Sunday Sophistry: Kerry, Terrorism and Nuisances
Or
Marc Racicot Channels the Spirit of Jacques Derrida

Just when you think they can't stoop any lower, the Bush camp up and surprises you. CNN reports that Kerry recently said the following in an interview in the NYT Magazine:

''We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance...as a former law enforcement person,I know we're never going to end prostitution. We're never going to end illegal gambling. But we're going to reduce it, organized crime, to a level where it isn't on the rise. It isn't threatening people's lives every day, and fundamentally, it's something that you continue to fight, but it's not threatening the fabric of your life.''

A perfectly sensible thing to say, of course. In fact, consonant with some things Bush himself has said. But the Bushies, perhaps taking a cue from those "Bible Code" folks, long ago discovered that if you take the words someone says and rearrange them...well, you can win elections!

Marc Racicot, a man not known for a superabundance of intellectual honor, claims that Kerry said that:

"...the war on terrorism is like a nuisance. He equated it to prostitution and gambling, a nuisance activity. You know, quite frankly, I just don't think he has the right view of the world. It's a pre-9/11 view of the world."

CNN also reports that:

Republican Party Chairman Ed Gillespie on CBS' "Face the Nation," used similar language."Terrorism is not a law enforcement matter, as John Kerry repeatedly says. Terrorist activities are not like gambling. Terrorist activities are not like prostitution. And this demonstrates a disconcerting pre-September 11 mindset that will not make our country safer. And that is what we see relative to winning the war on terror and relative to Iraq."

Of course it does no good to argue with these people because none of them believe what they are saying. One would have to be dimwitted in the extreme--far more dimwitted even than Gillespie or Racicot--to interpret Kerry's words as they allegedly do. Or you'd have to have an exceptionally tenuous grasp of the English language. This is obvious and intentional distortion. Lying, that is. Lying about what Kerry said, and about the clear intent of his words. But just for the sheer pleasure of it, let's treat the talking point in question as if it were to be taken seriously.

If Kerry thought that the war against terrorism were a nuisance, then he would not say that we need to get back to a place where they're a nuisance. See, if he thought they were a nuisance now, that wouldn't make a lick of sense.

It's almost too obvious to explain, but here goes: Kerry is saying--as Bush has said--that it is unreasonable to expect to eradicate terrorism completely. Like prostitution and gambling, it will always be around; the only reasonable goal with regard to any of these crimes is to make them rare. To undertake to eliminate them completely is quixotic. So, in this respect, terrorism is like gambling and prostitution. But there is nothing in anything that Kerry said to suggest that he believes the absurd proposition that terrorism is no more dangerous than gambling or prostitution--nothing to suggest that he thinks that it is currently a mere nuisance.

I suppose if Kerry had said that he wanted to reduce pollution to 1975 levels Racicot and Gillespie would accuse him of thinking that it was 1975...

The thing about these people is--as they demonstrate again and again--they are willing to undermine the very rational presuppositions that make democratic government possible. This is--as I have often pointed out--the Postmodern presidency, in which truth takes a back seat to ideology and reason to mere persuasion. First the administration's positions on global warming, stem cells, etc. made it seem that they were channeling the spirit of T. D. Lysenko. But now, perhaps, it is the recently-deceased Jacques Derrida: anything can mean anything, actual words and clear intent be damned.

[Hey, whence this outbreak of Republican Francophilia, anyhow?]