Long Time Leaving (61 page)

“Oh
yeah.
Heck
yeah. Can you give me a hint?”

“Yes, but a Methodist woman will do in a pinch.”

And, of course, with tongue firmly in cheek, the number-one answer to give the attorney general when he asks whether your sexual preference is the same as most men's: “Most? So all the votes have been counted?”

All right, maybe that would be pushing our luck. Then, too, who among us (even if we, personally, have been spared the actual sight of a telecommunications veteran in tears) can honestly say, under oath, “There is nothing whatsoever I could learn from a chance to take a hard look at my sense of humor”?

Maybe it's true, as Republican turncoat (what was
he
thinking?) David Brock writes, that Republican stalwart Tony Blankley
did
write that Gore supporters “might as well be Martian reptiles for all the moral kinship they have with us.” Well, gee, I think we might want to show old Tony that he in all good faith has got the wrong impression, don't you? Republican journalist (see, not an oxymoron) David
Brooks
writes that the Grand Old Party is divided into two camps: Reaganite academic antiliberal ideologues who regard the other camp as “hapless anal-retentives,” and Bushite nose-to-the-grindstone corporate-managerial types who regard the other camp as “hapless geeks.” Anyone who can't find a place for himself, or even herself, somewhere along
that
rollicking spectrum might want to give some thought to coming down off of whatever.

Speaking of which, aren't you glad you weren't
a parent
in the sixties? Or a hall monitor?

In our hearts, we must know that nobody really wants every non-criminal in America to have an assault weapon. But if we don't demand that every noncriminal in America have the
right
to an assault weapon, then what happens the next time Gore zealots start desecrating keyboards? What are we going to do,
reason
with them?

Can it be that some of us, deep down inside, worry that we have neglected to develop the marketplace chops that Republicanism rewards? Well, then, let's put our raggedy-ass shoulder behind the voucher concept. Not just private-school vouchers, but country-club vouchers, third-car vouchers, tax-attorney vouchers, margin-call vouchers. Okay, maybe a $500 personal-dietician voucher will be of scant use to anyone who cannot pretty well afford a personal dietician already. Vouchers will, however, get a certain amount of public money into the private sector, and that will put fat-cat public-schoolteachers’ feet—for example— to the fire. Figure of speech.

This administration intends to bring back the missile-shield defense, which cultural trendies—and isn't it interesting, how they sentimentalize Mutual Assured Destruction?—have mocked for so long. Did it ever occur to you that “Star Wars” just might be a misnomer? If every visionary defense program must have an old-movie tag, okay, why not “Star Spangled Rhythm”? Check it out: Paramount, 1942, big musical finale has Bing Crosby backed by choir and Mount Rushmore mockup. Mellowly, Der Bingle puts a sour antiflag skeptic in his place as representatives of every undivisive American walk of life, including the Confederate dead, hum spirituals and tell what the Stars and Stripes means to them: “tracking rabbits in the snow” …“throwing pop bottles at the umpire” …“You know any other country where a Brooklyn girl can become a movie star?” Crosby, you may have noticed, is cool again. Okay, early Crosby. So what are you into, trip-hop? Can't we all get along?
Star Spangled Rhythm,
incidentally, was made for under one million dollars.

Pollution bother you? That's where Republicans “speak softly, but carry a big carrot.” Do you think Republicans
love
pollution? In fact, it's a loaded term. Perhaps we who have expended so much capital on politically correct phraseology—i.e., “freedom of expression” for “smut”—can help unpack this term
pollution.
Call it environmental influence. Do Republicans love environmental influence? No. But we're not talking about
filth
here; hydrocarbons aren't
immoral.
Here's the thing: little as Republicans
enjoy
effluents, they
hate
taxes (and we love taxes?) more. So if a petrochemical plant gets a tax credit for willingly influencing the environment less than it might, then both an irritant and an
evil
have
been reduced. Now. Who is in a better position to know how much a plant is influencing the environment than the plant itself? Let the plant be the judge, and we reduce what is the greatest evil of all in a civil society: government.

