Will Saletan rightly takes president Bush to task for seeming sympathetic to the plight of John Walker. But he cannot use the rhetoric of this war and make an exception for a terrorist simply because he is a young American. As Will puts it, “You can frame this as a war on terror and demand that all terrorists and those who harbor them be punished. You can frame it as a war on Afghanistan and demand that the United States spare the lives of young Taliban and al-Qaida fighters. But you can’t call it a war on terror and spare-much less harbor-the one al-Qaida fighter known to be an American. That’s not a perspective. That’s a lie.” Amen.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:
“Moderns in Marin try to live down their mothers back in Spokane (“I mean, she makes casseroles”), make up bumper-stickers for their Volvos (“Another Glass-blower for Udall”), attach tiny silver coke spoons to their high school charm bracelets, drink at “The Silenced Minority,” buy Earth shoes at “The Electric Poppy,” and get hair cuts at “Rape of the Locks,” where a black militant shampooer harasses the ladies by constantly changing the soul handshake.
“Marin’s affliction is “French bread thumb,” a wound suffered by hostesses who drink too much with hors d’oeuvres and then slice themselves instead of the bread. Marin exercises inclde Zen jogging, and dressing for tennis… The Serial is a comedy about moderns struggling to keep their chins above the rising sea of their status anxieties. It is a Baedeker guide to a desolate region, the monochromatic inner landscape of persons whose life is consumption, of goods and salvations, and whose moral makeup is the curious modern combination of hedonism and earnestness.” – George Will reviewing the novel, Serial: A Year in the Life of Marin County, by Cyra McFadden, in 1977.
EPIPHANY WATCH: “Three months ago, the World Trade Center was destroyed by terrorists, and what happened to the Bay Area? One of our young men, from Marin County no less, was captured in Afghanistan fighting with the Taliban. This provided the only chuckle of the war, yet led to an entirely serious debate about whether John Walker, Taliban Ranger, is an only-from-Marin phenomenon or not. Well, folks, he wasn’t from Nebraska. Now that would be news, although not as good a story. Walker is the worst thing that’s happened to Marin County since peacock feathers, and everybody has an opinion. Why the big fuss in the Bay Area? Because we’ve had a crisis of belief, and our truest believer turned up with an AK-47 on the side of the enemy. ” – Rob Morse, San Francisco Chronicle.
The Dish 