In July of 2009,
I saw Frankfurt am Main,
Visited Weimar and Berlin,
Went to Warsaw, and in
Two days found myself in Krakow
(Via Czestochowa, of
Black Madonna fame, and Auschwitz).
Quickly through Slovakia, which,
Though picturesque & panoramic,
We tourists viewed in panic
Lest our dinner in Budapest
Should turn cold. I didn’t rest
In Vienna, Austria, either,
Grabbing just one souvenir,
A weiner, and some beer
Before heading to Prague to hear
A recital of Strauss, etc.
In Rothenburg, a plethora
Of crafts and pastries met our eyes.
We yet again said our goodbyes,
And in the nick
Of time, Munich
Came into view: the Glockenspiel
In Marienplatz, the real deal,
Chimed, and charmed us; then
(Already?) Frankfurt again.
In the morning, to the airport—
Farewell, Frankfurt!
Oh, there’s Heathrow,
Just a stone’s throw
(Yes, it’s pertinent)
From the Continent.
In July of 2010,
I forsook travel; attempted Zen;
Took two weeks off from work,
Seeing neither carrier nor clerk,
Neither customer nor canine;
Stayed up late, awoke again at nine
After having gotten up at eight
(Everything could wait);
Wrote, reread, unwound whenever I pleased.
Time, this time, not distance, was the feast.
From my house’s patio,
Observing hares hop to and fro,
And crazy squirrels go,
Without apparent vertigo,
Up and down the maple tree
Was sight-seeing enough for me.
Another day, bicycling up a trail,
Leaving life’s mundane travail
Behind, the crunchy gravel
In that moment was all the travel
I needed or desired.
Stopped when I got tired
Of exercise, or too wired
From being required
To search for synonyms.
Sang some hymns—
Prolonged a hug—
Pulled the plug—
Ate whenever hungry—
Shaved when I felt scraggly—
Moved as if I were a snail
Browsing at a yard sale.
The clock did tick
And tock, but it had lost its kick,
Lacked its verve and grit and urgency.
Nothing then but tendency—
Molasseslike momentum—
Spun the atom
Monday, September 27, 2010
Miracles 101
When under stress,
Grasping at the hem of Christ’s garment
As though at straws,
Praying for this or that—for employment,
Wisdom, healing—
Whatever particular lament
Has got you kneeling,
Do you sometimes wonder if God can’t?
Can’t give you peace,
Or food on the table, money for rent,
Simple surcease
Of pain? I, when troubled, invent
A syllogism-
Like series of questions, expressly meant
(Think of a prism)
To delineate God’s might and intent.
Can He yet provide,
Despite a lull prolonged, a job, a cure?
Did His feet not ride
Upon the tossed and plunging waves, secure
In step and stride?
And was this more difficult than taking pure,
Plain water aside,
And turning it to wine instantly mature?
He multiplied
Two fish and five loaves of bread, feeding
A crowd that cried
For free refreshments at the meeting.
A friend who had died
Harkened to Christ’s voice, and Lazarus
Stirred, blinking inside
His tomb. This was a more fabulous
Feat of power
Than setting up a livelihood for you
Out of nowhere,
Or ameliorating symptoms of your flu!
Not impressed? Not
Quite persuaded? Need another clue?
Like a clot,
The sea stiffened, letting Israel through.
Out of clay,
Man was fashioned; from nothingness, a slew
Of suns, day
And night, water, land, and air, on cue,
Appeared. Before that,
There was God alone, and the only view
He had, where He sat,
Was of Chaos. With it came a notion: you.
Grasping at the hem of Christ’s garment
As though at straws,
Praying for this or that—for employment,
Wisdom, healing—
Whatever particular lament
Has got you kneeling,
Do you sometimes wonder if God can’t?
Can’t give you peace,
Or food on the table, money for rent,
Simple surcease
Of pain? I, when troubled, invent
A syllogism-
Like series of questions, expressly meant
(Think of a prism)
To delineate God’s might and intent.
Can He yet provide,
Despite a lull prolonged, a job, a cure?
Did His feet not ride
Upon the tossed and plunging waves, secure
In step and stride?
And was this more difficult than taking pure,
Plain water aside,
And turning it to wine instantly mature?
He multiplied
Two fish and five loaves of bread, feeding
A crowd that cried
For free refreshments at the meeting.
A friend who had died
Harkened to Christ’s voice, and Lazarus
Stirred, blinking inside
His tomb. This was a more fabulous
Feat of power
Than setting up a livelihood for you
Out of nowhere,
Or ameliorating symptoms of your flu!
Not impressed? Not
Quite persuaded? Need another clue?
Like a clot,
The sea stiffened, letting Israel through.
Out of clay,
Man was fashioned; from nothingness, a slew
Of suns, day
And night, water, land, and air, on cue,
Appeared. Before that,
There was God alone, and the only view
He had, where He sat,
Was of Chaos. With it came a notion: you.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
Eavesdropper
There is in that forest preserve a spot
Which joggers and surveyors have not found—
A hole the size and depth of a cot.
You could not tell it from solid ground.
Beneath its dandelion-covered lid,
My pit from other eyes is ever hid.
No arms but mine may lift its roof;
Cranes cannot pry its boards; no bomb
Exists, or horse’s hoof,
That has the force to shake my tomb.
Many a dawn have I lain in it,
Beneath the tread of Alexander,
Caesar, and Charlemagne—an infinite
Column on the march, while inches under
Them, secluded and silent as a mole,
I listened as far-flung empires turned
Their swords upon each other, till the toll
In blood could scarcely be discerned
(I peeked, a crack above the sod)
From the crimson sky of an angry God.
I have heard the scream of Genghis Khan
Rise above the roar of panzer tanks
As Napoleon’s troops were overrun
By Hunnish hordes right through their flanks.
For the loam in which my hole is dug
Is also shifting sand, and anywhere
That history’s tectonic forces tug
My little hollow will be there,
My hiding place, which cannot sag
Though earth itself may lurch or lag.
Cedar from Lebanon, fragrant wood,
Surrounds its sides, and makes the air
Within ever and exceeding good.
For food and drink, within my lair,
I have lembas bread, peanut butter,
And a quart of Aphrodite’s nectar.
Enclosed, invulnerable,
I can sense the sinuous lion passing
Overhead, and hear the rumble
Of wildebeests and zebras massing
Upon the sun-beaten Serengeti.
I have noted the clickety-clack
Of civilization in Cincinnati,
Right above a subway track;
Also the subtle thud of pygmy feet
Landing near some hapless animal.
Shoes and heels, ever in pursuit of meat.
The din has become subliminal.
The patter, the incessant shuffling…
The winds of change howling, as one,
With the dogs of war, ruffling
My feathers. I am undone!
Snug in that deer-inhabited preserve,
I am coming close to losing my nerve—
Leaping from my burrow in the ground,
The weedy, mulchy cover thrown aside,
I gasp for air, and, blinking, look around.
There, snoring (bless her), and still beside
Me, lies my wife of nineteen years,
Whose arms, enfolding mine, assuage my fears.
