The Right Cross (Mary Lyon)

  By Mary Lyon, From The Left -- World News Trust

  Oct. 16, 2006 -- The cynic in me has long suspected that conservative, indeed regressive, reactionary politicians have viewed people with strong religious convictions as just so many sheep. Sheep to be used and exploited for whatever might be taken from them. Sheep to be shorn at regular intervals, and to be herded off to market, either to sell wholesale, or to funnel into slaughterhouses to be bludgeoned, carved up, and consumed outright. I never saw the politicians involved as having much interest in any of the core beliefs that moved the legions of the faithful. It always seemed to me that you should get into politics to help people, to better the system, to serve the common good -- rather than to target large groups, carnivorously and ruthlessly, to be manipulated for the self-interest of greedy individuals.

  The Bush Administration has brought out the cynic in me. And the beast in me. Not that I have a “666” tattoo on my skin (you may, however, find one on Dick Cheney’s chest above where a normal person’s heart would be, beneath one of Karl Rove’s double chins, or behind that signature shock of long blond hair pulled around to the front to conceal one side of Ann Coulter’s scrawny neck). I’ve never once felt any temptation to take anything from the Bush people at face value without suspecting some ulterior motive. They’ve always been alert for crowds of easy marks that can be fleeced for political advantage. Not very Christian, at least as far as I’ve always understood it.

  I’m 53 years old now, which means I’ve been a Catholic for 53 years. I did more than my share of time in Catholic school, from preschool through my high school graduation day. My youth was thoroughly marinated in Christian thought, study, and on good days, deeds. And if you’ve steeped in it for that long, the flavorings tend to stay with you -– perhaps even for a lifetime if your superiors have done their jobs.

  Part of what stuck with me, besides the cyclical observances of Christ-centered special events, was an overriding belief system –- belief in stuff that still seems rather pure and legitimate, genuinely good. You were supposed to be a humble believer. God was supposed to use you –- it wasn’t the other way around. You didn’t swagger and strut down the center aisle at church to make sure everybody’d see the pile of money you were about to dump into the collection plate. Heaven forbid anyone be encouraged to worship you or anoint you as God’s Chosen. You weren’t supposed to be in it for power or show. Heck, the Gospel of Matthew, Chapter 6, even said you’re supposed to go pray in the closet (good Lord, what would the “religious” “right” make of THAT?). While I don’t presume to know the mind of God, it strikes me that Jesus would have cringed over the wealth, power, and media razzmatazz of the Falwell or Swaggert ministries, the “700 Club,” and the “Focus on the Pharisees” machinery. St. Paul once dissed such Barnums & Baileys while writing to the Corinthians about the evils of noisy gongs and clanging cymbals.

  Sadly, this current regime has embraced all of the above in an armhold long and tangly enough to reach easily into everyone’s pockets. It’s only now, with the new book “Tempting Faith” by David Kuo, that it seems to be a little more okay, perhaps a little more mainstream, to point out that it’s not just the emperor prancing around naked, but his bishops also. Kuo has stuck a pin in their giant, Macy’s Parade-style inflatable plastic crosses and Moses tablets. Many of us on the “heathen” left long suspected this White House faith-based posturing was as phony and calculating as hell. I’m sure Rove and friends called some of these people names a lot worse than “nuts.”

  I suspect that most of the organized so-called “religious right” will dig deeply into denial. Hell NO! They’ve NOT been used and scorned as soon as they turned their backs. Hell NO! They haven’t been punked, played, and suckered by manipulative political serpents eyeing them for the avalanches of money they could contribute, the bully pulpits they could command, or the loyal volunteers and massive blocks of reliable votes they could deliver again and again. Hell NO! These Bush administration people wouldn’t lie to us, would they? These republi-CONS, “good Christian” men and women all, wouldn’t cheat on us, would they? That’d be breaking the Eighth Commandment! I hate to break it to these willful naifs, but this White House is carpeted with wall-to-wall false witnesses. Funny -– notice how much of that starts with “W”?

  David Kuo was among those taken for a ride down the Garden of Eden path, and he appears to be one of an increasing number of newly-awakened believers who now sees the truth. He ate a lot of the apple, alright, but finally recognized the plague it stirred up in his stomach –- not to mention in his spirit. I’m pressing myself hard to be forgiving of this earnest young man, even while he pulls a Lee Atwater. Atwater, the republi-CON party chieftain who ruined Michael Dukakis’s name and career, among others, and taught Karl Rove everything he knows, finally “got religion” and attempted to make amends to Dukakis, after Atwater was stricken with a brain tumor that left him on his death bed. It took the Grim Reaper breathing down his neck to get him at last to change his evil ways. So, too, David Kuo, who issues his confessional after coming face to face with his own brain-tumor mortality. So be it. I apologize for being so crass. I’m really not here to judge -– especially since Scripture says I’m not supposed to! It’s nice that it finally happened, even while I can’t shut off the screaming in the back of my head about why it took SO DAMNED LONG! God Bless Kuo for seeing The Light, while, it appears, he still has time. At least, with his book, he finally has a chance to spearhead some justice and some healing.

  The holier-than-thou morality fraud within the GOP that was first exposed in the Jeff Gannon gay male prostitute scandal, the immorality of the neglect of Hurricane Katrina’s many victims (and in general, of the increasing numbers of poor across America), and then with disgraced ex-Congressman Foley’s escapades with underage boys, has finally given the disciples of Bush a severe shaking. Down to their cores, and their core beliefs. And now comes Kuo, throwing the biggest right cross of all, hopefully to make sure they don’t roll over, hit the snooze button, and sleep through this latest wake-up call. He’s living proof that souls really can be saved. We’ll know in another month whether there’s enough salvation like his to save the country.

  Visualize IMPEACHMENT!!!

 Then go DO something about it.

***

   Mary Lyon spent the first 25 years of her adult life as a broadcast journalist, at Los Angeles radio stations KRTH-FM,KFWB-AM, KHJ-AM and KLOS-FM, the NBC, ABC, RKO Radio Networks,and KTLA-TV.  She retired from day-to-day broadcasting in 1996, after covering Hollywood for nine years in radio, TV, and print, for the Associated Press.  She wrote and illustrated "The Frazzled Working Woman's Practical Guide to Motherhood," and is presently at work on a new craft book for kids and friends.  A lifelong Democrat who began her political involvement in the Student Coalition for Humphrey-Muskie, and Tom Bradley's first L.A. Mayoral campaign, Mary currently is a weekly columnist for www.democrats.us -- from the Left.

{mos_sb_discuss:2}