Essay by Martha Quillen
American politics – May 2003 – Colorado Central Magazine
THERE ARE at least 116 sides to every major issue, but Americans keep trying to reduce everything to two sides — maybe because of our two-party system.
Personally, I think it makes us look uneducated and bigoted, or maybe it doesn’t merely make us look that way, maybe it actually makes us ignorant and bigoted.
But I’m tired of hearing about how terrible Americans are, because we don’t really seem any worse than anyone else. After all, bigotry and ignorance are pretty common traits. So all right, all ready, I know:
1) But the U.S. is the richest, greediest nation ever known to man, and our corporations, our military industrialist complex, our weapons of mass destruction, and our wasteful, self-destructive lifestyles are befouling the planet and destroying everything.
2) How dare you call us fallible? Where is your patriotism? We are the freest, fairest, bravest nation on earth, and our boys are over there fighting for you at this very moment — so why don’t you shut up?
3) Well, of course, we’re only human, but we’re still the greatest country on earth.
4) Do you know what happened to the Dixie Chicks? Well, you’ll get yours.
As I said, there’s usually more than one way to look at things, but our opinions do seem pretty polarized. Where are the whys, the wherefores, and the discussions on what we hope to accomplish? Lost in angry, two-sided rhetoric, I suspect.
Recently, Ed and I were on KVRH and I asked Gail Ann how she thought people in our region felt about the war — since she does talk shows and the like. I was curious, because I wrote a short piece on the subject for the April magazine.
Based primarily on local print media, but also on websites, talk, and radio, in March: Crestone was against the war; Buena Vista for it; Salida seemed to be more anti-war than pro; Gunnison about half and half; and Cañon and Westcliffe seemed a little more pro-war than not.
If these figures strike you as extraordinarily anti-war in light of recent events, remember that the war had not yet started then, and national opinion polls claimed that 65% of Americans didn’t approve of going to war without international support.
When we went on the radio, the war was only three days old, and according to the polls pro-war sentiment was rising — which I presumed it would. But that fascinated me, because I hadn’t met a single person who had changed his mind (either way). And I still haven’t (but I have met people who are scared to talk about it).
Anyway, the evening before Ed and I did that show, I happened upon three different newscasts in short order claiming that “53%,” “62%,” and “72%” of Americans supported the war.
So where in hell did those polls come from? And what had they actually asked? And why do we persist in putting up with all of these unexplained, unattributed polls?
Polls influence politics, the media, and public opinion, but they’re absurdly simplistic: Are you for or against: Roads? The Stock Market? Astrophysics? Huh?
Whether the poll that irked you said that Clinton’s approval rating was 80% or the war’s approval rating was 80% — and I’ve got to admit that such polls irk me — the next election will prove that those high numbers are bogus.
BUT THE NEWS just gets worse every day — and by that I don’t mean that the war is going badly. Two months ago, I complained that there was no foreign news on television. But in recent weeks, that medium has proven the old maxim: Be careful what you wish for because it might come true.
Now half the news sounds like satire — as if someone from Saturday Night Live got an unwise promotion. Most of the Denver news is flag-waving, tear-jerking, intrusive, voyeuristic nonsense, as persistently hand-wringing as the reports on Columbine High School.
Adjectives, which were normally frowned upon when I took journalism, are suddenly de rigueur. Yep, they barely have time for headlines, but now they’ve got time to tell you about the “dangerous, tragic, heart-breaking, brave, heroic, courageous” happenings of the day.
Although this seems pretty popular right now, before long viewers are bound to start wondering whether the cameramen are really vultures waiting for the kill.
Right now, the news is true-blue and patriotic, but skimpy at best. What’s happening in Afghanistan these days? Don’t they have a provisional government now? Isn’t anything about that place worthy of our attention?
No wonder people abroad hate us. Our news sources make it all too obvious that we’re only interested in seeing American kids waving back at us; otherwise we don’t give a damn what happens over there.
Or maybe we do, in which case we had better start paying better attention. But that’s pretty difficult, because today’s warm, fuzzy war coverage doesn’t tell us a darned thing about Afghanistan or Iraq, or their culture, wants, needs, casualties, supplies etc. Yet soon enough we’ll presumably play at least some role in their occupation. Thus it might be helpful to both our discussions and our democracy if we knew a little more.
But our current tactless coverage will no doubt increase, regardless — until it totally parodies itself, and everybody ends up sounding like Geraldo Rivera. Then its practitioners, like Arthur Kent, the Gulf War’s famed Scud stud, will disappear — or perhaps more fittingly end up on the History Channel — having learned some excruciatingly bad habits.
(But hey, maybe they’ll dust Kent off and bring him back to feign nonchalance again, which was his specialty — cool in the face of fire. As it turned out, however, Kent was reporting from the swimming pool of his hotel, although that weird covering on the pool sure did look like tents.)
With increased coverage in recent weeks, there are a few diamonds amidst the swill, but it keeps getting harder to stomach the hypocritical overkill. After all, only three months ago the major networks couldn’t cut three minutes out of their sports coverage to report on Afghanistan.
