RIPTIDE

The Rev. Dana Prom Smith, S.T.D., Ph.D. (December 26, 2006)

In his victory speech aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, May 1, 2003, George W. Bush said, “We have seen the turning of the tide.” Raised in Midland, Texas, a place he described as “a desert,” George knows nothing of tides. Maybe blinding sand storms, but not tides. He didn’t know that tides have undertows and riptides, and that Iraq is a land of cultural undertows and religious riptides. A mechanical rationality, such as his, knows nothing of complexity or feedback, and, therefore, he doesn’t know what he is doing. He’s caught in an undertow, gradually pulling him down into a tragedy, as the nation pays for his folly with life, limb, and wealth.

He has no policy, only slogans, such as “stay the course.” Policy is based on knowledge while slogans cover ignorance. Now, George is toying with the slogan of “ramping up” his war, repeating with more of the same that which has already failed.

Harry G. Frankfurt, Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University, writes in his book On Bullshit, “Bullshit is unavoidable whenever circumstances require someone to talk without knowing what he is talking about.” George and his Republican supporters didn’t know what they were talking about. Ignorant of Iraq’s undertows and riptides, they sloganeered the nation into a tragedy while justifying their war with the sincerity of their testosteronic patriotism. They weren’t liars because they didn’t know the truth. Instead, they promoted their sincerity, and as Professor Frankfurt concludes, without truth, “Sincerity itself is bullshit.”

Copyright © Dana Prom Smith 2006