Meals From The Marketplace

             First of all, what do we call it?  Was it the zeros, as in “zero one, zero two, …”?  Something seems to be missing in that handle.  Or maybe the thousands, “thousand one, thousand two”?  Night exactly the right ring, with all due respect to Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey.”

             The oh’s might work, as in “twenty-oh-one, twenty-oh-two.”  But oh, as any decent mathematician will remind us, is not a number, so scratch that one.

             The default seems to be the aughts, using the word that those greeting the twentieth century adopted when the 1900s began.  Aught isn’t used in common parlance anymore – no one speaks of “getting married in aught five” or of “graduating with the class of aught seven,” but it may come closest to identifying the decade that began with the year 2000 and ends this week. 

             So, okay, let’s call it the aughts.  What did the aughts do for us?  What happened during the ten year span of human history that reaches its conclusion this week?

             It started with great revelry, as every civilized nation in the world ushered in the new millennium with hopes of world peace seeming to grab hold in capital after capital.  For those of us living in the western U.S., much of the celebration preceded our own, and through the wonders of satellite transmissions, we were able to see each major city, first in Asia and Australia, then in Europe and Africa, and finally in the eastern parts of the Americas, celebrate the seemingly significant turning of a page in the annals of human development.

             It was a world-wide party that may have been rivaled in recent times only by the landing of men on the moon some thirty years earlier.

             The joy lasted for most of that first year.  And then it quickly dissipated.

             When it began, lest we forget, Bill Clinton was completing his second term as president.  U.S. unemployment was as close to zero as economists believe it can get (below four percent to be specific), a budget surplus had been achieved and the national debt was actually in the process of being wiped out (within seven to 15 years by most economists’ projections), the country was at peace and so was most of the rest of the world, and a major environmental agreement had been fashioned (the Kyoto accords) that would have marked a major step towards combating global climate change.

             And in the last year of the aughts, the United States inaugurated its first African-American president to great fanfare worldwide.

             In between those two years, however, things were not so rosy.  And the not-so-rosiness began with the 2000 presidential election, which took six weeks to resolve and was ultimately decided by a margin of one single vote (at the U.S. Supreme Court).

             What the Court’s decision in Bush v. Gore set in motion was the Bush decade, which is how I will always remember the aughts.  Let’s review, perhaps for one last time, just what that man and his administration wrought (near homonym intended).

             Whether he wrought it or not, 9/11 occurred on the Bush watch.  Some, myself included, firmly believe he and his top staff were asleep at the switch; others are less inclined to cast blame (and, not coincidentally, instead point to the lack of domestic terrorist attacks thereafter).  Either way, the cat was very much out of the bag after that horrific day, and the following years marked decisively the character of the aughts.

             To be specific, the world became a far more frightening and far less peaceful place during the Bush years, as a war was poorly fought in Afghanistan and unconscionably initiated and hopelessly bungled in Iraq. 

             The result of these dual disasters has been a diminution of U.S. prestige and influence throughout the world and an increase in terrorist activities far beyond anything that existed when the decade began.  (Again, apologists for Bush will say things would/could have been even worse; critics claim he caused or at least exacerbated the problems.)

             But Bush has more to bear in his decade of dominance.  His economic policies – massive tax cuts (especially for the wealthiest Americans), excessive deregulation of financial and commercial markets, and utter disdain for any attempt to deal with environmental degradation – made the country poorer in every respect.  Gone are hopes of a diminishing national debt and of energy independence, and unemployment now soars at levels not seen since the early 1980s.

             The other “legacy” that Bush and his gang have left is the utter destruction of bi-partisanship.  Never mind that the idea of any kind of universal health care was anathema to Bush and his Chicago School of Economics pals.  Eight years of the Bush brand of conservatism (marked by excessive foreign entanglements, astronomical budget deficits and a steadily dwindling middle class) have created a polarized nation in which the Republican Party is now bereft of any moderates (in the traditional sense of that word).

             Perhaps the most telling statement about the aughts/Bush decade is that the U.S. Senate, long a bastion of democratic bipartisanship, has now been reduced to an undemocratic institution, wherein only a super-majority of 60 votes can pass meaningful legislation. 

             And while the former president has been essentially silent in the months since he left office, his chief attack dog, Dick Cheney, has maintained a robust, if often inane, assault on the new president, most recently suggesting, in constitutional terms, that he is giving “aid and comfort” to the enemy in his foreign policy decisions.

             Meanwhile, even farther to the right (or perhaps “off the political spectrum entirely” would be the better phrase), a former governor of Alaska, who quit her job because she is “not a quitter,” is working up a frenzy in another legacy from the Bush decade, the tea bagger movement. 