Which joggers and surveyors have not found—
A hole the size and depth of a cot.
You could not tell it from solid ground.
Beneath its dandelion-covered lid,
My pit from other eyes is ever hid.
No arms but mine may lift its roof;
Cranes cannot pry its boards; no bomb
Exists, or horse’s hoof,
That has the force to shake my tomb.
Many a dawn have I lain in it,
Beneath the tread of Alexander,
Caesar, and Charlemagne—an infinite
Column on the march, while inches under
Them, secluded and silent as a mole,
I listened as far-flung empires turned
Their swords upon each other, till the toll
In blood could scarcely be discerned
(I peeked, a crack above the sod)
From the crimson sky of an angry God.
I have heard the scream of Genghis Khan
Rise above the roar of panzer tanks
As Napoleon’s troops were overrun
By Hunnish hordes right through their flanks.
For the loam in which my hole is dug
Is also shifting sand, and anywhere
That history’s tectonic forces tug
My little hollow will be there,
My hiding place, which cannot sag
Though earth itself may lurch or lag.
Cedar from Lebanon, fragrant wood,
Surrounds its sides, and makes the air
Within ever and exceeding good.
For food and drink, within my lair,
I have lembas bread, peanut butter,
And a quart of Aphrodite’s nectar.
Enclosed, invulnerable,
I can sense the sinuous lion passing
Overhead, and hear the rumble
Of wildebeests and zebras massing
Upon the sun-beaten Serengeti.
I have noted the clickety-clack
Of civilization in Cincinnati,
Right above a subway track;
Also the subtle thud of pygmy feet
Landing near some hapless animal.
Shoes and heels, ever in pursuit of meat.
The din has become subliminal.
The patter, the incessant shuffling…
The winds of change howling, as one,
With the dogs of war, ruffling
My feathers. I am undone!
Snug in that deer-inhabited preserve,
I am coming close to losing my nerve—
Leaping from my burrow in the ground,
The weedy, mulchy cover thrown aside,
I gasp for air, and, blinking, look around.
There, snoring (bless her), and still beside
Me, lies my wife of nineteen years,
Whose arms, enfolding mine, assuage my fears.
The Umpteenth Amendment
“Everything costs money,” merchants say
As, splaying their palms and shrugging,
They explain why customers have to pay.
And you, victim of a ritual mugging,
Sigh in your turn, “Everything costs money.”
"Everything costs money, buddy,”
Says the taxman, taking his cut
With impudence, exactitude, no qualms;
Says, too, the panhandler on his butt,
Having bought his booze with slimy alms.
“Everything costs money, honey,”
Purrs the costly catlike bunny—
Opines the bishop from his pulpit—
Cries the lawyer, seeking restitution.
We, the People, have—we couldn’t help it—
Added this line to the Constitution.
Everything costs money.
It isn’t even funny.
As, splaying their palms and shrugging,
They explain why customers have to pay.
And you, victim of a ritual mugging,
Sigh in your turn, “Everything costs money.”
"Everything costs money, buddy,”
Says the taxman, taking his cut
With impudence, exactitude, no qualms;
Says, too, the panhandler on his butt,
Having bought his booze with slimy alms.
“Everything costs money, honey,”
Purrs the costly catlike bunny—
Opines the bishop from his pulpit—
Cries the lawyer, seeking restitution.
We, the People, have—we couldn’t help it—
Added this line to the Constitution.
Everything costs money.
It isn’t even funny.
Evolution of the Public Sector
The colony began as a normal, thriving society of ants. The queen reproduced assiduously, and the various castes of workers tended to the larvae, or guarded the colony’s entrance, or collected food for everyone. The drones, who were also community organizers, kept to themselves, waiting for the appointed time when they would mate with the queen. Somehow, due either to a mutation or a rogue pheromone, these drones began to infect the other ants with “progressive” ideas, using their antennae as instruments of propaganda.
The first thing that happened was an interruption in the ant trail outside. Instead of carrying bits of food and detritus, some of the workers decided to station themselves at regular intervals on the line, and to collect toll. Meanwhile, in the nursery, a third of the crew abandoned its assigned larvae, and demanded to be shown the permits and professional licenses of the other workers. Most alarming of all, the soldier ants were letting in alien ants from hostile colonies. They were loathed, they said, to “profile” anyone, just because his or her formic acid smelled different.
Soon, the minor workers, tired of being harassed by the toll-collectors, formed their own unions. One group of ants carried only plant matter; another transported only millipede legs; another collected only dues; yet another took breaks, and nothing else.
And what of the queen? Without anyone to feed her, she ceased to reproduce her own kind, begetting instead quantities of pension liabilities, which quickly filled her chamber, and asphyxiated her. The death of the queen, however, did not destroy the colony. The ants had by then metamorphosed into bureaucratic parasites, and those organisms, as we know, live forever.
The first thing that happened was an interruption in the ant trail outside. Instead of carrying bits of food and detritus, some of the workers decided to station themselves at regular intervals on the line, and to collect toll. Meanwhile, in the nursery, a third of the crew abandoned its assigned larvae, and demanded to be shown the permits and professional licenses of the other workers. Most alarming of all, the soldier ants were letting in alien ants from hostile colonies. They were loathed, they said, to “profile” anyone, just because his or her formic acid smelled different.
Soon, the minor workers, tired of being harassed by the toll-collectors, formed their own unions. One group of ants carried only plant matter; another transported only millipede legs; another collected only dues; yet another took breaks, and nothing else.
And what of the queen? Without anyone to feed her, she ceased to reproduce her own kind, begetting instead quantities of pension liabilities, which quickly filled her chamber, and asphyxiated her. The death of the queen, however, did not destroy the colony. The ants had by then metamorphosed into bureaucratic parasites, and those organisms, as we know, live forever.
Sunday, August 22, 2010
Apollo Mission: Implausible
It is 1961, and President Barack Obama has thrown a challenge to the nation’s space program. Put a man on the moon before the decade is out! Nancy Pelosi contorts her facial muscles. She asks pointedly, “Why necessarily a man?” The president, looking quizzically at his Teleprompter, mumbles, “Er, it’s supposed to be a manned mission, right?”
Later that night, Harry Reid gazes up at the sky, and wonders if, since the moon may be made of cheese, Congress might not as well send up some pork, to complement the cheese. He wonders, too, what the senators from Wisconsin would think of his plan. Mr. Reid, like Alice in Wonderland, does a lot of wondering. But not Mr. Emanuel. The chief-of-staff is certain that, somewhere in that half-million-mile journey, there is bound to be a crisis, and thus an opportunity for the administration to advance its agenda. Excitedly he takes out his checklist, and the roll of toilet paper nearly strangles him.
The government wastes no time (“Is that possible?” Harry Reid wonders) in initiating the president’s plan, and in five years the Environmental Impact Study is finished, all the theoretical hydrocarbons counted, the hypothetically foul emissions deodorized, the seagull population at Cape Canaveral polled for its opinions. Now all that’s left to do is the construction of… “Why not a submarine?” asks Jim Webb, of Virginia, a coastal state with shipyards. Harry Reid, incredulous, yet clearly awed, wonders, “Is he thinking of even more pork?”
