Thursday, September 02, 2004
(9:56 PM) | Anonymous:
Reading Two Sentences From Bush's Speech.
I don't have television so everything becomes text. Of course I can see in my mind's eye the crowds intoxication, the gestures of the speakers, even the glazed over look of all involved. Still it is only text. Transcribed speech, but it was text before it was a speech. These are ideas that have been written, scratched into paper and we know that this kind of writing always has the possibility of being a sacred act like every blood ritual.There is something profane and vulgar about the way American politics engages in speaking and writing. On NPR I heard Karen Hughes, the former communications director, talking about what Bush was going to speak about tonight. "He's going to speak about liberty." Now this is no light task, to speak about liberty, and anyone who takes upon herself that task best take care to know what hallowed ground they are stepping on. Liberty, to borrow from Derrida, is one of those words that carry with it the greatest of promises.
This is what Bush had to say:
The story of America is the story of expanding liberty: an ever-widening circle, constantly growing to reach further and include more. Our Nation's founding commitment is still our deepest commitment: In our world, and here at home, we will extend the frontiers of freedom.
These two small sentences carry a great deal of meaning hidden underneath every word. Read over every line as if it meant something for enemies too demand that we read them well.
The story of America. America is something unified enough to have one story, a definite article. This is not "a story" it is "the story". This story is the story of expanding liberty, that is the story of America. Does this mean that America is the first to expand liberty? That the story of the expansion of liberty is completely tied up with the story of America? An ever-widening circle. One thinks of the Universe and what we are told as small children in science books. The Universe is expanding, going into the places that literally are not. This allusion is strengthened by the next couple of words, constantly growing to reach further and include more. Where there is no liberty, which is the thing that constantly expands, there is no story of America. Another thought, a more religious one, is also alluded to. I speak of the world without end, the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Though we all grow tired of that thought that what is different is excluded here we are presented with it again - with a twist. The ever-widening circle wants to include more within itself and that is within liberty. Those that are included are given liberty to stand upon, a story to have, in fact the story of liberty.
Our Nation's [sic, I swear!] founding commitment is still its deepest, our piety still lies with that of our fathers and their fathers before them. We can't doubt that liberty spoke the promise to those fathers (but what of those mothers?) but the promise was and continues to be deferred as slaves fight over the meaning of liberty. That meaning, that this is the story of America and thus our story is the deferment of that promise. This becomes clear with this statement, In our world. Of course this becomes our world since the story of liberty is a story tied up with America. There's a little of that promise there but it is deferred again by saying and here at home. Here at home? Is this not an expanding circle of our home? One that, to paraphrase early parts of the speech, will not be held back (unlike the Universe which will reach its limits). We will. "Man would rather will nothingness than not will at all," says Nietzsche. Ultimately, though Bush can't recognize this fact yet, an ever-expanding circle will be limited by time itself. This is not the world of forms, only a place of shadow and as such to will this ever-expanding circle is to will nothingness because, still, we don't know the way liberty functions. Of course this is to take the words out of context and I did that only to illustrate something. Let's put it back within the full context of the sentence: We will extend the frontiers of freedom. Now obviously freedom is a synonym with liberty and though each has a certain nuance let's pass that by. The more pressing matter, it seems to me, is does the use of the word frontiers by Bush mean he recognizes, though he won't admit it, that there are limits to the (for)ever-expanding circle? A frontier always has something which lies outside itself, still unknown, still without a story. The closing of the American Frontier was caused by the limits laid upon the land by the oceans and the seas. Does Bush know that there are limits? That his faith, his piety, to creation without destruction (I am speaking of his plans to create without generating revenue through taxes) will have limits? Money is tied to very moody gods. Their names are mammon and mars and in them lies no creation.
This is good therapy.
If you are interested I wrote a piece on the Eschatological language of the Bush administration that, for its many undergraduate, Christian and class prepared weaknesses, may be of some interest. You can read it here. (I don't really know how to take away the really annoying links to the footnotes, if anyone can help please clue me in on how to fix this or how to format it to the The Homepage template. I am an idiot.)
