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Volume 27, Issue 5, September 9, 2004

Opinion

Convention Cliff Notes: New York

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Joel Tagert
Columnist

Welcome to the Republican National Convention, where selfishness and fear reign supreme, bolstered by lies, damn lies, and Fox News. Rudy Giuliani started off the week by beating America over the head with the old 9/11 stick. It’s the now-routine Republican response to anything: whatever they say, respond with 9/11. It’s meant less as a memorial than a threat. Vote for us, or 9/11 will come again.

Giuliani slipped when he said his first thought after seeing the towers fall was that he was glad George Bush was in the White House. He meant it as a testimony to George’s level-headedness. I hope America saw it for the tawdry partisanship it was, one which revels in disaster as a means of consolidating power. I saw the same pleasure on Jeb Bush’s face in discussing Hurricane Frances on CNN.

Next up was Arnold Schwarzenegger, who regaled us with the myth that anyone can overcome the odds and become an action-movie star.

Schwarzenegger was preceded by Michael Steele, lieutenant governor of Maryland, who more or less gave the same spiel.

Together they reprised Booker T. Washington’s speech at the Atlanta Exposition in 1895, in which Washington encouraged his fellow African-Americans to put down the pursuit of equal rights and fair treatment in favor of just working real hard. The white establishment loved it then, too.

Here we encounter the great American myth: that if you just work real hard, then you can achieve anything.

The individual is all-powerful, and if you fail, then it’s your own damn fault.

Don’t believe it. The more you buy into individualism and pursue your own aims solely, then the less you identify with your community. This is the mind set that shops at Wal-mart, seeking lower prices for itself, while standing by as community businesses are destroyed.

This is the mind set that glorifies the rich and punishes the poor.

This is the selfishness pushed by the GOP.

On Wednesday the convention turned nasty, with Dick Cheney and nominal Democrat Zell Miller delivering one-two punches.

Cheney stepped up with his habitual sneer and somberly delivered the verdict on Kerry (he eats babies and molests calendar kittens), enhanced by a little black lie or two.

Here’s one whopper: “The world’s worst source of nuclear weapons proliferation is out of business and we are safer as a result.”

Ah, you say. Clearly, he is talking about Pakistan, known to possess nuclear weapons and willing to deal with the most brutal of regimes.

But no! He appears to be referring to Iraq, believe it or not—a country known not to possess nuclear technology before the war began, and therefore unable to export anything to anybody.

Pakistan, on the other hand, continues to point its missiles at India, which is only too happy to point them right back at Pakistan.

For that matter, here’s a cheery headline in the Denver Post the day after Cheney’s speech: “Iran restarting nuclear work.” Turns out Iran intends to process “tons” of raw uranium into weapons-grade enriched uranium, setting the stage for a nuclear standoff with Israel. Feeling safer yet?

Following Cheney was Georgia senator Zell Miller, who claimed to be a Democrat while charging that all Democrats hate America and would have destroyed the Twin Towers themselves had Al Qaeda not beaten them to it. Hey, can’t you kick someone out of the party if they stab you in the back? Someone needs to tell Zell that fanatics usually feel more comfortable with the GOP.

Skipping the vapid (and scripted) musings of Laura and the twins (Bush, not Coors), we come last and least to the Great Miscommunicator, the Mission Accomplicator, Little Georgie Porgie, Mad King George, our Almost-Elected Leader, George Dubya Bush.
No surprises here. 9/11, 9/11, likes his family, 9/11, cut taxes, screwed schools, lost jobs, 9/11, started a couple of wars, gonna catch ‘em dead or alive, yeehaw and yippee kaiyay. Then it’s a couple more 9/11s and God Bless America.

If I sound cynical here, it’s because I am. It turns my stomach how the GOP wraps itself in the apparel of patriotism while peddling fear and selfishness.

Meanwhile, outside the convention, hundreds of thousands of people protested the GOP’s offensive policies on everything from reproductive rights to environmental degradation. Some fifteen hundred people were arrested. Kudos to them for standing up to the right’s bullying.