Winners, losers
Winners, losers
Updated 11:49pm (Mla time) Nov 07, 2004
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the November 8, 2004 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
CNN had an interesting feature shortly before the US elections. It asked Iraqi residents whom they preferred to be the new American president. Most of those interviewed were indifferent to the exercise, saying a win by John Kerry wasn't likely to change anything. But most felt bitter toward George W. Bush, saying they had no great love for him, he had destroyed their country. Saddam Hussein, they said, had ruled monstrously, but that was nothing compared to what Bush was doing to Iraq.
One old man was positively furious. He could barely breathe as he spouted his anger before the camera. Who cared about the American elections, he fumed. Why did they have to be forced to want one American president or another to rule them? Why didn't the Americans just go away and leave his country alone?
It was a very good reminder that however monumentally fateful the US elections were for the world-CNN had an ad saying exactly that-it was first and last a political exercise that had to do with Americans and solely with Americans. The interests of the world, as Americans saw them, were not going to decree who would win in those elections, the interests of Americans, as Americans saw them, were.
The analysts themselves showed so, not by the answers they gave but by the questions they asked. One said a day before the elections that Bush was leading Kerry on the issue of who could best deal with Iraq. The debates notwithstanding, most Americans felt Bush was the more decisive on that issue. Though you never know, he said. The Osama bin Laden tapes had had an unexpected effect. It reminded Americans that he was still around to threaten them. He, in fact, was the author of 9/11 and not Saddam Hussein. That raised a host of questions about Bush's real capacity to deal with terrorism.
But the very issue itself of who could better deal with Iraq showed exactly the kind of perspective the American voters had in choosing who was going to lead them. Despite America's global dominance, despite its claims to have the moral authority to democratize the world, it looked at things from a narrow and parochial viewpoint. Elsewhere in that world, the question was not who between Bush and Kerry could better deal with Iraq, it was whom between Bush and Kerry Iraq could better deal with. Iraq did not pose a problem for America until America invaded it. Why America has to deal with Iraq, only Americans can say. Why Iraq has to deal with America, all the world can say. As the old man in the CNN feature cried with wrathful eloquence, why don't the Americans just go away and leave his country alone?
"Fear versus anger" was how the analysts said the elections would go, and clearly fear won. I was beside myself with dismay and bitterness learning from CNN-on the morning of Wednesday in a sleepy Italian town called Loppiano-how Bush had taken the elections by a narrow margin. I had seen the figures shortly before the exercise and knew it was going to be close. But I had hoped it would go the way of the German elections, with Gerhardt Schroeder stealing the thunder from his rival, Edmund Stoiber, by taking a stand against an impending American invasion of Iraq.
Kerry himself had shown the folly of that tack a year and a half after it took place. He had won all three debates. Alas, the American voters are not like the German voters. America took great care to make sure another Hitler would not rise in Germany by ingraining among Germans a culture of peace. It forgot to do it right at home among Americans.
The way the elections went is a reminder of yet another fundamental thing, which is that America is not one nation but two. It is not just the nation of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Mark Twain and Martin Luther King, it is the nation of William McKinley, Randolph Hearst, Joseph McCarthy, Richard Nixon and George Bush. It is not just the nation of the Bill of Rights and a free press, it is the nation of Guantanamo and Fox News. It is not just the nation of the Founding Fathers and libertarianism, it is the nation of lost sons and imperialism.
Americans stood at the same crossroads more than a century ago when they were asked to choose between clinging to their democratic tradition and embarking on an imperial venture-the imperial venture being to seize the Spanish colonies of Puerto Rico, Cuba and the Philippines. The League of Anti-Imperialists, as it called itself, to which Mark Twain belonged, did a magnificent job showing the folly of imperialism. It did not merely stand to devastate the nations America would occupy, Twain and the others argued, it stood to devastate America itself. It stood to destroy the very foundations of democracy, which had stood for more than a century already at that time, which had made America a beacon to the world.
At the time the choice was between greed and reason-the business interests in the United States making a case before the US Congress about the enormous economic benefits to come from taking the path of colonialism. But it was, too, in many ways a case of fear versus anger. It was Randolph Hearst, the spiritual forefather of Fox News, who supplied the fear, often with absolute cynicism. He it was who replied to a cable from his photographer informing him that nothing was happening in Cuba: "You supply the pictures, I'll supply the war." Fear won then.
As it has now. I did say before that the dumbest voters are not to be found in the Philippines, they are to be found in America. The difference is that our dumbness results only in self-flagellation-look at what President Macapagal-Arroyo is doing to us; while their dumbness results in flagellating others-look at what Bush is doing to the world.
Fear has just won in America. Well, may the world tremble in its wake.
