Monday, October 16, 2006

None so blind

TIME.com has a brief excerpt from David Kuo's book. Kuo is obviously earnest and somewhat disillusioned. But the Time excerpt includes this passage:
Now I am finding the courage to speak out about God and politics and their dangerous dance. George W. Bush, the man, is a person of profound faith and deep compassion for those who suffer. But President George W. Bush is a politician and is ultimately no different from any other politician, content to use religion for electoral gain more than for good works. Millions of Evangelicals may share Bush's faith, but they would protect themselves—and their interests—better if they looked at him through the same coldly political lens with which he views them.

Thus Kuo reveals himself to still be illusioned in some significant ways. How, exactly, does he know that Dubya is "a person of profound faith"? What evidence can he martial in support of that conclusion? The thesis of his book appears to be that Dubya, like his administration, is coldly cynical and a bald-faced liar -- and not in service of his faith, but in service of his own earthly power.

So how could he know if Bush's piety is genuine? Does he think he knows what is in another man's heart? How has that worked out so far for Dubya? Not so well. At the very least, Kuo is still horribly naive. He continues to manifest the very flaw that has allowed this Administration to fleece its flock -- an eagerness to believe the cynical pieties of of charlatans. If Kuo can still believe, after witnessing such manipulation and betrayal, that the perp is deeply religious, he will be fleeced again-- and, frankly, deserves it.

(On the other hand, I suppose it is possible that Kuo doesn't really mean the sentence I am pointing to. Perhpas it is a sop thrown to his evangelical pals to try to soften and make his core message more palatable. But what would that say about him?)

4 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Poor Mr. Kuo. First he thought he understood people of faith. Now he thinks he understands politicians. He is useful in ridiculous times such as these, while George III remains in power, but I have to doubt his intelligence or his sincerity.

George Bush's faith, if any, is demonstrably not profound. The man cannot survive dialogue on any subject, which is why he wants to keep on being president. And compassion is beyond him. He has some rudimentary training in the ways of empathetic humans and can imitate some of their gestures, but he does not understand them. George III is a thin skin stretched over an emptiness so vast and bleak that it even disquiets him sometimes.

If Mr. Kuo truly wants to understand the man he supported and the world he is living in, I would suggest a visit to living history to calibrate his faith and his intellect: Jimmy Carter. An imperfect and often irritating president who also continues to embody the qualities Kuo projected onto Bush's surface.

6:10 AM  
Blogger bluememe said...

A:

Two great insights in your post.

First, that it is the power to deflect questions and accountability that makes Bush crave his office.

Second, that Jimmy Carter is and was what George Bush pretends to be, and the religious right pretends to believe he is. Can you imagine Bush taking up a hammer for Habitat For Humanity?

Write on, A.

11:14 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Can I imagine Bush taking up a hammer for Habitat for Humanity? Well, actually he did somewhere where Katerina hit...so yeah, I can imagine it...I just can't believe he'd do if there weren't any cameras around to document his 'humanity'. What a jackass.

3:29 PM  
Blogger Eric Soderstrom said...

I haven't thought about this song in a while. It occured to me that most people I know who are way in to Jesus don't refer to him as a philosopher. But then this song popped in to my head and I realize Jesus would be the best philosopher ever.

King Missile - Jesus Was Way Cool

Jesus was way cool
Everybody liked Jesus
Everybody wanted to hang out with him
Anything he wanted to do, he did
He turned water into wine
And if he wanted to
He could have turned wheat into marijuana
Or sugar into cocaine
Or vitamin pills into amphetamines

He walked on the water
And swam on the land
He would tell these stories
And people would listen
He was really cool

If you were blind or lame
You just went to Jesus
And he would put his hands on you
And you would be healed
That's so cool

He could've played guitar better than Hendrix
He could've told the future
He could've baked the most delicious cake in the world
He could've scored more goals than Wayne Gretzky
He could've danced better than Barishnikov
Jesus could have been funnier than any comedian you can think of
Jesus was way cool

He told people to eat his body and drink his blood
That's so cool
Jesus was so cool
But then some people got jealous of how cool he was
So they killed him
But then he rose from the dead
He rose from the dead, danced around
Then went up to heaven
I mean, that's so cool
Jesus was way cool

No wonder there are so many Christians

1:12 AM  

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