Andrew Sullivan, in his piece in Salon this week on the violence surrounding the Miss Universe contest in Nigeria, takes an opportunity to, one more time, exploit heart-rending tragedy for disreputable purposes: As a stick with which to beat a petty partisan drum.

Animosity and horrific violence between Muslims and tribal, often Christian, groups in Africa has a long history. Including a devastating recent history that Americans of all political persuasions have mostly ignored. And, intrusions of Western commercial culture into the region have sometimes provided the spark.

Dealing with, and working to avoid, such violence, on a smaller but constant scale, was a routine part of my husband's job as a construction supervisor for a major oil company in Sudan in the early 1980s. Which is why his employers so valued his credentials as a former Green Beret with experience of the bloody conflict in the Congo in the 1960s. The violence in Sudan, of course, got much bloodier still a decade later – but still, we Americans barely noticed. Just as few, outside the "paleo-feminist" movement, as Sullivan deems it, have, over many decades, barely noticed the ongoing and equally morally reprehensible violence that Islam routinely visits on those within its own ranks.

9/11 has certainly heightened our awareness, and made us cast a more critical eye at those who have often been our business partners. But the primary reason this recent event has so thoroughly captured the attention of our media, and therefore our attention, is because the Miss Universe contest is a Western media event.

Sex and violence sells. Wrap it in some shallow and ersatz political moralizing with Old Glory for a backdrop, and it sells even more.

Mr. Sullivan's latest contribution to the Punch and Judy Show of Culture War, practiced by our elites to so little good effect for the unity and welfare of our own country, adds nothing to our understanding of the situation.

Because what happened in Nigeria is not about us.

And it is certainly not about an ever-more-debased and self-serving dispute over which wing of the American political spectrum holds the most correct moral attitudes.

In a world grown smaller and more inter-connected, in which American interests extend to even the most remote and dusty villages -- and American commercial culture is ever more on display in those remote places -- we are neither innocent bystanders, stalwart moral saviors, or malevolent provocateurs. We are simply humans going about our business, following our enthusiasms, indulging our pleasures, for good and ill, in a world that has diminished in size, but not in complexity.

This, in a parallel to a phrase of Mr. Sullivan's, is what cultural egotism, decadent culture-war journalism, and ever-more self-congratulatory conservative polemics, like Sullivan's, amounts to: a failure to grasp that freedom is a rare commodity.

And that unless leavened with liberal tolerance, as well as integrity, responsibility and humility, it is no salvation against hatred and violence. In fact, it can be quite the opposite.

It is not their “ hatred of our freedoms” that led to the violence in Nigeria. It is their hatred and intolerance of each other: Their moral arrogance, lack of humility, and the violent insistence of some that their freedom depends on controlling, and extinguishing the freedom of, others.

In other words, their inability and unwillingness to view morality in any terms other than the most partisan.

One of the keys to our free society is freedom of the press -- even to be disrespectful, annoying, blasphemous – even to sow division, encourage rancor, heat up resentment and focus moral hatred. What just happened in Nigeria, has happened here. Bombings and arsons, threats against the families of political officials, the death of a doctor or young receptionist here, the death and injury of bystanders at a public event there, the death and injury of only a few hundred bureaucrats, children and citizens somewhere else. These were immoral acts undertaken, and yes, to some degree incited, in the name of a partisanly defined morality. Hatred of the freedom of others exists even in the land of the free.

To say, as some conservatives do, that they cannot be equated with what others do elsewhere is morally reprehensible. To, over and over again, dismiss such events as solely the result of a lone and alien evil, and dismiss their context, is morally dishonest. The innocent dead are dead, and they must be accountably acknowledged, and the context of their deaths honestly expatiated, if we are to, anywhere, speak with any moral authority at all.

It isn’t envy, as Mr. Sullivan says, that genuinely challenges Americans as we become more and more entangled in this complex world -- where conflicting values, traditions and ancient hatreds still reign. A world that is, in fact, and nonetheless, becoming more and more free.

It is finding the answer to this perplexing question that freedom always poses: How to be both moral AND morally tolerant.

And further, how to relate to the many whose moral values so offend our own, without making war with more than half the world -- or, succumbing ourselves to the morally reprehensible.

If we hope to find the answer to those questions in relationship to the rest of the world, we may have to find it first right here at home.

And, inevitably, we will find it in the context of those liberal values -- freedom balance by tolerance and respect, the desires and passions of the self balanced by obligation and accountability to community -- that Mr. Sullivan, and so many contemporary others, so disdain.

