I did keep a straight face when he said it. Definitely pompous, but was it more elite than arrogant, or the other way 'round? He laughed about how small the website was and mocked himself with such aplomb that I knew in my bones he actually had not made it up ... and that it was no laughing matter to him at all.
So after the goodbyes and the I-had-a-nice-times were over and he (who will have to remain unnamed) and his party were safely out the door, I skipped my usual put everything that's out of place either into the dishwasher or the hamper routine and instead beat feet and fingers to the net. They are called Democratic Globalists, it seems. Kumbaya, world court, universality of the rights of all to to be equally proud of being ordinary, or ignorant and impoverished because capitalism isn't a global calling and democracy is just another word for nothing else to lose, and one must give equal credence to say, the philosophy of Iran or Venezuela because who can say their concepts are not as valid and as relevant as those of the materialistic and provincial Judao Christian screed that is the heritage that spawned those ugly Americans?
WHO CAN SAY IT? I CAN. American Exceptionalism leads the world for more than a few reasons. Some of the most easily thought of are by- products of the integrity and sanctity of individual human life and its flowering in a free and democratic society. From those precious individuations come innovation in art and science, jurisprudence and technology, but more important, more rudimentary, more inside the fiber of our existence is a moral courage, a belief that we are intrinsically good and that ultimately good overpowers evil, whatever the guise -- whether it is a Civil War to be fought or a War on Poverty -- or a race to the moon or a race to eliminate HIV Aids. Where there is a challenge and a moral calling, where there is need for excellence, where having heart counts...that's where you'll find Americans.
Democratic Globalism -- I wish it had been a joke. It seems, however, to comprise a set of existential tendrils that tangle crooked paths through post modernism and have become an apologia for the average and for the politically correct disintegration of European/Canadian society. Too bad. Well, at least I know it wasn't the pizza making me sick to the stomach!
