Letters to the Editor
AJCalhoun
Published Letters: 964 Editor's Choice: 127
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Strangely Conservative Reactions From the Left
[Read the article: Obama's magic]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]There's an awful lot of reticence to my left, here, when it comes to the laying of palm fronds and rose petals in the path of Barack Obama as potential Presidential candidate. As a Republican and nominal conservative I get a somewhat different vibe from all this than the readership at large. Here's what it looks like:
Obama is black. That's seen as a problem, if only a logistical one. Hillary is a woman, probably slightly less problematic - except that she is not likeable, she is not her husband, and she's doing OK where she is now. There is a certain arrogance and coldness about her that people can't shake - but she is at least white.
People fear a black man - even an articulate, bright, even luminous mixed-race black man - just can't win, and that's reason enough to discount him.
Obama doesn't have the requisite "experience." Well as many have pointed out, neither did Dubya. They seem to feel both men have "charisma", however, which puzzles me, because if there was ever any charm to Bush the Younger, it was his utter lack of charisma and his total (and totally false) down-to-earthness. Obama does have charisma and something more: he has the moment. We have waited so long for an articulate, passionate and eminently intelligent candidate, yet we compare this one with Duh-byah? Well he is black...kind of.
I'm no stranger to the faux liberal form of racism. I've lived with it here in and around our nation's Captitol and it's not confined to here. Say the right words, but for god's sake don't DO anything. Don't rock the damn boat. Pretend you are rocking it.
Obama is also quite spiritual. That's got to be off-putting to as many Democrats as it is fascinating to disaffected Republicans. This man harks back to the quietly revolutionary spirit of our founding fathers while encompassing the later hope invested in "Children of the Future." Obama is a child of the future. Progress lies ahead, not behind us. That he has not committed any of the sins of the past because he hasn't had time is a pretty weak reason to write him off.
We as a people (as opposed to political opponents) may have been give a grand opportunity. As the left edge of the Right begins to assess the New Possibility we find Obama ascending. He is not JFK, he is not FDR and he most certainly is not Hillary.
Give me Barack Obama with Nancy Pelosi as VP, and we could take over the universe.
Perhaps we should be asking ourselves, at this low point in our history, "Why not?" We could do infinitely worse. We already have.
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Racism vs. Generalized Contempt
[Read the article: Salon Person of the Year: S.R. Sidarth]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Ah, Rakhia, you stepped right in the gazonga! You were making me nervous with your "dumb southern racists", but I figured yes, they were in the south, probably locals and were gutless enough to politely laugh at Allen's idiotic "joke", so I bit my tongue and followed, but then sure enough, the Great Faux Liberal Faux Pa came gurgling out: "...working a group of rednecks."
Are you with me so far? Allen got busted for pointing out a member of a singular race and religion, a Virginian among fellow Virginians, by use of what is, in some quarters, a racial epithet (though sure as hell not in Virginia - at least up til then) and you call the fawning audience members "rednecks." Do you know what that word means?
I am no fan of Political Correctness, everyone here knows that. But I am a fan of even-handedness. It is fine to kick Allen in the nuts for the Macacca incident. Over and over, even. I get a perverse satisfaction from it. But to use a similar (and far more pointed) epithet to describe the people in Allen's audience, well, you lost me there. I'd refer you to a recent post-election washington Post article about Allen's nemesis (and my newest hero), Jim Webb, which was titled "Don't Call Him Redneck." Look it up. 'Nuf said.
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Abraham, Look What You Started!
[Read the article: Finding my religion]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Dunn's article strikes me as a rather sweet, if naive testament to the sameness of Abrahimic interpretation of reality. We "convert" from one Abrahimic religion to another, discover the Joy of Sects, and continue to repeat the magic words, rephrased and re-arranged to suit the variations on the theme: that Islam, Judaism and Christianity are all founded upon the legacy of Abraham, a man who allegedly believed God to be such a crazed fellow that he would require of Abraham that he murder his own son in order to "prove" his devotion to this cosmic madman. Then, of course, at the critical moment when Abraham himself proves to be the actual madman, God hollers "I was just kidding!" and saves Isaac from his father - and then fell asleep at the wheel for several thousands of years.
We can choose one religion or sect as more "enlightened" than another, but among the three endlessly infighting Abrahimic ones there is only one thing certain: that they will continue to argue, fight among themselves, and pronounce random, often pointless, too frequently atrocious "directions" from God.
I say this as a student of religion and an adherent of a heretical and unspeakable Christian religion cross-bred with Sufi Islam, while all the time reserving the right to declare,along with J.Krishnamurti, "No guru, no method, no teacher!" I think I'm with the mother on this one. It's kind of like that lovely old song's lyrics: "You may not be an angel...But until the day that one comes along, I'll string along with you."
Take on any mantle, it's all good. Just don't fight nor persecute anyone else. Hopefully eventually you'll happen to look within, and there you will begin the real "aha." Til then, be anything, but be nice. It couldn't hurt.