In 1969, a giant contrivance named “Titanic II” lifts off from its launch pad in Florida. Naturally it is made of biodegradable material. To satisfy various constituencies, the rocket comes in fifty stages, the last one being a piece of pork on a skewer, courtesy of the state of Nevada. For fuel, the rocket burns the compressed embers of ten trillion dollars incinerated in the Capitol’s basement furnace. Will it reach the moon? “Let’s hope so!” cheers Mr. Obama, proud of his legacy.
Later that night, Harry Reid gazes up at the sky, and wonders if, since the moon may be made of cheese, Congress might not as well send up some pork, to complement the cheese. He wonders, too, what the senators from Wisconsin would think of his plan. Mr. Reid, like Alice in Wonderland, does a lot of wondering. But not Mr. Emanuel. The chief-of-staff is certain that, somewhere in that half-million-mile journey, there is bound to be a crisis, and thus an opportunity for the administration to advance its agenda. Excitedly he takes out his checklist, and the roll of toilet paper nearly strangles him.
The government wastes no time (“Is that possible?” Harry Reid wonders) in initiating the president’s plan, and in five years the Environmental Impact Study is finished, all the theoretical hydrocarbons counted, the hypothetically foul emissions deodorized, the seagull population at Cape Canaveral polled for its opinions. Now all that’s left to do is the construction of… “Why not a submarine?” asks Jim Webb, of Virginia, a coastal state with shipyards. Harry Reid, incredulous, yet clearly awed, wonders, “Is he thinking of even more pork?”
In 1969, a giant contrivance named “Titanic II” lifts off from its launch pad in Florida. Naturally it is made of biodegradable material. To satisfy various constituencies, the rocket comes in fifty stages, the last one being a piece of pork on a skewer, courtesy of the state of Nevada. For fuel, the rocket burns the compressed embers of ten trillion dollars incinerated in the Capitol’s basement furnace. Will it reach the moon? “Let’s hope so!” cheers Mr. Obama, proud of his legacy.
Perplexed in Phoenix
Last night, I noticed a dirty dish on the kitchen counter. The rule in our home stipulates that whoever uses plates, cups, or utensils must place them directly in the dishwasher afterwards, as a courtesy. So I asked the man sitting at the table, next to my wife, whether it was he that had left the dirty dish there. The man nodded guiltily. And so I said, “Who are you anyway? And what are you doing in my house?”
Suddenly, three U.S. Department of Justice employees barged into my living room, brandishing legal papers, and threatening to sue me if I asked the stranger any more questions. They said ascertaining the trespasser’s identity was their job. “Okay,” I shrugged. “Ask him.”
“We’d rather not,” replied the federal officials.
“Why not? It’s your duty, isn’t it?”
“We decide what we decide” was their cryptic comment.
“Very well,” I said. “Please escort him out of here.”
“Let him stay. How do you know he’s not a member of your family?” asked the feds.
I told them I knew who my wife and children were.
“What about your extended family? He could be a long-lost relative, or an old forgotten friend.”
“Let’s ask him then,” I volunteered.
“No,” insisted Obama’s people. “You can’t ask, and we won’t.”
“DAD!” yelled my teenaged daughter. “That guy’s going through your closet!”
By this time, my neighbors had noticed the black helicopter parked on my driveway. Several of them, peeking into my kitchen, were shouting at me. “Ari! Leave the guy alone. Or we’ll boycott your garage sale next summer.”
Guess who did the dishes that night.
Suddenly, three U.S. Department of Justice employees barged into my living room, brandishing legal papers, and threatening to sue me if I asked the stranger any more questions. They said ascertaining the trespasser’s identity was their job. “Okay,” I shrugged. “Ask him.”
“We’d rather not,” replied the federal officials.
“Why not? It’s your duty, isn’t it?”
“We decide what we decide” was their cryptic comment.
“Very well,” I said. “Please escort him out of here.”
“Let him stay. How do you know he’s not a member of your family?” asked the feds.
I told them I knew who my wife and children were.
“What about your extended family? He could be a long-lost relative, or an old forgotten friend.”
“Let’s ask him then,” I volunteered.
“No,” insisted Obama’s people. “You can’t ask, and we won’t.”
“DAD!” yelled my teenaged daughter. “That guy’s going through your closet!”
By this time, my neighbors had noticed the black helicopter parked on my driveway. Several of them, peeking into my kitchen, were shouting at me. “Ari! Leave the guy alone. Or we’ll boycott your garage sale next summer.”
Guess who did the dishes that night.
"It Don't Rain in Indianapolis"
The jinn appeared out of nowhere, materializing, it seemed, out of the steam from my Dunkin’ Donuts coffee. The apparition—rare, especially in the suburbs—gave me a fright, causing me to spill some of my coffee. But the sight which made my jaw drop, and a clump of half-eaten doughnut along with it, was the costume the genie was wearing. It was a stars-and-stripes ensemble right out of Uncle Sam’s wardrobe, though instead of a top hat, the genie had on a red-white-and-blue turban.
“What th—!”
“I give you tree choices!” declared the genie, in a thick Chicago accent. “You pick one, I granite to you, no charge. Choice number one—a townhouse in Naperville. Tree bedrooms, two bats widda finished basement. Choice two—two hunnerd gold coins, one ounce each, tweny-four karats.”
“Hmm,” I wondered, sipping what remained of my coffee. “The townhouse would be nice. But the assessment fee would be substantial, the property tax confiscatory, the traffic horrendous, and some of my neighbors’ attitude would be a pain. I’d be contributing to urban sprawl, global warming, class warfare, the spread of obesity, and the desensitizing effect of mega-churches.
“Gold bullion, on the other hand,” I continued, looking at my chocolate-covered fingers, “is sweet and simple. No sales tax, no transfer documents. Very liquid, yet never leaks. Hedge against inflation, for when Naperville becomes the Weimar Republic. And what’s the third choice, O—uh— Patriotic One?”
“I transport you!” cried the genie—and here a flying carpet whizzed into view, as quiet and eager as a Prius. “To Indiana,” the genie intoned, “where taxes are low, and government is well-run.”
“Oh, yes,” I exclaimed. “Take me there!”
“What th—!”
“I give you tree choices!” declared the genie, in a thick Chicago accent. “You pick one, I granite to you, no charge. Choice number one—a townhouse in Naperville. Tree bedrooms, two bats widda finished basement. Choice two—two hunnerd gold coins, one ounce each, tweny-four karats.”
“Hmm,” I wondered, sipping what remained of my coffee. “The townhouse would be nice. But the assessment fee would be substantial, the property tax confiscatory, the traffic horrendous, and some of my neighbors’ attitude would be a pain. I’d be contributing to urban sprawl, global warming, class warfare, the spread of obesity, and the desensitizing effect of mega-churches.