But wait. Is it the government's money? No. The government has no way
of making
money—except in the very limited sense of minting it. The money is the plant's. “Who is the government, then,
to give
anyone a “tax credit”? So let's get this straight: the plant charges the government a tax debit.

That leaves the whole “wilderness” thing. Please. If we get lost in that wilderness, we'll be mighty glad to see a derrick. And let's face it: wildlife bites.

This land can be our land. All we have to do is apply to the office of Representative Dan Burton, 2185 Rayburn House Office Building, “Washington, D.C. 20515, phone
2,02,-2,
2
5-2
27
6,
fax 202-225-0016, for a pardon.

I
heard this old boy on the radio—didn't catch his name, but I can't feel too bad about that, because a name is just a fact, and what this old boy was saying was, we don't want facts. There is no way we can catch all the facts, much less sort them out and add them up to get the truth. “What we want, he said, is a story. And that, he said, is marketing. And that, if we buy the story, he said, is truth.

He was promoting a book he'd written about all this, and I didn't catch the book's name either. So, let's say I buy his story. (If it is a story; seems more like a theory to me.) I'm still not going to buy his book. So if marketing is truth, he lied.

But hey, I like a good story. And I'm Southern, so stories ought to roll off my keyboard like …like similes off an ad campaign.

Listen to that. That shows you why I am not the natural storyteller that by birthright I should be: In college I majored in English. Literature. Stories that have no selling point. Novels like
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man,
in which a big scene might be two college students arguing about what a simile is like. In contemporary terms:

I know, I know. That is going nowhere, slow. Even if I had enough of a grip on phenomenology myself to pass it on, this country ain't going to be hustled by Husserl. (Though I do believe Husserl would have liked what the old boy said when he was asked whether he believed in infant baptism. “Believe in it?” he said. “Hell, I've seen it
done.
” And also what, according to my old friend Slick Lawson, another old boy said: “I saw Jesus in a dream last night. And I thought he was
taller
than that.”)

What this country needs is a new story. A story just as slick as the one that has dominated the market for quite a while now, about how Bushypublicans stand with Jesus and freedom against liberals, taxes, Al-Qaeda/Gore, and other forms of evil. Because that story is getting stale.

So let me see if I can spin you a yarn about how, it seems to me, things have gone in this country since I finished majoring in English, back in the sixties. A Fable, like what Faulkner won the Pulitzer for, though it wasn't real-thing Faulkner, because it had a message:

Once upon a time there were these Backward, Uptight people who had three things wrong with them:

They put down People of Color.

They feared the Natural Human Body.

They loved War.

And these were the Forces of Hate. And up against them rose Enlightened
Youth. And these were the Forces of Change. This made for a good story.

And the Stronghold of Evil lay to the South, in places like Georgia and Texas, and the Wind of Freedom came from the North. Yet there were among uncolored people of the South some who:

Not only liked people of color but also ate the same food.

Not only weren't afraid of the natural human body but felt about it this way:
Hot Damn.
Not only didn't love war but were willing to admit that their great-grandaddies had lost one, and probably should have lost it, but you probably shouldn't Press Them Too Hard on that.

And these were Southern Liberals. And although these weren't exactly what the North had in mind, still they recognized a common ground. And in return, the Southern ones introduced them to Willie Nelson.

And the Enlightened ones said, “Well, of course we don't like Country Music, but he's all right.”

And lo and behold, the South began to produce Presidential Candidates who pushed aside those of the North. A Hero of the North was martyred in Texas, which was terrible, but it gave juice to the forces of change. However, the martyr's place was taken by a Texan. The Texan liked people of color. He was so comfortable with the human body that he displayed unto the media the operation scar on his stomach. However, he also liked war, and so his place was taken by…

Well, by a Dark-Jowled Embodiment of Evil. This development seemed dire, but the dark-jowled one overreached and was brought down by Hero Storytellers, Sir Woodward and Sir Bernstein. That gave the forces of change more juice.

