opinearc04

enemy

STAY FOCUSED ON OUR ENEMY: AL-QA'IDA

(6 January 2004)

Who is the enemy we are fighting in the war on terror? Al-Qa’ida, the militant “Mujahideen” organization under the leadership of Osama bin Laden and Dr. Ayman Al-Zawahiri, was responsible for 9-11. It would seem to be obvious that Al-Qa’ida is therefore the enemy that we must engage and overcome.

The US presumably is continuing to seek bin Laden after our Afghanistan campaign and to disrupt and deter Al-Qa’ida by overt and covert operations.

Meanwhile, however, the Bush administration designated the Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad as our most prominent terrorist threat and gave top priority to deposing it. The invasion of Iraq and its deadly aftermath have made it harder for Americans to understand the identity and nature of our principal enemy in this war.

It helps to clarify our war targets if we differentiate Saddam from Osama.

Both are Arabs. Both have had a grand vision of a pan-Arab nation state free to determine its destiny without the controlling influence of Western powers. But the similarity seems to end there.

Saddam led a secular party and suppressed the influence of Islam in politics. In his grand vision, he would have used force to take over the other Arabic states that emerged from colonialism. He would have ruled them all under his dictatorship from Baghdad.   He would have driven Israelis into the sea and included Palestine in his empire. But Islamic doctrines would not have inhibited him from dealing with Western powers militarily or economically. Indeed, he negotiated successfully for US help during his war against Iran in the 1980s.

Osama’s grand vision, like Saddam’s, is rooted in fierce attachment to the land of Arabia. But Osama is not a secularist like Saddam. He leads a “holy” organization whose objectives blend pan-Arab nationalism with a fanatical attachment to Islamic history and belief. Like Saddam, he wants to destroy the sovereignty of the Arab nations that arose from the withdrawal of colonial power in the twentieth century. He wants to combine them into a pan-Arabic superpower, and, of course, destroy Israel. But unlike Saddam, he wants that superpower to be completely under Islamic law and isolated from contact with the West. He wants to rid the entire region of Westerners.

Osama will not be satisfied with the mere re-establishment of the Islamic superpower of many centuries ago. The purpose of re-establishing it is to engage in a final global battle against the West—or, the Byzantines, as Al-Qa’ida calls its ultimate enemy.

Al-Qa’ida’s strategy against the West calls for violence in our homelands to distract us from further domination and exploitation of the “land of the two holy places” (that is, Arabia, site of Medina and Mecca). Al-Qa’ida denies that the current leaders of Saudi-Arabia, Syria, and other Arab countries are legitimate. They are products of the Western colonial system and must be removed. Al-Qa’ida targets the house of Saud in particular for destruction at the right time.   Pending that destruction, it depends on Saudi Arabia’s Wahhabist brand of Islam to produce new extremist recruits to its ranks; and it depends on Saudis for funds.

Our invasion and occupation of Iraq seems to play into Al-Qa’ida’s grand strategy. By creating a massive American-Western presence in Iraq, we have given Al-Qa’ida a convenient target in the region for its tactics of terrorist violence. This violence aims to demoralize and drive us out of the Middle East. By preoccupying us in Iraq, Al-Qa’ida believes that it is keeping us from exploiting and polluting the rest of the sacred Islamic lands. And it believes that it is steadily weakening our resolve and our resources in preparation for the final jihad that will destroy us.

President Bush said that Iraq is now the “front line” in the war on terrorists, as if this is a favorable development for the US. Given its general strategy, Al-Qa’ida probably agrees that Iraq is a new front line and probably sees that as a development favorable to its purposes. It can conveniently keep up a campaign of guerrilla violence against US troops.

We learn about Al-Qa’ida’s vision and strategy by reading its official magazine, The Voice of Jihad, available through the website of the Middle East Media Research Institute.

In recent editions, an Al-Qa’ida ideologue says that members of the Saudi ruling house are slaves to their American (“Crusader”) masters. The battle plan will be to engage the “Crusaders” through violence in Iraq and in our homeland so that we do not have the will or the way to rescue the slaves (Saudi rulers) when Al-Qa’ida is ready to depose them. Here is this grand vision in a nutshell, in that ideologue’s own words:

No political program has a chance of succeeding if we do not defeat the West, militarily and culturally, and remove it from Muslim countries. Then, it will not be difficult for the [new pan-Arab] nation, with the help of its tremendous resources, to rebuild life according to religious Islamic principles. We will become the masters of the world, as the world's economic fate depends on us because we have the resources the world needs and all the elements of controlling the world are in our hands. What we are lacking is to live free and to rule ourselves by ourselves, cut off from the West and its agents.