“Gold bullion, on the other hand,” I continued, looking at my chocolate-covered fingers, “is sweet and simple. No sales tax, no transfer documents. Very liquid, yet never leaks. Hedge against inflation, for when Naperville becomes the Weimar Republic. And what’s the third choice, O—uh— Patriotic One?”
“I transport you!” cried the genie—and here a flying carpet whizzed into view, as quiet and eager as a Prius. “To Indiana,” the genie intoned, “where taxes are low, and government is well-run.”
“Oh, yes,” I exclaimed. “Take me there!”
Sunday, August 8, 2010
My Ideal's Underbelly
When I was ten years old, and still a Filipino, my brothers and I would play war games. We had the requisite plastic soldiers, and for other war materiel we made do with matchboxes and domino tiles. We were living in the Philippines. All I knew of America was that it was big, and good, and it always won. In our war games, I was always America.
I chose to be America because, being the eldest, I made the rules. Also, I could see the future. America was my ideal, a shimmering fantasy with rock-hard muscles. America became real for me in 1975, when, courtesy of Rotary International, I found myself in Salem, Oregon, as an exchange student. I remember the scent of evergreens as my foster family drove me from the airport, and into their lives. I was still the oldest child, even in the Fraley family, but how could I, in my mind, represent America now? My new-found siblings were blond, had freckles, and looked good in baseball caps. I didn’t even drink milk!
I did, however, have certain advantages. Having been educated by Jesuits, I possessed a vocabulary larger than any of my classmates’ at South Salem High. My knowledge of geography seemed amazing to kids who thought Hawaii was the capital of Manila. Mr. Manuel, my English teacher, adored my Gothic-horror style of fiction-writing. He said it was a style engendered by a Catholic education. My Americanization, at fifteen, continued, accelerated by hormones and “Saturday Night Live,” which was new on the tube. Through cultural osmosis, I imbibed Dennis Miller’s wry wit, and acquired John Belushi’s accent.
I live in the Chicago suburbs now, where Belushi grew up. I sometimes drive past the former pharmacy where he loitered incessantly as a teenager. My wife’s uncle knew him. As for me, I’m a U.S. citizen, fifty years old, still an admirer of Dennis Miller’s rants. I am, while listening to talk radio, waiting for my turn to bankrupt the Social Security System.
That system is a sham. Being a sham, it shall soon be a shambles. Since Reagan’s time, politicians have used its so-called "trust fund" to pay for general budget expenses, and when the wave of baby boomers retires in a few years, we will all be swamped in red ink. Ah, red ink. The Red Menace!—lurking still in McCarthyites’ paranoia. The Red Death!—born of Poe’s melancholia. We shall soon look universally rosy, but in an appalling way.
I have two children in college. They have, from birth, been Americans. They required no war games to make them love this country. They must love America, right? Why else would they consent to being burdened with thirteen trillion dollars of federal debt? And when Medicare and Medicaid, like aging Godzillas, rear their ugly heads above our empty storefronts and ruined penthouses, what then will become of the America I once knew?
We’re still big—sometimes too big. Good? The notion is fraught with judgmentalism. Do we always win? Winning is antithetical to Barack Obama’s inclusionary vision. America is one nation, under You-Know-Who. In (fill in the blank) We Trust. The mainstream media idolizes diversity. The political establishment on the left, especially, believes that out of diverse individuals should arise…identity politics. Groups, from sea to warming sea, blanket this nation like a suffocating quilt, dividing us according to race, sex, age, income, ideology, weight, language, yes, and religion, too.
Red states!—right out of Karl Rove’s coloring book.
After watching a year’s worth of SNL, I returned to Cebu City in 1976, went to college, and watched Carter flail haplessly amid the Iranian hostage crisis. I read a lot of Newsweek, God help me, in order to augment my already amazing grasp of geography. But the world was changing so rapidly. National borders were being reconfigured, dialects were vanishing, and a new ice age was creeping up on us, an odd precursor to the global warming that was to come, engulfing entire ecosystems, scant decades later. Was America, like the climate, changing?
Oliver North testified before the Senate, while I taught English in China. My students wanted to know how to use the word “glo-ba-li-za-tion” in a sentence, and I, dumb foreigner, showed them. At that moment, they rushed out of the building, joining their families and neighbors to make umbrellas and buttons and sandals and things like that.
I met my wife in Xiamen, China. She was there from Illinois, teaching grammar, and discreetly proselytizing. We married in the Philippines, and after the customary glitch in immigration papers was resolved, we came and settled in Illinois, the heartland of America, which throbbed like a Chevy engine. This was the future I had seen as a combat-eager, clairvoyant ten-year-old.
Today, nearing retirement, I hold a pair of sneakers that some of my socialist Chinese friends have made. What to do? Where to go? Our industrial jobs have been outsourced, and now illegal aliens are swarming over the wall to take our service-sector jobs. Yes, I know I should have said “undocumented workers.” But I am seeing red.
I chose to be America because, being the eldest, I made the rules. Also, I could see the future. America was my ideal, a shimmering fantasy with rock-hard muscles. America became real for me in 1975, when, courtesy of Rotary International, I found myself in Salem, Oregon, as an exchange student. I remember the scent of evergreens as my foster family drove me from the airport, and into their lives. I was still the oldest child, even in the Fraley family, but how could I, in my mind, represent America now? My new-found siblings were blond, had freckles, and looked good in baseball caps. I didn’t even drink milk!
I did, however, have certain advantages. Having been educated by Jesuits, I possessed a vocabulary larger than any of my classmates’ at South Salem High. My knowledge of geography seemed amazing to kids who thought Hawaii was the capital of Manila. Mr. Manuel, my English teacher, adored my Gothic-horror style of fiction-writing. He said it was a style engendered by a Catholic education. My Americanization, at fifteen, continued, accelerated by hormones and “Saturday Night Live,” which was new on the tube. Through cultural osmosis, I imbibed Dennis Miller’s wry wit, and acquired John Belushi’s accent.
I live in the Chicago suburbs now, where Belushi grew up. I sometimes drive past the former pharmacy where he loitered incessantly as a teenager. My wife’s uncle knew him. As for me, I’m a U.S. citizen, fifty years old, still an admirer of Dennis Miller’s rants. I am, while listening to talk radio, waiting for my turn to bankrupt the Social Security System.
That system is a sham. Being a sham, it shall soon be a shambles. Since Reagan’s time, politicians have used its so-called "trust fund" to pay for general budget expenses, and when the wave of baby boomers retires in a few years, we will all be swamped in red ink. Ah, red ink. The Red Menace!—lurking still in McCarthyites’ paranoia. The Red Death!—born of Poe’s melancholia. We shall soon look universally rosy, but in an appalling way.
I have two children in college. They have, from birth, been Americans. They required no war games to make them love this country. They must love America, right? Why else would they consent to being burdened with thirteen trillion dollars of federal debt? And when Medicare and Medicaid, like aging Godzillas, rear their ugly heads above our empty storefronts and ruined penthouses, what then will become of the America I once knew?
