Calhoun's Cannons for Nov 1, 2013
It's getting difficult to walk through the living room now
because of the dizziness caused by the eye rolling. When I turn on the TV or
radio or open a newspaper, it begins to flood the brain like fuzzy snow as the
cascade of idiocy pours out. In an
instant, they're everywhere. Makes it hard to move.
I refer, of course,
to "air quotes." You know,
when you're referencing something that's so blatantly phony you put your hands
up in front of your face and make little quotation marks in the air with your
fingers? Then roll your eyes?
When I'm alone I don't make the physical gesture to myself, except for the eye roll. I can't seem to stop that, but there they are
inside my head like an annoying tic, all those little hands and little fingers
twitching out little punctuation marks. Pick, up a paper, read anything to do with Congress
or politics, or almost anything at all where somebody is weaseling, and suddenly
it's one big flickering blur of air quotes.
The Select Committee to air
quote Investigate air quote Benghazi? Or air
quote investigate the Affordable Care Act's roll out? Investigate? Really? These Committees aren't interested in air quote investigating anything. Folks on those committees are only interested
in bloviating and preening, and playing political gotcha during their three
minute tap dances upon the national stage. Except Darrell
(I'm-ready-for-my-close-up-Mr. DeMille) Issa.
If he gets less than three minutes face time with the TV cameras rolling, he'll
form another pointless committee to air quote investigate something else.
And what's so astonishing about all these airquote investigations is what they
reveal: What a collection of dunces are running this country. I heard one
technical expert commenting on the computer bungles of the ACA roll-out express
astonishment at how technologically ignorant the air quote investigating Committee members were about how computer
networks actually work. Indeed, he
considered them to be dangerous fools. An apt judgment since these are
the people responsible for crafting laws and policies about which they know
less than nothing. After which they form committees to air quote investigate why the policies and programs they know
nothing about went kerflooey?
Where in God's name did we get these people? I mean, Louie Gomert? Really?
Is that the best Texas can
do? And Darrell Issa? California
should put The Paper Bag of Shame on its head. Or people like the air quote right honorable Congressman
who personally raked in $3.5 million in taxpayer financed air quote farm subsidies, then voted to cut food stamp programs
that keep hungry children fed, all in the name of air quote saving taxpayers money? Same guy who quotes scripture and
runs on a platform of air quote
family values?
It's endless. You
can't turn around without bumping into air quotes. Name any issue facing this
country: Air quote National Security.
Air quote National Debt. Air
quote Reforming Medicare. Air quote Saving Social Security. Air quote Climate Change. Air
quote Income Disparity. Air quote
Child Poverty. Roll eyes.
None of these serious issues mean anything any more. Not
really. Thanks to the corruption of our
political speech (Pace, Frank Luntz, Grover
Norquist, Karl Rove, Faux Noise, et al) everything
has become "so-called," the alternative version of the air
quote. And it's all slipped down the
rabbit hole into Alice in
WonderlandVille where Humpty Dumpty rules:
"When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean, neither
more nor less."
And in a country where science, technology, facts, honesty,
clarity, even practical, grown-up common sense is ignored in favor of hypocritical
morality, dishonest ideology, scientific illiteracy and technological
Ludditism, a country where everything
is transformed into a so-called, air quote fake,
how can serious people govern themselves?
Yes. I know. Roll eyes. Then head for cover.
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