This is the vision that presumably inspires suicide terrorists to kill innocent Americans.   Their destruction of the twin towers and their attack on the Pentagon on 9-11 were not just symbolic expressions of hatred of the West. They were acts that Al-Qa’ida wants to repeat until the US gives up its will to resist the rise of a new Islamic nation.

This “far out” scenario boggles the mind. Surely, we want to say, these kooks can’t be serious. Then we remember the damage they have done so far and have to renew our resolve to defeat them. We have to combine that resolve with all the ingenuity and vision that we can command. The agenda has to include the following elements.

1. Put Iraq in proper perspective—not at the top of our priority list.

2. Fiercely fight bin Laden and the legions now with him. His is a totalitarian vision even more ambitious than Hitler’s.

3. Avoid action where possible that motivates young Muslims to buy into the Al-Qa’ida dream.

4. Articulate a vision for the Middle East that competes with Al-Qa’ida’s vision for clarity and contains hope for ordinary people. This includes resolving the Israel-Palestine conflict and reducing our dependence on Middle-East oil.

5. Engage responsible Muslims in a project to establish common cultural ground, in particular to reduce the Koranic basis of Muslim prejudice against Jews and Christians (dhimmitude).

6. Conduct diplomacy and foreign aid so that current Middle East regimes minimize extremism and behave as increasingly responsible members of the international community.

It is easy to draw up such a list of things to do. It is hard to see the end of it all.

Samuel P. Huntington says that this is a new era of “the clash of civilizations.” Many disagree with his concept of separate civilizations. Looking at the agenda, though, you sure get the feeling that something is clashing in a big way.

fiscal

BUSH FISCAL POLICY EARNS CRITICISM

(11 February 2004)

The following letter appeared in the "Readers' Views" section of the Pottstown Mercury on 4 February 2004.

In his State of the Union address, President Bush did not reiterate his call for a new manned space program to the moon and Mars. Perhaps he deleted the item because he is getting increasing criticism from members of his own Republican party for promoting bold ideas without showing how we will pay for them.

Under Bush, federal spending has gone up annually in double digits, according to the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank now criticizing him. That is over and above the extraordinary costs for war and homeland security. Alison Fraser at the Heritage Foundation believes that the administration has lacked the "self-discipline required to balance fiscal priorities."

Combining big spending increases with huge tax cuts, we now are looking at deficits that some analysts say will reach or exceed $5 trillion over the next decade. Republican Senator John McCain said that spending on Capitol Hill is "completely out of control, and it's an absolute disgrace."

The president's call to cut his deficit in half over five years looks to many like election-year rhetoric. The administration has no realistic plan for meeting it.

As Gene Lyons reported in his 22 January Mercury column, the International Monetary Fund says that Bush fiscal policy now threatens the entire world economy.

The nation is fortunate that, before the presidential election, responsible Republicans and conservatives are finally acknowledging that Bush policies are not above criticism. By November, perhaps many will conclude that the nation cannot afford four more years of fiscal recklessness.

spin

ADS & SPINMEISTERS DO NOT HELP VOTERS CHOOSE

(24 March 2004)

(The following item ran in the "Readers' Views" section of the 29 March 2004 edition of the Pottstown Mercury.)

As the general election campaign nears, serious voters need to prepare themselves for an unprecedented barrage of smears, spins, and shameless exaggerations. With millions to spend on ads, the Republicans will be selling us a predictably nasty picture of the Democratic challenger. And the Democrats will be doing their best to reduce "Dubya" to a cartoon.

Voters who try to pick their way through all this trash in search of the right choice in November will be sorely frustrated. It will not lend itself to rational analysis. The best strategy for undecided voters will be to ignore the paid ads and the partisan spinners. That will save time and avoid the sense of frustration that conflicting bombast is bound to create.

The 2004 election is so important to the future of America that it should not hinge on the knee-jerk responses of voters to ads and the rants of spinmeisters.

