It's been ingrained into my brain since a time I don't even remember anymore. Peace on Earth and goodwill towards men. This is what the holidays mean to me. Not in a "this is what I did over the Christmas holiday" essay sort of thing, but as a big old spirit of goodness that spreads from young to old, black to white, and rich to poor.
The holidays are a time to celebrate and reflect. It's the end of a year, and a gathering of nations. For a short time, everyone gets into the spirit somehow. And maybe this is just my American naiveté, but it seems like the whole world is cured of evil, if for only just a few moments.
Peace on Earth and goodwill towards men.
Not this year.
We've given up all of that for petty bickering and bombs.
I was at work on Saturday, a half hour or so before deadline, when Speaker-elect Livingston turned everyone on their ears and resigned (but not right away--he's gonna wait until after this whole impeachment thing ends--possibly giving him a way to get back in if necessary). We had to change the front page.
And then the things everyone knew were going to happen happened. The Prez was impeached. The Republicans cheered, patted each other on the back and talked about defending our "great constitution." The Democrats went on a short walk to the White House and denounced everything as partisan politics of the worst kind. Everyone else caught the end of the Jets/Bills game.
This is the time of year when everyone attends a lot of parties. Christmas parties, Kwanza parties, Hanukah parties, graduation parties, end of the school year parties, birthday parties, New Year's parties, watch out for the evil Y2K parties, and many more. It's so nice to see all your friends, give everyone hugs and beer and then settle in for a long discussion about how the people up in Washington are scumbags.
But we have to talk about it. There's nothing like a glass of eggnog and a thorough examination about the chances of censure or full impeachment trial in the Senate. Thanks politicians, I didn't want to talk about the new words my Furby learned in the last week anyway.
I didn't question the timing of the bombing on Iraq. I was a little surprised we actually went ahead with it, but I didn't question it. The administration and military have been wanting to do this for a while. I knew when a couple of the inspection teams were turned away last week something was going to happen. And something did. We bombed the hell out of Iraq for a few days.
A few days.
It's not a war. It's a couple of news cycles. Suddenly that murder-suicide the local TV news pounded into the ground (Transients worried about the Y2K computer problem? They should be a little more worried about eating.) doesn't seem so bad.
I knew TV and the Internet was giving everyone a shorter attention span, but this is ridiculous.
Peace on Earth and goodwill towards men.
It was interesting that no one was up in arms about the U.S. starting a war during our own holiday season. There was a tremendous rumbling about bombing during Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting. Maybe our officials in Washington thought they would start the Iraqis fasting a few days early.
All of this has upset my own holiday celebrations. After a hard night of drinking on Wednesday night, I woke around 5:30 to a ringing telephone and an aching stomach. The phone was work (they wanted me to come in on my day off to help with the paper's "war" edition). The stomach was sympathy pains for the Iraqi people--or maybe a bad combination of cheap beer and sublime Samuel Smiths. I didn't go in.
But everything has stopped for now. The Senate will no doubt wait until the new year to do anything about the Impeached President, and we've ceased bombing Saddam and the rest of his people. Hurrah, hooray, we've still got four shopping days till Christmas.
Peace on Earth and goodwill towards men.
This year it rings hollow, kind of like the tossed off "Have a nice day" from every customer service representative at every super discount specialty store in every business building cluster. Maybe if I say it one more time it won't feel like a lie.
Peace on Earth and goodwill towards men.
No dice.
Matt Worley also believes in the golden rule. When it's politically viable.