And next will be the Salem Witch Trials, and why not the Inquisition? The way the Chuck Hagel confirmation hearings look to me reminds me of the McCarthy hearings in 1954. As I have told you before, the HUAC hearings were the first television I had seen in my life. I was 10 and I was visiting my grandparents who had one of those 6 inch TV screens in a gigantic piece of cabinetry. The hearings were the only thing on or at least at their house.
They were real Boston Irish living in Lawrence, MA a mill town on the Merrimack River. Nellie and Jack served lobsters at Thanksgiving because my grandfather proclaimed that no pilgrim in his right mind would eat wild turkey when the lobsters were so abundant. We had lobster races in their huge kitchen before the dinner was cooked.
Nellie was 'lace curtain' Irish. In those days that meant that she had a beautiful home with real china and silver and a grand piano. It really meant that they were putting on 'airs' because they weren't English and therefore were supposed to be less than. That kind of changed when Jack Kennedy became president. But this was in the days when the Irish were running Boston, but they couldn't join any of the establishment clubs. Rough and tumble outsiders. But they were all Democrats. All of them. And something about these hearings on un-American activities reminded them of the repression they remembered from Ireland.
And well it might. My grandfather had to be wondering whether eating lobsters on Thanksgiving was reportable as subversive and therefore he could be blacklisted. Being blacklisted had nothing to do with facts, but it never the less ruined many lives and livelihoods. It could happen to anyone.
Go to the web and watch a snippet of Army vs. Committee and look at the tactics. Then watch Chuck Hagel being interviewed about why it didn't think the Iraq war was a perfect idea! Then watch the terrible, but pointed SNL parody of the hearing. Good God! We are doing it again. It is the same technique that the Spanish Inquisition used. It is not about senators governing with the best interest of their constituents in mind. They are trying to fight the election. They are trying to fight the Civil War. They are fighting the Cold War. They are making the war country a country without a Secretary of Defense. I think the biggest crime of Hagel is that he is not ready to bomb Iran at the behest of Israel. The biggest crime of Obama is he is half black. That and the fact that occasionally he seems to be trying to serve up what the electorate wants. (health care)
I don't even know Chuck Hagel, but we never will with the kind of idiotic, hateful, scornful questions that are badgering him. The schizoid, angry, weird shit that comes from the mouth of Senator McCain wouldn't be tolerated by civilized people. What are they afraid of? Why can't we get a government that wants to govern rather than obstruct? Why aren't our representatives our servants? I think that was the idea our democracy. Yikes!
I am, once again, reminded of the conversation between Gandhi and Churchill when Churchill ask Gandhi what he thought of English civilization. Gandhi replied "I think it would be a good idea." I am not against a good debate by any means. I am not against a heated argument between our representatives, that is the idea, but badgering, innuendos, ugly lies are going to lead us nowhere good. What is going on here? The world is watching.
When I was elected to School Board in a small district in southern New Hampshire, at our first meeting we were told that we could say our peace in the meetings, debate again and again our side of any issue as representatives of our towns, but once the board made a decision we were to stand behind it publicly. It was a dignified way to proceed. The process was open so people knew where you stood, but the committee having voted, we then worked together to implement the policies that were chosen.
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