The election will come down to a simple but awesome decision on whether or not to change the priorities that steer our national government. What would four more years of a Bush administration do to our quality of life and the international status of America? What could a Democratic administration do to improve things? To make such critical evaluations, we voters should try to understand the broad movement of the nation to the right during the Bush years and read between the lines of both candidates. We should not waste our time on paid sound bites and obvious puffery.

fantasy

AFTER SUPPORTING BUSH FANTASY, AMERICANS ARE REDISCOVERING THE REAL WORLD

(11 May 2004)

It's okay for you to blame the Bush administration for leading the American people into a wrong-headed preemptive strike on Iraq. But in doing so, you are also obliged to blame the American people for following their misguided leader. The majority of Americans endorsed his war policy in polls and through the votes of their representatives in Congress.

Bush could not have captured this support with his dubious rationalizations and sophomoric rhetoric if the majority of the American public had not been predisposed to believe and follow.

What could they have been thinking—and feeling?

First, shock and fear. The 9-11 attack on America still traumatized them.

Second, revenge and resistance. To cauterize their fear, they needed a quick and certain strike at the purported source of their trauma.

Third, trust in leadership. Traumatized and desirous of relief from it, they desperately wanted to believe what Bush told them.

At home, the absence of a second 9-11 so far has eased a pit-in-the-stomach feeling of fear. More Americans are beginning to remember that an enraged counter punch may release feeling but miss its mark. And after Fellujah and Abu Ghraib, alas, they are beginning to wonder if they misplaced their trust. Fewer than half by now approves of the way the Bush administration is handling Iraq.

***

Bush's claim to a superior "moral clarity" eschewed nuance and trumpeted self-confidence. Fearful and vengeful, the American public allowed the claim of their leader to stand. Voices of the right, more articulate than the leader himself, explained how refreshing and promising Bush's plain and simple stance was, in contrast to Clinton's.

One of those voices was that of columnist David Brooks. How refreshing it is now to read his acknowledgment of "intellectual failure." Intellectual nuance, of course, was precisely what Bush has sought to avoid in his leadership style. But purported plain talk, it now appears, cannot reduce the complexity of the real world to an equivalent plainness. Brooks in the 11 May 2004 New York Times:

[I]t's not too early to begin thinking about what was clearly an intellectual failure. There was, above all, a failure to understand the consequences of our power. There was a failure to anticipate the response our power would have [sic] on the people we sought to liberate. They resent us for our power and at the same time expect us to be capable of everything. There was a failure to understand the effect our power would have on other people around the world. We were so sure we were using our might for noble purposes, we assumed that sooner or later, everybody else would see that as well. Far from being blinded by greed, we were blinded by idealism.

The wrong kind of idealism, that is. (And before we are cleared of the charge of greed, we have to see the whole story of private contracting in post-Saddam Iraq.) Brooks now calls us to see the war on terror with the same tragic irony--he calls it "rugged idealism"--that guided our mission in World War II. That highly nuanced attitude allowed the US to save Europe without expecting sainthood. By contrast, our adventure into Iraq "seems like a childish fantasy." He thinks that the American public, led by Bush, expected to do its good deeds and then receive the universal admiration of Iraqis and the world.

Brooks and we now know that it won't happen that way. (The Bush administration probably knows too, but, given its self-righteous moral clarity, cannot yet make such an admission.)

So, welcome back to the real world, Americans, where irony and nuance are not the adornments of effete intellectuals but the very substance of our life as a nation. The Bush administration has tragically revealed its inability--and that of its citizen supporters--to acknowledge or deal with the complexities of the age of terrorists.

A conservative Bush supporter like Brooks can now say, "For Iraqis to win, the US must lose." Good Iraqis must acquire a democratic forum in which they can defy us, he says. Otherwise, the only anti-Americans will be the evil ones. In losing, we too will win.

Such subtlety would have befitted Clinton and Gore, by golly. Now, morally clear and simple sensibilities in the Bush world must begin to wrestle with this strange kind of thought. What irony.

In the 2000 presidential campaign, Dick Cheney punctuated his stump speeches by saying, "They've had their chance; now it's time for them to go."

It's time now for the American public to put its fears into perspective and rethink how it wants to resist the ongoing threat of terrorists. It's time for it to abandon the leader who has played on its fears, misdirected its desire for revenge, and fed it fantasy.

ground

LEFT & RIGHT BOTH SHOULD SEEK COMMON GROUND

(26 May 2004)

The following letter appeared in the "Readers' Views" section of the Pottstown Mercury on 20 May 2004.

Because Pennsylvania is a swing state, the way we vote could determine whether Bush or the Democratic nominee wins in November. This electoral situation compels thinking Republicans as well as Democrats in the Keystone State to vote against a second term for Bush.

