A Third Way

Much has been made of Obama leaving Bill Clinton to conduct a presidential presser. It’s even worse than it appears: Both Obama and Clinton are effectively endorsing Bush (tax cuts), fueling the conviction of some that there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the parties.

Both parties are under assault. It makes no difference, Democrat or Republican. The American version of British royalty must fall. They no longer offer viable alternatives. All either one can say is NO. There is no leadership on either side. Our nation is running on empty.

Now, here comes the tricky part: What will replace them? The tea parties? Unlikely. They have the spirit, but lack organization. The hard-left commies? No. It goes against the grain of everything our country stands for. Independents? No. Everyone is in mortal fear of them ever since the Perot debacles in the 90’s.

What may be needed is a ‘third way‘. Those who may be familiar with the term’s connotations (especially on this site) will bristle at this. It, like most terms used for political purposes, has been corrupted to favor one side over another. Even in its preferred usage, it refers to a compromise between the Left and the Right - hence, Center. None of this will work. A ‘third way’ must shun both Left and Right, and start from scratch. It must have an appreciation for what has made our nation great. As such, its approach must be practical. Its creed must be to preserve and protect. It’s thrust must be problem-solving.

If and when such a force were to arise from the shambles of our current political landscape, all this will be embodied in a leader. We will not fail to recognize him (or her). Current leadership has strayed from doing what’s good for America, concentrating instead on what’s good for the party. The Obama - Bush - Clinton paradigm has spent itself. There are only two ways in which a third way can assert itself: One is for a leader to appear; the second is by outside events conspiring to forge a ‘third way’ from our existing reservoir of the myopic and the timid. At this point it looks like that the proverbial Zen slap-in-the-face is what's needed.

It is interesting to note that every one of our enemies possess that which we lack: identity. It is identity that fuels their passion. We must display an equal or even greater passion in order to defeat them. They are growing stronger. We must lead by example. We must learn the definition of ‘winning’ - not whining. I understand that’s a tall order for a people who still have to learn what the definition of ‘is’ is.

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Leaders And Jailers

Leadership should not be difficult. The Bible says that people should obey their leaders as to make their leadership not a burden to them. A leader is in essence a tube through which a higher power speaks. The people will be proud to serve for they know that he serves them as well. They will be confident that he has their best interests in mind.

Leadership is a gift - an inborn skill, like that of ‘boys who can hit a bird with a stone at thirty paces. They have not learned it; they can simply do it; it did not come by effort, but by magic or grace. The stone in their hand flies off by itself; the stone wants to hit the bird and the bird wants to be hit.’*

How far we have fallen!

Leaders who complain about how hard it is to lead are not leaders; they are jailers who must constantly watch their backs. They preside over chaos and discontent. Indeed, they make use of these in order to promote the fiction of their leadership. It renders them ever more isolated, like planets spinning out of their orbits.

‘There must seem to be a center in the vast network of associations. If one were at that center, one would know everything, could see all that had been and all there is yet to come. Knowledge must pour upon the one who stands at that center as water runs to the valley and the hare to the cabbage. His word would strike sharply and infallibly as the stone in the sharpshooter’s hand.’*

I used to admire Jerry Brown. I had read somewhere that he studied Buddhism and practices Zen. As such, I thought of him as possessing some measure of wisdom. Now I see him (and others) as just another in a long line of political hacks.
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*excerpts taken from Hermann Hesse’s ’The Glass Bead Game’ and translated roughly from the German to fit the context of this writing.

Traitors In Our Midst

What does all this tell us? It doesn’t tell us anything we don’t already know: We’ll swing Republican in the next election cycle. The Dems have overreached and frightened the people. So, while we catch our breath and wait (and make fun of the Dems) – just like we waited and made fun of Republicans the last time around - it might do well to take a few moments to consider what happens next.

We’ve already seen this movie before. The next scene should not come as a great surprise. Republicans too will be shown as dangerously inept and cruel-hearted. Every unfortunate child in the country will be afforded a page in The New York Times to shout its contempt the GOP; for capitalism. Obama will have been forgotten, as it is not the habit of Republicans to blame predecessors by name or party affiliation.

In fact, Republicans will be sorely tempted to outdo the Democrats in hopes of stemming the barrage of mainstream editorial and academic criticism. By doing so, they will earn the contempt of their base to no particular advantage. Two (or four) years later, it’s Democrats again; and so on and so on…

Luckily, there is a God. Clio will not allow people to go rushing from side to side on Titanic’s deck in perpetuity. At some point (with all due respect to Al Gore) she will put an iceberg in its path. This will come in the form of an outside event. The most likely (at this point) could be a coordinated attack on the dollar. It could also be war breaking out in the Middle or Far East, choking off our energy supply. Such events (and a host of others like it) could of course also conspire to happen all at the same time.

In any case, it would take on the function of a kind of Zen slap in the face, telling us that we have to pull ourselves together to survive to haggle about racial quotas and gay marriage another day. No doubt, it will signify our acid test to determine whether or not we even deserve to be called a nation anymore. Leaders will emerge. Will they be up to the task? When the chips were down, they always have been in the past. No reason to doubt their resolve and competence.

