Absinthe & Cookies (a bit bitter, a bit sweet)

Psychologically Reassuring

Another email list conversation I have going. This time on the election and the public's need for psychological reassurance. These two articles touch upon something I've believed for a while, that rather than face reality, many people would rather believe someone like Moore. Look at how Churchill was vilified in the years prior to WWII when he tried to warn of the danger. I think it's human nature, and a dangerous aspect of it at that. But no matter what fantasy Moore spins, the facts are that we live in very dangerous times, it's going to be a long war, and a lot more of us are going to be killed. And yes, I fervently hope I'm wrong time. But like 9/11, for me, the writing is on the wall.

The first was an article in the Telegraph:

.... Moore is the most powerful spokesman of the myth that gripped the Spanish people when they elected Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero as their Prime Minister in the wake of the Madrid bombing: namely, that if we oust specific politicians from office - replace Bush with Kerry, Blair with Brown - the Islamic fundamentalists will leave us alone. It is, of course, psychologically reassuring for voters to be told that they have this power, that there is something quick and clean they can do about their collective predicament. But it is also a fantasy. The theocratic guerrillas of al-Qaeda and its associates who, it emerged last week, were planning to bomb a British primary school in Madrid and, on Friday, promised fresh attacks in Europe, will not be appeased by any number of political scalps. Their ambitions for the world are much greater and more terrifying.

And Peggy Noonan's latest:

.... But let me share a thought I've been having that is not so jolly. It has to do with Mr. Bush's re-election prospects and a worry I have. History has been too dramatic the past 3 1/2 years. It has been too exciting. Economic recession, 9/11, war, Afghanistan, Iraq, fighting with Europe. fighting with the U.N., boys going off to fight, Pat Tillman, beheadings. It has been so exciting. And my general sense of Americans is that we like things to be boring. Or rather we like history to be boring; we like our lives to be exciting. We like history to be like something Calvin Coolidge dreamed: dull, dull. dull. And then we complain about the dullness, and invent excitements that are the kind we really like: moon shots, spaceships, curing diseases. Big tax cuts that encourage big growth that creates lots of jobs for young people just out of school.

No, I am not suggesting all our recent excitement is Mr. Bush's fault. History handed him what it handed him. And no, I am not saying the decisions he took were wrong or right or some degree of either. I'm saying it's all for whatever reasons been more dramatic than Americans in general like history to be.

Here is my fear: that the American people, liking and respecting President Bush, and knowing he's a straight shooter with guts, will still feel a great temptation to turn to the boring and disingenuous John Kerry. He'll never do anything exciting. He doesn't have the guts to be exciting. And as he doesn't stand for anything, he won't have to take hard stands. He'll do things like go to France and talk French and they'll love it. He'll say he's the man who accompanied Teresa Heinz to Paris, only this time he'll say it in French and perfectly accented and they'll all go "ooh la la!"

The American people may come to feel that George W. Bush did the job history sent him to do. He handled 9/11, turned the economy around, went into Afghanistan, captured and removed Saddam Hussein. And now let's hire someone who'll just by his presence function as an emollient. A big greasy one but an emollient nonetheless.

I just have a feeling this sort of thing may have some impact this year. "A return to normalcy," with Mr. Kerry as the normal guy.

Posted by Ithildin at July 5, 2004 6:55 PM | PROCURE FINE OLD WORLD ABSINTHE