Just Above Sunset
Volume 5, Number 10
March 11, 2007

Had Enough?  Choose Your Motivation - Anger, Hate, Grumpiness or Other

The ever-whimsical and always clever Garrison Keillor seems to have decided to discuss the Miracle Drug of Anger - "Raging against Republican hypocrisy is the tonic that keeps us old liberals forever young."

Is that so?

Of course you have to understand what lies at the base of this. As he writes from Missoula -

Twice in my life I have lived in rural paradises like Montana and I learned that contentment only goes so far and what I thrive on is irritation and dread. You need the city for that. 1) A guy walks down the avenue with his baseball cap backward on his head and you want to shake him until his contacts fall out. He is in his early 30s but still thinks of himself as an 8-year-old. He is Narcissus in sneakers. 2) People who, instead of saying, "That is so cool," say, "How cool is that?" A way of expressing enthusiasm without sounding enthusiastic. How dumb is that? 3) The man in the airport who is yelling to himself like an escaped lunatic and then I notice the dangly cellphone hanging off him. 4) Shrieky women in restaurants. You sit down and look at the menu and suddenly you're in a National Geographic special about orangutans, but it's not, it's just Girlfriends' Night Out, and they've had their first glass of merlot and gotten nice and loosened up and every 30 seconds there is an outburst of screeching. The alpha female shrieks and then they all do. 5) When I say "Thank you" to a younger person and he says, "No problem." That's a brushoff, not an acknowledgment. He is supposed to smile and say, "You're welcome." Or he could say, "It was my pleasure." A thank-you should not be brushed away like a housefly. You could be lying unconscious on the floor, your arms and legs twitching uncontrollably, and a paramedic puts the paddles on your chest (Stand back!!) and saves your life and you say, "Thank you, thank you, thank you, a thousand thank-yous," and he says, "No problem." How inappropriate is that?

Amusing. But the vivid examples overwhelm the main point. Perhaps it is true that many of us thrive on irritation and dread. It may be the curse of political junkies and policy wonks. Some things just get to you. Others shrug at the same news.

Here's Keillor -

Pick up a newspaper and read about Congress and you will find yourself yelling at walls and terrifying the cat. Last week, Congress moved to suspend habeas corpus, one thing that distinguishes a civil society from a police state. Reaction was muted.

Then the Party of Family Values was revealed to have protected a sexual predator in its midst until finally a reporter asked some pointed questions and the honorable gentleman resigned and ran off to recovery camp. This level of hypocrisy takes a person's breath away. You thought that Abramoff, Norquist, Reed and DeLay had established new lows, but the elevator is still descending.

Yeah, so it is. So what? Look at the great middle of us all - no one much seems to be that very bothered by it all. Go to work, pay the bills, get the kids off to school…

But he asks us to look at the bright side of the few thriving on irritation and dread -

The power of righteous vexation is what keeps so many old Democrats hanging on in nursing homes long past the time they should have kicked off. Ancient crones from FDR's time are still walking the halls, kept alive by anger at what has been done to our country. Old conservationists, feminists, grizzled veterans of the civil rights era fight off melanoma, emphysema, Montezuma, thanks to the miracle drug of anger.

That of course falls under the heading of cold comfort. It's no way to live. But then it is motivation of sorts. Keillor says it's time "to clean some clocks" and kick some butt.

That's easy to say, but what exactly are you going to do, write a letter to the editor of your local paper? He paraphrases Robert Frost - "The woods are lovely, dark and thick. But I have many butts to kick and some to poke and just one stick." Just having one stick seems to be the problem. The population of the United States just reached three hundred million. Like you matter?

So you take a representative day in the current implosion of those in power - say Tuesday, October 3 - and look at some of the news and try to figure out what anyone can do about any of it.

One -

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and former Attorney General John Ashcroft received the same CIA briefing about an imminent al-Qaida strike on an American target that was given to the White House two months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The State Department's disclosure Monday that the pair was briefed within a week after then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was told about the threat on July 10, 2001, raised new questions about what the Bush administration did in response, and about why so many officials have claimed they never received or don't remember the warning.

One official who helped to prepare the briefing, which included a PowerPoint presentation, described it as a "10 on a scale of 1 to 10" that "connected the dots" in earlier intelligence reports to present a stark warning that al-Qaida, which had already killed Americans in Yemen, Saudi Arabia and East Africa, was poised to strike again.

Analysis -

Richard Clarke was at the July 10, 2001 meeting.

It's confirmed now. Condi was warned. She ignored it.

Some people just have an instinct about danger, military matters and a need to pull the trigger. Some don't. Condi doesn't, yet she was our national security adviser, now secretary of state. Few people have been less qualified for such exalted situations. Blood is on her hands, though that blood is splattered across the Bush administration, with most of it resting on Bush himself.

