Quote:
|
Originally Posted by roachboy
1.
bush's comments on his "war on terror"--whatever that means--seem a rare slip from script that opened onto a space of near honesty....
what matters is that the "war on terror" has its flip in a constant flirtation with a state of emergenecy. radical nationalists love that. whether they admit it or not in the public sphere, when in power, the state of emergency is a double of a discovery of a "national essence"--always military, always narrow-minded, always murderous.
it is pretty repellent stuff.
|
roachboy,
do you suspect that such 'slips' are tactical?
your point regarding the use of this as a national essence seems to be well-supported in light of all the speakers I watched all night on C-SPAN. As often as they could, seemingly endlessly, they dropped discursive landmines. The most frequent, in my opinion, was this 'war on terror.' They made it quite clear that this was the single issue framing the election.
I think that's bizarre in light of the response to the question my wife asked this morning: what happens if Kerry is elected in regards to Iraq? Absolutely nothing, in terms of the troops remaining or whether we would suddenly become uninvolved, was my answer and belief. This issue as a single election issue has been manufactured and our state of emergency has been reified to the point of drowning out all points of interest. Our political landscape is paralyzed due to this topic, and our public discourse is suffering as a consequence of the inability of any of our prospective leaders to transcend it. The power to capitivate hundreds of thousands of people on a riveting issue, whether it obliterates other chances of resolving important issues, seems too intoxicating for any candidate to back off and call a time out. The public is so galvanized that I don't even know if one
could back off if one wanted to.
When I listened to callers and even candidates from the republican party repeat disinformation that had long ago been discredited, I couldn't help but feel a slight bit of anger at C-SPAN. Many people thank them for their service, and I usually agree with that, but I have no idea why a factual recount or at least a pointer to a clearinghouse of information is not even attempted. I don't know what binds their hands, but this notion of a free press has radically failed this nation in the current political climate.