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About The North Coast times-eagle. (Wheeler, Oregon) 1971-2007 | View Entire Issue (July 1, 2006)
NORTH COAST TIMES EAGLE, JULY 2006 PAGE 11 :" « N E X IT S TR A TE G Y REX BABIN At this point I should probably reiterate that I (that is, the corporeal, arrestable “I" that the initial “I” above will predictably be mistaken for) am a peaceful man, with no actual wish to exact payment for anyone’s continued debasement of humanity by feeling the life drain out of him, slowly, through inordinately sensitive nerves in my fingers and palms. I would much prefer that the President sleep soundly in his bed at night, even as the 2,500+ American soldiers whose lives his lies have ended sleep soundly if not so warmly in theirs. I would ask, in fact, that the President feel no pain whatsoever, as is felt daily or hourly by the 17,500+ Americans blessed by his bellicosity with their wounds. I would hope him untroubled even by guilt, as might haunt any normal human being who had caused the deaths of more than 30,000 Iraqi civilians in order, it would seem, to invite the wrath of the world's people down upon the heads of his own, so deeply does my kindness extend. I worry, though, that this Christian attitude will buy me little leeway in the courts, and that my plea for a literal reading of these lines will be rejected in favor of a more liberal approach, and that I may have inadvertently left myself open to a charge of glibness, which I understand is even further out of fashion these days than is kindness. Therefore I have already begun the assembly of my legal team. In the first chair I would like Floyd Abrams, who defended Judith Miller after she converted the front page of the New York Times into a flyer for Bush’s prewar propaganda and then refused to name which of her administration “sources” had blown the cover of an intelligence operative who dared to be married to a man willing to say that our government was peddling murderous bullshit. Generations may pass before we see it as such, but this was the elevation of the publicist’s grind to an art form, and it was big of Floyd to hop in and defend it. I would like very much for Floyd to hop in and defend my art, too. Admittedly, mine has not yet shown itself able to maim and kill on a level commensurate with Judith’s (which rates, at a minimum, 49,845 assists in the casualties quoted above), but it is not without its own quiet panache, and I imagine that it could, despite its obvious weaknesses (fairness, balance, compassion), imperil my liberty to a degree worthy of any first-rate attorney’s time and gamesmanship. Why, then, when I called Floyd to discuss the central question of this essay (if not its actual thesis), and recited verbatim that standout passage wherein I ask whether I am allowed to write that I would like to hunt down George W. Bush, the President of the United States, and kill him with my bare hands, did he not respond with an immediate offer of legal representation? Why did he offer instead, in an unhurried UNIONTOWN and reflective tone, a learned gloss on the case law surrounding “language calling for criminal conduct,” which shed a great deal of light on the predicament of others but, it seemed, precious little on my own? Why, when I steered our conversation away from protestors and KKK orators and so forth, and back toward, say, writers who cop a nonviolent attitude yet nonetheless ask a question now and then about killing a President, did Floyd say, “Are you really asking if you would be in trouble?” THE EXTREMIST Roger Scruton in The Dictionary of Political Thought defines extremism as: 1 Taking a political idea to its limits, regardless of unfortunate repercussions. Impracticalities, arguments and feelings to the contrary, and with the intention not only to confront, but to eliminate opposition. 2. Demonstrating intolerance toward all views other than one’s own. 3. The adoption of means to political ends which show disregard for the life, liberty and human rights of others 4. Engage in name calling, ad hominem (attacks against the person and not the ideas), and character assassination instead of dealing with facts or issues. Questioning motives, qualifications, past associations, personality, tend to use intimidation and epithets such as “traitor” and any spurious allegations in order to avoid issues through the tactic of diversion. 5. (Extremists) employ generalization with little or no evidence painting all their adversaries with the same brush and obfuscating what constitutes proof anyway. They employ false dilemmas like it is either monarchy or anarchy, or the strawman of Nixon’s dog Checkers. The false emotional appeal and post hoc ergo propter hoc ('after this therefore because of this'); the assumption that a prior event explains a subsequent occurrence because of precedence alone. 