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Perry Peddling the Mythological Texas
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The manner of a man's arriving is not without consequence. Tom Enders, the
German-born and American-educated head of Airbus, the European aircraft
giant, likes to do it by parachute, if it is an open-air event. People
don't always remember what he says, but they sure remember how he got
there.Of Texas Gov. Rick Perry, it could be said that he parachuted into the
race for the Republican presidential nomination. The manner of his entry
will be remembered, as it was meant to be.Perry orchestrated a drum roll of media speculation, leading up to his
announcement. He assessed, contemplated, debated, discussed, examined,
explored and weighed entry. The media followed: might he, should he, would
he?The drum roll, fed by leaks, grew louder as the declared candidates
traveled to Iowa for a debate and straw poll. Then Perry, with an
announcement in South Carolina, jumped and precision-landed on the parade
in Iowa.Poor Michele Bachmann, left like a performing dolphin that has had its
fish snatched away. She had won the straw poll, deserved a few hours of
party adulation and had her joy cut by this man, who dropped in from the
West, all swagger and handshakes.Perry hit the ground campaigning, when she was hoping to savor a victory
moment or two. Those famed southern manners don't extend into Texas
politics. Ask fellow Texan, Kay Bailey Hutchison. He crushed her in a
Republican primary in Texas.In Perry's political lexicon Texas, and things Texan, are at once policy,
ideology and creed. But Perry's Texas is not all of Texas, with its
alluring geographical and social diversity. It is the Texas of the
caricature — of barbecue, boots, swagger and can-do. It is not the Texas
of artists in Austin, of the symphony in Houston, ballet in Dallas or jazz
in San Antonio.It is an inauthentic Texas, minted not on the ranches and the oil rigs,
nor the ugly, sprawling, low-income housing that surrounds the bustling
cities – a testament to an increasing chasm between rich and poor. It is
not the place where schools are failing, the prisons are overflowing, and
the execution rate is the highest in the advanced world.Perry's projection of Texas, which he sees as a template for the rest of
the United States, is as inauthentic as tumbleweed — an invasive species
from Russia. Perry's Texas was created in novels, honed in Hollywood and is
part of the myth that Texas and Texans are imbued with qualities denied to
lesser breeds beyond the Lone Star State.The problem with believing in myth, and elevating it to the the standing
of principle, is that myth is flexible and can be adjusted to reality.
Ergo the early revelation that Perry is happy to disavow difficult things,
like global warming. He says that there is a list of scientists, growing
almost daily, that say global warming is not the result of human activity.
This is cunning. It disavows responsibility without having to deny the
evidence. While the heads of most advanced governments worry about the
impact of greenhouse gases, a President Perry will not have to.Perry has also laid down his marker as a man of faith, or at least a man
of public piety. He might want to note that the two most publicly
religious presidents of recent times, Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush,
left office in low esteem and are not faring well in the first books of
history. He may want to ponder why the Founding Fathers were so anxious to
separate church and state.Perry's political barbecue sauce, such as berating the Federal Reserve,
may be the precursor to a string of tired, old political nonsenses, like
returning to the gold standard; quitting the United Nations; and
abrogating treaties, in the belief that every commitment abroad is an
infringement of sovereignty.Perry has made a dramatic entry. Now we wait in trepidation; even George
W. Bush's people are alarmed. Are we to be shown the real Texas, at the
same time proud and flawed, or the synthetic one, doctored for political
effect? — For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate - no responses
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Winding Down the Nomination Show
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Now that Mitt Romney is pulling ahead, I’m saddened to see the greatest political show in years drawing to a close. When will we again thrill to the way Texas Gov. Rick Perry parachuted into Iowa and eclipsed Michele Bachmann briefly? At that moment the nomination was Perry’s to lose, and he wasted no time in losing it. He entered stage right with Texas panache. Writers and broadcasters, including myself, who had the temerity to question the Texas mystique – that famous swagger – got an earful from Lone Star loyalists. One thought that I should be roped and dragged behind a cutting horse. Another volunteered to do it. Texans with six-shooters on their hips were ready to defend the honor of their state with cordite. That was until their leader drew a bead on his own foot and fired. It wasn’t so much that Perry forgot the government department that was bringing down the United States, but that he gave the impression he had never heard of any of his targets before they were whispered to him seconds before he walked to the podium. One prefers one’s political heroes to explode rather than implode. We want to be able to laugh out loud, not feel terribly sorry. Poor Perry. When he had to substitute piety for swagger, it was over. We want our Texans loud and brash with belt buckles as big as lesser states. A personal favorite of mine was Herman Cain. Damn it. I liked him; an original by any measure, I’d say. But he was brought down by something less than original: a roving eye directing a roving hand. Jobs-for-sex would not, one feels, solve the unemployment crisis. I didn’t care that Herman the Lover didn’t know where Libya was. If