Somehow this has been the only thing to cheer me up of late:
Bruce Springsteen News: brucespringsteen.net
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
Won't Get Phooled Again
Everyone I know has been pretty depressed this past week contemplating the larger meanings of the election: We didn't just elect a president; we declared ourselves a nation of gullible morons willing to trade our own self-interest for the chance to ensure particular sectors of the populace don't enjoy the same liberties as the rest. Whatever commentary we listen to, whatever rationalization we soothe ourselves with, sensible people can't quite make sense of this trend toward boneheadedness. Garrison Keillor was not entirely facetious Saturday night when he told his radio audience that he had become the chairman of a national campaign for a Constitutional amendment to take the right to vote away from born again Christians.
When the anger subsides, I recognize a sense of despair that is best depicted in To Kill a Mockingbird when the guilty verdict is delivered in the Tom Robinson case. Even a child can feel the depth of injustice that is being done, and Atticus has his hands full answering Jem's simple question: "How could they do it, how could they?" All Atticus can come up with is, "I don't know, but they did it. They've done it before and they did it tonight and they'll do it again and when they do it--seems that only children weep." Though that's where the analogy breaks down somewhat. This time, anyone who pays attention and is fully engaged with civic affairs at least feels like weeping.
We're told the American public turned out to vote for strong "moral values." Yep, I know exactly which values we're talking about here: stopping people in love from marrying, taking reproductive choice away from women, denying scientific progress, and breaking down our country's hard-won separation of religion and government. And don't forget the guns. Value-oriented Americans can always be counted on to vote with their trigger fingers.
The best comment on values I've heard recently came from Bruce Springsteen speaking at the final Kerry rally before the election. After singing "Promised Land" and a couple other well-chosen songs for the crowd, Bruce said, "I believe our American government has drifted too far from American values: The human principles of economic justice, healing the sick, health care, feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, a living wage so folks don't have to break their backs and then come home and not be able to make ends meet, an open American government that's unburdened by unnecessary secrecy, protection of our environment, a sane and responsible foreign policy where we take our place amongst a community of nations, civil rights and the safeguarding of our precious Democracy here at home."
I guess we all voted our values last week. Evangelical Christians just seem to have the more popular ones.
When the anger subsides, I recognize a sense of despair that is best depicted in To Kill a Mockingbird when the guilty verdict is delivered in the Tom Robinson case. Even a child can feel the depth of injustice that is being done, and Atticus has his hands full answering Jem's simple question: "How could they do it, how could they?" All Atticus can come up with is, "I don't know, but they did it. They've done it before and they did it tonight and they'll do it again and when they do it--seems that only children weep." Though that's where the analogy breaks down somewhat. This time, anyone who pays attention and is fully engaged with civic affairs at least feels like weeping.
We're told the American public turned out to vote for strong "moral values." Yep, I know exactly which values we're talking about here: stopping people in love from marrying, taking reproductive choice away from women, denying scientific progress, and breaking down our country's hard-won separation of religion and government. And don't forget the guns. Value-oriented Americans can always be counted on to vote with their trigger fingers.
The best comment on values I've heard recently came from Bruce Springsteen speaking at the final Kerry rally before the election. After singing "Promised Land" and a couple other well-chosen songs for the crowd, Bruce said, "I believe our American government has drifted too far from American values: The human principles of economic justice, healing the sick, health care, feeding the hungry, housing the homeless, a living wage so folks don't have to break their backs and then come home and not be able to make ends meet, an open American government that's unburdened by unnecessary secrecy, protection of our environment, a sane and responsible foreign policy where we take our place amongst a community of nations, civil rights and the safeguarding of our precious Democracy here at home."
I guess we all voted our values last week. Evangelical Christians just seem to have the more popular ones.
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