Email from Delegate Deb
Here's another one:
Jon Carroll
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
All around me is the rending of garments and the beating of breasts. All around me are people on their knees shaking their impotent fists at heaven. All around me people are saying that Bush will win and that therefore they will move to Canada/move to Mexico/join an ashram/go to bed for four years/marry a Republican/acquire ritual tattoos/take too many drugs. My message to them: Get over yourselves. Retain a grip in reality. This is not the worst time in the history of America -- remember the Civil War? That was a bad time. This is not the nastiest presidential campaign ever -- check out
the contest of 1800, starring the soon-to-be-immortal Thomas Jefferson. This is not the first president ever to be held captive by corrupt industrialists -- see the years 1870 through 1900, where candidates were bought and sold like trading cards. Also in 1870 -- women and blacks could not vote; there were no child labor laws and no labor unions; pollutants were spread everywhere without government interference. It sometimes seems as if that is the era the Bush administration longs for, but it may long all it wants -- it ain't gonna happen.
First, it's not a lock that Bush is going to win. Polls are just guesses, and the guesses are disagreeing with each other, and for God's sakes it's September. So why is it the time for despair? Sure, Karl Rove is a genius liar, but Richard Nixon was a genius liar too, and he came to a bad end. And you're giving up now? Now? Let's talk about Poland. Let's talk about 1939. The overwhelming German blitzkrieg overran the country. The Polish army was large and gallant, but it was no match for the Germans. Once the Nazis controlled a town, they began executing people. If one person resisted, the whole town was razed. It took them five days to reach Warsaw. And what did the Poles do? They kept fighting. England and France had pledged to come to their aid, but England and France backed out. The Polish cause was hopeless, but the Poles fought on. Death rained from the sky, and the Poles fought on. The Nazis installed puppet leaders and marched Jews to death camps and turned their attention westward to Belgium and France -- and the Poles fought on. And you're going to retire to your tent because the numbers have turned sour? Is that what I'm hearing? It seems to me that despair is a luxury item right now; it seems to me that despair is an insult to all the people who had real reason to despair, and didn't. You gotta have more resilience than a futon, people. Meaning no disrespect to futons.
OK, let's assume the worst. Let's assume that Four More Years becomes a reality. That would be a bad thing, yes. The rivers and the forests, they would mourn. The have-nots would mourn, guessing that they would have even less. Workers in emergency rooms and classrooms would mourn. But it is not the end of the world. You want the end of the world? Try Fallujah. I don't care which side you're on -- try Fallujah. If you're a solider in any army; if you're a mother or a merchant or a monk, you don't want to be in Fallujah. And you know that Fallujah is on all our consciences. It's no good to walk away and blame Donald Rumsfeld; you are one of the people who can affect what's going on in Fallujah. You can't save the world, but you might save a few lives. And you're going to pick up your marbles and go home? Man, with that attitude Mahatma Gandhi would still be practicing law in South Africa -- and he'd be very, very old. We can't help it; as American citizens we are inordinately powerful. We will be powerful -- more powerful than a citizen of Rwanda or Turkmenistan or Yemen -- no matter what happens in the elections. And with power comes responsibility, as we are forever being reminded. So take some echinacea and cover your head with a warm towel and take a deep breath, and then come out fighting.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh really? How about we all go to Burma and then you can tell me how darned oppressed you are? Wanna live in downtown Kinshasa? You see my point. Fight, fight for old Notre Dame, carry the banner, wearing the flame, la la la something something fame, something jcarroll@sfchronicle.com.
Jon Carroll
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
All around me is the rending of garments and the beating of breasts. All around me are people on their knees shaking their impotent fists at heaven. All around me people are saying that Bush will win and that therefore they will move to Canada/move to Mexico/join an ashram/go to bed for four years/marry a Republican/acquire ritual tattoos/take too many drugs. My message to them: Get over yourselves. Retain a grip in reality. This is not the worst time in the history of America -- remember the Civil War? That was a bad time. This is not the nastiest presidential campaign ever -- check out
the contest of 1800, starring the soon-to-be-immortal Thomas Jefferson. This is not the first president ever to be held captive by corrupt industrialists -- see the years 1870 through 1900, where candidates were bought and sold like trading cards. Also in 1870 -- women and blacks could not vote; there were no child labor laws and no labor unions; pollutants were spread everywhere without government interference. It sometimes seems as if that is the era the Bush administration longs for, but it may long all it wants -- it ain't gonna happen.
First, it's not a lock that Bush is going to win. Polls are just guesses, and the guesses are disagreeing with each other, and for God's sakes it's September. So why is it the time for despair? Sure, Karl Rove is a genius liar, but Richard Nixon was a genius liar too, and he came to a bad end. And you're giving up now? Now? Let's talk about Poland. Let's talk about 1939. The overwhelming German blitzkrieg overran the country. The Polish army was large and gallant, but it was no match for the Germans. Once the Nazis controlled a town, they began executing people. If one person resisted, the whole town was razed. It took them five days to reach Warsaw. And what did the Poles do? They kept fighting. England and France had pledged to come to their aid, but England and France backed out. The Polish cause was hopeless, but the Poles fought on. Death rained from the sky, and the Poles fought on. The Nazis installed puppet leaders and marched Jews to death camps and turned their attention westward to Belgium and France -- and the Poles fought on. And you're going to retire to your tent because the numbers have turned sour? Is that what I'm hearing? It seems to me that despair is a luxury item right now; it seems to me that despair is an insult to all the people who had real reason to despair, and didn't. You gotta have more resilience than a futon, people. Meaning no disrespect to futons.
OK, let's assume the worst. Let's assume that Four More Years becomes a reality. That would be a bad thing, yes. The rivers and the forests, they would mourn. The have-nots would mourn, guessing that they would have even less. Workers in emergency rooms and classrooms would mourn. But it is not the end of the world. You want the end of the world? Try Fallujah. I don't care which side you're on -- try Fallujah. If you're a solider in any army; if you're a mother or a merchant or a monk, you don't want to be in Fallujah. And you know that Fallujah is on all our consciences. It's no good to walk away and blame Donald Rumsfeld; you are one of the people who can affect what's going on in Fallujah. You can't save the world, but you might save a few lives. And you're going to pick up your marbles and go home? Man, with that attitude Mahatma Gandhi would still be practicing law in South Africa -- and he'd be very, very old. We can't help it; as American citizens we are inordinately powerful. We will be powerful -- more powerful than a citizen of Rwanda or Turkmenistan or Yemen -- no matter what happens in the elections. And with power comes responsibility, as we are forever being reminded. So take some echinacea and cover your head with a warm towel and take a deep breath, and then come out fighting.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh really? How about we all go to Burma and then you can tell me how darned oppressed you are? Wanna live in downtown Kinshasa? You see my point. Fight, fight for old Notre Dame, carry the banner, wearing the flame, la la la something something fame, something jcarroll@sfchronicle.com.
posted by BLONDIE at 9:17 AM
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