Well, she said the administration never got any transition plan from the Clinton administration on dealing with terrorism generally and al Qaeda specifically. The 9/11 Commission says she got the plan, and it's on file - thirteen dense single-spaced pages. Copies are on file. She still maintains it never existed and doesn't exist. And her own records confirm the July 10, 2001 meeting - her office says so. The commission now says they were briefed on the meeting, they just forgot to put a note in the report about it. But they have Tenet's testimony about the meeting on file, and his PowerPoint slides. She still says there was no meeting - she would have remembered it. It's a bit bizarre. There's documentation, and there are her assertions. She seems to think you ought to believe her, not the available record. This seems to be a "faith-based" thing - if you believe in the administration and what it's doing then you believe her. It's a test of faith, and you don't want to be found wanting in faith, as they say. Or what you see here is The Triumph of Will, as in the famous film of the same name.

Two -

President Bush, on a campaign swing in the West, is arguing the Democratic Party is weak-kneed on national security and shouldn't be trusted to hold the reins of Congress.

"If you listen closely to some of the leaders of the Democratic Party, it sounds like - it sounds like - they think the best way to protect the American people is, wait until we're attacked again," Bush said Monday at a $360,000 fundraiser in Reno, Nevada, for state Secretary of State Dean Heller's congressional campaign.

Bush delivered the administration's oft-repeated claims about the Democrats as it struggles with persistent questions about a recent intelligence report that suggests the Iraq war has helped recruit more terrorists, and a new book, "State of Denial," by journalist Bob Woodward that contends Bush misled the country about the war.

The Democrats shouldn't be trusted to hold the reins of Congress comes under the general heading of "brass balls."

One Democratic staffer said this - "The Republicans chose to protect Foley instead of those kids."

One angry Republican, John Cole, said this - "Maybe if Foley had been hitting on a fetus, these folks would get it."

The Republican congress is hardly in good shape at the moment. They look either useless, or rather evil. Take your pick. Trust, indeed. And yes, all sixteen of his sixteen intelligence agencies agreed the president's war of choice made things worse, not better. Those balls are brass.

Three -

In the fine tradition of George W. Bush standing under the "Mission Accomplished" sign, or any one of the Katrina backdrops (where no expense was spared to bring power to an area for a photo op, and then just as quickly cut off), we now have the head of the NRCC, Tom Reynolds, using small prop children as set decoration in a press conference devoted to the topic of… yes, predatory online sexual solicitation of minors.

Tom Reynolds, the head of the National Republican Campaign Committee, one of the first to be told of what Mark Foley might have been up to with the sixteen-year-old male House pages, held a press conference about it in Buffalo, New York. His statement was clear - he told House Speaker Dennis Hastert about it so he did what he was supposed to do. Nothing was his fault. And he was more than willing to take questions, but the problem for reporters was that he held the press conference at a day care center, on stage surrounded by lots of little kids. The reporters asked him if the kids could leave, so they could ask question about the substance of the issues. He said no, they were his constituents, and they stayed, so ask your questions. The reporters were frustrated. You can read about it here at "Buffalo Geek" -

Reporter: Congressman, do you mind asking the children to leave the room so we can have a frank discussion of this, because it's an adult topic. It just doesn't seem appropriate to me.

Reynolds: I'll take your questions, but I'm not going to ask any of my supporters to leave.

Reporter: Who are the children, Congressman? Who are these children?

Reynolds: Pardon me?

Reporter: Who are these children?

Reynolds: Well, a number of them are from the community. There are several of the "thirty-something" set that are here and, uh, I've known them and I've known their children as they were born.

Reporter: Do you think it's appropriate for them to be listening to the subject matter though?

Reynolds: Sir, I'll be happy to answer your questions, I'm still, uh…

It was very clever. And it gives a news meaning to the term "human shields" of course. He did say the spare campaign money he received from Foley - the hundred thousand dollars - was clean money and he certainly wasn't going to donate to any charity like one that aided victims of child abuse. The money was for the Republican campaigns. And that was that. He's a very cool customer.

Could this make anyone angry?

See Richard Einhorn here -

Dear Democratic candidate for Congress,

If your consultants don't take this story [1] and combine it with this one [2], then add numerous references to this unbelievably outrageous stunt [3] and urge you to flay the Republicans over their dangerous incompetence, their sheer inability to perceive reality, their malicious lies, and their unparalleled moral hypocrisy... If instead, your consultants insist that in the next month you ignore all these genuine gifts so you can re-emphasize prescription drugs or concerns over the economy, fire them immediately, sue them for fraud, then grab them by their throats, stick 'em in an empty room and force them to listen to the complete recorded works of Andrew Lloyd Webber. Over and over. For a week. No. Make it two weeks.