it had had a Godfather’s Pizza franchise, things would have been different. The guy was appealing. While pizza may not have the same ring as computers or pharmaceuticals, he had a great resume as a mathematician and naval officer. It could be argued that Cain and that other roguish aspirant for high office, Newt Gingrich, at least have standard-issue libidos. The rest were, well, a little sexually hung up. The lovely Michele Bachmann, the righteous Rick Santorum and oh-so-pure Romney, who apparently has been untouched by human temptation or anything else as messy as human beings and their needs, all suffer from moral fundamentalism. It’s hard to imagine Romney as evincing passion of any kind, even though he is the father of five. Santorum is the most fanatically puritanical about sex. Especially gay sex. To Santorum, the family is the triumph of human achievement. Not since Oliver Cromwell, apparently, has anyone cared as much about the family or its sexuality as Santorum. For him it’s not the individual that builds the state, but only the family — unless it’s the gay family. Indubitably big government is dandy, so long as it’s in someone else’s bedroom. The same anti-gay fundamentalism animates Bachmann and, apparently, her husband who has a clinic to “cure” homosexuals. What is it about these people that has them so frothed up about other people’s private acts? Oh, let it go if they froth in private. Who cares now that the race is narrowing? When Gingrich goes, I’ll be shattered. Gingrich and his wife Calista standing by him as immobile as a cigar-store mannequin, belong on the high shelf of American political bric-a-brac. Gingrich sprouting his version of history, his version of his own role in history; Newt magnanimous in his brief ascendency and bitter as oblivion threatened. This was the Man Who Would Be President unmasked. The consolation prize of National Grouch surely belongs to Newt. Of course there was a bit player, an understudy, someone qualified but unsung: enter, stage center, Jon Huntsman. A brief appearance, exit stage left. No applause, no mention in the program even. So dim the lights, bring down the curtain, strike the set – never have so many outrageous eccentrics so unsuited the highest office in the world so entertained so many of us for so long. Sadly, the long national farce is over. – For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate - no responses
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Winds of Change in Washington?
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They are not a gale, not even a stiff breeze — more like a zephyr really — but there are winds of change stirring Washington. There are hints that when Republicans return from their travels and their time with constituents they will be ready for some righting of their ship, which has been listing heavily to starboard.
Over in Democratic circles there are hopes that President Obama, presumably buoyed by the fall of Tripoli, will tighten his grip on the helm and begin to assert himself in ways that his party has felt that he has been missing.
The Associated Press released the results of a new poll on Thursday that showed approval of Congress has dropped to 12 percent, down from 21 percent in June, before the ugly debate over raising the debt ceiling. The Associated Press-GfK poll taken earlier this month also showed that the Tea Party has lost public support, Republican House Speaker John Boehner is increasingly unpopular and that people are warming to the idea of not just cutting spending but also raising taxes, just as both parties prepare for another struggle with deficit reduction.
Stuff happens — and when stuff happens, the political dynamic is changed.
An earthquake and hurricane, for example, has convinced people along the East Coast the cutting the funding for the U.S. Geological Survey, as has been proposed, may not be so prudent. Likewise, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration might need full funding.
Enter states in economic shock. From Maine to California, they are bracing for the impact of federal grants drying up.
At least two Republican governors, who were out in front with austerity programs, are looking less sagacious.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican Party favorite, sacrificed a long-planned new tunnel into Manhattan on the altar of economic rectitude, just before it was becoming apparent that the only way government can really create jobs is through big infrastructure projects.
Farther south, in a burst of ideological zeal, Florida Gov. Rick Scott waved off federal stimulus funds for high-speed rail and other things. So the funds traveled up the coast to be plowed into road projects in Massachusetts, much to the joy of Democratic Sen. John Kerry who crows about his state's infrastructure progress. The wily presidential hopeful Texas Gov. Rick Perry denounced the stimulus package and then pocketed $14 billion for his state.
The lesson for those who thought that statesmanship lay in placating the well-intentioned but economically challenged Tea Party movement is that surgery with a machete is doomed to terrible results when a laser scalpel is needed.
Malcolm Muggeridge, the great British essayist and popular philosopher, wrote a prescient essay on the failures of reform. Of 12 major reforms, from the Russian Revolution to the ending of Tammany Hall political domination in New York, people who were supposed to benefit were left worse off.
The latter is an issue that Obama may want to ponder as his health care reforms are implemented. Without a public option to benchmark prices, he may have covered more Americans but, in so doing, allowed for prices to further escalate.
It is by the Republicans that the larger pressure for course correction is being felt. "No new taxes," increasingly sounds about as sophisticated as what spectators to the guillotining of French aristocrats chanted, "Off with their heads!"