We’re still big—sometimes too big. Good? The notion is fraught with judgmentalism. Do we always win? Winning is antithetical to Barack Obama’s inclusionary vision. America is one nation, under You-Know-Who. In (fill in the blank) We Trust. The mainstream media idolizes diversity. The political establishment on the left, especially, believes that out of diverse individuals should arise…identity politics. Groups, from sea to warming sea, blanket this nation like a suffocating quilt, dividing us according to race, sex, age, income, ideology, weight, language, yes, and religion, too.
Red states!—right out of Karl Rove’s coloring book.
After watching a year’s worth of SNL, I returned to Cebu City in 1976, went to college, and watched Carter flail haplessly amid the Iranian hostage crisis. I read a lot of Newsweek, God help me, in order to augment my already amazing grasp of geography. But the world was changing so rapidly. National borders were being reconfigured, dialects were vanishing, and a new ice age was creeping up on us, an odd precursor to the global warming that was to come, engulfing entire ecosystems, scant decades later. Was America, like the climate, changing?
Oliver North testified before the Senate, while I taught English in China. My students wanted to know how to use the word “glo-ba-li-za-tion” in a sentence, and I, dumb foreigner, showed them. At that moment, they rushed out of the building, joining their families and neighbors to make umbrellas and buttons and sandals and things like that.
I met my wife in Xiamen, China. She was there from Illinois, teaching grammar, and discreetly proselytizing. We married in the Philippines, and after the customary glitch in immigration papers was resolved, we came and settled in Illinois, the heartland of America, which throbbed like a Chevy engine. This was the future I had seen as a combat-eager, clairvoyant ten-year-old.
Today, nearing retirement, I hold a pair of sneakers that some of my socialist Chinese friends have made. What to do? Where to go? Our industrial jobs have been outsourced, and now illegal aliens are swarming over the wall to take our service-sector jobs. Yes, I know I should have said “undocumented workers.” But I am seeing red.
Looking Through the Liberal Lens
There is a passage in T. H. White’s The Once and Future King where the young King Arthur, through Merlyn’s magic, is able temporarily to perceive and experience the world as an animal does—as a perch, early in the story, and later as a goose. I have, via the magic of Google, gotten hold of Merlyn’s cell phone number, and he has granted me the power to do the same thing. The wizard is retired now, and living in Florida. The climate there, at his age, suits him, and the nocturnal revelry of Miami reminds him of the excesses of pagan England. He’s happy and single.
In my hand, I hold a flask containing an elixir which, when drunk, will allow me to look at the world through beastly eyes. In a minute I shall drink it, and for the next six hours I will record my impressions, in real time, on this laptop. A bird or a fish cannot type, of course, though the former may twitter in its fashion. What animal besides man, you ask, is able to use a computer? Ah! As Merlyn himself might have replied—“Yes, and no.” The animal whose form I propose to assume is that most cunning yet naïve political creature, known to us as Americanus liberalis.
Here goes—
.
Okay. I’m okay. America feels…so much safer…now that Barack Obama is president. We’re not blindfolding prisoners, or eavesdropping on phone-sex conversations, or insulting Muslims. Perhaps now we’ll get some respect. I don’t understand why Republican hawks think there’s a connection between Islam and terrorism. Just because Muslims and Jews are fighting in Gaza, and Muslims and Hindus kill each other in Kashmir, and Muslims attack Christians in New York, bomb humanists in London and Madrid, battle with Buddhists in Thailand, clash with atheists in Chechnya and Xinjiang, assault animists in Darfur, slaughter fellow Muslims in Baghdad and Islamabad, you know, doesn’t mean that Muslims don’t want peace.
Give peace a chance, I say. John Lennon sang it. Neville Chamberlain even wrote his own lyrics—“peace in our time.” Big hit in Munich. Too bad Hitler and Mark Chapman had other ideas. But that’s why handguns and blitzkrieg should be outlawed—and prostitution and marijuana legalized. Our priorities are all wrong! Okay, I totally need some caffeine now.
It is eleven in the morning, and I am sitting at Starbucks enjoying a cappuccino. There’s a funny syrupy taste in my mouth that I can’t get rid of. The wi-fi here is free, as health care everywhere should be. The coffee beans are from Columbia. Very good, like the country’s cocaine. Not cheap, though. We ought to subsidize it. Get the feds involved. Or get Starbucks to buy Walmart, so we can get cheaper gourmet coffee. Pay, and dress up those greeters like baristas. Poor saps, going without benefits or Abercrombie shirts. Walmart should be banned from doing business outside Bentonville, Arkansas. Bleepin’ red state! Only good thing to come out of Arkansas is Bill Clinton. Hillary, too, of course. Hey, she’s secretary of state—isn’t she in charge of Columbia now? There you go, get the feds involved.
Leaving Starbucks. It’s three o’clock, and the shade has left my spot. Hard to read the laptop’s screen. Getting awfully hot, too. If only people would drive smaller cars, global warming might be reversed. But, you know, it’s so hard to get obese people to drive small cars. They eat all this junk food and fast food and crap tuna that doesn’t let the dolphins escape the nets. That’s where the problem starts. We don’t respect animals in the sea, and McDonald's tortures its four-legged animals before serving their meat as Happy Meals to all these fat people in their SUV’s that guzzle Middle East oil from Halliburton’s derricks. No wonder the terrorists are happy! They didn’t get fries, but they’re plenty happy!
All right, I know Bill Clinton liked to eat Big Macs. And Obama smokes a pack of cigarettes a day. And Al Gore lives in a mansion with a carbon footprint bigger than Bush’s ego. Nobody’s perfect. You make a mistake, you get an abortion. You marry the wrong woman, you try a guy next time. You shoot some pervert raping your daughter, you turn in your gun to Mayor Daley. We can’t all leave the exact tip every time.
Except fundamentalists of course. Oh, Christians are sooo perfect. They know what’s good for everyone. What’s that word they use? Righteous. Jesus, they drive me crazy! Yet what could be crazier than somebody talking to God? C’mon! The universe wasn’t created by God. It appeared—BAM!—out of nowhere, like fireworks over a ghost town. Don’t ask questions. Just pretend it’s the fourth of July, and it’s the start of a new year. Life arose from bubbly chemicals, and then, over millennia, lower organisms evolved into fans of The Jerry Springer Show. Design and meaning are an illusion. Spirituality has to do mainly with yoga and the power of crystals. And maybe angels, as well—as long as they’re feminists. The Dalai Lama, too, so like a panda, so friendly and photogenic. How could you not adore him? This open-minded kind of religion can be apprehended only through multicultural education, with a minor in condoms. That’s why Christians homeschool their kids—they hate the rest of us! They despise the United Nations. They’d rather have a right-wing-on-steroids Kingdom of God established on earth than have the U.N. take charge of our lives. I don’t know about you, but I’d prefer my neighbor to wear a beret any day. Halos give me the creeps.
Why are these unshaven people staring at me?
What are all these paragraphs I’ve written?
Oh, yes. Merlyn’s elixir. It’s worn off.
Hey, no hair on my knuckles! No stake through my heart. I’m a conservative again. I’d better leave this porn shop.