And a great Man of Color from Georgia was martyred, which was terrible, but it gave the forces of change yet more juice. And yet somehow the place of the Dark-Jowled One (after a brief irrelevant Upgraded Sidekick from Upper Michigan interlude) was taken by a Georgian not of color.

Which was a Bit Much. But the Georgian did not love war—naturally not (as it seemed in those days), for he was a former military man, and a Christian. And not only did he like people of color but they liked him, and in his heart, at least, he embraced the natural human body. So the Enlightened forces had to go with him.

But he did not make for a Heroic Story.

“Give us a story!” the people cried. And there arose, from the West, a force of Aged Geniality.

“What a Doofus,” chuckled the forces of Enlightenment. “Indeed, an
Extreme
Doofus!”

And yet, the Aged Genial One loomed large.

Gallantly, a brother of the Northern martyr stepped forward, to take up this new challenge in the Georgian's stead. But the Georgian did not make way. He pushed the martyr's brother aside (yea, verily, going so far as to boast that he could “kick his ass”), which caused the forces of Enlightenment to sull up.

And the Georgian debated, and the Aged Genial One chuckled, and prevailed.

And so there came to pass an Age of Aged Geniality, presided over by one who was himself a Great Storyteller (if you like a certain kind of country-club story) and certainly not Hung Up on Facts, so although the Enlightened forces did not like him, most of the American People did. The juice was flowing in Another Direction.

And the genial one was succeeded by his Sidekick, who told a Glorious “War Story in the Televised Sky.

But he did not have the Vision Thing. He did not Capitalize. Yea, verily, he got Hung Up on Fiscal Facts, to the point that, though Such Things Cannot Happen Today, he even …Raised Taxes.

And lo, a man from Arkansas arose, who was an Avatar of the Northern martyr. The Arkansan
so
did not love war, that he didn't even Salute Right. He was Downright Enthusiastic about the Natural (or in a pinch even the Bouffant-Haired) Human Body. And lo, it came to pass that a great Storyteller of Color, Lady Morrison, proclaimed him as, in effect, an honorary man of color.

But he didn't switch the juice back very much. For one thing he had gone Overboard with regard to the natural human body (so had the Northern martyr, we came to find out).

And various Plagues had befallen the natural human body.

And the American People had begun to wonder (as in the past) why there was Anything Special about people of color.

And lo, some new Forces of Evil arose. These, though they sprang from the Holy Land, more or less, were not Christian by a long shot. They attacked a Great Northern City, which was terrible, but it generated a lot of juice. “Which flowed to people who looked a good deal like the forces of hate from before, but now they were the Forces of Faith. And their Stronghold was in the South.

And the American People were sore afraid and felt that a little Righteous “Warfare might not be so bad along about then, and there arose a
Knothead of the North, processed through Texas, who said unto them: “You are Right to be afraid, but behold I am a Better Man than my Father of the Same Name”—who happened to be the vision-lacking Sidekick of the Genial One—“for I am a Christian Texan, and I have Appointed Persons of Color, and my natural human body is Happily Married, and I will Smite the Evil Ones.”

He wasn't hung up on facts. He stuck to his Story.

And where were your Southern liberals now?

Some might be found dwelling in a Blue State and being dismissed as Guilty Southern White Boys. And they would fain have brought change, as in the Old Days, but they lacked juice. Lo, there arose a Young Candidate from North Carolina, but he was able to rise only to the station of sidekick, to a Northerner who was a “Warrior. That is, had been a warrior once. But since then had found Antiwar Enlightenment. Still, he said he could Vanquish the Evil Ones. But he could not vanquish the Knothead, even. For the antiwar warrior did not make for a good story.