A Chilling Message from Deepak Chopra

OBAMA AND PALIN EFFECT
Deepak Chopra

Sometimes politics has the uncanny effect of mirroring the national psyche even when nobody intended to do that. This is perfectly illustrated by the rousing effect that Gov. Sarah Palin had on the Republican convention in Minneapolis this week. On the surface, she outdoes former Vice President Dan Quayle as an unlikely choice, given her negligent parochial expertise in the complex affairs of governing. Her state of Alaska has less than 700,000 residents, which reduces the job of governor to the scale of running one-tenth of New York City. By comparison, Rudy Giuliani is a towering international figure. Palin's pluck has been admired, and her forthrightness, but her real appeal goes deeper.

She is the reverse of Barack Obama, in essence his shadow, deriding his idealism and exhorting people to obey their worst impulses. In psychological terms the shadow is that part of the psyche that hides out of sight, countering our aspirations, virtue, and vision with qualities we are ashamed to face: anger, fear, revenge, violence, selfishness, and suspicion of "the other." For millions of Americans, Obama triggers those feelings, but they don't want to express them. He is calling for us to reach for our higher selves, and frankly, that stirs up hidden reactions of an unsavory kind. (Just to be perfectly clear, I am not making a verbal play out of the fact that Sen. Obama is black. The shadow is a metaphor widely in use before his arrival on the scene.) I recognize that psychological analysis of politics is usually not welcome by the public, but I believe such a perspective can be helpful here to understand Palin's message. In her acceptance speech
Gov. Palin sent a rousing call to those who want to celebrate their resistance to change and a higher vision.

Look at what she stands for:
--Small town values -- a denial of America's global role, a return to petty, small-minded parochialism.
--Ignorance of world affairs -- a repudiation of the need to repair America's image abroad.
--Family values -- a code for walling out anybody who makes a claim for social justice. Such strangers, being outside the family, don't need to be heeded.
--Rigid stands on guns and abortion -- a scornful repudiation that these issues can be negotiated with those who disagree.
--Patriotism -- the usual fallback in a failed war.
--"Reform" -- an italicized term, since in addition to cleaning out corruption and excessive spending, one also throws out anyone who doesn't fit your ideology.

Palin reinforces the overall message of the reactionary right, which has been in play since 1980, that social justice is liberal-radical, that minorities and immigrants, being different from "us" pure American types, can be ignored, that progressivism takes too much effort and globalism is a foreign threat. The radical right marches under the banners of "I'm all right, Jack," and "Why change? Everything's OK as it is." The irony, of course, is that Gov. Palin is a woman and a reactionary at the same time. She can add mom to apple pie on her resume, while blithely reversing forty years of feminist progress. The irony is superficial; there are millions of women who stand on the side of conservatism, however obviously they are voting against their own good. The Republicans have won multiple national elections by raising shadow issues based on fear, rejection, hostility to change, and narrow-mindedness.

Obama's call for higher ideals in politics can't be seen in a vacuum. The shadow is real; it was bound to respond. Not just conservatives possess a shadow -- we all do. So what comes next is a contest between the two forces of progress and inertia. Will the shadow win again, or has its furtive appeal become exhausted? It would be a shame to elect another Reagan, whose smiling persona was a stalking horse for the reactionary forces that have brought us to the demoralized state we are in. We deserve to see what we are getting, without disguise.

Banned Books.... What Next

Greetings my fellow book lovers. As a writer I feel it is my duty to share any and all information regarding what we love .... books. Therefore, when I received the following, I knew that it was my responsibility to pass this along. Believe or disbelieve--just dont ignore this. It is too important.
The following is what I received.
___________________________________________________________