Next time, I’ll just go to the zoo.
In my hand, I hold a flask containing an elixir which, when drunk, will allow me to look at the world through beastly eyes. In a minute I shall drink it, and for the next six hours I will record my impressions, in real time, on this laptop. A bird or a fish cannot type, of course, though the former may twitter in its fashion. What animal besides man, you ask, is able to use a computer? Ah! As Merlyn himself might have replied—“Yes, and no.” The animal whose form I propose to assume is that most cunning yet naïve political creature, known to us as Americanus liberalis.
Here goes—
.
Okay. I’m okay. America feels…so much safer…now that Barack Obama is president. We’re not blindfolding prisoners, or eavesdropping on phone-sex conversations, or insulting Muslims. Perhaps now we’ll get some respect. I don’t understand why Republican hawks think there’s a connection between Islam and terrorism. Just because Muslims and Jews are fighting in Gaza, and Muslims and Hindus kill each other in Kashmir, and Muslims attack Christians in New York, bomb humanists in London and Madrid, battle with Buddhists in Thailand, clash with atheists in Chechnya and Xinjiang, assault animists in Darfur, slaughter fellow Muslims in Baghdad and Islamabad, you know, doesn’t mean that Muslims don’t want peace.
Give peace a chance, I say. John Lennon sang it. Neville Chamberlain even wrote his own lyrics—“peace in our time.” Big hit in Munich. Too bad Hitler and Mark Chapman had other ideas. But that’s why handguns and blitzkrieg should be outlawed—and prostitution and marijuana legalized. Our priorities are all wrong! Okay, I totally need some caffeine now.
It is eleven in the morning, and I am sitting at Starbucks enjoying a cappuccino. There’s a funny syrupy taste in my mouth that I can’t get rid of. The wi-fi here is free, as health care everywhere should be. The coffee beans are from Columbia. Very good, like the country’s cocaine. Not cheap, though. We ought to subsidize it. Get the feds involved. Or get Starbucks to buy Walmart, so we can get cheaper gourmet coffee. Pay, and dress up those greeters like baristas. Poor saps, going without benefits or Abercrombie shirts. Walmart should be banned from doing business outside Bentonville, Arkansas. Bleepin’ red state! Only good thing to come out of Arkansas is Bill Clinton. Hillary, too, of course. Hey, she’s secretary of state—isn’t she in charge of Columbia now? There you go, get the feds involved.
Leaving Starbucks. It’s three o’clock, and the shade has left my spot. Hard to read the laptop’s screen. Getting awfully hot, too. If only people would drive smaller cars, global warming might be reversed. But, you know, it’s so hard to get obese people to drive small cars. They eat all this junk food and fast food and crap tuna that doesn’t let the dolphins escape the nets. That’s where the problem starts. We don’t respect animals in the sea, and McDonald's tortures its four-legged animals before serving their meat as Happy Meals to all these fat people in their SUV’s that guzzle Middle East oil from Halliburton’s derricks. No wonder the terrorists are happy! They didn’t get fries, but they’re plenty happy!
All right, I know Bill Clinton liked to eat Big Macs. And Obama smokes a pack of cigarettes a day. And Al Gore lives in a mansion with a carbon footprint bigger than Bush’s ego. Nobody’s perfect. You make a mistake, you get an abortion. You marry the wrong woman, you try a guy next time. You shoot some pervert raping your daughter, you turn in your gun to Mayor Daley. We can’t all leave the exact tip every time.
Except fundamentalists of course. Oh, Christians are sooo perfect. They know what’s good for everyone. What’s that word they use? Righteous. Jesus, they drive me crazy! Yet what could be crazier than somebody talking to God? C’mon! The universe wasn’t created by God. It appeared—BAM!—out of nowhere, like fireworks over a ghost town. Don’t ask questions. Just pretend it’s the fourth of July, and it’s the start of a new year. Life arose from bubbly chemicals, and then, over millennia, lower organisms evolved into fans of The Jerry Springer Show. Design and meaning are an illusion. Spirituality has to do mainly with yoga and the power of crystals. And maybe angels, as well—as long as they’re feminists. The Dalai Lama, too, so like a panda, so friendly and photogenic. How could you not adore him? This open-minded kind of religion can be apprehended only through multicultural education, with a minor in condoms. That’s why Christians homeschool their kids—they hate the rest of us! They despise the United Nations. They’d rather have a right-wing-on-steroids Kingdom of God established on earth than have the U.N. take charge of our lives. I don’t know about you, but I’d prefer my neighbor to wear a beret any day. Halos give me the creeps.
Why are these unshaven people staring at me?
What are all these paragraphs I’ve written?
Oh, yes. Merlyn’s elixir. It’s worn off.
Hey, no hair on my knuckles! No stake through my heart. I’m a conservative again. I’d better leave this porn shop.
Next time, I’ll just go to the zoo.
Illinois As Middle-earth
Not in the Midwest; in Middle-earth—that’s where I live. I am a creature more lowly than a Hobbit. I am an Illinois taxpayer. My village is in DuPage county, not far from the Shire, west of the Lake, and distant enough from Spring-in-the-Field that, until recently, I could earn my living with little interference.
But…the world has changed, and, with it, the tax rates. I can feel it in the air quality, and in the water user fees. My hand trembles when I see the sales tax on my invoice. Where is this money going? I could have bought some lembas bread, on sale, with it. Instead, it is being transferred to the municipality’s account.
A year ago, this tax was raised by half a cent on the dollar. Protests were made by business and consumer groups, but in the end they were stifled by politicians, who are masters at concealing the truth, at twisting it, spinning it, or tabling it for future consideration by a committee. As Dwarves mine their caverns for mithril, so politicians bleed their constituents dry for revenues. While you wonder where your dollar went at the store, they reassess your home, and grab a few more hundred bucks.
In 2009, the county collector charged me $5,277.48 for living in my own home. This year, she wants sixty-eight more dollars. I look around. It’s the same shack I’ve occupied for seventeen years. The single bathroom my family uses is the one thing that didn’t change, when the world, as a whole, did. I’ve got asphalt shingles on top of thatch, and windows as old as the race of Elves. Yet Gwen Henry in her castle on County Farm Road has assessed my house at $316,700. My property has been on the market now for a month, listed at $199,999, and no nibble from prospective buyers has disturbed the “For Sale” sign in the yard.
Ms. Henry has a reason for her intractable figures. Though the present value of my home has diminished significantly, my tax bill reflects the fact that 2006 was, in fact, a good year for real estate. My home’s “fair cash value” from that year, even allowing for the market collapse in the ensuing years, somehow precludes any lowering of my liability. In other words, the year 2006—and not the birth of Christ—should henceforth serve as the reference point for all historical events and home sales data.
I know that sounds like arrogance on the part of government. Yet Ms. Henry, believe it or not, is unconvinced that this reasoning alone will protect the county from any revenue shortfall. After all, when 2006 lapses as a factor in formulating property values, heretics among the middle class will inevitably surge toward her office, holding in their hands new appeals and petitions, dangling like so many super-sized teabags. Best, she has decided, to head off the mob preemptively.