Updated 11:49pm (Mla time) Nov 07, 2004
By Conrado de Quiros
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the November 8, 2004 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
CNN had an interesting feature shortly before the US elections. It asked Iraqi residents whom they preferred to be the new American president. Most of those interviewed were indifferent to the exercise, saying a win by John Kerry wasn't likely to change anything. But most felt bitter toward George W. Bush, saying they had no great love for him, he had destroyed their country. Saddam Hussein, they said, had ruled monstrously, but that was nothing compared to what Bush was doing to Iraq.
One old man was positively furious. He could barely breathe as he spouted his anger before the camera. Who cared about the American elections, he fumed. Why did they have to be forced to want one American president or another to rule them? Why didn't the Americans just go away and leave his country alone?
It was a very good reminder that however monumentally fateful the US elections were for the world-CNN had an ad saying exactly that-it was first and last a political exercise that had to do with Americans and solely with Americans. The interests of the world, as Americans saw them, were not going to decree who would win in those elections, the interests of Americans, as Americans saw them, were.
The analysts themselves showed so, not by the answers they gave but by the questions they asked. One said a day before the elections that Bush was leading Kerry on the issue of who could best deal with Iraq. The debates notwithstanding, most Americans felt Bush was the more decisive on that issue. Though you never know, he said. The Osama bin Laden tapes had had an unexpected effect. It reminded Americans that he was still around to threaten them. He, in fact, was the author of 9/11 and not Saddam Hussein. That raised a host of questions about Bush's real capacity to deal with terrorism.
But the very issue itself of who could better deal with Iraq showed exactly the kind of perspective the American voters had in choosing who was going to lead them. Despite America's global dominance, despite its claims to have the moral authority to democratize the world, it looked at things from a narrow and parochial viewpoint. Elsewhere in that world, the question was not who between Bush and Kerry could better deal with Iraq, it was whom between Bush and Kerry Iraq could better deal with. Iraq did not pose a problem for America until America invaded it. Why America has to deal with Iraq, only Americans can say. Why Iraq has to deal with America, all the world can say. As the old man in the CNN feature cried with wrathful eloquence, why don't the Americans just go away and leave his country alone?
"Fear versus anger" was how the analysts said the elections would go, and clearly fear won. I was beside myself with dismay and bitterness learning from CNN-on the morning of Wednesday in a sleepy Italian town called Loppiano-how Bush had taken the elections by a narrow margin. I had seen the figures shortly before the exercise and knew it was going to be close. But I had hoped it would go the way of the German elections, with Gerhardt Schroeder stealing the thunder from his rival, Edmund Stoiber, by taking a stand against an impending American invasion of Iraq.
Kerry himself had shown the folly of that tack a year and a half after it took place. He had won all three debates. Alas, the American voters are not like the German voters. America took great care to make sure another Hitler would not rise in Germany by ingraining among Germans a culture of peace. It forgot to do it right at home among Americans.
The way the elections went is a reminder of yet another fundamental thing, which is that America is not one nation but two. It is not just the nation of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Mark Twain and Martin Luther King, it is the nation of William McKinley, Randolph Hearst, Joseph McCarthy, Richard Nixon and George Bush. It is not just the nation of the Bill of Rights and a free press, it is the nation of Guantanamo and Fox News. It is not just the nation of the Founding Fathers and libertarianism, it is the nation of lost sons and imperialism.
Americans stood at the same crossroads more than a century ago when they were asked to choose between clinging to their democratic tradition and embarking on an imperial venture-the imperial venture being to seize the Spanish colonies of Puerto Rico, Cuba and the Philippines. The League of Anti-Imperialists, as it called itself, to which Mark Twain belonged, did a magnificent job showing the folly of imperialism. It did not merely stand to devastate the nations America would occupy, Twain and the others argued, it stood to devastate America itself. It stood to destroy the very foundations of democracy, which had stood for more than a century already at that time, which had made America a beacon to the world.
At the time the choice was between greed and reason-the business interests in the United States making a case before the US Congress about the enormous economic benefits to come from taking the path of colonialism. But it was, too, in many ways a case of fear versus anger. It was Randolph Hearst, the spiritual forefather of Fox News, who supplied the fear, often with absolute cynicism. He it was who replied to a cable from his photographer informing him that nothing was happening in Cuba: "You supply the pictures, I'll supply the war." Fear won then.
As it has now. I did say before that the dumbest voters are not to be found in the Philippines, they are to be found in America. The difference is that our dumbness results only in self-flagellation-look at what President Macapagal-Arroyo is doing to us; while their dumbness results in flagellating others-look at what Bush is doing to the world.
Fear has just won in America. Well, may the world tremble in its wake.
posted by Dante at 12:00 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home