Well, along with being a political commentator, Einhorn is noted composer. You have to forgive him the Andrew Lloyd Webber crack, although as a nation we have now legalized torture, so it may be permissible. The score from "Cats" or "Phantom of the Opera" will do nicely.

But his anger is real. He does know the highly paid consultants will tell the Democrats to run on the economy and such, so they can entirely avoid the topics of values and being strong on terror, as they'll never win anything on those issues. And they'll buy it. He's frustrated. But that really is how things work.

You take the high road and don't deal with New Foley Instant Messages; Had Internet Sex While Awaiting House Vote - "Former Congressman Mark Foley (R-FL) interrupted a vote on the floor of the House in 2003 to engage in Internet sex with a high school student who had served as a congressional page."

And you ignore the press conference - NEW ADMISSIONS FROM FOLEY: HE GOT BOINKED BY AN UNNAMED PRIEST WHEN HE WAS 13 OR 14; HE'S GAY (NO!) BUT HE'S PROBABLY LYING ABOUT BEING AN ALCOHOLIC.

Yeah, it's all self-righteous whining about how it all not really his fault at all. He's a victim too, damn it. Aren't we all?

So you let it all slide, and lose.

Nope, we don't want no Democratic congress. Dennis Hastert said so on the Rush Limbaugh show -

There were two pieces of paper out there, one that we knew about and we acted on; one that happened in 2003 we didn't know about, but somebody had it, and, you know, they're trying - and they drop it the last day of the session, you know, before we adjourn on an election year. Now, we took care of Mr. Foley. We found out about it, asked him to resign. He did resign. He's gone. We asked for an investigation. We've done that. We're trying to build better protections for these page programs.

But, you know, this is a political issue in itself, too, and what we've tried to do as the Republican Party is make a better economy, protect this country against terrorism - and we've worked at it ever since 9/11, worked with the president on it - and there are some people that try to tear us down. We are the insulation to protect this country, and if they get to me it looks like they could affect our election as well.

Any fool knows you don't mess with the insulation. Garrison Keillor is no doubt yelling at the walls and terrifying the cat.

But getting angry is a problem. You should not get angry.

As the law professor and Los Angeles Times columnist Rosa Brooks points out -

Are you a Bush hater, so blinded by "primal" loathing for the president that you automatically dismiss everything he says or does?

It's one of the far right's favorite weapons: If anyone criticizes the administration, brand them a Bush hater. The implication is that no sane or fair-minded person could be appalled by this administration's policies. Any criticism of Bush must be caused by what columnist Charles Krauthammer described as "contempt and disdain giving way to a hatred that is near pathological."

But she says the right has got it quite wrong -

I don't love George Bush, it's true. No matter how many times I urge myself to hate the sin but love the sinner, I just can't get there. But I don't hate Bush, either. I hope that he'll never personally experience any of the "alternative methods" of interrogation he's so willing to use on U.S. detainees; I hope he'll never lose a child to war; I hope he'll never experience the soul-sapping poverty to which his administration has abandoned so many Americans.

No, I don't hate George Bush.

But I sure hate what he's done to my country.

I hate the fact that Bush and the radicals in his administration play politics with patriotism, casting critics of misguided legislation on military commissions and wiretapping as "soft" on terrorism and telling us, as Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld recently did, that "moral or intellectual confusion about who and what is right or wrong can weaken the ability of free societies to persevere."

… I hate the fact that after promising to unite us, this president has done his best to divide us. In Bush's America, there are real Americans and then there are the blue states … and the Democrats.

… I hate the fact that to Bush, having "values" seems to mean absolutist opposition to gay marriage and abortion and indifference to many forms of suffering. In Bush's America, preventing gay marriage is apparently more important than preventing cruel or degrading treatment of detainees, or helping the millions of Americans who struggle to make it from paycheck to paycheck.

… I hate the fact that Bush's reckless foreign policies have led many of our closest allies to regard this nation with contempt and fear. Increasingly, people around the world see the U.S. as a threat to global stability, not as a source of stability.

… I hate the fact that to Bush, the phrase "the buck stops here" is apparently as quaint as the Geneva Convention. He has yet to come clean about the degree to which he overstated the charge that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or on the lack of a link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11. In Bush's America, being president means never having to say you're sorry.

But other than that, things are fine. The item appeared on 29 September, before the Mark Foley business.

Then she said -

The United States is in trouble. The spread of militant Islamic extremism and WMD will pose dangers for decades to come, and global warming, disease and poverty are all serious threats. If we're going to respond to those threats, we need to pull together - and we need to stop letting the far right get away with dismissing all criticism of the Bush administration as irrational "hatred."

That gets harder every day. But then, as Garrison Keillor points out, at least Brooks will live a long life.

Had enough?

This item posted Sunday, October 8, 2006