From a vault in her chamber, the troll-like Treasurer has secured an ancient scroll with an incantation to defeat any conceivable legal or procedural maneuver which might come from the people. She has included this incantation in the brochure which she mailed out with everyone’s property tax bills last April. It reads, in Legalese—
“The assessment is a variable, which when divided into the amount of funds requested (by the taxing district), creates a percentage or tax rate each of us must pay. Even if your assessment were reduced significantly, the tax rate would increase by the same amount, resulting in the same dollar amount due.”
Translation: The game is fixed. What’s more, Sauron is stirring in far-off Spring-in-the-Field.
Quinn the Grim, Sauron’s ally, has mobilized an army of AFSCME members, misshapen beings who were once men in the private sector. The army is led by pundits of terrible voice and countenance. They have overrun the countryside, east and west of the Illinois River, demanding a “one percent surcharge for education.” A few math-savvy peasants reply that raising the state income tax rate from three to four percent would constitute, not a one percent, but a thirty-three percent, hike. The army responds by predicting budgetary chaos, mass layoffs of busybodies, children eating dirt. The Mayor of the White City screeches hysterically on the local news. Some people waver. Demigovernor Quinn continues his onslaught. Personally, I liked it better when we had a leader who used profanity on tape, and quoted Kipling and the Bible. Blagojevich the Foul-mouthed at least had a human side. Quinn is all business—or, rather, anti-business.
Quinn would burden Illinoisans with higher taxes, more onerous regulations, and the sight of his unsmiling face on television for many seasons to come. And so I, with my Fellowship of Conservatives, have decided to act. We will march through prairie and cornfields, over I-55, toward the Enemy’s lair in Spring-in-the-Field. From its outskirts, I shall proceed alone to the edge of the Grand Deficit in the center of the city. The Deficit is a hole of unimaginable immensity, so deep you can drop eighty billion dollars in pension obligations into it, plus all of Mount Doom, and still have room for an echo. Into this chasm, I shall toss the thing that is most precious to politicians, and which, henceforth, they can never confiscate—my last paycheck.
But…the world has changed, and, with it, the tax rates. I can feel it in the air quality, and in the water user fees. My hand trembles when I see the sales tax on my invoice. Where is this money going? I could have bought some lembas bread, on sale, with it. Instead, it is being transferred to the municipality’s account.
A year ago, this tax was raised by half a cent on the dollar. Protests were made by business and consumer groups, but in the end they were stifled by politicians, who are masters at concealing the truth, at twisting it, spinning it, or tabling it for future consideration by a committee. As Dwarves mine their caverns for mithril, so politicians bleed their constituents dry for revenues. While you wonder where your dollar went at the store, they reassess your home, and grab a few more hundred bucks.
In 2009, the county collector charged me $5,277.48 for living in my own home. This year, she wants sixty-eight more dollars. I look around. It’s the same shack I’ve occupied for seventeen years. The single bathroom my family uses is the one thing that didn’t change, when the world, as a whole, did. I’ve got asphalt shingles on top of thatch, and windows as old as the race of Elves. Yet Gwen Henry in her castle on County Farm Road has assessed my house at $316,700. My property has been on the market now for a month, listed at $199,999, and no nibble from prospective buyers has disturbed the “For Sale” sign in the yard.
Ms. Henry has a reason for her intractable figures. Though the present value of my home has diminished significantly, my tax bill reflects the fact that 2006 was, in fact, a good year for real estate. My home’s “fair cash value” from that year, even allowing for the market collapse in the ensuing years, somehow precludes any lowering of my liability. In other words, the year 2006—and not the birth of Christ—should henceforth serve as the reference point for all historical events and home sales data.
I know that sounds like arrogance on the part of government. Yet Ms. Henry, believe it or not, is unconvinced that this reasoning alone will protect the county from any revenue shortfall. After all, when 2006 lapses as a factor in formulating property values, heretics among the middle class will inevitably surge toward her office, holding in their hands new appeals and petitions, dangling like so many super-sized teabags. Best, she has decided, to head off the mob preemptively.
From a vault in her chamber, the troll-like Treasurer has secured an ancient scroll with an incantation to defeat any conceivable legal or procedural maneuver which might come from the people. She has included this incantation in the brochure which she mailed out with everyone’s property tax bills last April. It reads, in Legalese—
“The assessment is a variable, which when divided into the amount of funds requested (by the taxing district), creates a percentage or tax rate each of us must pay. Even if your assessment were reduced significantly, the tax rate would increase by the same amount, resulting in the same dollar amount due.”
Translation: The game is fixed. What’s more, Sauron is stirring in far-off Spring-in-the-Field.
Quinn the Grim, Sauron’s ally, has mobilized an army of AFSCME members, misshapen beings who were once men in the private sector. The army is led by pundits of terrible voice and countenance. They have overrun the countryside, east and west of the Illinois River, demanding a “one percent surcharge for education.” A few math-savvy peasants reply that raising the state income tax rate from three to four percent would constitute, not a one percent, but a thirty-three percent, hike. The army responds by predicting budgetary chaos, mass layoffs of busybodies, children eating dirt. The Mayor of the White City screeches hysterically on the local news. Some people waver. Demigovernor Quinn continues his onslaught. Personally, I liked it better when we had a leader who used profanity on tape, and quoted Kipling and the Bible. Blagojevich the Foul-mouthed at least had a human side. Quinn is all business—or, rather, anti-business.
Quinn would burden Illinoisans with higher taxes, more onerous regulations, and the sight of his unsmiling face on television for many seasons to come. And so I, with my Fellowship of Conservatives, have decided to act. We will march through prairie and cornfields, over I-55, toward the Enemy’s lair in Spring-in-the-Field. From its outskirts, I shall proceed alone to the edge of the Grand Deficit in the center of the city. The Deficit is a hole of unimaginable immensity, so deep you can drop eighty billion dollars in pension obligations into it, plus all of Mount Doom, and still have room for an echo. Into this chasm, I shall toss the thing that is most precious to politicians, and which, henceforth, they can never confiscate—my last paycheck.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Pro-Choice, Antebellum
“Frankly, I am not in favor of slavery, though I do think that the abolitionists are too harsh in their criticism of the South. It’s plain to see that Africans are human. They have eyes and ears, arms and legs; they sweat, bleed, and procreate. Regarding their capacity for civilized behavior, and for language in general, I have my doubts—honest doubts. But if you press me, I will have to say—despite the ebony glaze of their skin, and the strange texture of their hair; despite that air of insouciance they have about them—that these slaves must actually be human, though they may not necessarily be akin to us in every way.
And that’s where I’m a little conflicted concerning this issue. I mean, I’m a Northerner. What do I know about the rigors of running a plantation? Cotton, to me, is not some cultural icon. It’s a crop, a commodity. But to the Southerner, you understand, it’s got heritage.
So I can see how a Southern merchant, or your man in the street in Richmond might look at a Negro, and see, not a person, but a bale of cotton. It’s an economic imperative, as far as Southern folks are concerned; not a question of morality at all. It’s their land—their way of life—their right to choose!
