler that he wouldn't even let the black reps
> talk
> about their motion to contest Florida electors when the
> Loser-in-Chief was
> certified the victor Saturday. The Republicans have been fighting
> no-holds-barred for 20 years now, since 1980, Reagan, Terry Dolan,
> and
> NCPAC; and almost rabidly since Clinton's ascension. Democrats,
> however,
> have maintained a befuddled civility as if they couldn't quite
> understand
> why the Republicans hated them so much, as the Republicans-fueled by
> hate
> radio-became dominated by extremists and fringe fundamentalists.
>
> Nothing demonstrated this vicious hatred better than the
> demonstrators
> picketing and harassing the vice president at his home to "get out
> of Dick
> Cheney's house," as the presidency was corruptly and violently
> ripped from
> his pocket. At some point hatred and lies must be classified in their
> larger category: evil.
>
> Politics all involves some damage to the truth, but when one repeats
> an
> egregious lie over and over, until half the country repeats (or
> believes)
> that untruth, you haven't just damaged the system, you've damaged
> the very
> language and changed the firmament on which the system sits. And
> nothing
> is ever the same again. It's been so in every dictatorship, as rulers
> conditioned their people to accept constantly rising levels of
> outrage, of
> violence, of enemies-internal and external-that must be warred
> against.
> And this lie involved the voting that's the very basis of democracy.
> The
> next step of shifting relativity, already floated by Bushmen and
> perhaps
> soon to be picked up by vapid commentators, is to seal the votes-to
> prevent all this uncertainty and instability.
>
> This is a different Bush, not one of noblesse oblige, but one of
> simmering
> anti-intellectual resentments; a compassionate conservative who
> drives his
> heart-surgeried veep pal out of the hospital like a plow horse, who
> goes
> golfing 800 miles away as his daughter recovers from emergency
> surgery
> with orders to "clean out her room;" an Ivy league graduate so
> bereft of
> ideas that he had to reach a quarter century back to staff his
> administration; his Corporation USA/Bush; a West Texas product who
> believes that millionaires should be in control and what's right for
> corporations is right for America. We are moving from the best public
> speaker in a century to the worst. Contrast this man with the Gore
> that
> warmly and graciously greeted every senator in the historic
> swearing-in*,
> including his sworn opponents. It's a matter of class. Bush only
> values
> money, power, and loyalty. Witness White House Counsel appointee
> Alberto
> Gonzales (who helped Bush avoid jury duty in DUI case), a potential
> Supreme Court nominee, as he swore his fawning fealty, his undying
> loyalty
> to Bush at his public debut. He would have kissed his ring, if Bush
> had
> one. It was embarrassing, and chilling in its exposition of the
> quality of
> Bush's nominees.
>
> The Ashcroft nomination could be seen as an act of contempt-offering
> up an
> extreme right-wing ideologue for top cop, but it's something else.
> It's a
> test: a sop to the hard right, who will be suitably energized if he
> is
> defeated, and some red meat to aggrieved Democrats to chew on. He
> isn't
> supposed to be confirmed. If he is, the shell-shocked Dems will have
> demonstrated how weak and directionless they are (frightened?), and
> set
> themselves up to be steamrollered on a variety of issues. And
> America,
> prosecuted by a religious fanatic, judged by the Supreme
> Republicans, will
> take another giant step towards the terrifying shifting landscape of
> a
> dynastic reactionary relativistic ether, where the truth itself
> will. . .
> . depend.
>
> And red is gray and gray is white, and we decide which is right.--
> Moody
> Blues
>
>
> *You have the President of the Senate: the vice president who became
> president, but had the election stolen from him, greeting his running
> mate, the real next vice president, but now senator again, and the
> president's wife, who is now also a senator, while the president
> watched
> from the gallery; and the opposition beamed with pride, as if they
> hadn't
> banded together en masse to strip the presidency from veep, who
> would in
> two weeks,. . . . be nothing. If this were a TV movie with Alan Alda,
> you'd turn it off for being too absurd.
>
>
> Michael Hammerschlag has written commentaries for the Seattle Times,
> Providence Journal, Honolulu Advertiser; Moscow News, Tribune, and
> the
> Guardian; was a TV reporter and produced a documentary series on the
> presidential primaries. His website is http://mikehammer.tripod.com
> e-mail
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
> Copyright � 1998-2001 Online Journal. All rights reserved.
>
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screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are
sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis-
directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with
major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought.
That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and
always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no
credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply.
Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector.
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