RIGHT AFTER ED and I were on KVRH a man called the station and asked to talk to me. At some point, he started berating me for being a shill of the liberal media — and sure enough, he absolutely insisted that all of the main stream media are liberal.
I, on the other hand, am confident that television newscasters are as facile as politicians at pandering to the polls: liberal this week, conservative the next, and so adept at changing that even their best friends don’t know for sure.
But in case you think, in this time of war, that my caller thought I was a traitorous peacenik hoodwinked by the duplicitous liberal press because I had courageously challenged the war, the President, the religious right or anything else, think again.
Ed and I were talking about our last issue: the Klan, piñon beetles, the drought, West Nile, and Michael Chavez. Then I asked Gail Ann about opinions on the war (since I’d written about that), and she said she thought most people were for the war.
I said I thought the region was still pretty divided on the issue, but I also mentioned that a lot of sentiment didn’t seem to be stolidly for or against war, but a little torn. As an example, I recalled the day Ed and I went to Buena Vista for the Olympic torch ceremony. At that point, people were still eager to fight a war in Afghanistan, and there were banners on all of the motels, and flags on cars, booths, and T-shirts.
There was also a choir on the stage in B.V. singing “Let there be peace on earth, and let it began with me,” (quite beautifully, I might add). And it struck me as bizarre — under the circumstances — singing about giving peace a chance in Buena Vista on that particular day with all of the flags, posters, and stickers waving in the breeze.
At one point, I wondered if the singers were trying to make a political statement, but later I decided that they weren’t because such dichotomy in speech and rhetoric have been pretty standard ever since. The slogan today seems to be “Talk peace, and use a big gun — often.”
Anyway the caller was mad because he thought I made it sound like Buena Vista was full of hippie peaceniks marching all over the place — which, of course, was not my intention. As a matter of fact, I assumed that everyone listening would know that just the opposite was true, and that’s what made the music seem rather surreal.
After the caller hung up, I asked Ed, “Do you think I somehow inadvertently implied that there were peace marches in Buena Vista?”
“What?”
“The man on the phone thought I said there were lots of peaceniks in Buena Vista.”
“You know what, Martha? You have got to stop thinking that people actually ever listen to other people — because that’s totally erroneous and it makes you worry about really stupid things.”
“Wow. Now I feel so much more confident about going on the radio.”
BUT SERIOUSLY, Ed gets at least a hundred letters a month since he started writing for the Post, and many of them address “you people who are trying to take away our guns,” and “you people who voted for Al Gore,” and “you people who think that cheating on your wife is just fine.” And it doesn’t really matter that Ed’s against gun control; or voted for Ralph Nader; or that his wife would kill him (or even that he actually wrote that Clinton should resign).
Such correspondence is definitely disconcerting, but I suspect it’s fair, since the columnist — or the radio announcer, or the television talk show host — gets to start from scratch. I think people need to express their political views, worries, and frustrations if we want any sort of participatory democracy.
But I worry about how much we all — including journalists, political parties, and politicians — purposefully stereotype, simplify and distort the other side’s position.
In America, you’re either for war or against it, and it doesn’t matter that there’s a war in Afghanistan, and a war in Iraq; and that our President has proposed fighting terror in Syria, Iran, North Korea, and other points still undisclosed. It’s unpatriotic to suggest that perhaps these wars should be considered separately, or on their own merits. And it’s warmongering to suggest that there might be any valid reasons for America to send in troops.
In America, there are only two sides to every issue: the correct and the incorrect. Life is extraordinarily simple, here, and so are our opinions.
In other words, this is America and we don’t need to discuss anything fully, because we already know where we stand — and those people who don’t agree with us are either listening to the dishonest liberal media, or addicted to reactionary talk radio.
HALLELUJAH. I thought it was impossible, but in this case I agree with both sides: We don’t know much of anything because our national media are awful. We should be hearing more about foreign affairs — before we go to war. We should know more about how the U.S. votes in the U.N.; and the consequence of American trade restrictions; and American military interventions abroad.
Why? Because our senators, congressmen, and President were hearing the same non-news as the rest of us before they got elected — and that’s a truly scary thought. They probably didn’t know what they were getting into — and horror of horrors, maybe they still don’t.
This time around, however, I quit paying attention to the news after political discussion disintegrated into aspersions against U.S. dissenters. This has been both a national and local phenomenon, and has led us even further away from the serious issues.
Recently, a woman wrote to the Mountain Mail to say that she was a Marine and Salidans had no right to say anything against the war because “you can still step out your door and no one is walking around with AK 47s,” and “people aren’t being tortured and killed on the streets by government officials.”
According to PFC Janette Nicole Smith, citizens have no right nor cause to “complain” (especially to newspapers). But by her definition, neither did our founding fathers.
Obviously, Smith feels that she’s willing to risk her life and some people don’t appreciate that. But in all fairness, people against the war don’t want Smith or anyone else to risk their lives in Iraq. They think the war is wrong, and they have every right to say so.
But Smith doesn’t think that they should exercise their rights — and she was actually complaining about letters people wrote to the Mountain Mail before the war began, back when she was home on leave “several months ago.” Apparently, even before a war, people have no right to “complain.”