             In the end, the aughts may not so much be remembered as the decade that began the “war on terrorism.”  Instead, they may be noted as the years that brought the country Sarah the terror.  For that reason alone, the Bush decade is best forgotten.

            It has been twelve years since I penned the following ode to the joys of the holiday season.  At the time, the first of the horrific school shootings (by a 14-year old) had just settled into our collective consciousness, we were only beginning to recover from the sudden death of Princess Diana, and we were finally becoming aware of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and of rampant famine in parts of sub-Saharan Africa.  Still, as I look back on those days, I am struck by how innocent our world still was. 

            Indeed, only two years later, on December 31, the world  community celebrated the arrival of the new millennium with a sense of joy and hope that was probably unparalleled in human existence. Never before had so many of us joined in a salute to the grandeur and splendor of life. 

            And then, as that new age we had feted began to unfold, we were hit with the harsh reality of  9/11, and from the heights of hope and faith, we were plunged to the depths of despair and anguish.  Instead of a brave new world, we appear to have rediscovered the horrors of the scared old one, with two near-decade-long wars against the evil of terrorism but the latest evidence.

            Some view 9/11, and the events that have developed in its aftermath, as signs of a coming apocalypse.  Others, myself included, instead choose to observe how little the human condition, and the attendant struggle for survival with which we all do battle every day, has changed.  We are, always and forever, a strange combination of the best and the worst of our essential makeup.  We can create, and we can destroy.  We can love, and we can hate.  We can be merciful, and we can be unjust. 

            And so I offer again my little ode to the spiritual oneness that binds us all.  We aren’t perfect, far from it.  But occasionally, we can feel the perfection that may somewhere exist.  HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

            Every year at just about this time, the four of us in my little family schedule two nights to watch two of my favorite movies of all time.  They are the classic “It’s a Wonderful Life,” starring the incomparable Jimmy Stewart and Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol,” or, as it was titled in its original release, “Scrooge,” starring Alistair Sim in the role of a lifetime.

            Together these two movies express beautifully the spiritual awareness which the holiday season seems to rekindle in each of us every year.  Yes, they say, every life, every individual human being, can make a difference and be a source of good will to our fellow earthly inhabitants.  And, in living such a life, they conclude, we can all know joy in the love that we create and thereby receive in return.

            I am fully aware of the other side of the holiday season, that being the almost unbearable stress which it creates in many of us, what with the greeting cards that have to be mailed, the presents that have to be hunted down, the meals that have to be planned and prepared, the decorations that must go up, the lights that must be strung on the roof (often at no small risk to life and limb), and the countless other “burdens” that compound the difficulties that are constantly with us as we struggle to make our way in an often seemingly cruel and inhospitable world.

            But those travails pale when compared with the wonderful spirit which pervades our interactions at this time of the year.  What is it that causes all of us to be just a little friendlier, a little more in touch with our better instincts?  For Christians, I suppose the answer is likely to revolve around a reverence for the occasion of the birth of Jesus, the light of the world, as he is described in the Gospel of John.

            This feeling of goodness is not limited to the many followers of Christ, though.  In fact, it seems so infectious as to know no religious bounds.  And so I think the sense of joyfulness which we all feel during the holidays must be as much a testament to some kind of spiritual link which binds us together. 

            In presenting this admittedly ethereal thesis, I do not want to be accused of Gnostic mysticism or even some kind of pantheistic theological belief.  I readily admit that I have very little understanding of ecclesiastical matters, notwithstanding my fascination with them.

            But I cannot deny what I feel, and what I perceive others feel as well, and I am left with the unavoidable conclusion that, despite our inherent selfish nature, there is, in this strange species of ours, a will, a need, a burning desire to care for each other.  We are, in this sense, kindred spirits, seeking a union with our fellows by which we can somehow feel more complete.

            So it is that we can feel the pain of the parents of the three young girls who were killed by their 14-year old classmate in Kentucky, or feel the pain of the assailant’s parents perhaps even more, or mourn, collectively, when an otherwise unknown princess dies on the other side of the world, or long for a way to help starving children in a far-off place we will never visit, or cry at the cinematic depiction of past horrors and injustices which were inflicted before we were born.

            In his marvelous personal reflection on the meaning of his Armenian ethnicity, Michael Arlen, in “Passage to Ararat,” identified the genesis of this quest for union with our human comrades by stating that “we were all kin to begin with.”

            Maybe that fact is what we get more in touch with at this time of the year.  Surely there is an impetus for this realization, and it may well come from a power greater than we can know.  No matter the source, it happens every year.  And it feels good, doesn’t it?

            Peace, love and the joys of the season to all.

“Meet the new boss; same as the old boss.”