>
> Below is a paragraph from this week's Time magazine article on Sarah Palin:
>
> "[Former Wasilla mayor] Stein says that as mayor, Palin continued
to inject religious beliefs into her policy at times. "She asked the library
how she could go about banning books," he says, because some voters thought they had
inappropriate language in them. "The librarian was aghast." The librarian, Mary
Ellen Baker, couldn't be reached for comment, but news reports from the time
show that Palin had threatened to fire her for not giving "full support" to the mayor."
Mary Ellen Baker resigned from her library director job in 1999.
>
>
> Here is the list of books Palin tried to have banned:
>
> A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
> A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
> Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden
> As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
> Blubber by Judy Blume
> Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
> Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
> Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
> Carrie by Stephen King
> Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
> Christine by Stephen King
> Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
> Cujo by Stephen King
> Curses, Hexes, and Spells by Daniel Cohen
> Daddy's Roommate by Michael Willhoite
> Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck
> Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
> Decameron by Boccaccio
> East of Eden by John Steinbeck
> Fallen Angels by Walter Myers
> Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure) by John Cleland
> Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes
> Forever by Judy Blume
> Grendel by John Champlin Gardner
> Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam
> Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
> Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
> Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
> Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling
> Have to Go by Robert Munsch
> Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
> How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
> Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
> I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
> Impressions edited by Jack Booth
> In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
> It's Okay if You Don't Love Me by Norma Klein
> James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
> Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence
> Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
> Little Red Riding Hood by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
> Lord of the Flies by William Golding
> Love is One of the Choices by Norma Klein
> Lysistrata by Aristophanes
> More Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
> My Brother Sam Is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher
Collier
> My House by Nikki Giovanni
> My Friend Flicka by Mary O'Hara
> Night Chills by Dean Koontz
> Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
> On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer
> One Day in The Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
> One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
> One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
> Ordinary People by Judith Guest
> Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women's Health Collective
> Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy
> Revolting Rhymes by Roald Dahl
> Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones by Alvin Schwartz
> Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
> Separate Peace by John Knowles
> Silas Marner by George Eliot
> Slaughterhouse- Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
> Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
> The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
> The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
> The Bastard by John Jakes
> The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
> The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
> The Color Purple by Alice Walker
> The Devil's Alternative by Frederick Forsyth
> The Figure in the Shadows by John Bellairs
> The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
> The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
> The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
> The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Snyder
> The Learning Tree by Gordon Parks
> The Living Bible by William C. Bower
> The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare
> The New Teenage Body Book by Kathy McCoy and Charles Wibbelsman
> The Pigman by Paul Zindel
> The Seduction of Peter S. by Lawrence Sanders
> The Shining by Stephen King
> The Witches by Roald Dahl
> The Witches of Worm by Zilpha Snyder
> Then Again, Maybe I Won't by Judy Blume
> To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
> Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
> Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary by the Merriam-Webster
Editorial Staff
> Witches, Pumpkins, and Grinning Ghosts: The Story of the Halloween
Symbols by Edna Barth

Danger Ahead . . .

Below, my girl L.A. Banks aka Leslie Esdaile, gave me permission to share her letter that she fired off to the Philadelphia Inquirer.




This whole Palin nomination thing triggered a writing fit to the Op-ed pages of the Philadelphia Inquirer. The day after I listened to her speech in horror (and the pundits praise of this kook), I really had to take flaming pen in hand. The only thing that made me feel better was Gloria Steinem's rebuttal that Gwen sent today (Thank you Gwen)... see Steinem's letter below... but mine is attached. So, the attachment is something different--check it out, but I wanted to copy the text of what Gwen sent me, too. Write y'all... make your voices heard, this is sooo bogus I cannot even believe it's happening -- worse yet, it is DANGEROUS.

Much Love, Leslie

Last night I watched, appalled, as Governor Palin completely distorted the facts, used smokescreens to keep the media from legitimately inquiring about her checkered political past, and then launched into one of the most vicious and unnecessary attacks by a person at her “supposed level” as a Vice Presidential candidate that I've seen in a long time. I sat mouth agape in outrage wondering if anyone else was witnessing the RNC circus in the same way.

As a woman, I am offended... as someone who has worked in grassroots organizations I am offended, and as an American I am offended. How can John McCain and the Republican Party bring out a candidate who is so small-minded that she would use her power of office to make her ex-brother-in-law lose his job? Is that someone you want to take the 3AM call about a potential war, is that the person you really want to be a heartbeat away from leading the nation--a person so vindictive and pedestrian in thinking that she’d also call for the resignation of a librarian for not supporting her desire to ban books? John McCain picked Palin, does that seem like sound judgment to you? I have hard questions for the old guard of the Republican Party, but even harder questions for women voters. Do we really want to roll the clock back to rebuff science and start teaching kids one religion's concept of the origins of mankind while we trash the periodic table, as well as trash the evidence of evolution because it suits a select, hard core, right wing group?

