corrente

"But do we want a president who pretends that he can do no wrong and never has?"
(via Josh Marshall)

Is this a perfectly sensible observation about our actual President, who as we all know, was unwilling to name a single example when asked to identify mistakes he'd made? No, the target of this accusation is John Kerry, the quote but one item in a truly outstanding litany of what passes for "Christian thought" from Marvin Olasky, former Brezhnev stooge and now stooge for the ravening wolves (Matthew 7:15) who masquerade as moral and political leaders today. (Apparently the mistake of Vietnam, which Kerry, originally a supporter, fought to save other people from dying in, does not count.)

Bob Herbert writes today of the "politics of the madhouse", but I think that lets the inmates off too lightly. I thought I'd become inured to the hypocrisies of televangelists and their ilk, but the enthusiasm with which millions of their followers are prostituting every avowed principle in the pursuit of worldly power--"thou shalt not bear false witness" being the latest one thrown overboard--and their willingness to subscribe to a complete inversion of verifiable fact (Kerry as cowardly hypocrite; Bush as humble, truthful, decisive) raises disturbing questions about us and our future. Millions of people have not suddenly gone mad. They've done something more troubling. They have become unserious.

It's impossible to credit that any substantial number of voices now smearing John Kerry and covering for Bush truly believe what they are saying. The calculation behind the smears is too obvious; the naked cynicism of the accusations belies the idea of these beliefs having been come by honestly. But charlatans are nothing new; what is new is how readily their snake oil has been swallowed by the populace, and by none so enthusiastically as the Christians claiming to be our moral exemplars.

Christianity's central challenge to Man is the recognition of his unregenerate nature, that he is at root a creature of fear, selfishness and aggression towards others, with self-deception and hypocrisy lubricating all, consigning him, if not saved, to the certainty of suffering. Leaving aside its prescription, I happen to think its diagnosis not wildly off the mark. The truth about ourselves is not something we get for free, and in fact it's usually not something we really want, because the truth usually gets in the way of the selfish pursuits that occupy most of our waking attention.

We all delude ourselves to varying degrees, but we normally have some face-saving excuse. In politics, there is usually some genuine virtue that partisans can magnify to distract attention from their heroes' flaws and their policies' shortcomings. Even Nixon was a skilled stateman. What makes the Bush Cult scary is the bottomless, willing self-delusion, the eagerness to embrace every new hypocrisy, coupled with a moral certitude completely devoid of any actual moral self-scrutiny. Here is a man devoid of discernible compassion, respect for the truth, basic competence, introspection, honesty, humility, subtlety of mind or personal courage. He is from all appearances, an utterly hollow man whose every action belies the religion he wears on his sleeve. There is not an iota of evidence that he has ever done anything for anyone outside his family in his entire life. He thus presents a test case for all of us, but especially for any Christian who believes in the importance of living in Truth: how low are you willing to go for this man?

I'm afraid we have yet to find out. I am not sure I want to be around when we do.