6. (Extremists) try to discourage any critical examination of their positions, judging their actions by intent, and the actions of others by the outcomes, both of which they quite often fabric- cate. They want their assumption accepted on faith yet demand proof of their opponents in a double-standard. They have a tendency to view all opponents and critics as evil and see the world in absolute terms of good and evil (a Manichean world view that those who are not with me are against me). 7. The advocacy of censorship of the speech of their opponents and suppression of public hearings and legislation against informing and teaching. (Extremists) may feel threatened by the truth and free speech, even bum books and threaten authors. 8. (Extremists) employ millennial prognostications of doomsday and Armageddon to instill the idea of crisis and catastrophe to distract people from reasonable and arithmetic analysis of events and proposed actions. 9. (Extremists) believe that it is allowable to engage in evil in order to further their interests. They will lie, slander, liable and engage in any form of violence without remorse. 10. (Extremists) invoke that theirs is the will of God Bikes & Bevond 2 1 8 WEST M A R IN E DRIVE ASTORIA, O R E G O N 9 7 1 0 3 (5 0 3 ) 3 2 5 -8 7 0 8 1089 MARINE DR. ASTORIA, OREGON I submit that Floyd behaved this way because he is a man who understands the law and believes in it. I submit that Floyd is unafraid I submit that Floyd would have leapt to my aid had I managed to present him with a decent challenge, which someday I may. I submit that if Floyd is peruser of what now passes for political discourse in this country he must be nearly as bored as I am. What I have written thus far is, of course, no crime at all. These words are a reference to a crime, and specifically I do not personally think has any business being a crime in the first place, but they do not yet, in and of themselves, violate the statute under which, to review, it is deemed illegal to write that one (I) would like very much to take the President’s throat in one’s (my) hands and, with the force of opposable thumb on privileged windpipe, work the life out of it. According to the case law, and as Floyd helpfully affirm ed, a threat against the President must be a true threat in order to be judged a true crime That is, the Tenderer of the vile lang uage must give sufficient indication to any “reasonable” person who encounters it2 that the Tenderer hopes earnestly to realize in the physical realm, just once, what he can experience again and again, with no harm to any of God’s creatures, in the infinitely expansive realm of words. Given such a choice, only a person as unimaginative as George W. Bush would opt for the lump sum payment. I will not I sincerely mean none of the violence contained in my paragraphs to be translated into those abhorrent expressions of hatred that pertain in the world beyond the page, and as long as that holds true I have neither committed an offense nor allowed the threat of unjust law to create a police man of my own thoughts where once stood, or sat, a citizen. As long as I (that is the corporeal, arrestable “I”) wish no real damage upon the President, I (the other “I”) should theoreti cally be free even to enhance the scenario at hand for the enjoy ment of my public. In place of the initial question I might ask instead, “Am I allowed to write that I would like to kidnap George W. Bush and fly him to a prison in some faraway land where his ‘rights’ are no longer an issue, there to put a bag over his head and make him stand for hours on one leg while I defecate on his New Testament before chaining his arms to the ceiling until he dies of a heart attack, after which I will claim that he never existed?" Here, though, taste, if not simple human decency, again rears its delicate head: I doubt that I could bring myself to read such a thing, let alone write it. All the same, the answer to the question posed at the start of this essay is no. I am not allowed to write that I would like to hunt down George W. Bush and kill him with my bare hands. Floyd gave me to understand that the “true threat" idea would help me out if I did, as would the First Amendment, which still has some strength left in it despite its wasting disease, but that any outright declaration of violent intent could, and perhaps even would, be considered a violation of the law. He also urged me to keep things “satirical,” as that was going to be my defense “later on.” Satire, I fear, may be too ambitious for my craft, but anyone who has listened to our current President knows at least how to tell a bald-faced lie: I would like to hunt down George W. Bush, the President o f the United States, and kill him with my bare hands. Ben Metcalf is Literary Editor of Harper’s Magazine, from which this article has been reprinted. The Lower 595 Columbia Clinic 18th St. ) / v Astoria, OR -ol A , 503 325-9131 \ .< 7 ^ i Thomas S. Duncan, m o .' Susan L. Skinner, . ? C.N.M., C.F.N.P, I.B.C.L.C. __ Michael J. Meno, h i , pac < ( <---- ^Medical care fo r the entire family ■.At Min<»r surgery lactatio n counseling f u h i f Chip), I mporfed/ Beer env Jap #1 orv 2 vuL S t r e e t AitOTLCu* 3 2 5 -0 0 3 3
