Insisting that meddling Westerners were after their Lucky Charms, the bearded and turbaned dried apple dolls of the Iranian Guardian Council accused foreign governments of meddling in the election aftermath with their fancy Great Satan tools like Twitter and BBC and Grand Theft Auto and Denial of Service.
This should point out the utter craziness of the basic premise behind the Iranian theocracy: Imagine, if you will, that you found the half dozen or so most heavily Brylcreemed and polyestered AM radio preachers in America, the ones most disconnected from reality, and made them into a sort of Supremely Supreme Court; the ultimate arbiters of everything in the country. Before you knew it, video games and Tinky Winky would be illegal, it would be a death penalty offense to hide satanic messages backwards in your music or to be Marilyn Manson, the national anthem would be changed to "Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam", and the Kennedies would have to find honest work again, perhaps smuggling liquor from Canada like they used to.
I guess part of it is a question of whether one has a relativistic outlook on life. If there is a capital-T Truth out there then we could appoint Best Buy salesmen as leaders and still be fine so long as they could discern that Truth. If this Truth is the same as that revealed by Shia Islam or pop Evangelical Protestant Christianity then mullahs or televangelists may in fact be the best people to have.
ReplyDeleteI may not agree with John Paul Stevens or Ruth Bader Ginsburg very much, but I can't say that they're not qualified to be on the Supreme Court, offering their interpretation of the Constitution.
(Yes, that's an imperfect analogy.)
I guess the premise of Iranian theocracy or what Tam mentions are only absurd if you've already decided that their belief system is flawed. I'm Catholic, and knowing that belief system to be true, have no problem having one man be final earthly arbiter of what doctrine is true and what isn't, even if he's generally an old European dude. I'm not, though, Shi'ite or Evangelical Protestant (as much-encompassing as that can be), and so I'm able to reject mullocracy or televangelocracy.
THis comment wins the internets!
ReplyDeleteAh oops, this POST wins the internet. Sorry about that it's too early.
ReplyDeletei see that vehicle travails have not dulled the sharpest snark knife in the drawer...
ReplyDeleteamazing that the radio and teevee preachers you mention demonized the very medium that they embraced to get out the "good" message, and the ragtop supremes make maximum use the net and other newmedia that they aim to stifle. all without the slightest recognition of the elegant irony of it all.
jtc
Kennedys getting honest jobs?? That might be a good trade, let me think about that one...
ReplyDeleteAs someone who takes her faith very seriously, I put the people Tam mentioned square in the "shut up, shut up, you're making us look like idiots, *please* shut up" category.
ReplyDeleteI got grief last year because I couldn't stand Huckabee, but all the good Christians were voting for him. I finally came to the conclusion that we were electing a leader, not a preacher. My faith is the main thing I consider when voting. The candidate's faith, however, is not.
As for the Kennedys, don't forget the fortune Daddy made in shipping kickbacks from the railroads. My ex-father in law worked for the Union Pacific and had dozxens of tales about the shenanigans he saw.
ReplyDeleteGee, I hope I don't wind up at the bottom off Chappaquidick...
Old Squid.
Oh, but video games under a teleevangelocracy wouldn't be banned...the winners would be the ones who could feed the most with the bread and fishes, or could heal the most lepers, or could baptize the most in the river Jordan, etc...
ReplyDeleteGee, I hope this doesn't mean I will be shoveling coal you-know-where for eternity...
Old Squid/
Joanna:
ReplyDeleteI finally came to the conclusion that we were electing a leader, not a preacher.
Were you paying attention last election? We elected a Philosopher King, a God Emperor.
Kennedys finding honest work again, eh? Hmmm. Maybe this ain't a bad idea after all! ;o)
ReplyDeleteNo, Steve, we elected a Soviet Premier.
ReplyDeleteIt's all well and good, but what do you have against smuggling liquor from Canada? OK, their whiskey is mediocre, but still...
ReplyDelete-- Lyle