[Mb-civic] And the Winner Is: Not Washington - Eugene Robinson - Washington Post Op-Ed

[William Swiggard]

And the Winner Is: Not Washington

By Eugene Robinson
Tuesday, February 28, 2006; A15

Why is it that Washington often seems so out of touch with the rest of 
the country? Maybe it's because people here are so busy taking 
themselves seriously that they don't have the time, or the inclination, 
to go to the movies. Just look at this year's contenders at the Academy 
Awards.

When homosexuality is raised as an "issue," which is the only way 
anything gets raised around here, politicians in the nation's capital 
tend to fall into two camps: those who invoke Sodom and Gomorrah in 
flights of demagoguery and those who suddenly realize they have pressing 
appointments elsewhere.

Yet the leading contender for the Oscar for best picture is "Brokeback 
Mountain," a love story about two gay cowboys -- not Village People 
"cowboys" prancing up and down the streets of some godless big city 
where "values" means nothing more than a half-price sale at a fancy 
boutique, but real cowboys who live in the flyover, red-state American 
West. (Okay, it's been noted by some that actually they herd sheep, but 
they're definitely what most of us think of as cowboys.) Another nominee 
for best picture is the biopic "Capote," whose subject is a great writer 
who happened to be flamboyantly homosexual. And Felicity Huffman is a 
contender for best actress for playing a preoperative transsexual in 
"Transamerica."

No, the prominence of gay-themed movies this year doesn't mean that 
America has reached a consensus on homosexuality when it is framed as an 
issue. Battles over marriage, domestic partnership, survivor benefits 
and the like will doubtless continue for many years. But Hollywood, 
which doesn't make movies to lose money, seems to have decided that most 
Americans will neither faint dead away nor riot in the streets if 
homosexuality is openly depicted and discussed. So there's no need to 
hurt yourselves scrambling for the door, senators.

Another axiom in Washington seems to be that this great nation can 
survive anything except an open, honest, nuanced discussion of race. 
Somehow we think we can talk about policies, such as affirmative action, 
without talking frankly about racism, prejudice, immigration, fear, envy 
and the other nitty-gritty factors that define race relations in this 
country.

But we can't get anywhere if we insist on confining our debate on race 
to anodyne truisms and regular celebrations of Black History Month. 
"Crash," another best-picture nominee, surveys the complicated, 
mine-strewn racial landscape that Americans traverse every day. Only 
along the banks of the Potomac is policy debate considered an adequate 
substitute for human experience.

Here in Washington we reporters tend to act as if any question about any 
aspect of the war on terrorism -- arbitrary detention, secret prisons, 
domestic spying -- has to be phrased almost as an apology. "Pardon me, 
Mr. President, but I was wondering, could you please be so kind as to 
explain once again why interrogation techniques defined by international 
agreements as torture are not, in fact, torture? If you're too busy to 
answer, I'll understand."

Watching Edward R. Murrow go after Sen. Joseph McCarthy in the 
best-picture contender "Good Night, and Good Luck" should remind us how 
to ask a proper question -- and also how even a struggle against a 
menacing foe, such as communism, can become a witch hunt if good people 
stand by and do nothing.

And maybe seeing "Munich," the final nominee for best picture, would 
point out to everyone in Washington something President Bush seems to 
forget, or at least pretends to forget. He talks about the war on 
terrorism without mentioning that terrorism is just a tactic -- a 
horrible, unacceptable and evil tactic, to be sure, but just a means to 
an end -- and that you can't wipe it out with bullets and bombs.

This is hardly the first time the movies have had a "Hello?" message for 
Washington. I remember how stunned many people around here were when Mel 
Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" became a runaway hit, despite 
scenes of unwatchable violence and dialogue in an ancient language no 
one speaks. That time, of course, mainstream Hollywood -- which tends to 
be liberal and secular -- was even more surprised. A few politicians, 
mostly Republicans, had a sense of the breadth and depth of the 
fundamentalist Christian movement and have been able to use that 
knowledge for political gain.

This year, if the Oscar nominations are any guide, it's the Democrats 
who ought to be in a position to absorb valuable political lessons. 
America is a complicated place filled with minorities of all kinds, 
including gay people. Celebrating America means celebrating our 
differences. Standing for America means standing for American 
principles. War, even when it's justified, has to have peace as its 
ultimate end.

Really, folks, we should get out more.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/27/AR2006022701042.html?nav=hcmodule
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