2008 Woodie Awards
Posing questions I'm not supposed to ask
Daniel Black
Issue date: 2/1/07 Section: Opinion
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This past weekend, as I briefly considered all the topics about which I could write my column, I found myself unable to stop drifting back to the same unanswerable, disconcerting question that I've pondered for years, but never as seriously as I have these recent days. The question, difficult to formulate into words, has proven elusive not because it is unanswerable, but because it is too often unasked.
By traveling from one end of the mainstream political dialogue to the other, anyone can easily discern the limited range of acceptable discussion and discover that only specific issues are appropriate for such discussion. Any ideas outside of these bounds, independent of their legitimacy or urgency, are simply omitted from public discourse. This reality, though seldom acknowledged, is nevertheless real and alarming.
I have found that explaining political disagreement is no longer reducible to merely tension across party lines or variance between differing but compatible democratic ideologies; specific realities have come to light, at least in my eyes, that preclude that sort of easy-out.
Our president and his top officials have committed war crimes; they continue to make policy decisions that flagrantly violate international law and pervasively abuse human rights. The underpinning rationale, along the lines of "piss on the global community and justice-seeking activists be damned; we are at war", has not escaped the attention and protest of the international community, especially not by the victims and observers of our grand-scale aggression who feel that they, themselves, have a right to exist too. These decisions and the collective will of U.S. citizens have been severed from each other and operate autonomously from one another. The democracy that was once this country's sacred design is now nothing more than a doctrinal technicality, a fading memory that has, for far too many, evaporated entirely.
Our president maintains the support of scarcely a quarter of his people, trusted only by those he and his cohorts have been able to deceive plus a handful of cognizant though psychologically unhinged plutocrats. This non-representative minority is responsible for consistently blockading progressive social action, derailing attempts to enact legislation that could potentially restore global stability, minimize the volatility of ideological and sectarian intolerance, stifle nuclear proliferation, and preserve the environment as a livable habitat for forthcoming generations. Recall that these pressing concerns don't even find their way onto the president's agenda; most of these are touted as high priority, but are clearly masks that disguise the real agenda. That agenda, we are told, although it is beleaguered with making war against impoverished peoples, diplomatically isolating others, and crushing still others with oppressive economic sanctions, is revealed to President Bush through his communications with God. Justification of that nature should -whether you are Christian or not- cause your fear and anxiety to redline.
By traveling from one end of the mainstream political dialogue to the other, anyone can easily discern the limited range of acceptable discussion and discover that only specific issues are appropriate for such discussion. Any ideas outside of these bounds, independent of their legitimacy or urgency, are simply omitted from public discourse. This reality, though seldom acknowledged, is nevertheless real and alarming.
I have found that explaining political disagreement is no longer reducible to merely tension across party lines or variance between differing but compatible democratic ideologies; specific realities have come to light, at least in my eyes, that preclude that sort of easy-out.
Our president and his top officials have committed war crimes; they continue to make policy decisions that flagrantly violate international law and pervasively abuse human rights. The underpinning rationale, along the lines of "piss on the global community and justice-seeking activists be damned; we are at war", has not escaped the attention and protest of the international community, especially not by the victims and observers of our grand-scale aggression who feel that they, themselves, have a right to exist too. These decisions and the collective will of U.S. citizens have been severed from each other and operate autonomously from one another. The democracy that was once this country's sacred design is now nothing more than a doctrinal technicality, a fading memory that has, for far too many, evaporated entirely.
Our president maintains the support of scarcely a quarter of his people, trusted only by those he and his cohorts have been able to deceive plus a handful of cognizant though psychologically unhinged plutocrats. This non-representative minority is responsible for consistently blockading progressive social action, derailing attempts to enact legislation that could potentially restore global stability, minimize the volatility of ideological and sectarian intolerance, stifle nuclear proliferation, and preserve the environment as a livable habitat for forthcoming generations. Recall that these pressing concerns don't even find their way onto the president's agenda; most of these are touted as high priority, but are clearly masks that disguise the real agenda. That agenda, we are told, although it is beleaguered with making war against impoverished peoples, diplomatically isolating others, and crushing still others with oppressive economic sanctions, is revealed to President Bush through his communications with God. Justification of that nature should -whether you are Christian or not- cause your fear and anxiety to redline.
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