THE CHRONICLE indulges less often than it once did in open and generalized contempt of Texas. Nick Anderson is a Pulitzer winner, however, and so . . .
. . . cannot be stifled ashe speaks truth to the hoi polloi.
Last week, for instance, he took on, as hypocrites, Texans with the temerity to oppose a bigger welfare state and fiscal bankruptcy for our kids and grandkids.
This came in a cartoon that shows a bunch of rabid Texans throwing tomatoes at Washington, D.C. We know they are Texans because they are standing on a map of God's country and we know they are rabid because, as is so common among Texans, their teeth are bared and their eyes wide with fury.
"WASHINGTON SUCKS!" says sign No. 1. "WE DON'T NEED YOU," adds sign No. 2.
Then Mr. Anderson makes his charge of hypocrisy: One protestor holds a sign that says, "BUT SAVE OUR SPACE PROGRAM!!"
Fair enough. Have a laugh.
Many folks, perhaps most old folks, don't see that they are big-time welfare recipients, through Medicare, Social Security, and other federal programs, large and small. When these folks oppose the growth of federal spending in the abstract while demanding more money for themselves, that is -- if not exactly hypocrtical for folks who grew old relying on the promise of these programs -- at least problematic.
When liberals charge hyporcrisy against conservatives, however, that is a pose, not an argument. Under Mr. Anderson's theory, a person who takes a federal dollar is then obliged to do what liberals devoutly wish all citizens to would do: shut up and get out of the ruling class's program to extend the rails of the federal gravy train to the ends of the earth.
But just because the federal government has already enacted programs it cannot pay for is no reason to enact more programs it cannot pay for.
Furthermore, that approach would, rigously applied, lead to this outcome: Only liberals could take new federal money (though I suspect conservatives would still be permitted to pay taxes).
Taking federal dollars while opposing the further growth of government is like taking an income-tax deduction -- a "stimulus" deduction, for instance -- that the taxpayer opposes on principle. One plays the game acccording to its rules. One does not, however, give up the privilege of trying to change the rules.
(Contra, see Elmer Kelton.)
Notice that Mr. Anderson's cartoon does not specifically mock conservatives. It generally mocks Texans, for being insufficiently grateful to Washington, D.C.
This cartoon is as almost as bad as "Sinkhole," May 9, 2008, that showed Texas as a black hole into which all of the nation's wealth was being sucked by high energy prices. "News Item: Huge sinkhole forms in Texas swallowing everything in sight . . ."
Later last week, Mr. Anderson did another of his regular anti-death-penalty 'toons ("Capital of Punishment") with his regular Texas-bashing angle.
The panel is largely filled by a "Welcome to Texas" road sign with a death-chamber gurney standing in for the "T." The left side of the sign features a Texas flag. The right bears this text: "Execution Capital of America!! (PLEASE DON'T ASK IF ANY MIGHT HAVE BEEN INNOCENT)."
That sign, alone, makes a stong point, but Mr. Anderson ratchets up his message with an image of an incoming automobile -- a family moving here from California, perhaps? -- in which mama, papa, and a backseat munchkin are seen looking at the sign in puzzlement or, perhaps, horror.
The theme, common at the Chronicle, is that outsiders regard Texans variously as simpletons, hypocrites, or barbarians, and that -- more to the point -- the outsiders are right.
The death penalty is a tough issue, morally, politically, and legally, and Mr. Anderson and the Chronicle are entitled to their opinion. This is not the place to debate it.
My point is that while opposing it, they show no respect for the democratic processes under which the death penalty was enacted and through which it is maintained, the moral and policy arguments for the death penalty, the protections built into the legal system to give the benefit of the doubt to defendants, or Houstonians and Texans who sincerely disagree with the Chronicle's point of view.
Mr. Anderson is enormously talented, but he belongs in one of the failing newspapers on the East or West Coast, not in the failing newspaper on the Third (and Better) Coast.
For his undisguised contempt for his readers and fellow Texans (most of whom do not live in $800,000 swankiendas), shame on him and the newspaper he rode in on.
Comments