One thing they will have to face is the disposition of the traitors in our midst. In recent times unbelievable suggestions have been openly floated; history re-written, deleted or changed; constitutional principles ignored; heroes besmirched. This cannot be allowed to continue. For the very reason that our survival will be at stake, I can guarantee it won’t.

Osama To Obama

Osama (to Obama) seems not to know that America is a polyglot society. He does not know which part he is addressing. He is either ignorant (or impatient) of the facts on the ground. He does not know (as Obama asserts) that a nation is not a speedboat; that it cannot be turned on a dime. Has he been unaware of America's incremental distancing (itself) from Israel; from its incrementally building hostility towards it? He may think that Turkey has successfully made the turn – and it has at that. Osama forgets that the U. S. is not Turkey; that it has a long history of obligation, innovation and freedom (that acts as ballast). Neither does Osama understand elections, and the damage they can do to a chief executive.

Osama addresses Obama to taunt him; in the same way I sometimes address the American people, to open their eyes - that Zen slap in the face - to warn, not necessarily of what will happen (I am essentially an optimist, though some will no doubt dispute it), but to warn of what could. This is not pessimism; it is to motivate; to get them off their asses and take a look around.

Osama is prodding the POTUS to double down on Israel; to deliver that scalp. In turn, he promises that we will be allowed to live free from fear. Now isn't that the odd 'stick and carrot' routine?

A Child With a Pink Ball...

A child with a pink ball is running and laughing out loud. A few steps behind, her parents are locked in a muted but bitter dispute. All three are heading down the steep, narrow path leading to the Japanese stone garden. Upon reaching it, the child bounces her ball across the meticulously raked sand.

Her father shouts and runs to catch up with her. He grabs her roughly from behind and spins her around to face him. Then, he slaps her hard with his open hand. The child staggers and falls.

She is stunned and silent now, whimpering softly to herself at the edge of the garden; while her mother retrieves the ball, leaving the imprint of her footsteps in the sand.
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Kyoto, Japan (1976)
There is one garden in particular which struck my eye and imagination. It is the 500 year old rock garden at the Ryoanji Temple in Kyoto. It was constructed by a landscape artist in accordance with the principles of Zen Buddhism.

The scene, briefly, is this: a rectangular sea of small white pebbles in which 15 rocks of varying sizes are arranged in groups. One is supposed to sit quietly and meditate. The mind struggles for comparisons. Depending on the vividness of one's imagination, anything is possible. Given that one sits there long enough, the mind will at some point cease its struggle and see the garden simply for what it is: a semi-random arrangement of stone.

This final stage is difficult to achieve, even under the best of circumstances. And here at Ryoanji, conditions are far from perfect. Loudspeakers drone on intermittently. Hordes of tourists are continually either arriving or leaving. Their faces are infinitely more arresting than this simple study in serenity. And the eye and heart are so easily nudged away from the disciplines required to...
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In the mid to late ‘70’s, I discovered an exact replica of the garden referenced above at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden in New York City. The following is an excerpt from my notes:

I sit down at a point just to the left of center near the front edge of the platform. The two young people behind me glance up from their pamphlets. The boy returns to his reading presently, but the girl's eyes continue to linger over the somber shades of the garden.

I am startled when I realize that it is precisely from this same perspective that I had viewed the original garden in Japan. As then, my eye glides naturally to the open area of crushed rock directly in front of me. (None of the major configurations of stone interest me for the moment.)

The bright bed of finely fractured stone blinds me to detail at first. But soon, the parallel patterns - drag marks left by the points of a rake - begin to emerge throughout my field of focused vision. The patterns appear to be shifting under my steady gaze, almost as if something were about to materialize in this vast illuminated field.

If light is energy, and energy is indeed merely a manifestation of mass, then there might almost be enough of the stuff here to create something from light alone. Perhaps this explains the five islands of rock and moss which are only now beginning to intrude into my consciousness. Perhaps someone long ago - or was it I, myself, even - had stared long and hard at the brightness and had organized it into stone; from there creating the rest: moss and ants and men with rakes...

The people behind me are stirring. They get up and head for the exit. The girl looks back at me before rounding the corner. A pale smile flickers across her painted lips.

Finally, just two and a half minutes before closing, I do manage to attain some sense of unity when a slight movement distracts me. The static perfection of the garden becomes momentarily unhinged and I recognize my opportunity. My senses respond to a single sound: that of a dry leaf scratching across the white surface of raked stone, propelled by a hesitant breeze. Its brittle points leave no mark on the stone (the way the rake did). Soon it will have reached the wall where, in time, it will disintegrate to become the stuff from which new living shapes are spawned.

The guard has entered the garden. He walks silently across the platform. His size twelve shoes leave odd-shaped patterns of moisture and mud on the wooden surface. I remain unaware of his approach. The guard puts his gnarled hand heavily on the younger man's shoulder. I start, and turn to look up into the old man's tired eyes.

"I must lock up now, son," he says. "Do come back tomorrow."