“So remember that this 18-year-old young woman is always putting you and your family before herself,” Smith wrote. “I’m always taking care of you, the families that live such a privileged life.”
“Many letters showed the expressions of humans with no knowledge of how privileged they are,” she wrote. “Privileged to live in a country that has people like me to stand up for rights of people I will never meet.”
But what rights are those?
At this point, you’ve got to think twice about whether most Americans believe in democracy at all. And if we don’t believe in freedom of speech, and political choice, what is it we plan to export to Afghanistan and Iraq?
PFC Smith characterizes Salida’s anti-war faction as unappreciative complainers who sleep in late. Personally, I don’t remember everyone who’s written to our local newspaper, but three people have come by my house to speak against the war. One was a veteran; one was a 70+-year-old retired nurse who has treated veterans from many wars; and one was a woman I’ve encountered many times before because she also donates her time to animal shelters, patients who need transportation, and her party.
Obviously, Smith has a right to speak out (even if she doesn’t think that others should have first amendment rights), but I wonder if it was fair of her to invoke her military status again and again in an attempt to foster hatred and discrimination — because presumably the United States Marine Corps does not advocate suppressing legally protected rights.
Today, zealously nationalistic rhetoric is spreading across our country like wildfire, and in this case, someone actually paid to have this polemic put in the Mountain Mail — again and again.
So it’s one, two, three, what are we fighting for? Obviously not democracy, not freedom, not rights, not dissent, not the constitution, and not free speech.
But this woman is young; maybe someday she’ll understand why dissent and discussion are important.
RIGHT NOW, HOWEVER, many Americans feel that their fellow citizens have no right to speak out during a time of war. The constitution, however, definitely doesn’t say that. And more to the point, nobody was saying that when Americans were fighting ethnic Albanians, or Somalians, or Serbians. On the contrary, many Americans expressed concern about the wisdom of sending our troops abroad to police peace, a relatively new course, which was clearly open to debate.
Today, many Americans are concerned about the war, congress’s abrogation of its responsibility, the Patriot Act, and our break with NATO. But apparently, the right to speak out against Presidential decisions is only accorded to those who oppose certain administrations. And that’s crazy.
Today’s hate-filled, hyperbolic rhetoric is outrageous, one-sided, party politics at its worst, and it’s just plain wrong.
In fact, I think it’s time for both our President and our armed services to start weighing in on our constitution. That’s what they took an oath to defend: our constitution, our rights, and our freedom to disagree with the authorities. And that’s an oath each and every person in our armed services has to take (even though they apparently don’t require that all young Marines actually read and understand the constitution).
At this point, I think Bush should take to his podium and quell this nonsense — because this war is not supposed to be pitting Americans against Americans. Yet it’s rapidly disintegrating into something very ugly.
As for me? I supported our war in Afghanistan, but I’m dubious about the President’s war on terror. I’m afraid it may lead to perpetual warfare; serious economic problems at home; increased hatred of Americans world-wide; and a break-down of social order and consequent chronic turmoil for the countries we “liberate.” Thus I’m afraid that our war on terror may result in a permanent decline in America’s living standards and foreign relations.
But at this point, I’m willing to bide my time and see what congress and our President do next. After all, President Bush, Tony Blair, and Senator John Kerry all claimed that Saddam Hussein presented a real danger to Americans — and now that we’re in Iraq, maybe we’ll find some evidence, or maybe not. Either way, however, I still harbor some hope that congress will object to expanding our war on terror.
But I honestly don’t know what citizens who object to this war should do — since protests don’t seem to be very persuasive when our troops are still in jeopardy.
Some people think that they have to protest now, and perhaps they’re right; maybe it’s imperative to write now, speak now, and march now. Maybe later will be too late to prevent the next war; I don’t know.
But whatever you believe, I fail to see how it’s unpatriotic to try to convince your government not to take a course you see as wrong. That’s not unAmerican; that’s democracy in action. Iraqis may be required to silently follow their leader like so many lemmings, but presumably Americans are not.
THE OTHER NIGHT on the Tonight Show, Dennis Miller delivered one of his foul-mouthed harangues about the stupid, f***ing, peacenik, hippie scumbags, and how damned proud he was to see American boys going to fight Saddam. Then he ended by saying, “But of course I’m not for war. Only someone insane would say they’re for war.”
And yet Miller calls other people stupid?
But on the other hand, maybe that really is the only sensible thing that Miller has said in the last two millennia. After all, most reasonable people are capable of seeing that war is seldom simply right and peace is rarely purely wrong; and that the world isn’t a comic book place populated by superheroes and villains.
Yet, in the wake of this war, more and more people seem to want to reduce everything to just that: the good guys and the bad guys and nothing more.
But just who, in this scenario, are the truly unpatriotic guys? Who is most dangerous to our system of government? Who threatens to destroy America faster than Saddam Hussein?
Personally, I think a lot of people who are pointing their fingers these days, while ravening about unpatriotic, unAmerican, unconscionable behavior, should look in the mirror. — Martha Quillen