Is The Success of the Conservative Revolution the Beginning of the End of the "United" States?

That is an extreme question, I know. But, I wonder, with Liberalism vanquished, how long this always rather impossible "union" of diverse states, values and interests that we call the "United States" can really hold together?

Someone recently suggested that in raising this question, in light of the Republican consolidation of power achieved in the last election, I am behaving like the Far Right extremists, found in greatest numbers in the West, who have separated themselves from our recent political traditions and refused to acknowledge the legitimacy of a "government" that does not share their values.

But these people illustrate my point exactly.

The far, far extreme of the Reactionary Right demonstrates, in the extreme, one of contemporary conservatism's most important features; it is separatist and uncompromising. It is my way or the highway. It is Right people vs. Wrong people. It is "us," and "them." Me, and my enemies.

Like these extremists, the people in power today also believe that compromise is dishonorable. Tolerance is weakness. Diversity is dangerous. Accomodation is betrayal. Criticism is treason. And, politics is war.

They do not believe the Constitution is a living document; they embrace what they term as "first principles" and reject more than 200 years of liberal, Enlightment impulses and evolution toward ever-expanding equality and democracy. They reject the influence of the Enlightment itself on our founders, and insist this is a "Christian nation" founded on religious principles alone. They reject more than 100 years of progressive influence on our economics and believe we abandoned economic "freedom," the only freedom they recognize -- and only for limited numbers of people -- in the 19th century.

They believe in power, property and established authority -- not the "natural rights" of ordinary men.

They are the political descendents of those who did not want the Bill of Rights in the constitution, and those who flirted with the idea of making Washington "King."

40 years ago, when conservatives first started making their move toward power, they removed the national "We" from our political conversation. There is no "Pluribus Unum" in their philosophy. Only "Unum."

Unfortunately for us, it is the liberal impulse -- the impulse and tradition that today's conservatives have declared as "unAmerican" and an enemy to be destroyed -- toward tolerance and compromise that has kept our rather unlikely union together for more than 200 years.

Furthermore, in a diverse society, freedom, as Michael Ventura said in a recent essay, does not mean you get everthing you want -- it means nobody -- no one person, interest, school of thought, political group, region -- gets everything they want.

Without tolerance there can be no "Pluribus Unum," without tolerance and a willingness to compromise there can be no "Freedom."

And, without the liberal tradition in our politics, we are no longer the "exceptional" nation -- we are just another place where the rich and powerful rule over those who are not.

The conservatives in power today see dishonor in not using their power to get everything they want. Because they believe what they want is the ONLY thing any of us SHOULD want. They don't see their political opponents as fellow Americans who they must work with, and whose diverse claims they must accomodate, instead, they see all of those who disagree with them as a monolithic and "unAmerican" enemy that they must fight against and destroy.

The end of tolerance, the disdain for diversity of opinion, the refusal to acknowledge diversity of interest, IS the end of freedom.

The last 30 years have been, as Ted Kennedy recently said, a Cold Civil War. Unfortunately, one side was, by its very nature, unprepared to see it as war.

The liberal promise of the Declaration of Independence was not born whole as a reality in the Revolution. It wasn't based in what was -- it evolved slowly, and with much resistance, from an idea, based on what could be. American liberalism has always compromised. It has always both accomodated and tolerated its enemies. It has always settled for what it could get today in the hope of getting more tomorrow.

It has done this because to do otherwise would be tyranny -- and a rejection of freedom. And because, at heart, it has always believed, perhaps erroneously, that its impulses were "natural" and the triumph of its principles inevitable.

The notion of separation rather than unity, the notion of politics as "war," the notion of other Americans as "the enemy," of singularity rather than diversity -- none of this is consistent with American liberalism, which has always relied on resistance, protest and moral persuasion, rather than revolution, and compromise and persistence, rather than tyranny and power.

With that tradition vanquished, as conservatives hope to make it, dis-unity and separatism may not be a choice in our future -- it may be an inevitability.

Well, this time, at least, the people spoke.

What they said was that they are afraid. Afraid of freedom, afraid of the world outside our borders, afraid of their bosses' threats to take away their jobs, afraid to stand up for themselves, and, perhaps most of all, afraid of each other.

I don't think you can blame the Democratic "leadership." Or the media. Or, even, the lies the Republicans tell.

