Evil Talk

The first step to controlling your world
is to control your culture.
To model and demonstrate the kind of world
you demand to live in.
--Chuck Palahniuk

Dr. Evil: Why must I be surrounded by frickin' idiots?
--Austin Powers, International Man of Mystery (1997)

Truth, justice and the American Way
--Superman's creed
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An NPR commentator displayed a stupendous lack of awareness yesterday in a discussion of Obama's Nobel Peace Price acceptance speech. He explained that Obama used the rhetoric of combatting evil -- the rhetoric of his predecessor -- in response to Europeans who see America as an interloper in world affairs.

As Europe is generally far more secular than the U.S., Obama's explanation of combating a questionable intangible must grate (see Religious America, Secular Europe?, Peter Berger et. al.) The idea of a nation embarked on a crusade against evildoers can only fan their fears. Who is Obama kidding?

To a non-fundamentalist, talk of fighting evil is crazy talk. This may go over well from Rev. Wright's bully pulpit, but it does not play well to rational thinkers.

Foreign policy should not be based upon good versus evil. We have not come a long way in eight years, baby.