Entering office without majority support, Bush squandered an historic opportunity to lead a sharply divided America toward a new consensus in the middle. He could have sought to define the common political ground where sensible conservatives and liberals can coexist despite differences. He could have tapped into the pragmatic streak that still exists in our culture. He thus could have marginalized ideological zealotry on both the right and the left.

Regrettably, Bush stayed in step with the extremist right wing of the Republican Party and turned his back on the American mainstream.

Instead of speaking for the nation, he speaks for his radical base. This increasingly polarizes us. Joe Klein said in the April 12 issue of Time, "We may have reached the point at which a civil political conversation is no longer possible in this country."

If Bush showed any sign that he could become less ideologically rigid, responsible Republicans in Pennsylvania might be justified in voting for him. He shows no such sign. Their only practical choice is to join Democrats and help turn the nation toward common-sense solutions to the serious domestic and international problems that the Bush administration has created.

2004

THE 2004 ISSUE: HAVE PRESIDENT BUSH'S POLICIES MADE THE NATION BETTER OR WORSE?

(10 July 2004)

The following letter appeared in the "Readers' Views" section of the Pottstown Mercury on 28 June 2004.

Daniel F. McCabe in a June 12 letter said that he was not persuaded by my May 20 argument against the reelection of President George W. Bush.

Mr. McCabe lauded Mr. Bush for the clarity of his political positions and his courage in standing by them regardless of public opinion. But voters need to answer whether these positions have made the nation better or worse. Because of his clear but extreme positions, the nation’s long-term welfare is in jeopardy.

For example, owing to excessive tax cuts tilted toward the wealthiest, long-term budget deficits will prevent the government from doing the public’s necessary work on the environment, education, and health. (Rigid ideologues with whom the president aligns himself do not consider such work necessary anyway.) Foundation stones of America’s success as a nation—separation of church and state, protection of civil liberties even in an age of terrorists—are eroding.

Much as we all want Mr. Bush to succeed in fighting Islamist terrorists, fair-minded assessment shows that policy errors have seriously weakened America’s international position. True, the president is now modifying the go-it-alone agenda that he bought wholesale from extremist neoconservative hawks. But this improvisational flip-flop should inspire little confidence in his ability to chart America’s course in the world going forward.

John Kerry’s website (www.johnkerry.com/issues/) spells out pragmatic and sensible policy alternatives that would address problems created by the Bush administration. And Kerry would show a much-needed fresh face of American leadership to the world.

republicans

THE ARGUMENT FOR REPUBLICANS TO VOTE FOR KERRY

(3 September 2004)

The following letter appeared in the "Readers' Views" section of the Pottstown Mercury on 9 August 2004.

Columnist Morton Kondracke (July 16 Mercury) said that few Republicans are leaning toward voting for Democrat John Kerry. But columnist Joan Ryan (July 19 Mercury) gave one reason Republicans might switch. She said that a “corrosive quality” in the mistake-ridden presidency of George Bush is eating away at the party faithful.

Still, Republicans, like Democrats, do not easily become turncoats, even in the privacy of a voting booth. What will it take to persuade weary Pennsylvania Republicans to vote for Kerry?

They don’t have to see in Kerry the answer to all our problems. They just have to acknowledge that a Kerry administration will do far less harm than a second-term Bush administration. Kerry is much more likely than Bush to restore governing principles that are consistent with historic Republicanism—for example, fiscal responsibility, conservation, and international caution and cooperation.

Kerry at least will apply brakes to the reckless growth of long-term debt. After shifting a massive financial burden to our children and grandchildren, the Bush administration, if returned to office, would add more.

Kerry at least will try to stop the damage to forests, air, and water unleashed by Bush to favor corporations at the expense of long-term public good.

Kerry will be free to find solutions in the Middle East without the nagging need, which Bush has, to continue rationalizing huge mistakes already made. A new American face at the international table will give us a chance to restore relationships wrecked by Bush unilateralism.

By supporting a Democrat this time, Pennsylvania Republicans can help America regain its balance and correct its course.

COURAGE

IT TAKES COURAGE TO ABANDON BUSH IN FAVOR OF KERRY

(1 October 2004)

An edited version of the following letter appeared in the "Readers' Views" section of the Pottstown Mercury on 25 September 2004.

Three cheers for Debbie Parkins! In her September 10 Mercury letter, she displayed candor and courage. Having put her trust in George W. Bush in 2000, she acknowledged that his mismanagement of the nation’s affairs persuaded her to oppose his reelection in 2004.

