Sara and I snuggled down on the couch in the basement with popcorn and snacks, as though this was our Friday night movie cocoon date. After the first twenty minutes of watching Bush act as though his animal tranquilizer dosage had been doubled, I wanted to get up and go clip my nails or something.
Bush was aroused. It was primary arousal, not the b-team wariness and snarkiness he sent in to represent him at the first debate.
Kerry was firmer than usual, confrontational, and succinct.
As I watched both men sustain a level of verbal jousting that never quite achieved inspiration or mayhem, I was reminded of my most boring marital spats. Yadda Yadda.
And then I realized this was the prime time pilot for the most daring mainstream programming yet: a gay guy becomes president, and the first lady is a guy...and they argue all the time. Except sometimes they make fun of each other, or reminisce about the good old days in college. They come close to embracing, then rip into another face-off, name calling, lachymose apostrophes to old loves and what could have been. What could your mother have done to make you like this? Why do you still try to prove yourself to your father? Why can't you care about me? Why don't you love me anymore?
BushKerry is one persona speaking from two different sides of the head. There is no news here. There is no real escape from the escalating systems of self-indulgence and self-destruction that are undermining our country. There is no future here.
The future waits in the wings, watching the Punch and Judy show. The puppets wear each other's ties as a sign of devotion.
The future waits in the wings, spoiling. It is a man in a suit covered with fishhooks, and each hook dangles a mackeral, and they are rotting. The future is a city with no working sewers. The future is a candybar wrapper in the fist of a child who has starved to death.
"Why do you spend all your weekends playing paintball with those guys!"
"First you said you wanted me to get implants. Then you said you didn't. Then you said you did. Make up your damn mind!"
Boo hoo hoo.
It isn't Bush and Kerry's fault that their presentation to the nation is reduced to fractured fortune cookie invective and 15-second spot ad copy promises. It isn't our fault that we have surrendered the only hope the world had of seeing a democracy grow wise as it grew older.
There are too many transitions going on all at once. We are emerging from the chaos of the Industrial and Urban revolutions. We are staggering under the distraction of the Information explosion. We have all become wired and bankrupt, frantic with the will to score while hating our own games.
I want a leader who will tell me to sit down and shut up. And then follow his own advice. I want a leader who will send the neighbors away for a while while he cleans up his own messy house. I want a leader who can hear his own voice, who has a sense of modesty about his own capacity. Leaders like that don't make it through the play-offs.
I wonder how Dean would have done in a debate with Bush. He would have broken Bush's rhythym, never played to his meanness, raised the ante intellectually over and over until Bush's straw stuffing burst out of his suit and set the stage ablaze with shame.
Kerry and Bush should rule the country together. The Two Headed Yalie. They are Better than You, and they Know the Strings to Pull. Vote Yale for President...what other choice is there?
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