Category: The Dish

… and JFK Democrats? A reader muses:

Like you, I greatly enjoyed the profile of Barry Goldwater done by his granddaughter. You may call yourself a "Goldwater Republican" – I would call myself more of a "JFK Democrat". Funny how that era had more inspiring leaders. It seems to me that while both of them had differing points of view they agreed on many "big" issues when you look back from 40 years down history’s road. Sorry to say one died five years before I was born and the other saw his brand of conservatism thrown to the curb and retreated to his beloved Arizona.

It’s way too simplistic, but "Southwestern" American Conservatism I understand and appreciate even where I wouldn’t neccessarily always agree. It is expansive especially in regards to personal liberty and freedom. But "Southern" American Conservatism, which largely grew out of former Democrats (or as they called themselves "Dixiecrats") seems nearly devoid of all the principles previously held so dear by "conservatives". In my view that split is a great paradox of our time in American history.

Well I didn’t think of that. Why not have readers comment on a review? Here’s one:

I have just finished reading the review of your book in the Economist.  The reviewer (if he understood the book correctly) seems to use various keywords (quest, perplexing, personal, intriguing, unfinished) to describe your "brand" of faith and political philosophy.  The last sentence the author writes on your book, ""The Conservative Soul" is peculiar and inconclusive, but it is also intellectually challenging and thoroughly captivating," was striking to me.  Not so much that your book is "intellectually challenging and thoroughly captivating," but that it is described like a personal journey toward understanding the true meaning of faith.  If so, it is an honest reflection of Christianity as I understand it:  never fully formed and absolute (for that is the realm of the fundamentalist), but incomplete, full of doubt (for this is the true catalyst for a more meaningful search for understanding).

"Peculiar and inconclusive" – that is my life in a nutshell.

Mine too. And I’m grateful for it. For balance, here’s a negative review I just received. The reviewer is actually cited in the book defending fundamentalism. Money quote:

Sullivan has given up the hope that his religion is true. When he finds a contradiction between tradition and experience, he jettisons tradition and appeals to himself.

For the record, this is what I write about religious tradition in the book:

How can a Christian exist without the Gospels? How can a Christian today believe without the church’s centuries-long care in protecting an inheritance? How can a Catholic simply ignore the statements of those who have authority and leadership in the institution that baptized and educated him? He can do none of these things; and wouldn’t want to. But he will subject all of them to scrutiny and will not stop at any of these points. Such a faith incorporates these things but aims to live them, to translate them into life, and to experience God in the living here and now.

I have great hope that what Jesus taught was and is true.

Some of you think so:

I’m retired from the military and I read that quote as a jab at Rumsfeld.

A comment like that in front of troops would have caused eyes to roll and maybe a few laughs. The fact that General Pace felt he could make a comment like that about his boss is telling. If Rumsfeld could read that quote and not see the sarcasm, then maybe the SECDEF really believes he is channeling the will of God.

Maybe there’s a YouTube and we can tell.

A reader writes:

Growing up in South Africa, I had more than enough opportunities to be confronted by injustice. The fact that people of my particular hue happened to be the beneficiaries on these daily cruelties didn’t make it any easier. One (not the only, but certainly an important) source of consolation was the US‚Äô example. You had segregation, but you ended it. You ‘concentrated’ Japanese Americans, but you apologized for it. Being gay, I appreciated your focus on individual liberty ‚Äì the notion that people should live as they please. I liked the American project, and I wanted us to follow a similar dream.

I remember standing in the doorway to my bathroom (overly specific, I know, but that’s how I remember it), and hearing on the radio that Nelson Mandela was going to be freed, and the ANC un-banned. I cried (I was about 14 at the time, so that was a big deal also). I remember thinking: ‘Now we can be a normal country (like the US). Now we can make normal mistakes, fix them, and try to do better next time.’

I give you the background to put in context how incredibly disappointed I’ve been in America since September 11. Angry sometimes (Guantan√°mo), shocked a few times (Abu Ghraib, the fact that Dick Cheney and George W. are real people and not characters in a bad political satire). But the disappointment has been the worst.

So many lost opportunities to be the good guys.

In any event, the reason for my email: I had forgotten that the old dreams still live in America (if not in the White House). Your blog reminded me of that.

I’m reminded of it daily as I read my emails and tour the country. I have confidence – no, faith – that Americans will recover their country, its meaning, and its promise. Soon.

You’ve got be careful about what words you use in politics these days. With YouTube and naughty satirists, you can be edited and spliced to look, well, ridiculous. Ken Blackwell … well, let’s cut to the tape:

(Hat tip: Hit N Run.)