Or maybe we'd be more comfortable just claiming that any war we've decided to engage in was "God's will and task," and then turn a blind eye to the fact that within that very same Bible Palin beats at the prime time podium it says to love one's neighbors. So now we’ve devolved into fundamentalist politics at the highest office, the very same echo of madness we so abhor in terrorists?

From ignoring global warming as a manmade reality that can be addressed, to trying to BAN BOOKS (people are you listening?), to supporting incredibly stupid and expensive legislation--like the now infamous "bridge to nowhere," this woman is a disaster. I have to go back to her attempt at banning books, though, in this rant. I'm an author and I am shaking my head. Do people really want to put someone in the White House, give her control over the education of the largest most formidable country in the free world, when this person wants to ban books, and was so vicious that she even tried to fire a poor librarian? That theme of Palin throwing her weight around is becoming a refrain. Things that make you go, hmmm... Given that we’re all under the Bush Administration’s Patriot Act, which has taken away too many civil liberties to count here, would you want a potential Commander In Chief who is given to “snits” when you disagree with her, and like an old Mafioso, would possibly take your job if you crossed her?

Then, when Palin was challenged by the legitimate media, right off the bat she played the "woman card?" If Obama had played the "race card," the country would have been all over him. Hilary didn’t go there—maybe that was because she had a platform, had some REAL experience, and had enough substance that she didn’t have to. Hmmm. So, I guess now, if during the debates, if Senator Biden goes after Palin, as is typical debate strategy, he'd then be labeled a chauvinist pig?

Ladies, as a fellow feminist and someone who highly respected Hilary Clinton's journey, DO NOT FALL FOR IT. We as a nation have been had. This woman, Palin, is out of step with reality, has a serious vindictive streak, and is being used as McCain's shield. Right now, the Republican platform is weak. It is as old, ailing, and doddering as its Presidential nominee. They don’t respect true women of power and authority. What tells me that is the number of excellent Republican female candidates they by-passed. This isn’t a historic moment; this is a media ploy, a game. Don’t be bamboozled. As a last minute desperation attempt, they pulled a right wing extremist, married to big oil, soccer mom out of the farthest hinterlands they could find and threw her to the public, knowing that there were disgruntled Clinton supporters. But Palin is no Hilary Clinton, and we voters with a little common sense know that. We also know that, if McCain is going to continue to support the Oil Industry lobby and drill in Alaska, it helps to have Alaskan politicos on your ticket waving the flag. You’d want those folks to get the benefits of your office while you destroy pristine natural resources, I suppose.

And, since the men opposing this atrocity can't go after Palin without some whining backlash about fairness coming from the GOP, let me chime in with millions of other women who were not fooled last night by saying, "Are you insane?" Or, how about this, "We ain't buying it, lady!" There, I’ve said it, you can count my voice in, because I will be loud and vocal, and since I’m a female I can’t be anti-feminist, can I?

What outrages me so about Governor Palin even being allowed to grace the podium has nothing to do with her chaotic personal life. On that I agree with Senator Obama, who elected, as always (and has throughout the campaign) to take the high road. What disturbs me to my core is that, in this twenty-first century, I want my daughter to have a choice, ESPECIALLY if she is God forbid raped or God forbid, ever fell victim to incest. I want my daughter to get a REAL education, which means reading opposing points of view, understanding diversity, and yes, being fully versed on the way her body works. I want that smug, self-proclaimed Washington outsider, Palin, to take note of the fact that, I'd rather, at this juncture, take my chances with some folks who know their way around the Capital than with someone who is plugged into BIG OIL -- literally married to it like a lobbyist. And, for the record, getting elected as a Senator of Illinois, a huge, densely populated state, is quite different than being Governor of a place that has more wildlife and Caribou than people, let’s be real. Wishing you were something doesn’t make you that, hon. Let’s give credit to the Obama/Biden ticket where it is due. Only a couple of months ago, you (Palin) were quoted in the media as saying you didn’t know much about Vice Presidential responsibilities and didn’t know what a VP did. The sound-bite was stunningly that of an airhead, but that’s just my opinion.

Bottom line is, I want my kid to be able to look up to the Oval office and see people there who have integrity, not a bunch of liars and scam artists who threw the Constitution under a bus for the sake of gaining political office.

Lastly, Governor Palin, I wouldn't tout your "executive decisions" too loudly as a campaign platform, given they were foolish and mean-spirited decisions. The record doesn't help you, sis.

Angrily submitted by
L.A. Banks, Philadelphia