Results tagged “Iraq” from Marilyn Sewell

A ferocious conversation about shoe-throwing is taking place all over the Middle East just now.  It appears that there are two schools of thought at the moment regarding the action of Muntader al-Zaidi, the journalist who threw two shoes at President Bush during a press conference.  Some people are saying that the act was wrong, that traditional Arab hospitality towards a guest demands respect, even if a person disapproves of the guest (as most Arabs apparently do, of this guest).  Far more people, however, seem elated by the defiant act--in fact, Muntader al-Zaidi has become something of folk hero to many.  In the Sadr City section of Baghdad, people are taking off their shoes and sandals and putting them on long poles, and waving them high in the air, demanding that Americans immediately withdraw from their country.  (See NYTimes, 12/16)

I must say that it was pretty amazing to see repeated television images of someone throwing a shoe at the President, hard and fast, and the President ducking, and then, whoops, here comes another one, again just barely missing.  Bush made light of it, saying "This is how democracy works."  Well, actually, no--being in a democracy doesn't give a person permission to fling shoes at their President.  The act, no doubt, was disrespectful.  But was it brave and appropriate--or rash and foolish?

I grew up in the South, in a society in which politeness was paramount--rules were followed.  It was "Yes, Ma'am" and "Yes, Sir."  It was speaking softly and slowly, it was moving gently in the world.  And yet often, out of the mouths of these good and gentle people, who would stretch and strain never to offend, came horrendous remarks and acts of racism.  The rules about black and white were clear: "Nigras" were fine so long as they "stayed in their place."  When they did not, when they dared to violate the rules, violence erupted.

Well, who makes the rules, and for what purpose?  And when should rules be broken? 

I am of two minds of this.  I am all for rules of decorum.  I prefer polite behavior.  Let me tell you, that a man can open the door for me any time.  And I like to visit the South, where children have been saying "Yes, Ma'm" to me since I was 35.  I believe that these rules of behavior are there for a reason, and generally that reason is so that society can remain civilized, and people will remain respectful of one another.

On the other hand, sometimes rules and traditions need to be broken, and their very breaking shines a light on something that is awry in the society.  Martin Luther King, Jr., taught his followers to practice civil disobedience, and so they sat in restaurants and at drugstore counters that were "White Only."  Rosa Parks did not follow the rules of the city bus line.  The Berrigan brothers poured blood on draft records during the Vietnam War.  Every year demonstrators go to the School of the Americas in Georgia, where the U.S. trains foreign soldiers to terrorize their own citizens, and these demonstrators break the rules--they step over the government "line" and are arrested, and many have been jailed, some for as long as six months--nuns and priests and ministers, among them.

Every person must discern for himself or herself when it's right and appropriate to break the rules.  One rule of thumb would be your motive, of course--are you breaking the rule for your own benefit, or to grandstand--or because you believe a statement must be made that cannot better be made another way. 

I myself--well, I'm a good girl and always have been.  I follow the rules.  That's why I was elected "Best Christian" in my senior year in high school.  And then I became an English teacher, and you know how they are about rules.  Now I'm a minister, and we all are aware of the rule-bound-ness of religion.  Except there's one rule in religion that's bigger than all the others--it's called the Rule of Love.  So when we face a dilemma, we can ask, "What is the most loving thing to do?"  Sometimes it's fasting.  Sometimes it's not eating British salt.  Sometimes it's speaking the truth to power, even though that's going to get you in a mess of trouble. 

Sometimes it's throwing a shoe.

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George W. Bush is easy to hate.  More than other single individual, he is responsible for our illegal attack on Iraq and our terribly flawed war effort after we arrived; for the lack of moral leadership our country has among nations; for the frightening extension of the executive branch of government; for our willingness to imprison without trial and to torture; for the unprecedented spying on American citizens; and now for leading us into the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

So why would anyone want to make a movie about W.?  "Because he's larger than life," says Oliver Stone, and I would agree with him.  George W. Bush is one of those real people who is so unreal that as a fictional character, he would hardly be believable--in other words, as the incredulous onlooker at Bush in action so often says: "You can't make this stuff up."

And yet the real W. is a living, breathing human being who is more like ourselves than different, and to Josh Brolin's credit, that's how the actor plays him.  This film is not a satire.  It is a picture of a man who is ambitious, like many other men; who, like many others, can't quite find his niche; who, like all too many guys, drinks too much and has sex with women he has no intention of marrying; and who, like many such men, finally marries a good woman who stands by him. 

The one thing that makes W. different from most of the rest of us lost and searching souls is that he has a rich and powerful Poppy (played beautifully by James Cromwell) who keeps bailing him out.  And another thing: W. just isn't all that bright.  And so he can be manipulated by those around him--people who are smarter and more nefarious than W. could ever think to be.  Richard Dreyfus leaves his usual fast-talking character behind to become the oily snake-in-the-cabinet Dick Cheney.

W. knows he has been going down the wrong path, and so he decides he needs to quit drinking and to be "saved."  Had he not made these changes, he surely would have become the unseen, unheard of, ignominous Bush son that his parents feared he would be.  But Carl Rove guided him to victory as the Governor of Texas, and then on to the White House for two terms.  Books will be written for a hundred years about how that happened, but it did--enough said.

Josh Brolin, though, lets us in on the struggle of the man--to please his father, to overcome his alcoholism, to make something of himself.  W. thinks he is "called" to become President, and he goes forward with the moral certainty that is the hallmark of those who are not educated or reflective.  He is a man who is in way over his head.  Way, way over his head.  And because he is surrounded with toadies, he cannot see a way out, he can only "stay the course." 

"W." is not a great movie--it never brings us to the universal realm that a greater film perhaps could have.  In the end, it is topical, and it will die with the times.  But I liked the film because it humanizes a man who has now become a character to most of us.  The film reminded me that George Bush must be devastated right now, and he must be confused.  He must surely wonder how his advisors and his God could have let him go so wrong.  Maybe he wanted to grow up and be a man and give, but he just didn't have the capacity for the job of President.  Which, of course, is a vast understatement.  I'm sorry for him, and I'm sorry for this country.

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