There is a unifying theme in broad circulation among those invested up to their necks in the social, political and economic status quo in this country.
It is the fundamental belief, acted upon or, as is more often the case, simply spouted without true personal conviction, that America is above question, above doubt and above pessimism.
Optimism is the key driving force of conservative America, and in the face of impending disaster, it has become clear that America -- the one from the stories of your childhood and from your civics textbooks -- is a colossal lie.
President Bush, despite the pronouncements of everybody from Greenspan on down, continues to insist that the economy is not in a recession. All that is needed is consumer confidence, borrowing and spending, to right the ship.
The pastor of a leading opposition candidate is roundly condemned for a host of rhetorical offenses. And while some of them may well not be true (notably the AIDS accusation), others are dead on the money. His crime, however, is having the audacity to point to America and call her what she has become. Even the AIDS accusation, which seems so unbelievable to an America conditioned to believe the best about itself, has its origins in an episode of experimentation of African Americans in Alabama that, no doubt, seemed just as unbelievable when it finally came to light in 1972.
FOX News wants to give you the "good news" about Iraq. New schools, etc. Nevermind that we could have rebuilt our country's crumbling infrastructure and sent all of our kids to college for what the Iraq debacle has cost us. We'll be fine.
It is this unrelenting reliance upon simple optimism that the conservatives imagine will save America from collapsing under her own sickening obesity, this incapacity for observing America and seeing problems that need fixing, this unwillingness to listen to those among us who are brave enough to speak the truth about America that will ultimately doom the nation-state we call home.
As long as we're shouted down, ridiculed and ostracized for pointing out America's flaws and for failing to do our part as consumers, America will continue down the primrose path. Don't get me wrong: There's plenty to love about America. But the continued state of denial exhibited by some of our elected leaders is doing nothing to help, no matter how hard they wish it were otherwise.
It's almost as if the corporate-owned oligarchy running the country into the ground is simply buying time...
T.