The Coming Desperate Political Upheaval
Dear Ted:
All right, I could understand that you'd hate the
test-ban treaty for the GOP's reasons, but to say that we can't put the nuke
genie back in the bottle because we act badly in groups and that all pacts as a
rule fail sounds like circa-1952 cold-warrior rant. The facts don't support
that. Nukes have been around since 1945, and since the World War II, not one
has been fired in anger. That's an amazing record for a species that can be
counted on for the worst behavior all the time. The treaty didn't alone arrange
for that. It was a part of humanity's desire to step back from the brink and
cool the madness. Unless that idea has salience in the future, we can kiss our
sweet planet good-bye. It'll be a bit of bad news cartoonists won't be able to
draw about. Instead of trashing this treaty because it doesn't do everything,
we ought to be working on how to go further in the direction of international
control of all nukes. Einstein said that humanity doesn't have a prayer without
the advent of a world federal government. The whole process of killing the
Earth (which is our big issue every news cycle,
regardless of what the suits tell us) won't be brought to heel without strong
international agreements ... and I'm not referring to Mercedes and Chrysler.
Who will lead this movement? Will they be successful? How far will they get
before we see we're really doomed? We'll find out deep in the next century. It
really will be crunch time. A time of desperate political upheaval, calling for
a focused and educated world population. But let's leave that to the kids and
enjoy our happy fin de siècle with Jesse Ventura, Rudy Giuliani and
his Blessed Virgin Mary, and JonBenet Ramsey (still dead, huh?).
Ted, you seem itching to get down to cases on the
subject of cartoons and satire. OK, Spiegelman aside, whom do you love and whom
do you hate? And why?
By the way, do you want to hear my Phil Harris theory
of politics?
Peace now,
Steve
