"Ashamed to be American"
The BBC reported this week from “the Parish” (as St. Bernard, a modest suburb of New Orleans, is known throughout the city) for the two-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. Two years out, it still resembles a war-zone. One resident told the reporter that she was “ashamed to be American” after the government’s (at all levels) pathetic response to the devastation. On the other hand, the report noted how impressive the robust efforts of other Americans to volunteer have been. The next president needs to shift priorities (less on the military, more on domestic programs, as many responses to my last post helpfully noted) and to mobilize this outpouring, by Americans for Americans. The government, let’s remember, put people on the moon. Americans (at least in “da Parish”) still want that kind of government.
Michael Kinsley argued in Time magazine a few weeks ago that the American people should bear responsibility for the war, since, by all accounts, they eagerly embraced the jingoism of Washington and the media. As Kinsley notes, “Bush's decision to go to war in Iraq was scandalously unilateral, but it did in fact have the support of most American citizens, which surely egged him on.” He’s certainly right, but it’s important to note the importance of leadership. (Would there have been an Iraq war if Al Gore had been president?) As many have noted, a different president could have mobilized the country for a green revolution after 9/11 and real work on inequality after Katrina. Instead, this president exploited what is worst in our nationalism and brought disastrous (but profitable for many) wars. As Kinsley notes, though, “[U]nlike the politicians and the pundits, they do not face pressure to recant or apologize. American democracy might be stronger if they did.” The pre-Iraq mania represents something real about American culture, no less than the all of the Gulf-Coast volunteering. Acknowledging this could prevent future presidents from exploiting us again. We haven’t blinked to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on Iraq (and to allow our government to inflict immense suffering). As Professor Warren recently blogged, wouldn't it be great if we instead could make, say, public universities this kind of priority? I long for a president (as Obama likes to say) that inspires “the better angels of our nature.”
I definitely agree with the first example, but the second really really bothers me. To take Katrina and turn it into a campaign about inequality, well that just sort of reminds me of doing something like taking 9/11 and turning it into a campaign about Iraq. Politicians who do that sort of thing, turn specific problems into grand ideological wars, turn me off. Just stating my personal preference here.
Someone on your taxes thread mentioned JFK's "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." I first heard that as a little kid, and I thought it was dandy, I guess. As a grown-up, I see it as a jingoistic metaphorical call to arms all tied up with the Cold War frenzy. A challenge to get on the moon in a decade, on the other hand, is great: specifics. So would a challenge in 2001 to find alternatives to oil. War on poverty, war on drugs, war on terror, war on the appeal of communism, that is where a politician will lose me.
August 29, 2007 6:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't get it. What is it about a major national effort to alleviate poverty and inequality that turns you off?
August 29, 2007 12:21 PM | Reply | Permalink
Instead, Katrina was used as a fulcrum in the war on Democrats and the war on black people.
I dunno. It strikes me that a national disaster should potentially be a time for reflection and for unified effort at the larger issues reflected in the disaster. For example, a proper response to a killer earthquake might be improving building standards nationally all across the country. Call it a 'war on unsafe or risky buildings.'
August 29, 2007 2:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
I love the idea of Americans for Americans. I especially love the idea when applied to our government. Of course this means ALL Americans and not at the exclusive pleasure of political cronies and corporate interests and we'll really need to address that. But I see this as not only a solid platform to run on but a solid and long overdue policy to enact. Our country's infrastructure is falling apart at the seams and we need to stop believing that "the market" work things out for the best.
But I was particularly irked by this:
Michael Kinsley argued in Time magazine a few weeks ago that the American people should bear responsibility for the war, since, by all accounts, they eagerly embraced the jingoism of Washington and the media. As Kinsley notes, “Bush's decision to go to war in Iraq was scandalously unilateral, but it did in fact have the support of most American citizens, which surely egged him on.”
