Obama sent a thrill up this liberal's spine when he talked tough against Pakistan. The spastic sputtering by lefty bloggers makes me wonder if the right wing demagogues don't actually have a point when they accuse the left of not taking terrorism seriously.
Listen, folks. This is a liberal speaking. I am as horrified as any of the rest of you by what has befallen our beautiful country since 9/11 and the awful aftermath, in which almost every single action taken by our government -- the misbegotten war in Iraq, the sanctioning of torture, the creep of secretive executive power and new branches of government, the crass and cynical abuse of patriotic discourse to browbeat and stifle legitimate demotratic debate -- all of this seems hell-bent on finishing for the terrorists what they had only begun on that the most tragic of days, namely the destruction of democracy and freedom in America. I veer between heartbreak and outrage to think of what America has become in the past six years, and I long for justice to those who have trampled on our country, and moreso to those who unleashed this terrible chain of events. If I were the praying type, I think I would pray every day for Al Gore to run for President (with Wesley Clark as his VP), right after I prayed for some long, unspeakably painful death to every fanatic who has conspired to kill my country and the stupid but loveable people who live here.
So I'm a liberal, a long-time lurker on Kos, with a burning and unsatisfied need to see justice in this world. And, by justice, I mean health care and a clean environment for all, untrammelled reproductive rights for women, nuptial rights for gays, a massive educational fund for black people as reparation up for slavery, and a trade unionist in every household. Oh, and OF COURSE, by justice I also mean a live 24/7 telecast of Osama bin Laden and every single one of his flunkies doing a Conga line on hot coals in the deepest pit of Guantanamo. Is that too much to ask in exchange for the deaths of so many of my countrymen, and the shredding of our values that has ensued?
I can and have spent hours -- hell, maybe it's beeen days, even weeks or months -- dreaming of Dubya and his band merry band of mayhemers behind bars where they belong. Such idle imaginings are deeply satisfying, but even when I am fully in the grips of my fantasy, something nags at my conscience and begins to eat away at my joy, until the whole thing seems hollow and stupid. Because what good will it do to put GWB behind bars (or at least behind us), when HE, and THEY are STILL OUT THERE, holed up in their caves in Pakistan, plotting by cell phone, organizing the transfer of funds in secret bank accounts, sending messages by courier and of course, PRAYING, always praying to Allah for victory against the infidel. Turning the subway into a potential death trap, and every flight into a nightmare of anxiety and inconvenience. And, worse, turning us against each other, in a civil struggle that has been so vicious and draining that I wonder if Osama bin Laden isn't channelling Machiavelli.
We need a national cleansing and reconciliation to help us overcome the aftermath of 9/11, and to tend our festering social divisions. But isn't it painfully obvious that the first step in that process -- a process which eventually will unite all Americans in a shared sense of patriotism and mutual accountability -- is to go and get the bastard who attacked us in the first place? That at least seems like ONE thing -- maybe at this stage the ONLY thing -- that we can ALL agree on. Red, blue or purple, can't we all agree that step one in the healing of country is to march into the mountains behind Musharraf's veil of power, and to bring out Osama's head on a silver platter? Hearing Obama call out Pakistan and demostrate a real focus on this most urgent of national projects gave me my first true thrill of this election season. Barack, everyone else may think you're trying to out-cheney cheney, but today you are my hero.
(update - btw, thanks for the interesting discussion folks. Kept me up past my bedtime on a Sunday.)