Dancing in the Streets

Trey Smith

If you really believed that Obama was a lesser evil — 2 percent less evil, as I believe Digby once described the Democrats in 2008 — if you really did find the drone wars and the White House death squads and Wall Street bailouts and absolution for torturers and all the rest to be shameful and criminal, how can you be happy that all of this will continue? Happy — and continuing to scorn anyone who opposed the perpetuation of this system.

The triumph of a lesser evil is still a victory for evil. If your neighborhood is tyrannized by warring mafia factions, you might prefer that the faction which occasionally doles out a few free hams wins out over their more skinflint rivals; but would you be joyful about the fact that your neighborhood is still being tyrannized by murderous criminals? Would you not be sad, cast down, discouraged and disheartened to see the violence and murder and corruption go on? Would you not mourn the fact that your children will have to grow up in the midst of all this?

So where is the mourning for the fact that we, as a nation, have come to this: a choice between murderers, a choice between plunderers? Even if you believe that you had to participate and make the horrific choice that was being offered to us — “Do you want the Democrat to kill these children, or do you want the Republican to kill these children?” — shouldn’t this post-election period be a time of sorrow, not vaulting triumph and giddy glee and snarky put-downs of the “losers”?
~ from The Reality of the “Lesser Evil” Is This Child Dead Enough for You? by Chris Floyd ~

Yes, I quoted from this penetrating article in my last post and here I am doing it again. But this second important point goes hand-in-hand with the first.

The jubilation of supposedly reluctant Obama supporters belies that supposed reluctance. Instead of expressing worn out sighs at his election "victory," people are dancing in the streets. They are acting as if a paragon of virtue has retained the coveted Oval Office when, in truth, one thug beat out another.

There was no victory on election night to celebrate. All that happened is that the perceived lesser evil prevailed over the perceived greater evil. Given two unpopular choices, Americans chose one.

That's a reason to bow your head in sorrow, not dance around like you won the lottery!