One of the nice things about having been away from the blog for a while is that you find you're less caught up in the day-to-day or hour-to-hour shifts of opinion, which might mean that you're better able to see the big, long trendlines developing.
Case in point -- the long slide of the Bush administration. From a remove it looks like this: post-9/11, a bunch of us are willing to support them because a) we're staggered and b) whatever else we think about them, they seem competent. That sense of their competence erodes slowly in Iraq -- then gets wiped out altogether during Katrina week. The result? A new story -- we shift from "competent" to "flailing." And events that we would have considered separately before -- like Cunningham -- now become part of the picture because they fit the picture. And on the other hand, all the backdrops and all the uniformed audiences in the world can't help set things right because the fundamental story has changed. A year or a year and half ago, those staged events would have looked like more evidence of mastery and control. Now they look like part of the desperation.
Times are, to coin a phrase, changing. The whole cluster of sensibilities -- executive leadership, command and control, the market system -- that used to be a support and a comfort, now seems disconnected from a negative, uncertain lived life. Yesterday in Slate, Edward Jay Epstein wrote about Hollywood's tendency to vilify business. Why do they do that? For want of more challenging targets? Maybe -- let's not underestimate Hollywood's gift for superficial emotionalism and simplification. But there's also this -- an increasing sense that all those business values that we staked so much on haven't actually done us a lot of good. If there's a rise in communitarianism, post-Katrina -- and there will be -- then entrepreneurial individualism is going to suffer. It's a long time since I've agreed with Krugman, but in this case I do. A worrisome sign.
On Sunday afternoon I went to see Syriana. There's plenty wrong with it. I'm not a fan of strong conspiracy theories, the kind that require lots of collusion in smoke-filled rooms. No one can believe in active conspiracies who's tried to arrange a conference call that stretches across more than one time zone -- people just aren't that competent ("what do you mean, 2 o'clock Central?") I lean toward weak conspiracies -- conspiracies of neglect, conspiracies of compromise, conspiracies that happen on their own when people can't stand up to the corrosive effects of money on the table. Those reservations aside -- I was struck by the size of the crowd and the amount of energy in the theater. This is not exactly mainstream entertainment, but it packed the house. Granted that 10023 isn't the heartland -- and it'll be interesting to see how the film does when it opens there on Friday -- but there really seemed to be something in the air that hadn't been present before, even here on the lower Upper West Side. Anti-Bush, of course, but also anti-business, anti-corporate, and strongly in favor of getting to the bottom of what's wrong -- and something seems decidedly wrong -- with our quality of life.
A year ago my friend Joe Apocalypse kept telling me that "the center is going to move left." I didn't believe him at the time -- but now, he's got me wondering. Joe, bless his dark heart, has been right before.
So step lively, and watch the changing times.
Remember Seattle? Anti-business, anti-corporate, so what's changed? perhaps the anti-forces that were mostly silenced since 9/11 have found the environment safer in which to whine again? Feh.
If the left had a credible vision, voice and plan, it would again be the center. But it doesn't.
Welcome back.
Posted by: Al B. | December 09, 2005 at 03:21 PM
Oh, it's not that the sentiment is new -- only that it seems to be getting more traction outside its core audience. The extreme viewpoints are a constant -- the shifts happen in the center. That centrist thing again. A theory in the making?
And re: the multiple posts, remember -- technology is not your friend.
Posted by: Alan G. Ampolsk | December 09, 2005 at 05:23 PM