It's been kind of funny listening to news about the Democratic cnadidates for
President. No matter who they talk to or who they ask about, the refrain goes,
"Well, I like so and so's position on (fill in the issues) but mostly I just want
someone who can beat Bush." I tend to think that it's not so much that Bush wants
to take power away from the people*, it's just that he wants to give it all to big
corporations and to religious organizations (as long as they're Protestant and
conservative).
[* Unless they're poor people, Middle-Eastern people,
people from other countries, or female people.]
Still, I maintain
that a good knowledge of history is an important tool in preserving hope. While
it's true, as I've said
href="http://dichroic.diaryland.com/histdespair.html">before, that the history
of the United States can be read as a story of freedom's being extended to broader
and broader groups, it can also be seen as a histoor of fighting off challenges to
the freedoms guaranteed in the Constitution and the common law from which it
derives. The administration may be trying to repeal rights which have already been
bled for, but that's not new. Try the Alien and Sedition Act, the
immigration quotas of the 1800s, the Know-Nothing Party, Jim Crow (read The
Delany Sisters: Having Our Say; their memories stretched back before the
"rebby boys" began to defer the dreams of Emancipation), Prohibition, and of
course the McCarthy Hearings.
Another reason for hope: the
href="http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=2&u=/nm/20031118/ts_nm
/rights_gays_dc">Massachusetts Supreme Court. Sometimes, freedom fighters pop
up where you don't expect them, like a spoiled Egyptian prince speaking out for
the slaves. (One place religion does belong in the public sphere is as a source
for analogies.)
One thing that does worry me about the next
Presidential race is realizing just how uniform our Chief Executives have been.
Yes, electing Sharpton (shudder) or Lieberman would make history, but it's even
worse than that. While everyone knows Kennedy was the first U.S President who was
not a Protestant, I think he was also the last. We've had exactly two Presidents
with Irish names, the other one being Reagan, a few Scottish ones (Buchanan,
Harrison, and a couple of others). There are exactly three with names not deriving
from the UK: Roosevelt and Roosevelt (Dutch) and Eisenhower (German). Like most
Americans, most of our Presidents probably have a heritage more mixed than their
names suggest, but it worries me nonetheless. I'd be even more worried if I were
Kucinich. Though I suppose the white-bread factor may actually help Dean.