Still trying to get the hang of this. Here is a reprint of my previous Memes from the deep end column:
Restore sanity, or keep fear alive
Gerold Firl
October 31 2010
The Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Keep Fear Alive took place on the National Mall in DC last Saturday (10/30/10). The rally presented our two-course political smorgasbord in microcosm. On the one hand, we have Jon Stewart, self-described comedian/pundit/talker guy, making the case for reason, optimism, and the liberal agenda. On the other, his Comedy Central arch-nemesis Stephen Colbert, the passionate uber-conservative, trying to Keep Fear Alive. The event was a joke, but a very serious one. Because it also provides a contrast with the Restore Honor Rally from this summer, when Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin held their own Right-wing revival meeting on the same spot. This is the political choice we face as a nation: restore sanity, or keep fear alive.
In a recent survey, Jon Stewart was voted most influential man of 2010, just ahead of Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and Steve Jobs. It's more than a bit ironic that the best political news on television comes from Comedy Central, in the form of Stewart's Daily Show, but not entirely unprecedented. In days of yore only the court jester would dare speak truth to power, and unfortunately we're in a similar situation today. Network news is bland and timid, afraid of offending the sponsors who pump their advertising lifeblood, while the Rupert Murdoch media empire openly operates as the propaganda organ of big business and the Republican Party (Republicorp for short). Only in the guise of comedy can the truth be told straight up.
This recognition for Stewart is a hopeful sign in dark times. Consider also the contrast between the attendance at the two rallies. According to AirPhotosLive, a commercial aerial survey company hired to measure crowd size at both rallies, more than twice as many Americans seemed to feel we have lost our sanity than our honor. AirPhotosLive measured an attendance of 87,000 at Restore Honor, and 215,000 at Restore Sanity (+/- 10%). Besides the numbers, however, there were other differences. The Stewart/Colbert crowd was younger, and they seemed to be having fun. The Palin/Beck crowd was more overweight, and they were angry. Angry about our honor, and how it's been lost. But even more dramatic is the contrasting response to the crowd estimates. Beck hears voices that assure him at least 500,000 superpatriots were there, while his even loonier BFF Michele Bachmann (R-MN) insists it was at least 1.6 million. Of course, these people are selling miracles, they're not in the reality business.
But a more disturbing matter than the delusional disconnect from reality suffered by the Keep Fear Alive crowd is their motivation. How exactly did we lose our honor, again? And why did they need to come to DC to restore it? Although Beck and Palin were too cagey to say it outright, their followers weren't so shy. They knew how the white marble of the shining city had been sullied. The White House had been occupied by a charlatan, a mountebank, a socialist Muslim imposter posing an existential threat to everything we hold dear. They wanted to express their righteous anger, and cleanse the stain from our honor.
Most of the Honor Restorers would deny being racists, and even believe it. But the evidence indicates otherwise. Obama-hatred in the right-wing fringe goes way beyond concerns over the size of the national debt. The same people getting hysterical about the constitution being “shredded” and “hanging by a thread” were cheering the Patriot Act, government eavesdropping, and torture in the name of security. The same people who are calling for a savior on a white horse to rescue us from the evil mulatto are still in denial about the monumental blunder of our criminal invasion of Iraq. Their refusal to face the truth is entirely consistent with the racist mindset, as is their anger and fear. They will Keep Fear Alive, at least a little while longer. But sanity will be restored, and truth will overcome.
