Suburban Guerrilla

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Empathy

Dec 23rd, 2006 at 9:31 am by Susie

I once made the analogy that in the imperialism business troops equal money, so perhaps I’m not in the best position to criticize. But I was trying to sound cruel and heartless for sarcastic effect, while Condi appears to have been utterly sincere — every bit as sincere as when she described Israel’s air assault on Lebanon as the “birth pangs” of the new Middle East. (How’s the baby doing, Condi?)

Maybe the simplest explanation is also the most accurate. Maybe Condi is just a cold, heartless bitch — as morally numb and sociopathic as her office husband. But these kinds of comments could also simply reflect the incredibly sheltered life Madame Supertanker appears to have led, especially since she entered the pampered, intersecting worlds of the academic, national security and corporate elites.

There’s a story from her childhood of young Condi practicing the piano in her comfortable middle-class home in Birmingham’s “black bourgeois” neighborhood as her father — himself no great friend of the civil rights movement — stood guard over the house with a shotgun while Bull Connors’ men blasted the demonstrators with firehoses downtown. I have no idea whether the story is true or not, but it certainly resonates with Condi’s current public persona, which is — not to put too fine a point on it — detached to the point of catatonia.

Does Condi understand how many deaths, mutilations and wrecked lives lie behind her “investments” and “birth pangs”? Undoubtedly. Does she care? I don’t know. But, from a public diplomacy point of view, it would behoove her to show some sign that she has an emotional connection to the rest of the human race — or, if she doesn’t, to at least pretend that she does.

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3 Responses to “Empathy”

on 23 Dec 2006 at 10:18 am1yank in london

I’ve got a mate who actually fancies her if you can believe that. I suspect however, that in the deep, dark and truely frightening recesses of his mind there are Nazi uniforms, stockings & suspenders and possibly handcuffs involved.

Happy Christmas!
on 23 Dec 2006 at 11:14 am2section9

Actually, some basic fucking historical research on Billmon’s part would have helped. Condi’s dad stood guard, with a rifle, in his neighborhood, with other black homeowners, because the nightriders of the Ku Klux Klan were burning crosses and engaging in terrorism in the early 1960’s. This was in the period in which Condi’s close friend, Denise McNair, was killed by a terrorist bomb at a church in her neighborhood.

Billmon has no idea what he’s talking about, as usual.
on 23 Dec 2006 at 6:37 pm3Susie

Actually, I didn’t include all the links Billmon had in his original piece. They’re there now.