It's hard being a rational person in today's world. You have to contend with so many irrational signals, with information that just doesn't accord with your concept of reality. I'm talking about how you see things that your experience tells you have clear cut meanings but then other observers, who hold positions of apparent respect in the community, see in other, often opposite ways. For example: The legislature of the state of Alaska prepares a report that says the governor broke the state's ethics law by abusing her power for personal gain. The governor says she's happy that the report exonerated her from any unlawful activity, ethics violation, or abuse of power. Then the mainstream media ignores both the report and the governor's characterization of it. Am I crazy? Am I missing something? Well, tonight, the Al Smith dinner gave me a clue about what's really going on. (More below.)
There have been more and more of these contradictory messages over at least the last eight years. The president says there are weapons of mass destruction we have to disarm in Iraq. We invade. No weapons. Who cares? He makes jokes at a dinner, looking under couches for those weapons (after thousands of American soldiers have died in a similar search) and the reporters who are supposed to sort out reality for us laugh. I mean, am I crazy? Am I seeing the same thing everyone else is?
So lately these inconsistencies seem to be occurring at an accelerating rate...and lots of them have to do with Sarah Palin. She says she stopped the bridge to nowhere that records say she supported. Our press seems to let that pass. She says she's good at foreign policy 'cause she can see Russia from Alaska. Wouldn't that seem ridiculous to any sentient person, anyone with minimal reasoning ability? But she's not laughed off the national stage. The press seems to decide to give her a pass or just accept it as a sane thing to say. Then the other day I'm listening to NPR and someone calls and points out that Republican rallies seem to be tending toward the violent and the host says, "To be fair, this also happens at Democratic rallies." But he doesn't mention any examples and I can't remember hearing about any violent expressions at Democratic rallies.
Well, these are just a few examples. I mean, it's everyday. Everyday I have to wrestle with myself over differences between what seems to be true and what the popular culture filters tell me is true. It's damn tiring, as you know since you also are a rational person trying to hold onto your sanity under the current circumstances.
Which brings me to the Al Smith dinner. Turns out that it's all a joke. All of these political and media leaders at the dinner have been in on it the whole time. Palling around with terrorists? Ha. Of course it's funny. Just a joke. See Russia from here? Wow. What could be funnier. Hussein middle name as partisan attack? Ha. McCain laughs. Just kidding.
Well, I have to admit, this realization pisses me off more than a little. If these things (and other truths) are so obvious to these elites as jokes at a dinner, why can't they let us in on them every day? Why do we have to look to humor, to Colbert at the correspondent's dinner, to The Daily Show, the Colbert Report, Dave Letterman, SNL, the Al Smith dinner, to give us a hint that maybe we aren't nuts. Maybe the world is. Why is the truth so hard in real life?
It seems to me it's a bit like the samizdat literature in soviet Russia -- but a bit more above board, with the elite buying in. It's wink, wink, don't worry. You're not crazy.
But that it's come to this, that we only get an occasional glimpse that they know, that they know what we know, is more than a little scary.