People want to believe those lies. Because those lies say you don't have to do anything and it will still be okay. You don't have to understand the world, care about your neighbor or take on the hard job of challenging the boss -- you just have to do the easy job of beating up on the vulnerable.

Personally, if we can't be a courageous, liberal country that values freedom, and is willing to fight for it, in which people accept moral responsibility for themselves and each other in the cause of creating a decent community, I wish we would, at least, become an honestly conservative country in which we are left alone to care for ourselves without the intrusions of government, and free of the bullying of tax payer supported corporate power.

I'd be more than happy to pay no taxes at all, if they'd let me. But, of course, that's never going to happen. Instead, as a small business person, I'm being taxed through the ying yang to support companies like Halliburton and help make people like Cheney and Rumsfeld and W rich. Why? Because a majority of Americans think their jobs depend on making sure the corporate powers that be get everything they ask for.

Middle class people in this country no longer pay taxes -- they pay tribute to their masters.

Who then skip off to some tax-haven to enjoy their plunder without having to pay taxes of their own.

People like Thune and Talent and Coleman and Chambliss, these aren't representatives of the people; they're hand-picked corporate lobbyists. You and I get to pay their salaries -- at least until they prove their mettle for their masters enough to make the really big bucks on the direct payroll.

But don't blame the politicians, because while they may not, with our permission, represent our true, long term interests, they ARE representatives of who we are: People who lie routinely, especially to ourselves, fluff up our resumes, and are perfectly willing to sell our souls, the family farm, the means of production, and our childrens' futures for a little bit of ready cash in the here and now, and a few more drops of oil for the SUV.

The only things most of your fellow Americans want in addition to that is a promise to keep the protestors out of range of the tv cameras, the homeless swept off the streets, and the misfits locked away forever.

They want to see no evil, hear no evil, and tell themselves that the lies we comfort ourselves with have no evil consequences.

Democracy worked.

ANDREW SULLIVAN IGNORES REALITY

“Should I feel guilty because I'm glad he's dead? If I feel like liberal democrats are American traitors, isn't that a logical response?” Posted 10/29/02, on Lucianne.com

What does it mean for a democracy, built as it must be on faith in ordinary human nature and capacity, when ordinary citizens begin to routinely entertain the notion, if not simply assume, that their leaders are committing the foulest crimes, including treason and politically convenient murder?

I don’t know the answer to that important question. But I do know this: Andrew Sullivan, in a recent Salon column, was wrong to state an equivalency between two Internet writer’s examinations of the bitterly paranoid response of some, who loved and admired him, to Senator Wellstone's unexpected death, and the multiple taxpayer-supported investigations of Vince Foster's suicide.

There was nothing “fringe” about speculation that President Clinton and his wife might be murderers. It was indulged in, with more than just a wink and a nod, by well-known public office holders like Representative Dan Burton, and influential media owners and political advocates like Reverend Falwell; people possessing, or routinely welcomed into, the nation’s most powerful and public forums.

Given that reality, Mr. Sullivan may want to revise his assessment of "American reasonableness." As well as re-examine any assumptions he may be harboring about the current state of American faith in our political leaders, or, for that matter, in each other.

Paranoia has been main stream for quite some time now. In fact, during President Clinton’s terms in office, we taxpayers indulged political paranoia and distrust to the tune of 70 million dollars.

Where was “American reasonableness” then? Could it be found dependably in the corridors of Congress and among the sworn officers of the courts? Did it thrive in the pressrooms of the nation’s most prestigious newspapers, or in the green rooms of our major broadcast media?

No. Paranoia stood in the halls of power bellowing down the majority voice of ordinary voters; dashing their hopes for a reasoned debate on the important, pragmatic matters of the day. It shattered civilized notions of privacy, robbed us, as a nation, of our dignity, and turned our politics into pornography. It saw conspiracy, and even treason, behind every human error, and read volumes into every ill-advised word. It turned political discourse into a non-stop expression of moral umbrage by people whose moral authority rested only on celebrity, and photogenic teeth and hair. It made careers and ruined lives. And ultimately it offered us irrefutable proof that our President had succumbed to the same age-old sins of the flesh that have tempted many, including our own neighbors, co-workers and friends. And then he had, as humans have done for eons, tried to hide those private, fleshly sins from public view.

Did the embarrassingly personal and private nature of the sin revealed, in comparison to the scouring public combat of the investigations, reassure us? Of course not. It just once again proved, to all of us, what we are most afraid to acknowledge: that the leaders at the helm of the most powerful ship of state in history are merely human.