Of all the sleazy slight-of-hand blame shifting... Did the ignoble Mr. Kinsley mention who it was exactly that filled peoples heads with all of that jingoism and stoked the nationalistic idiocy that enveloped this country? Or who is predominantly responsible for the spreading of all of those lies which allowed Bush's war to proceed? No, of course not. Blame the public, they should have known better. Mr. Kinsley, you are an ass. And his love tap on the wrist of the "untouchable" pundits is equally insulting. As if TIME and the other media outlets in this country did not then (as they continue to now) provide these ignorant blowhards a stage upon which to pollute the public thought.
The all encompassing Press failed this nation and shifting the blame onto the ignorant masses for not knowing better is a sham. I'm all for pointing out what complete idiots many Americans are...but Mr. Kinsley , TIME and the media in general shouldn't slime it's way out of it's responsibility.
August 29, 2007 3:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Blacks live in the same country and were fed the same Bush/Cheney/Rice/Powell & MSM war propaganda, but they did not support the invasion of Iraq.
It may be that most (white) Americans don't mind starting wars for very questionable reasons, they just don't like losing one. That is not something about which Americans can be proud.
August 29, 2007 7:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Another member, nykrindc, sums it up well for me in a comment on an unrelated thread:
The suffering, problems, and complex causes of those problems of the victims of Katrina is minimized by turning their problems into a slogan for a hugely wider, vaguer agenda. The specific victims would not be well served by it, actually shunted aside in a way. Ask Bob Geldof for other examples.
Likewise, if you want to fight Soviet propaganda, better to challenge a race to the moon than to ask everyone to get emotionally patriotic about their country.
P.S. Another member has furnished great specifics on one of the issues should have been raised by Katrina here.
August 30, 2007 6:22 AM | Reply | Permalink
The press failed to make up its collective mind on its own, merely reproting the public pronouncements of the administration. It is the administration, and Bush is chief of that, that misled us (and maybe themselves) about the threat.
Kinsley should point in the exactly opposite direction, not to the voters but to the leaders.
August 30, 2007 6:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think I understand your point, which in perhaps more simplistic terms is something akin to "stop chanting and start doing". If that's what you're saying, doesn't revving up the people about injustice in general sometimes pave the way for specific actions? Is it your concern that the chanting becomes the end in itself or, put another way, that an emphasis on global needs such as eradicating poverty necessarily diminishes the prospect that a specific crisis, like the one in New Orleans, will not be addressed?
August 30, 2007 6:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
No, it's more taking the emotion raised by victims and playing that for support for a big wide non-specific agenda, one that often has little to do with the victims. As I said in the original comment, this type of demagoguing/populist memes thing is what happened with Iraq. No one can truthfully claim that after Iraq War I, Saddam was not a serious part of the all the many problems in the Mideast. When you declare a big vague "war on terror" after 9/11, it is then all the easier to throw him into it.
BTW, one of the reasons I became a big fan of Bill Clinton (I was not at the start) is because he was so skillful in explaining how what might seem like a "baby steps" wonk iniative was important big picture.
And c'mon, do you really think something like a "war on inequality" would have gotten a sizeable number of people in this country "to the barricades?" People just wanted existing government to do it's job and then they wanted to help further. I think many would see it as a cynical ploy to use the victims. If you believe that, all I can say is "kumbaya."
August 30, 2007 6:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Got it, I think :-). I guess I just don't think that singing kumbaya will necessarily sap the ability or the will of the people to take necessary and specific baby steps. I would agree that singing kumbaya, or some reasonable facsimile thereof, can too often be a substitute for taking the baby steps that are the necessary precondition to that world envisioned by the choir, and can also, as with the "war on terror" refrain, lead us into waters where we simply don't belong and were never meant to tread in.
August 30, 2007 7:11 AM | Reply | Permalink
Bronto1:
You make at least one good point. Indeed, there were many constituencies defined by ethnicity, race and other factors, in addition to the African American community, that did not support the invasion of Iraq.