-The Who (“Won’t Get Fooled Again”)

            President Obama displayed appropriate humility in accepting his Nobel Peace Prize last week, acknowledging that he had done comparatively little to deserve the honor when matched up against past recipients like Albert Schweitzer, Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and George Marshall.  The rest of his speech put the humility to shame.

            That obligatory paragraph out of the way, Mr. Obama proceeded to don his George W. Bush mask as he moved from peace president to war president without missing a beat. 

            “I am the Commander in Chief of the military of a nation in the midst of two wars,” he declared with just a touch of defiance.  But don’t blame me, he seemed to suggest, as he reminded everyone that war had been part of the human condition since “the first man.”  He also could have laid some blame on his predecessor for those two wars, but he chose not to do so.

            Instead, he claimed that some wars are “just” and others are “unjust.”  It wasn’t a new distinction, but in embracing it, this president may have set a marker for what others may soon refer to as the “Obama Doctrine.”  For what Mr. Obama then proceeded to do was make a veiled comparison of the U.S. war in Afghanistan to the Second World War (WW II) both of which, he would assert, fall into the category of “just wars.” 

            He didn’t specify those wars that would be deemed “unjust” in his view, but presumably the current war in Iraq might qualify, since he has never favored it and wants to get the United States out of it as quickly as he can (i.e. under the timetable for withdrawal negotiated by his predecessor).

            But the Afghanistan/WW II comparison was one that he should not have made and should not have had to make, and therein lies the real story.

            The Nobel speech followed, by less than two weeks, Obama’s West Point speech.  In that one, he had told a contingent of Military Academy cadets that he was ordering the deployment of an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan, bringing the total U.S. force in that war to approximately 100,000, or twice the number that was there when he took office.

            Using Mr. Obama’s reasoning, only in the event of a “just war” could such an escalation be tolerable, let alone justified.  But if escalating a war can be labeled as tolerable, or even justified, because the war itself is “just,” then understanding the difference between “just” and “unjust” wars becomes critically important. 

            For openers, let’s agree that, taken together, the two speeches could easily have been delivered by George W. Bush, who would have had no trouble adopting the “just” war reference, and who never met a troop increase he couldn’t embrace. 

            But if one president believes starting a war in Iraq was “just” and another doesn’t, how is “just” to be understood?

            Obama cites the WW II example.  There, war was waged against Hitler’s Germany and Hirohito’s Japan.  Both countries were seeking global domination, and they were seeking to gain it through the use of military force.  In the case of the United States, Japan had attacked its forces on a U.S. colony (as Hawaii was at the time).  Germany had not attacked the United States, but it was at war with U.S. allies in Europe, where it was running roughshod over much of the western part of the continent.

            Still – and here is where the comparison warrants close scrutiny – the United States did not join the fray against Japan until it was attacked by Japan and against Germany until Germany declared war against the United States. (Both events occurred within a matter of days.)  Thus, if WW II is the paradigm for a “just” war, it stands for the following definition: A nation engages in a “just” war only when it has been attacked by a foreign power or when war has been declared against it by a foreign power.

            Does Afghanistan qualify under either of those measurements?  And the clear answer is no, it does not.  Afghanistan did not attack the United States, and it has not declared war against the United States.

            Ah, both Mr. Bush and Mr. Obama would respond, but we aren’t talking about that kind of war.  This war is one against terrorism, or to be more precise, against a form of Islamic fundamentalism that has implicitly declared its intention to wage a war of terrorism against the United Stated and its interests.

            And so the plot thickens, and we need to go back to 9/11/2001, when members of al Qaeda, then operating in Afghanistan (where the organization was receiving support from the Taliban government), commandeered commercial airlines and caused them to be flown into New York’s twin towers and the Pentagon. 

            Bush and Obama identify those acts as attacks by a foreign power, which then justifies the initiation of the Afghanistan war later in 2001. 

            But a closer view of the buildup to that war raises more questions.  In fact, the war in Afghanistan was only begun when the Taliban government refused to rid itself of al Qaeda’s presence and turn over those responsible for the planning of the 9/11 attacks.  In other words, the Afghanistan war was initiated against the then-ruling government of Afghanistan, not against the country itself.  And the Taliban government was disposed of with remarkable alacrity, officially falling within months of the October, 2001 start of the war.

            So much for the WW II comparison, and so much for a legitimate “Obama doctrine.”

            The new guy has decided to embrace the same strategy to keep his country safe.  It probably won’t work, because it will end up creating more terrorists than it kills, but that’s a separate issue.

            I’m writing this column to unmask the chicanery of the current president’s rhetoric.  He can deliver a whale of a speech, but on this critical issue he’s still “same as the old boss.”

