MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop
MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
Sooner or later, the line gets crossed and people can take no more. Nicolae Ceausescu wrote his own death warrant on the day in December 1989 when he decided to summon the people of Bucharest for just one more compulsory rally where they would have to stand, screaming with inner boredom, and clap their hands to order while he spoke for as long as he liked. I remember thinking, of the Egyptian "elections" of last fall, that President Hosni Mubarak would have gotten more respect for simply canceling them than for pretending to hold them in the insulting way he did. Something similar applies to the "green" rebellion that followed Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's most recent plebiscite: Everybody already knew that things were "fixed," but this time the mullahs didn't even trouble to pretend that they were not fixed. It's possible that people will overlook outright brutality sooner than they will forgive undisguised contempt.
[Hitchens]
Comments
I am would be constantly amazed at the cluelessness of those at the top of other countries if it were not for the how clueless nearly everyone in Washington is.
What is worse is that more and more they remind me of the gangland thugs of Chicago on the 1920s and 30s. It is amazing how the populous continues to fall for their sales pitch. Like the guy who comes back over and over to buy the same snake oil even though it makes him sick when he drinks it. He is sure that THIS TIME it will cure his gout.
by cmaukonen on Tue, 02/01/2011 - 5:21pm
Hitchens' subtitle asks, "When will dictators learn not to treat their people like fools?"
My guess is that will happen about the same time Hitchens learns.
by EmmaZahn on Tue, 02/01/2011 - 5:38pm