I think Kinsley overstated the point and did so in that inside the Beltway manner (even though I think he now resides in Seattle) that just makes me cringe. But I have to say that I am not sold on the notion that, however much we were disserved by propaganda from the Bush Administration and a weak-kneed Democratic Congress and MSM, it didn't take a brain surgeon to question the merits of rushing to war in March of 2003.
There was plenty of "known-to-be nonsense" being bandied about back then. I remember having a disucssion with one of my daughters, who was a high school senior at the time, right before the war. She was telling me about a visit that Congressman Weiner, a Democrat from New York, had made to her class earlier in the day. And his argument, as I understood it, was that the invasion was a done deal because the logistics of withdrawing all of the troops we had sent over there was too impractical and, in addition, we had to do what we had to do because the brutal desert summer was on the way. We both knew that was baloney and neither of us was or is a rocket scientist or a military expert.
Bruce
August 30, 2007 7:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't follow you. Who is talking about mere slogans and dogmas? The problems related to social and economic inequality are real, systematic, concrete and devilishly complex problems requiring just as much of a thoughtful response as the problems of environmental degradation. The Katrina disaster brought vivid examples of both kinds of problems, both local and national, to the surface of public attention.
You seem perfectly willing to allow the Katrina disaster to be used as a basis for a national discussion of environmental issues, and as a motive for activism on a national environmental program. But you disparage efforts to apply Katrina in the very same way to social justice issues. This suggests to me that you simply don't regard inequality as an important national problem requiring the same level of attention, or else are actually hostile to the goal of building a more equal society. That's your prerogative. But it is very unfair to suggest that the people who do care about these matters, and want to do something about them, are simply dogma- crazed, slogan-spouting populists, governed only by simple-minded "ideology", wheras for some reason those who wish to address environmental degradation are thoughtful and rational exponents of "theory" as opposed to mere ideology.
August 30, 2007 8:06 AM | Reply | Permalink
Just because I gave an example of the complexity of the environmental issues involved doesn't necessarily mean I don't think the class and race issues concerning New Orleans are not just as important.
Just give up on trying to make me a straw man, ok, cause I won't play. All I said in my original comment is that I think the making big grandiose "war on whatever" program proposals using the public's emotional reaction to specific tragic incidents is not something I like to hear from a politician, and chances are I won't vote for that politician. It makes me think that they full of air and b.s. and won't have a clue how to effect anything except breeding a lot of counterproductive action.
I posted it, rather than keep it to myself, mainly because I think there are a lot of others out there like me, and I thought that Phil Tedesco should be aware that there are some out there like me who are going to say "sorry, no sale, I've seen this before many times and I don't think it works."
August 30, 2007 8:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
The comment you responded to was this:
As many have noted, a different president could have mobilized the country for a green revolution after 9/11 and real work on inequality after Katrina.
And you said:
I definitely agree with the first example, but the second really really bothers me.
Now if anything, a green "revolution" seems decidedly more far-reaching and grandiose than "real work" on inequality. So what is it about the second that really bothers you, given that you definitely agree with the dramatic steps called for by the first?
August 30, 2007 9:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
I think Bronto1 has it just right.
Perhaps many white Americans had doubts about the questionable evidence. But their support for the war makes their case even worse!
They needed to hit back after 9/11. They needed blood. And as Tom Friedman said, we had to hit some Arabs. Didn't matter which ones.
Not sure where white Americans like Friedman grew up, but in the white American household where I grew up, that kind of attitude was considered the height of cowardliness.
And now, turns out, white Americans are sore losers. Well, tough. I'll give Friedman a taste of his own medicine: Suck. It. Up.
August 30, 2007 10:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Kinsley writes,
He should be more careful in his phrasing. Bill Kristol may have eagerly embraced the jingoism. So may have Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz and the rest of the neocon crazies.
But I take serious issue with his statement that "most American citizens... surely egged [Bush] on." There was a huge movement, in America and abroad, in advance of Shock'n'AweDay™, against invasion in Iraq. No doubt Mr. Kinsley would like to forget about that.
How disingenuous of him to reverse the cart and the horse here!
August 31, 2007 1:30 PM | Reply | Permalink