1
"Stubbornness and stupidity are twins."
Sophocles
What is it about Americans that they have so much going for them, yet they can be so very stupid?
Two stories in the Sunday New York Times jumped out as a sad backdrop to our misguided War On Terror.
The first is about the bigoted anti-Muslim xenophobia in New York over a proposed mosque some blocks from the site of the former World Trade Towers. The emotional volatility is being fueled by the usual Fox News agitators, and Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich stirred up the pot for their demagogic needs.
Even the Jewish Anti-Defamation League took off after the mosque and condemned it. Here's the Anti Defamation League's mission statement at the top of their web page:
"The Anti-Defamation League was founded in 1913 "to stop the defamation of the Jewish people and to secure justice and fair treatment to all.' Now the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency, ADL fights anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, defends democratic ideals and protects civil rights for all."
Don't you just love bullshit PR?
The Times quoted the nutcase president of something called Former Muslims United, Nonie Darwish, who said this: "A mosque is not just a place of worship. It's a place where war is started."
Ms Darwish is also the founder of Arabs For Israel, and she has spoken before Rev. John Hagee's group Christians United For Israel in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, where Republican office seekers have stirred up the pot over a proposed Muslim religious center.
Factor this kind of stupidity in with a recent report from The College Board that the United States is Number 12 and dropping out of 36 developed nations on the percentage of citizens with a college education.
Sure, not everybody needs to know about basic human psychology, Immanuel Kant's Categorical Imperative or William Shakespeare's Hamlet. What's scary about this American rush to stupidity, however, is it is usually linked up with the worst sorts of xenophobic fears and racism and our incredibly narcissistic feelings of American exceptionalism.
We are the best! Number One! The champions! We don't have to worry about education. We got Apache helicopters and Predator Drones, and we got people who know how to use "em. Hear that, you ragheads! Hoo-ah!
This strain is then further exacerbated by forces out there in the world that, for their own interests, fuel our US home-grown stupidity. Take the Anti Defamation League's decision to exacerbate anti-Muslim hatred in the New York case. What possible motive could "the nation's premier civil rights/human relations agency" have for doing this?
We hear more and more that elements in the current Israeli militarist right wing thinks it can somehow bamboozle the United States of America into doing something really stupid like mount an aerial bombardment against Shiite Muslim Iran. Whipping up anti-Muslim hysteria in the United States is perfectly in line with this strain of international stupidity.
The reasonable people of America who still believe in a thing called Education and open-mindedness and all those wonderful Enlightenment stirrings are being caught in a religious vice with willfully ignorant nutcases on either side.