Brooklyn’s Democratic leader, Vito Lopez, marks a new level of acceptance for big city pols to back full marriage rights for gays – even while representing ethnic, often Hispanic, Catholic voters.

"Think of history as a giant, unpredictable pool game. Tradition is simply the pattern that exists at any given moment on the table. It is where you start from; it constrains what you can do; it commands attention and respect; and yet there is still enormous potential for change. A skilled player will immediately intuit imaginative ways to reorder the whole table; or to play it safe; or to just move it along. In Michael Oakeshott’s words,

"A tradition is not something to which we must adhere; it is something which provides the starting point and the initiative for fresh enquiry. It is no use looking to it for finished conclusions, for settled answers to fixed questions because it is not a tradition of conclusions or even of questions, but of enquiry."

This is what time is; and it is the universe in which practical life has to occur. One thing leads to another; and every moment presents us with choices of how to act and what to do. Yes, there are constraints: the historically contingent pattern you are born into; the genetic lottery; the hazards of physical life. But in the end, practical life does not relent in offering every individual a constant array of choices, trivial and profound, that she has to make. Even not making a decision is a decision…

The conservative, unlike the fundamentalist or Marxist or any other adherent of a direction for time, simply observes that this is the way the world is. He will confront the fundamentalist with a puzzled look, and ask him how he knows for sure that something beyond contingency and choice is at work in human history, that some other force is directing human action and ends. He will enjoy pointing out the collapse of this great theory of history and that one. And in the meantime, he will simply make the choices he wants to make and live.

Laurence Olivier put the conservative temperament in this respect rather well when he said: ‘I take a simple view of life: keep your eyes open and get on with it,’" – The Conservative Soul, Chapter Five.

"I didn’t need a former Bush administration official to tell me that most White House political operatives don’t really like the evangelical base that brought them to power. I’ve seen the evidence for myself, up close and personal. But the more astonishing phenomenon is how current high-level officials of the Bush administration daily go out of their way to insult this critical constituency just weeks before the vote.

Here’s an example: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, someone who claims to be a Christian herself, which, by definition, means you submit to the authority of Jesus and the Bible, last week swore in to the position of AIDS coordinator an open homosexual. The position carries the rank of ambassador. The photo accompanying this column shows the smiling first lady, Laura Bush, and Mark Dybul’s partner, Jason Claire, leering at him.

During her comments, Rice referred to the presence of Claire’s mother and ‚Äì sit yourself down for this one ‚Äì called her Dybul’s "mother-in-law." Do you get the picture? Do you believe God will honor an administration that behaves this way? Do you believe God will continue to protect a country that flagrantly disregards His laws? Do you believe God will be mocked like this without consequences? Do you believe God will bless a party that acts so duplicitously? Remember what I told you on the evening of Nov. 7," – Joseph Farah, Christianist, editor of the conservative website, WorldNetDaily.

Leering?

It’s an open letter by Kevin Tillman, Pat Tillman’s brother (both pictured above in a family photo). It’s brutal and honest and there is so much in it that speaks to our moment. Money quote:

Somehow those afraid to fight an illegal invasion decades ago are allowed to send soldiers to die for an illegal invasion they started.

Somehow faking character, virtue and strength is tolerated.

Somehow profiting from tragedy and horror is tolerated.

Somehow the death of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people is tolerated.

Somehow subversion of the Bill of Rights and The Constitution is tolerated.

Somehow suspension of Habeas Corpus is supposed to keep this country safe.

Somehow torture is tolerated.

Somehow lying is tolerated.

Somehow reason is being discarded for faith, dogma, and nonsense.

Somehow American leadership managed to create a more dangerous world.

Somehow a narrative is more important than reality.

Somehow America has become a country that projects everything that it is not and condemns everything that it is.

Somehow the most reasonable, trusted and respected country in the world has become one of the most irrational, belligerent, feared, and distrusted countries in the world.

Somehow being politically informed, diligent, and skeptical has been replaced by apathy through active ignorance.

Somehow the same incompetent, narcissistic, virtueless, vacuous, malicious criminals are still in charge of this country.

Somehow this is tolerated.

Somehow nobody is accountable for this.

Well, the founding fathers ensured that every two years someone can be held accountable for this. So you now know what to do.

What’s a blogger supposed to do about reviews of a book? I’ve already been pretty crass in promoting the book on the blog – but mainly because I believe in its arguments and see no reason not to try and get it out to as many people as possible before the election. Reviews are different. Do I link to them? Ignore them? Respond to them? Reviewers have every right to criticize a book without the author jumping down their throats. So I’ll link to the few I’ve seen, and if any raise a serious argument that’s worth addressing, I’ll try and respond just to that argument. Anyway, here’s the Economist’s review. Make of it what you will.