We're Probably In The Middle 

The Washington Post has an interesting editorial this morning about columnists constantly calling American a theocracy (H/T Michelle Malkin):

I have been looking at myself, and millions of my brethren, fellow evangelicals along with traditional Catholics, in a ghastly arcade mirror lately -- courtesy of this newspaper and the New York Times. Readers have been assured, among other dreadful things, that we are living in "a theocracy" and that this theocratic federal state has reached the dire level of -- hold your breath -- a "jihad."

In more than 50 years of direct engagement in and observation of the major news media I have never encountered anything remotely like the fear and loathing lavished on us by opinion mongers in these world-class newspapers in the past 40 days. If I had a $5 bill for every time the word "frightening" and its close lexicographical kin have appeared in the Times and The Post, with an accusatory finger pointed at the Christian right, I could take my stack to the stock market.

It's an excellent column, and I recommend you go over and ready the rest. I've seen this sort of jihad talk myself... and find it just fascinating. First of all, one can easily relate this back to my post yesterday talking about Insurgents. If we constantly call ourselves by something we're not... just for the shock value... the word simply loses its meaning. Suddenly places like Iran (an actual theocracy) don't look so bad. After all, how bad could a theocracy be if we're in one?

But more than that... it's the fact that both sides are pulling on this particular rope pretty damn hard, and nobody seems to be pointing this out. Once again I refer back to Pat Robertson most recently who said that judges are even worse than terrorists. Why? They're turning us into a godless society of course. But how can that be in a theocracy?

I know... the theocrats are just saying that to scare everybody into giving them even more power. Or maybe it's the atheists who trying to scare people. The reality is that we're somewhere in the middle, with neither extreme liking it. Is it a perfect equilibrium? Of course not. I think there are a few kinks that still have to be worked out. Alright, maybe a lot of kinks. But what is causing those kinks? Is it that we're becoming too godless, or to theocratic? Neither. I would say we have kinks because our government is so big that it thinks it can decide which we should be. The result is that people trample on the rights of others as they get pulled by one end of the rope or the other. That's where we have to work out our kinks... in how we leave people alone.

But the fact that we're having the debate at all, and that we have two extremes pulling just as hard on the same rope will hopefully make sure that we somehow remain in the middle and don't get pulled into the mud. I just hope the rope doesn't break.