Comedy (Or Is It Tragedy?) In The San Francisco Chronicle

I will leave it to the many fine press mavens out there to determine whether the vitriolic political pollution emitted daily by the San Francisco Chronicle should be seen as primarily the cause or the effect of the dense politically correct fog that engulfs the Bay Area. As a temporary visitor from Red America, however, I can attest that both are definitely present.

Here are snippets from all of the mainly political articles in the Sunday Insight section, which attempts to resemble the NYT Week in Review or WaPo’s Outlook.

The two lead articles, taking up all but one column on the first page, appear inside a large, black-bordered box sandwiched between the huge top and bottom headline proclaiming “ALL WAR … ALL THE TIME.”

In “The battle on terrorism is an excuse to make fighting permanent,” Robert Higgs (of the Independent Institute) begins by stating that in order to have a permanent war you need “a dominant ideology … [s]omething like American jingo-patriotism cum anti-communism” as well as “periodic crises, because without them the public becomes complacent, unafraid, and hence unwilling to bear the heavy burdens that they must bear if the government is to carry on a permanent war.” He continues:

Each crisis piques the people’s insecurities and renders them once again disposed to pay the designated price, whether it takes the form of their treasure, their liberties or their young people’s blood….

Third, you would need some politically powerful groups whose members stand to gain substantially from a permanent war in terms of achieving their urgent personal and group objectives. Call me crass, but I’ve noticed that few people will stay engaged for long unless there’s “something in it for them.”

….

Just as during the Cold War hardly any American ever laid eyes on an honest- to-God Commie … , so now we may all suppose that anyone, anywhere might be a lethal terrorist in possession of a suitcase nuke or a jug of anthrax spores….

Potential terrorists are “out there,” no doubt, in the wonderful world of Islam, an arc that stretches from Morocco across North Africa, the Middle East, and Southwest Asia to Malaysia, Indonesia and Mindanao, not to mention London,

Amsterdam and Hamburg. And that’s good, because it means that U.S. leaders must bring the entire outside world into compliance with their stipulated rules of engagement for the war on terrorism. It’s a fine thing to dominate the world, an even finer thing to do so righteously.

O.K. I agree. You’re crass.

In the second All War .. All The Time front page article, William S. Lind argues that “in its quest for world empire” the United States foolishly assumes that its enemies will always be states instead of more amorphous groups like Hamas, Al Queda, etc. “As the old saying goes,” Lind concludes, “assume makes an ass out of you and me.”

Right again, at least as far as you are concerned.

Inside, regular columnist Joan Ryan’s column begins:

THE ART OF government consists largely of taking as much power from its constituents as possible and making them feel relieved to be rid of it.

The men and women in the Bush administration are particularly adept.

They swiped our civil liberties and people felt grateful for the “protection.” They waged an [sic] pre-emptive war on creaky evidence and Americans were misty with pride. They cut taxes to the rich and social services to the poor, and still people tell pollsters that President Bush is terrific.

Ah, those Americans. They’re such blockheads.

That’s it for today’s paper, but you shouldn’t think the tone of these is unusual. I don’t have enough time to provide a day by day, but here are a couple of representative samples:

In “How to Learn To Love Sodomy. This just in: GOP atremble, love & sex rejoice, revolution imminent. Can you feel it?” regular columnist Mark Morfod began his July 2 column as follows:

And now here we are, at a shimmeringly historic moment where we cannot help but note the delicious irony, the divine karmic genius of it all.

When we cannot help but notice how millions of progressive love-minded Gay Pride folks across America, from S.F. to N.Y., from Atlanta to Seattle to Chicago, were actually cheering on the Supreme Court last week — the same crusty bunch that snuck BushCo into office in the first place — for slapping the tragically heartless GOP right across its wan butt with a leather whip and a shocking 6-3 decision, stunning the Christian right into disbelief and abject terror.

And there’s the weekly columnist Harley Sorenson, whose Monday column is entitled “View From the Left.” (Where do the editors think the other views are from?) In his last column, June 30, Sorenson wrote that he “bit off more than I could chew” in his column before that, when he asked readers “for ideas on how to get George Bush and his merry nation-wrecking crew out of the White House.” He was inundated with good stuff.

My favorite suggestion came from Phil, in Clifton, N.J. It probably isn’t the best suggestion, but it’s most delicious, so I’ll mention it first.

Phil says we should urge our “coalition partner,” the United Kingdom, to investigate Bush’s antics. For instance, what did he know ahead of time about Sept. 11? Did he deliberately mislead the nation about Saddam’s alleged weapons of mass destruction? Was the real reason for the war in Iraq to provide an opportunity for Republican friends (like Halliburton, Bechtel and the Carlyle Group) to make millions repairing the damage we caused?

I can’t wait to see what he says tomorrow. Or maybe I can.

I would like to sympathize with the people of San Francisco, who are fed a steady diet of this stuff, and ask them whether they realize how far out this all sounds to many of us. But I can’t, for the sad fact is that the World According to the San Francisco Chronicle is not that different from the world seen by most, or at least many, Democrats.