Out in Right Field

One of the great things about living in the United States is that we can disagree without killing each other. We can have widely divergent beliefs, yet still be friends. On the political spectrum, broadly speaking, I suppose I would be a moderate conservative, placing me square in the center of the nation as a whole but way out in right field here in San Francisco.

One of my friends comments regularly on economic, and occasionally political matters. His views are typical of the people I encounter every day. His latest e-mail is reproduced below:

As you no doubt know from some comments I have made over time, I dislike President Bush intensely.  I view him as not only ignorant, but also devoid of morals.  Like his father he is willing to sink to any level of lies, distortions, and misrepresentations to achieve his ends.  I never believed the stories of weapons of mass destruction and links of Saddam Hussein to Al Queda [sic] as justifications for invading Iraq.  I always felt Iraq would turn into the quagmire and disaster it has.  The idea he stated that God had chosen him to do what he did in the Middle East was preposterous.  Why would God chose [sic] him?  His great intellect?  His honesty?  His integrity?
 
The Medicare bill was just another fiasco this incompetent, unethical President put us through.  He lied about the cost to get it through Congress.  The purpose of the bill was to protect the profits of drug makers, not to help seniors.  The drug makers were concerned about the growing threat of cheaper imported drugs.  Indeed, what logic is there in having the bill prohibit the government from negotiating prices with drug makers?  In addition, the way this bill was structured is the first step in applying means testing to Medicare.  Before things are done the Republicans will have cheated most Americans out of the retirement benefits they were promised and taxed for all their lives.
 
I have nothing but contempt for Bush and the Republicans.  The deficits being run up right now will haunt us in the future.  The propaganda they put out discussed below is just an attempt to whitewash a bad deal for Americans.  Bush's commercials attacking Kerry follow the pattern of lies, distortions, and misrepresentations he has consistently been guilty of.
 
As I say when people refer to Bush as "my," "your," or "our" President, he is not "my" President.  I didn't vote for him, nor do I support him or his policies.  He is "the" President, legally appointed in a decision that was a travesty by five Republican appointed Supreme Court justices.

I've watched my friend(and others) seethe with anger over the past three years. After the 2002 elections, when the Democrats lost control of all three branches of government for the first time since the 1950's, apoplexy would be a mild description of his condition. If President Bush is re-elected, how would he deal with that?

Both for reasons of self-knowledge--Plato said that was one of the goals of life--and anger management, the following article by Keith Burgess-Jackson, a philosophy professor and a Nader voter, may be helpful. According to Prof. Burgess-Jackson,

There are four signs of hatred:

Obsession. The hater returns again and again to the hated. Nothing looms larger in the hater's mind. The hated becomes a brooding omnipresence, a focus of suspicion, fear, and loathing.

Inability to see--much less to acknowledge‑-good in the hated. The hated becomes the very personification of evil, incapable of being, intending, or doing good. Nobody is perfectly bad, of course, but this is how the hated appears.

Cynicism. Nothing the hated says is taken at face value, however plausible it may be on its face and however sincerely it is expressed. Indeed, the hated's claim of good motivation is often taken as further evidence of his or her viciousness, duplicity, or perversity.

Malevolence. The hater is not merely indifferent to the welfare of the hated, as might be the case with a stranger, but wishes things to go poorly for him or her. The hater delights in the hated's misery or misfortune. The Germans have a special word for this: "schadenfreude."

After reading the article, I applied the test to myself vis-a-vis President Clinton, whom I did not support. An honest appraisal showed, I think, that I did not have the characteristics that Prof. Burgess-Jackson describes. For example, I thought President Clinton did well in his management of the economy, and he displayed political courage when he signed the NAFTA and welfare-reform bills. My friend, and many others, see absolutely no good in anything President Bush says or does. President Bush is both incredibly stupid, but somehow he's brilliant in his Machiavellianly evil plots. (Perhaps it's Karl Rove who is the Rasputin behind the throne?)

The difference between my friend and me is that I believe the Republic will muddle through and possibly do better than expected from the vantage point of these gloomy times, regardless who wins in November. If President Bush is re-elected, I fear for my friend's health. © 2004 Stephen Yuen