Many people find it hard to admit that they misplaced their support of a president. They feel better “staying the course” in spite of evidence that the course is going south. (The Bush administration, with its notorious unwillingness to admit mistakes, sets the example.)

But other people, such as Debbie Parkins, are able to release their grip on their past position and make a fresh judgment. I hope that all Mercury readers who are leaning toward Mr. Bush have the courage to make a fresh judgment as they approach this fateful November election.

Many thought that Mr. Bush, as the first president to hold an MBA, would lead the nation with the competence associated with best business practices. It didn’t happen. Ms. Parkins enumerated the negative results of the administration’s amazing incompetence.

In particular, she punctured the campaign myth, veiled in fear, that the Bush administration is our only shield against terror. Its tragic misdirection of resources to the quagmire of Iraq and its underfunding of homeland security illustrate its incompetence to plan and execute against the real enemy.

A Kerry presidency of course will entail inevitable unknowns. Still, voting for Kerry will be more prudent than voting to continue the too-well-known failures of the Bush administration.

better

AMERICA IS BETTER THAN THIS

(16 December 2004)

I write while grieving for the recent loss of Margot, my dear wife of 51 years. This personal loss overlaps and reinforces my sense of loss as an American.

In the worst Nixon years and at the height of the Clinton fiasco, something in my sense of American virtue did not crumble. Our exceptional place in the world still seemed to be demonstrable. Even those who dismissed Reagan’s romanticizing of America could not wholly deny in themselves a belief that we remained the city on a hill.

The decision of a majority of my fellow citizens to return George W. Bush for a second term first stunned me, then in the course of the most horrible month of my personal life turned into a general feeling of sourness. And the sourness now has turned into a feeling of persistent loss.

We had an uplifting celebration of Margot's great life. Now that she is resting in her white casket in the graveyard a short walk from where I write, I am able to steal some moments, after months of her suffering, to wonder about my country, which seems to have suffered and passed away as surely as Margot passed away.

On this website and elsewhere for the past four years, I have been quarreling about the particulars of Bush domestic and international policy that seem so willfully wrong-headed and alien to our best national interests.

I could continue doing that in an attempt to articulate what I now think we may irrevocably lose. But like the hurt of a loved-one’s death, this new sense of national loss cuts to the core of being. To be sure, it is about the loss of jobs and tax-cutting bonanzas for the wealthiest and the gutting of safety nets for the poor and enforced extensions of military service in Iraq and the destruction of nature's bounty.

But it is now about more than that.

***

It is about the shame that I now feel when I see my nation’s official position toward its people and toward the world. I am ashamed at the duplicity at the very heart of my government’s words and actions.

A generosity of democratic spirit, what I think of as the spirit of Walt Whitman, has disappeared. In its place is a rhetoric of empire, disguised as a commitment to enforced freedom around the world. Faith-based approaches to policy have displaced America’s hallowed commitment to reason and law. Political reality is now what the government says, not what the people say. Governance now is the manipulation of message carried to its ultimate “public relations” sophistication. The debasement of language now hardly knows a limit. Healthy forests are forests that are cut down for corporate gain. We conduct war because it is the only road to peace. We save cities by destroying them. We protect human rights by torturing people. We spread democracy with guns.

This damnable transformation of the nation of Washington and Lincoln, of two Roosevelts and Eisenhower, has been effected by Americans who claim to be restoring traditional moral values. And a majority of the electorate believes them and supports them. To shame, this leads me to add feelings of consternation and confusion. How can so many of my fellow Americans be so wrong about the distortion at the soul of our nation? How can they look at hypocrisy and deception and see forthrightness? How can they trust the untrustworthy, whose real agenda is never wholly revealed? We seem like a nation gone mad, without the leadership or the inner resources to recapture what we once thought we were. Why?

Fear of another 9-11 explains it in part; Americans are willing to give up the shining dream in return for the appearance of dull security against Islamist terrorists. Delayed reaction to the dismemberment in the 1960s of a more controlled American society explains it in part. The Karl Roves and George W. Bushes of the Baby Boomer generation did not buy into flower power; they bided their time and finally captured the handles of power that turn and shape the way people behave in public. One wit called the purported return to "traditional moral values"—an arguable issue—"Rove's revenge."