            With December now well underway, the advent season, which will run to the 25^th day of the month, is in full swing.  For those who may have forgotten (or perhaps never knew), the month of December is marked by two events of particular importance.  The first is the official start of winter (on or about December 22, depending on the juxtaposition of the moon and our planet).  It (winter) usually arrives without much fanfare, having been preceded in most parts of the country by at least one of the nasty storms that will continue until mid-March or so.

            The second event of note that occurs every December is the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ by Christians of just about every stripe.  (A few denominations observe the day in January because of a slightly altered view of the lunar calendar.)  That date seems to have been set for celebratory purposes as far back as the reign of Constantine sometime in the fourth century.

            The holiday has evolved over the years, but until recently it was primarily a religious observance, marked by worship and family fellowship.  The giving of token gifts as a means of commemorating Christ’s birth developed early on in recognition of the scriptural story of the babe’s birth in a manger in the little town of Bethlehem, where the mother’s husband, Joseph, was forced to seek shelter for his very pregnant wife.  There, amidst barnyard animals, Mary delivered her first-born, who was promptly visited by shepherds and “wise men” who were guided to the site by a giant star that pointed its rays to the manger.  (Much of the story is mythical, of course—for all but the most fundamentalist believers—but, as with much of the lore of most religions, it serves its purpose.)

            The three “wise men” had been told (as the story goes) that a great king would be born in that very town, and they brought the babe gifts (gold, frankincense and myrrh, says the Gospel of Matthew) in an apparent attempt to acknowledge the child’s presumed royalty.  And so, the first Christmas gifts were for the newborn child.

            In the centuries that followed, the holiday went through various stages of recognition.  For most of the first thousand years, it was celebrated with a modicum of festivities, including token gift-giving by loved ones to their kin. 

            With the split in the Church in the late 1500’s, the Protestant denominations began to regard the holiday with disdain (some even considering it a “pagan” festival).  Throughout the 1600’s, Christmas was actually outlawed in England and throughout the American colonies.

            Its appeal slowly revived, however, so that by the eighteenth century, it had been “reborn” (pardon the awkwardly obvious pun) with a newly resurrected (again, my apologies) Saint Nicholas who, in the New World, soon became Santa Claus. 

            Still, even in Chareles Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol,” the classic tale of the miserly Scrooge who is visited by three ghosts who revive his joyous appreciation of the spirit of Christmas, the holiday is depicted as one that focuses on the spiritual/religious significance of the day.  Dickens’ portrayal of the Cratchit family honors the original purpose of the holiday, with Tiny Tim’s classic line, “God bless us, everyone,” intoning not a need for gifts but a joy in the religious significance of Christ’s life.

             When, then, did the Christmas spirit devolve to the monstrosity the holiday has become?  Christmas American-style is an obscenely capitalistic orgy that begins earlier every year. (This year, the first Christmas ads appeared on TV right after Halloween, thereby stretching the commercialization of the holiday to a full eight weeks.  “Only 50 shopping days left ‘til Xmas,” was the tag on one ad, for high-priced jewelry, no less.) 

            The “big” Christmas movie five years ago, “The Polar Express” has now become a “classic.”  It is a celebration of the spirit of … you guessed it, Santa Claus, with not even a passing nod to any religious observance.  The children in the tale are a bunch of kids who have lost their faith in Santa, i.e. they aren’t so sure he really exists.  Is the story intended to be an allegory of the question of God’s existence?  Not hardly.  The actual depiction of Santa’s workshop is more like a giant toy factory, with Santa hailed for his materialistic value (exemplified by his award of the first present to the story’s hero child). 

            And so is the holiday celebrated in every nook and cranny of blue states and red.  Buy gifts to give, make out lists of gifts you want, spend money you don’t yet have on credit cards that you can’t afford to maintain.  Increase your indebtedness in the spirit of Christmas, which is a spirit of buying, spending and consuming.

            “Shop until you drop,” has replaced “’Tis the season to be jolly.”  And why should this bastardization surprise us?  Thanksgiving, that most cherished of our secular holidays, has now become a mini-Fourth of July, with nearly as much patriotic fervor, even though the original holiday was celebrated by loyal British subjects in the earliest settlements of colonial North America. 

            The recent Macy’s Day Thanksgiving parade was full of Red, White and Blue, in an apparent attempt to convince us all that the one thing we are most thankful for is our great country.  What would Miles Standish have thought of that development?

             But nowhere is American excess in greater evidence than in the new millennium’s version of Christmas.  It is now far more important to the country’s economic vitality than it is to its spiritual identification.  The holiday has become part of the orgy of excess that begins with Thanksgiving and runs through Super Bowl Sunday, which falls at the beginning of February. 

            Eat hearty.  Buy.  Drink plenty.  Buy some more.  Celebrate America’s richness.  And buy some more. 

            God forgive us, everyone.