BuzzFlash
presents Southern Style
by Rebecca Knight
It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World
By Rebecca Knight
June
12, 2002
Has the whole world gone crazy? Or is it just here in the good ole U. S. of A. where insanity seems to rule the day?
One of my favorite movies, "It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World" is used as the title of this article. It is an oldie, but a goodie, and if you haven't seen it, I highly suggest you go out and rent it. The plot consists of a group of eccentrics who witness a car accident resulting in the death of a thief whose last words tell of his claims to have buried a large sum of money underneath a big "W" – appropriate, huh? The cast consists of Milton Berle, Ethel Merman, Jimmy Durante, Buddy Hackett, Mickey Rooney, Jonathan Winters, Sid Caesar, Spencer Tracey, and many others. The entire movie is devoted to a mad dash by all the lunatics in search of the big "W" and the promise of wealth. I digress! Laughing!
Sometimes the "W" administration reminds me of a band of misfits as inept as the cast of characters in the above-mentioned movie. The leader of the "band" is the king of ineptness. That was obvious prior to election 2000 and it is even more painfully obvious now. After all, he recently asked Brazil's President Cardoso, "Do you have blacks, too?" That is the leader of the free world! Oh, but he is a nice Christian man, so quit being mean to him!
W promised to be a uniter and not a divider. Of course there is no such word as "uniter." But he is excused for hacking the English language. He is such a nice man. Gee whiz!
Dick Gephardt recently sent a letter to W requesting a copy of a videotape on Social Security reform he had provided to the Republicans in Congress, but not to the Democrats. I guess he is uniting the Republicans.
The Shrub Secretary of Defense recently totally confused NATO defense ministers with the following statements: "There are no knowns. There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns - that is to say, there are things that we now know we don't know but there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don't know. So when we do the best we can and we pull all this information together, and we then say well that's basically what we see as the situation, that is really only the known knowns and the known unknowns. And each year we discover a few more of those unknown unknowns." (1)
Say what? Has he been spending too much time with W? My translation of that is that he doesn't know who the enemy is, where the enemy is, or what the enemy is doing. But he certainly knows there is an enemy because Shrub wants to rid the world of "evil doers."
Then there is the justice department headed by John Ashcroft, whose intelligence agencies resemble Steve Urkel of the television show, "Family Matters," in there ability to say, "Did I do that?" Failing at every turn to connect dots, and not paying attention to warnings -- given by about ten foreign countries -- definitely contributed to the causes of 9/11. Ah, yes, but Ashcroft can't be blamed. He was focused on statues with bare breasts or other such foolishness!
The National Security Agency now reports that it intercepted and secretly recorded at least one conversation in Arabic before the Sept. 11 attacks in which the participants spoke about something big that was going to happen on that day. However, the information was not translated until after the attacks because agency officials were too swamped and overwhelmed with data. This is the first reported intelligence information that referred specifically to Sept. 11 as a time for the attack. (2)
Now, Shrub has announced the formation of the Department of Homeland Security. Oh! Isn't that grand. We all know that was recommended to him by the Hart/Rudman commission report in early 2001, but W makes a grand announcement as if his administration had originated the idea. Don't buy it. It is probably what is needed, but the timing of this announcement is a political ploy to distract attention from the failures of the intelligence communities under his administration's watch.
I get some very interesting comments in e-mail responses to my writings. The common theme is the despair over the chaos brought upon us by the illogical American electorate that helped the commander-in-thief obtain the White House. What is it that differentiates between those of us who educate ourselves politically in order to make informed choices and those who blindly "follow the leader" or simply don't participate at all? That difference in political make-up appears to be the crux of the matter that has resulted in our current political climate.
If American voters are waiting for political purity to deem it worthy of their time to go out and vote, they are waiting for the impossible dream. In my lifetime these are the candidates on the ballot for president; Ike Eisenhower, Adlai Stevenson, John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, Lyndon Johnson, Barry Goldwater, Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Ross Perot, Bob Dole, Ralph Nader, George W. Bush, and Al Gore. Is this a list of statesmen or a rogue's gallery? Probably a little of both, but you get the picture. None of them are all that exciting, nor do they instill in the American electorate a fervor to run out and vote.
The American media contributes to the problem. They fail to do their jobs by focusing on trivial matters. They don't inform the public of the differences between the two candidates on political and ideological matters.
I guess, in election 2000, it was much more fun to report that one candidate was a cut-up and the other was a stiff. They failed to mention the horrid record of Shrub as governor of Texas or his lies and exaggerations about that record. No, the environment, education, affirmative action, corporate responsibility, and healthcare were unimportant. What was important was that W was a likable guy and Al Gore was a stiff who could not "find" himself. Hogwash! W was a fabricated exaggeration with little substance and the media swallowed it hook, link, and sinker.
If the situation was reversed and Al Gore had a DUI, AWOL, and cocaine in his background, what would the media have focused on? We all know the answer to that one and it says a lot about the American media. They wanted Bush, plain and simple. They are complicit in our current problems and if you are looking for the mainstream media to report accurately, I think you had better forget it.
The most important aspect of today's political climate can be found via the Internet, where more truthful reporting can be found and where Americans share their real opinions. Thank you, Al Gore.
Readers of my columns encourage me to get my voice out to the mainstream media, but we know that a lot of what I have to say here would not be acceptable to them. I am open to suggestions. As for now, I encourage everyone to write letters, pass on truthful items you may find, and speak out loudly and forcefully!
It is, indeed, a mad, mad, mad, mad, world!
* * *
(1) http://abc.net.au/news/newsitems/s576186.htm
(2) http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/911conversation020607.html
* * *
Rebecca Knight is a native Tennessean, who grew up in Nashville. She currently resides in a small town about sixty miles outside of Nashville. She attended the University of Tennessee at Martin. She has also lived in North Carolina and Kentucky. She may be reached at tennessee_gal655@yahoo.com.
© 2002 by Rebecca Knight
* * *