The perversion of America's historic stance on religious freedom may be a subset of that capture. Bush's "base" believes wrongly that Christians came to America to found a Christian nation. They came to found colonies that gave them freedom to practice their brand of Christianity in their churches and not to be persecuted by a king or an established church for their beliefs. The paranoid "base" has hounded itself into believing that we the people out in the public arena want to deny them their freedom to worship. That is nonsense. Under the American dispensation, they have every freedom to go to their churches and worship all they want. The nation does not owe Christians or any other religious group exclusive, special, or even equal right to use public venues for their worship or their proselytizing. The "base" has its freedom to bitch because America separated state from church. If the "base" has its way, intolerance of anything but evangelical Christianity will become an official state rule someday. This is American madness.

***

At times, I feel like Rip Van Winkle, waking from a twenty-year slumber. During that time, the America that I knew and loved became weirdly distorted. His supporters acclaim George Bush's belief in Jesus Christ. But they do not condemn him for his tragic destruction of human life in a recklessly conceived and conducted war, his wanton destruction of our God-given natural world, his indifference to the best that has been thought and said by men and women in the quest for worldly knowledge, his inability to rise above faction and ideology in the interest of the whole throbbing heart of America. This disconnection of values borders on the insane.

I understand the feeling of many that they want to emigrate to Canada—to leave behind the wreck of lost pride in their nation. Few of them in fact will go.

I won't go. With the limited life left in me, I would like to redefine and defend the exhilarating America that has commanded my allegiance through a lifetime. I would like to resist the grip currently squeezing the breath out of the expansive nation I love. I would like to purge the shame and restore pride.

The agenda of the radical right has already led America into a wilderness. But the people who falsely believe in a weird theocratic America have not yet converted the nation into fascistic solidarity, despite their desires. I hope that a reaction will occur, that even true believers will wake up in time. I want to believe that the simplistic color map concocted by the media fails to convey the complexity of motive and allegiance that the whole American nation harbors in its heart. A red-and-blue America is a ridiculous oversimplification. I do not believe it exists. The real American heart is better than a map.

Fifty-three million Americans did not vote for George W. Bush. They have not melted into the soup of conformity. They are hurt and mad but alive and ready to resist.

The "base" believes it is restoring moral values in America. Most of the 53 million also want to restore moral values in America. It's just that their definition of our most powerful values differs radically from the "base's" definition.

I know that my recent private loss darkly colors my view of the changed public contest. I grant that I am probably overreacting. Time, if I have it, will balance my perspective somewhat. Nevertheless, the parallel surely is partly accurate. America faces the cold, and we must be brave and have hope, in spite of all.

America is better than this.

hope

HOPE IS ON THE WAY

(20 March 2005)

Enough freedom remains in the political dialogue to give hope. Yes, corporate ownership of the media too greatly has diminished the power of the press to criticize. But alternative venues arise on the Web to keep critical speech alive. And liberals are trying to revive their fortunes with new vision and leadership.

But the greatest reason for hope is the conflict between “radical fallibility” and the galloping belief of the right that it fully owns political truth. The political needs of the nation and the world arise from the inexhaustible desire of people for good. No single set of policies has the power to deliver all the good that people desire. Every set of policies sooner or later falls short of expectations. This dooms every party in power to ultimate failure. It confers on every party out of power the possibility of taking over at some turning point in the nation’s fortunes.

Team Bush has surprised us with its ability to sustain its argument that its policies are right and its opponents’ are wrong. But its excesses and corruption, especially its hand-off of the people’s resources to corporations and the very wealthy, are inevitably rising in public consciousness. Its zealous campaign to tack “privatization” onto Social Security may be the tipping point. The President’s bizarre appointments to the United Nations and the World Bank may further awaken the people. When he defended administration propaganda packages that pretend to be objective news, he may have bared the raw cynicism of an administration that will admit no wrong.

Bush and Rove have mesmerized the conservative evangelicals with diversionary issues over our culture, while using them to support the corporate agenda. But surely there is a limit to their gullibility. The political wellsprings of American society run deeper than the religious doctrines of the right. Even a believing Christian can see sooner or later that he is being had.

Meanwhile, the liberal segment of our society has not become the shrinking, marginalized minority the right would like it to be. It failed to defeat Bush by little more than a cat’s whisker. It is searching its soul for a new way to address America, just as the right did so successfully after the debacle of Goldwater’s loss in 1964. As the right marches on to more mistaken judgments, certain it is correct, the alternative vision of America presented from the left will interest more citizens, even those who have heretofore put their religion in place of their politics.

Hope is on the way.