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.
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