How variously we react to
the word "evil." George W. Bush, in his memoirs, thinks all the
fuss about his use of "axis of evil" was over the word
"axis," suggesting that Iraq, Iran, and North Korea had formed an
alliance like the one Germany and Italy had formed. "Evil" was
not worth remark.
Years later, as
his memoirs appeared, others were still lamenting the consequences of all that
the word had brought into play. "Oh that Manichaean view of the
world. Oh the demonizing of enemies. Look where it's left
us." A leader who inserts "evil" into a speech about
another nation, as Ronald Reagan first did, has dropped a canister full of bad
germs.
Reviewing all that
George Bush was unaware of is a fool's task, I know, but here we've got a puzzle.
He and his advisors seemed to be doing their best to make themselves
aware. I can't count the number of places in Rumsfeld's and Gates's
memoirs where, sometimes at Bush's insistence, they stop to "review all
the assumptions" and make sure they haven't missed any "concealed
hazards" in the course they have chosen. They are highly motivated,
they are bright, and they have gone to the best schools. And yet, as
revealed by their casual acceptance of the bomb-word "evil," they are
clueless. Where it may have counted most.
And it wasn't
rocket science. David Loy, a teacher like the rest in our liberal arts
philosophy departments, could have told them right away what was in that
bomb. As he did after 9/11, explaining that "evil" is a term
that people in our society, in contrast to a Buddhist society (he was living in
Japan at the time), need in order to feel good about themselves. "We
can feel comfortable and secure in our own goodness only by attacking and
destroying the evil outside us. If you want to be a hero, well, occasionally a
natural disaster will do, but the best thing is a villain to battle. St.
George needs that dragon in order to be St. George."
Listen to Loy and
professors like him and you, as soon as you hear "evil" come out of
Bush's mouth, will start wondering whether Iraq was maybe George's
dragon.
You have a lot to
go on. Bush certainly was rooted in the Christian tradition that makes
the opposition of good and evil most dramatic. He himself had fallen into
evil and been reborn into good. He had chosen a speechwriter from
fundamentalist Wheaton College, Michael Gerson, who spoke the language of moral
dualism most readily. And for philosophical justification of the Iraq
invasion he chose, for a visit to the White House, a University of Chicago
theologian, Jean Bethke Elshtain, whose bedrock convictions, according to
colleagues, included "the existence of an absolute good and evil"
(see Post #213). For an alert student Bush will look like just the person
who would reach for the word "evil," and start the whole Manichaean
thing going.
Except he didn't
reach for it. It was fed to him. By that graduate of Wheaton,
Michael Gerson, who sees "axis of hate" in a draft of the State of
the Union speech and knows right away it's not going to get the most out of
Midwestern voters. Change it to "axis of evil." What's
wrong with "hate"? It's "not theological
enough."
So we get the word
that drove liberally educated people up the wall. Graduates of Wheaton
College are not liberally educated; they are theologically educated. And
this puts them in tune with voters in the Heartland, most of whom still gain
their education in church. This is power, votes in the Heartland.
Manichaeism is in the saddle.
In a liberal
education you learn how to stand outside a culture and its vocabulary. In
English courses you learn how words work, and, drawing on what you have learned
in history and philosophy courses, you get an idea of the dangers in
words. In the word "evil" you see, or give yourself a chance of
seeing, how it turns eyes from threats to be avoided to natures to be
abhorred. "Evil" is an extreme abhorrence word. And it
brings a string of abhorrent-nature adjectives in its trail — vile, monstrous,
wicked, vicious, base, depraved. You see how those who use these words
will be carried further and further from the external world and any threats it
might present them with. You see (oh history, history) how it polarizes, how it
turns opponents into demons, how it makes compromise or surrender difficult.
And that's why,
when your president, in apparent innocence (I leave open the possibility that
it was cynicism in his speechwriters), opens the bomb bays in his State of the
Union Address and drops a canister like this you are going to be halfway up the
wall with everybody else who has profited from a liberal education.
And the only way
you can go is further up, because nobody in power, and least of all the
president, will be noticing you. With the painful consequences of the
president's neglect of the complex external world in Iraq already, after three
years, registering on the nation there he is, in the chapel at Camp David,
having "one of the best preachers" he's ever heard confirm the stand
he has taken. "Evil is real, biblical, and prevalent.... Some say
ignore it, some say it doesn't exist. But evil must not be ignored, it
must be restrained." There would be a cost, but, according to Bush's
memoir, the preacher reminded the president that "there has never been a
noble cause devoid of sacrifice" and assured him that "the Scriptures
put great premiums on faithfulness, perseverance, and overcoming. We do
not quit or give up. We always believe there is no such thing as a
hopeless situation." A Christian up against evil can't compromise,
and can't quit. A liberally educated student, standing outside the
Christian culture and vocabulary, will observe how easy it is to substitute
"Islamist" for "Christian" in the preacher's vocabulary.
And he or she
won't be distracted by the goodness or brightness or earnestness of individual
Christians or those who help them. Bush's helpers, the ones who went over
and over their assumptions and listed again and again the hazards, were as good
and bright and earnest as any you can find. They thought hard. They
just didn't think broadly. It was all theological or military. They
all might as well have gone to Wheaton or West Point.
So, another plug
for liberal education and English courses. Parents, direct your children
to them. Children, listen closely and study hard. Everybody hope
that the teachers understand the tradition they work in. The further it
spreads among citizens the wiser the country's foreign policy will be.
Start in the Heartland.
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