The public wants government to do many and mysterious things, like invent the Internet, go to Mars, cure cancer, build better highways, and keep us safe at home and abroad. Whether we enunciate it or not, we want the government to look after us in areas of health, world stature, scientific discovery, defense, and food supply and safety. Business does not do those things, and even the most rugged of individualists cannot do them for themselves.
Ergo, we have to pay for those things and the credit card is maxed out.
Tax is back on the table, if not in fashion. Tax and judicious cuts in spending.
Members of Congress also read the poll numbers. At around 13 percent, their approval ratings do not make them feel good. Nobody likes to be told they are an incompetent bum, especially incompetent bums.
So for the first time there is some feeling that the super committee, which is set to tackle the deficit problem, may actually do something before Congress allows mandated cuts — the machete to start hacking.
Just a little more wind, and a grand bargain will be scented on it. Wet a finger and hold it up in September. — For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate
- 3 responses
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Perry Peddling the Mythological Texas
-
The manner of a man’s arriving is not without consequence. Tom Enders, the
German-born and American-educated head of Airbus, the European aircraft
giant, likes to do it by parachute, if it is an open-air event. People
don’t always remember what he says, but they sure remember how he got
there.Of Texas Gov. Rick Perry, it could be said that he parachuted into the
race for the Republican presidential nomination. The manner of his entry
will be remembered, as it was meant to be.Perry orchestrated a drum roll of media speculation, leading up to his
announcement. He assessed, contemplated, debated, discussed, examined,
explored and weighed entry. The media followed: might he, should he, would
he?The drum roll, fed by leaks, grew louder as the declared candidates
traveled to Iowa for a debate and straw poll. Then Perry, with an
announcement in South Carolina, jumped and precision-landed on the parade
in Iowa.Poor Michele Bachmann, left like a performing dolphin that has had its
fish snatched away. She had won the straw poll, deserved a few hours of
party adulation and had her joy cut by this man, who dropped in from the
West, all swagger and handshakes.Perry hit the ground campaigning, when she was hoping to savor a victory
moment or two. Those famed southern manners don’t extend into Texas
politics. Ask fellow Texan, Kay Bailey Hutchison. He crushed her in a
Republican primary in Texas.In Perry’s political lexicon Texas, and things Texan, are at once policy,
ideology and creed. But Perry’s Texas is not all of Texas, with its
alluring geographical and social diversity. It is the Texas of the
caricature — of barbecue, boots, swagger and can-do. It is not the Texas
of artists in Austin, of the symphony in Houston, ballet in Dallas or jazz
in San Antonio.It is an inauthentic Texas, minted not on the ranches and the oil rigs,
nor the ugly, sprawling, low-income housing that surrounds the bustling
cities – a testament to an increasing chasm between rich and poor. It is
not the place where schools are failing, the prisons are overflowing, and
the execution rate is the highest in the advanced world.Perry’s projection of Texas, which he sees as a template for the rest of
the United States, is as inauthentic as tumbleweed — an invasive species
from Russia. Perry’s Texas was created in novels, honed in Hollywood and is
part of the myth that Texas and Texans are imbued with qualities denied to
lesser breeds beyond the Lone Star State.The problem with believing in myth, and elevating it to the the standing
of principle, is that myth is flexible and can be adjusted to reality.
Ergo the early revelation that Perry is happy to disavow difficult things,
like global warming. He says that there is a list of scientists, growing
almost daily, that say global warming is not the result of human activity.
This is cunning. It disavows responsibility without having to deny the
evidence. While the heads of most advanced governments worry about the
impact of greenhouse gases, a President Perry will not have to.Perry has also laid down his marker as a man of faith, or at least a man
of public piety. He might want to note that the two most publicly
religious presidents of recent times, Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush,
left office in low esteem and are not faring well in the first books of
history. He may want to ponder why the Founding Fathers were so anxious to
separate church and state.Perry’s political barbecue sauce, such as berating the Federal Reserve,
may be the precursor to a string of tired, old political nonsenses, like
returning to the gold standard; quitting the United Nations; and
abrogating treaties, in the belief that every commitment abroad is an
infringement of sovereignty.Perry has made a dramatic entry. Now we wait in trepidation; even George
W. Bush’s people are alarmed. Are we to be shown the real Texas, at the
same time proud and flawed, or the synthetic one, doctored for political
effect? — For the Hearst-New York Times Syndicate - 3 responses
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The Future of Drones
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Guests Claude Salhani, journalist and Amitai Etzioni, The George Washington University
Europe; its Problems and its Promise
May 6th, 2013
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A Discussion of the Anti-terrorism College at the National Defense University
April 22nd, 2013
Guests Michael Bell and Sebastian Gorka, College of International Security Affairs, National Defense University
Balance In The Media
April 15th, 2013
Guests Frances Stead Sellers, The Washington Post; Adam Clayton Powell III, University of Southern California