Are slaves human beings? That’s up to the masters to decide. It’s their private business, and none of mine. Nobody is forcing me to own slaves, and I’m not about to tell anyone to free his.
I’m pro-choice about this. And that’s okay.”
________________
Is it?
The letter above could have been written in 1857, north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Change a few words, however, and you may likely find it in Planned Parenthood’s clinic in Aurora, Illinois. The document describes the situation in the North prior to the Civil War. Many people then had reservations about slavery, but in order not to unsettle the Union, they rationalized their qualms away. If an act—murder, rape, genocide—is evil, then it must be opposed at all cost. But slavery had become so entrenched that what should have been an abhorrent plague became a fashionable institution, and then at last a rebel cry.
The abolitionists had convictions about slavery, and acted upon them. Those of their compatriots who merely had “reservations” about it did nothing. These were the “moderates” of their day, assuaging their conscience by telling themselves that, privately, they could not stomach the dirty business, but that, as a matter of policy, it was not up to them to judge others. This moral ambivalence, whenever it shows up, is unfathomable and infuriating. If slavery is wrong, then the only thing to do is eliminate it. Political negotiation over an absolute horror, be it Nazism, or terrorism, is futile. But moderates, then as now, like to put manicured finger to dimpled chin, and declaim, “Hmm. Let’s find a way out of this conundrum.”
There is no way out, except through a bloodbath, or, if we’re lucky, a Supreme Court decision. Liberals know this. Their counterparts in the nineteenth century declared slaves to be sub-human, and therefore undeserving of legal protection. The only way to dissuade those liberals, as Lincoln found out, was to crush their skulls in battle.
Goodness knows I have no love for liberals, but for this—their mulish defense of the indefensible—I grudgingly give them respect. Liberals today insist that, up until a baby’s head is emerging into the light, abortion is perfectly acceptable. Why? The unborn baby is simply not human. Killing it is no more grim than clipping one’s fingernails. No need, in either case, to wash the hands afterwards of guilt. This I can understand. Liberals have an argument, and they’re sticking to it. It’s a narrow argument, since they also believe, for purposes of federal law, that a bald eagle’s egg is the same as a bald eagle. Nonetheless, the logic of their reasoning is there, implacable and palpable, lending itself readily to refutation.
Moderates’ views are not as easily grasped, being absurd, and morally ethereal. They undulate in the wind, like the leaves of weeping willows. They wink in and out of our perception, like starlight. How in heaven’s name can you think that slavery is wrong, and still trust that others may find some use for it? How, if abortion is murder, can you let a woman and her doctor commit murder?
Roe v. Wade, let’s be honest, was an exercise in judicial legerdemain, paying lip service to obstetric science, even as it played dumb before natural philosophy. Yes, opined the court’s majority, abortion is reprehensible, but it isn’t as vile as depriving a woman of her “privacy.” We’ll allow it during the first two trimesters. And we will sanction it even in the third, if the mother’s life or health is endangered. Of course, by “health,” we mean her slightest emotions, as well. If the mother is a minor, do not notify her parents. But she may inform a black-robed stranger. If she cannot pay for the procedure, then others must. If the baby survives, let it starve while we deliberate.
No, slavery is wrong. And the slaughter of innocents is totally not okay.
And that’s where I’m a little conflicted concerning this issue. I mean, I’m a Northerner. What do I know about the rigors of running a plantation? Cotton, to me, is not some cultural icon. It’s a crop, a commodity. But to the Southerner, you understand, it’s got heritage.
So I can see how a Southern merchant, or your man in the street in Richmond might look at a Negro, and see, not a person, but a bale of cotton. It’s an economic imperative, as far as Southern folks are concerned; not a question of morality at all. It’s their land—their way of life—their right to choose!
Are slaves human beings? That’s up to the masters to decide. It’s their private business, and none of mine. Nobody is forcing me to own slaves, and I’m not about to tell anyone to free his.
I’m pro-choice about this. And that’s okay.”
________________
Is it?
The letter above could have been written in 1857, north of the Mason-Dixon Line. Change a few words, however, and you may likely find it in Planned Parenthood’s clinic in Aurora, Illinois. The document describes the situation in the North prior to the Civil War. Many people then had reservations about slavery, but in order not to unsettle the Union, they rationalized their qualms away. If an act—murder, rape, genocide—is evil, then it must be opposed at all cost. But slavery had become so entrenched that what should have been an abhorrent plague became a fashionable institution, and then at last a rebel cry.
The abolitionists had convictions about slavery, and acted upon them. Those of their compatriots who merely had “reservations” about it did nothing. These were the “moderates” of their day, assuaging their conscience by telling themselves that, privately, they could not stomach the dirty business, but that, as a matter of policy, it was not up to them to judge others. This moral ambivalence, whenever it shows up, is unfathomable and infuriating. If slavery is wrong, then the only thing to do is eliminate it. Political negotiation over an absolute horror, be it Nazism, or terrorism, is futile. But moderates, then as now, like to put manicured finger to dimpled chin, and declaim, “Hmm. Let’s find a way out of this conundrum.”
There is no way out, except through a bloodbath, or, if we’re lucky, a Supreme Court decision. Liberals know this. Their counterparts in the nineteenth century declared slaves to be sub-human, and therefore undeserving of legal protection. The only way to dissuade those liberals, as Lincoln found out, was to crush their skulls in battle.
Goodness knows I have no love for liberals, but for this—their mulish defense of the indefensible—I grudgingly give them respect. Liberals today insist that, up until a baby’s head is emerging into the light, abortion is perfectly acceptable. Why? The unborn baby is simply not human. Killing it is no more grim than clipping one’s fingernails. No need, in either case, to wash the hands afterwards of guilt. This I can understand. Liberals have an argument, and they’re sticking to it. It’s a narrow argument, since they also believe, for purposes of federal law, that a bald eagle’s egg is the same as a bald eagle. Nonetheless, the logic of their reasoning is there, implacable and palpable, lending itself readily to refutation.
Moderates’ views are not as easily grasped, being absurd, and morally ethereal. They undulate in the wind, like the leaves of weeping willows. They wink in and out of our perception, like starlight. How in heaven’s name can you think that slavery is wrong, and still trust that others may find some use for it? How, if abortion is murder, can you let a woman and her doctor commit murder?
Roe v. Wade, let’s be honest, was an exercise in judicial legerdemain, paying lip service to obstetric science, even as it played dumb before natural philosophy. Yes, opined the court’s majority, abortion is reprehensible, but it isn’t as vile as depriving a woman of her “privacy.” We’ll allow it during the first two trimesters. And we will sanction it even in the third, if the mother’s life or health is endangered. Of course, by “health,” we mean her slightest emotions, as well. If the mother is a minor, do not notify her parents. But she may inform a black-robed stranger. If she cannot pay for the procedure, then others must. If the baby survives, let it starve while we deliberate.
No, slavery is wrong. And the slaughter of innocents is totally not okay.
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