In the spirit of the moment, something is eating at me, big time. Although it's sparked by the Imus fandango, it's not specifically about him, and I have nothing worthwhile to add to Imus-gate. Rather, his public disgrace is just the springboard for this other sensation that is sweeping over me, a feeling not that far from despair. (Hey, i'm a Jew, after all. Or should i say a hook-nosed kike from Hymietown? Whatever.)
Why is it that the only kind of drama that the country and the media -- belly-to-belly in a grotesque jitterbug -- can really and truly be obsessed by is soap opera? Lest you think there's a whiff of condescension (as opposed to despair) in that observation, let me explain. Take yesterday's news, for example: those two Baghdad bombs -- the bridge bomb being every bit as enlightening and frightening as the Parliament bomb -- are what set me off. Hence, the questions:
Why does the "national conversation" (itself, a nauseating bit of politico-mediaspeak) never quite reach critical mass on something like that?
Why does the "n" word (in this case, "nappy") set off the chain reaction that television is broadcasting (and fomenting), while the "s" word (in this case, "surge") enters the national lingua franca unexamined and virtually unremarked? (No defense of Imus -- good riddance to him. i never got why he was such a big deal all along.)
Why, though, does ugly, racist speech unleash a tornado, while little things like death, destruction, spurting blood, and crunching bones prompt barely a breeze?
In short, I have no gripe with Imus being cast as the real 'ho, nor do i think it's not a story. Race, after all, continues to be a raw nerve of American life. But why this and not the other? Why, for example, is nobody wondering aloud about how many American troops will die between the 12th and 15th month of their new deployment?
Is it because we're all still recovering from the horror of some dogs dying after eating poisoned pet food?
The mind reels.