Now, with the political shoe on the other foot, Mr. Sullivan wants us, with no more than a few partisan assurances and the issuance of a high court’s judgement, to get our faith in democracy back.

But, for reasons far more serious than Bill Clinton’s philandering, or the Impeachment Manager’s partisan excess, distrust infects the air we breathe. And, because it’s useful, paranoia is still the coin of the realm.

In fact, paranoia and routine hints of conspiracy have infected Mr. Sullivan’s writing just as much as they have infected the broader body politic.

For example, in the very first paragraph of his commentary, Sullivan robs the two writers he has chosen to critique, Michael Nimans, an obscure college professor, and Ted Rall, a cartoonist, of their individuality, and assigns them to some “morally debased” and shadowy “movement.”

In size and power, this is not quite the same conspiracy that relentlessly stalks the forces of goodness and reason in books like “Bias” and “Slander,” yet, for his purpose, it will do.

Sullivan then selectively edits Mr. Rall's essay to, more dramatically, make his point and defeat the writer’s own. Giving us his assurance, with no provided link, that those quoted are “the money lines.”

But, as a discussion of responsibility for Senator Wellstone’s death, the actual money line, it seems to me, in Mr. Rall's essay is this: “Odds are overwhelmingly in favor of a natural or mechanical explanation for the crash of Paul Wellstone's plane.”

Whatever the writers’ criticisms of the Bush administration may be, Mr. Sullivan doesn’t answer them. Nor does it occur to him, any more than it would any other partisan, to try to address and allay the distrust that is these writers’ real subject. His argument, at heart, is one that, without reflection, is trotted out to cover any circumstance -- not that the opposition is wrong or mistaken in the particular, but that, in its general nature, it is morally wanting, false, and “other.”

That is paranoia at work.

And, despite Mr. Sullivan’s sophistication, it is the same kind of paranoia that makes our political conversation routinely absurd, and reflexively dismissive. For instance, by labeling the 52% of voters, overwhelmingly middle and working class, who did not vote for Mr. Bush in the last election as a shadowy “elite,” that does not share “our” values. Or, at best, implying that large numbers, even a majority, of citizens are profoundly foolish dupes of that elite -- that has overtaken our schools, emptied our churches, weakened our resolve, ruined our marriages, and contributed to the delinquency of our children.

It is also the kind of paranoia that can whip normally decorous partisans, many on the public payroll, into a frenzied mob determined to stop the legal counting of votes and discount the democratic voice of other citizens. That can loudly condemn, on no evidence other than self-interest, the judgement of one court as corruptly partisan, and, at the same time, lead another court to abandon its established principles in order to preemptively save us from the potentially messy consequences of democracy itself.

Like Mr. Sullivan, I would like to relegate destructive paranoia to the fringes of our political life, or assign it to only one side of the political bench. But, as a reasonable American I know, from experience and history, that, along with greed, ambition, arrogance, cynicism and, yes, even lust, it abides among the powerful as surely as among the rest of us.

I also know that paranoia, one of the most self-justifying human conditions, has done terrible things, and can be counted on to do them again.

Given the state of the physical evidence in the Wellstone crash, as it is now being reported, whether or not the Senator's death was caused by some intentional human agency may be something reasonable people are unlikely to ever, as a matter of absolute fact, be able to ascertain. As with so many things in life and politics, arguments against or for foul play must therefore ultimately rely, not on material fact, but rather, as Mr. Sullivan quite accurately states, on “reasonableness.”

But what, when fact is missing, or in dispute, does “reasonableness” rely on?

The answer to that is “trust.” Something that, in terms of this administration, despite the unwillingness of Mr. Sullivan and others to acknowledge it, many Americans lost in the wreck of the last election -- and that no amount of sifting through the evidence, or partisan arguments and rationales, can ever recover.

The plain fact is this: Bush partisans aggressively used all the levers of powers at their disposal to stop the vote count in Florida and gain the presidency. And, no matter what those partisans may wish to tell themselves, the people they used those powers against weren’t some conspiratorial elite or degraded minority trying to grab illegitimate power – they were millions of ordinary Americans like me, exercising, proudly, the legitimate, important, and only, political power we possess.

In positing politics as war, Mr. Bush’s party made America the enemy.

And if that isn’t both paranoia and a cause for it, what is?