[lbo-talk] Katrina Vanden Heuvel In the Court of the Crimson King

Dwayne Monroe dwayne.monroe at gmail.com
Fri Dec 11 08:43:48 PST 2009


Oh, who among you will explain Nation editor Katrina Vanden Heuvel to me?

She seems smart and well intentioned. And yet, while driving home last night, I listened to her tell an NPR voice droid the following about President Obama's speech in Oslo:

<snip>

SIEGEL: But you seem to be resolving this conflict between the wartime president, who's escalated the U.S. operation in Afghanistan and the peace prize winner, and the speech about peace rather easily. I'm surprised. I'm surprised you're not more stuck on that one.

Ms. HEUVEL: One of the factors of life in America, I think, Robert, is complexity. And while I, and the magazine I edit, have been in full opposition to both the Bush administration and its war in Iraq and to the war it bequeathed the Obama administration and the war he is making his own, one also has to understand that there is a fight ahead, that no great change comes without struggle from below, which President Obama spoke of. And he spoke of those who truly have fought for change from below like Martin Luther King Jr.

And I think it is up to the people, not only in the United States, but this world, to push him to live up to the words he spoke in the speech which was a complex speech. It was a, kind of a speech that could be taught in a college course on just war and America's role in the world. And that's why I am both interested in its complexity, but I'm also aware of the fact that he is a war president who is presiding over the escalation of a war that this country need not fight to be more secure and that may endanger his role in the world that he seeks.

[...]

full audio here:

<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121304855>

Ah, life (American life in particular, apparently) is complex and therefore, Predator drones...perhaps emblazoned with the image of MLK.

I see.

And what's more, the speech was so subtle, so precisely reasoned that Aquinas' bones hyper-sonically spun in admiration and oceans of time from now, floating brains will continue to marvel at its perfection.

You can read it here (warning, you might experience a nose bleed as your puny mind navigates its lofty concepts):

<http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2009/12/obamas_nobel_peace_prize_speec.html>

Others, rudely shaken from their hope-a-riffic nap by the reality of continually falling ordinance and charred bodies, seem to be snapping the hell out of it. Why is Vanden Heuvel content with being the Fire Witch? Or perhaps, the jester?

.d.



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