THE GRIM SECULARIST
February 17, 2004

by Joe Sobran

     It's always amusing when people carry their 
arguments to absurd lengths. For example, in the debate 
over whether the works of "William Shakespeare" were 
written by William Shakspere of Stratford or by the Earl 
of Oxford, Shakspere's partisans feel they must show that 
their man's lack of formal education wasn't a serious 
disability.

     Thus Professor Stephen Orgel assures us that 
Mr. Shakspere "received in the Stratford grammar school a 
formal education that would daunt many college graduates 
today." Well, maybe, considering that George W. Bush is a 
Yale alumnus. But Orgel neglects to mention that we've no 
record that Mr. Shakspere attended that school at all, or 
that he owned a single book, or that he was even able to 
sign his own name!

     Orgel goes on to assure us that "Oxford was not 
particularly well educated." No? He was educated at the 
royal court by the best tutors in England, studied at 
Cambridge University and the Inns of Court, and spoke and 
wrote fluent French and Latin.

     Yet to hear Orgel tell it, you'd think Oxford would 
have been better equipped to write HAMLET if he'd 
attended the Stratford grammar school!

     In the same spirit, Republicans are now arguing that 
John Kerry's war record is unimpressive -- he only 
received three lousy little wounds! -- whereas young 
George W. Bush showed "courage" by training in 
"dangerous" military aircraft.

     Only one conclusion is possible: Kerry volunteered 
for combat duty in Vietnam in order to evade serving in 
the Alabama National Guard!

     Not long ago, "Republican Guard" meant Saddam 
Hussein's notorious security forces; now it means where 
today's war hawks spent the Vietnam years.

     Kerry's candidacy, the increasingly ugly occupation 
of Iraq, and the revelation (for anyone who was deceived) 
that Saddam Hussein had no weapons that could threaten 
the United States -- all these have conspired to undercut 
what Bush thought would be his greatest strength in the 
2004 election: his record as a "war president."

     Bush never looked more pathetic than when flailing 
vainly at Tim Russert's softball tosses in their recent 
interview. He kept repeating his final remaining 
justification for the Iraq war: that Saddam was a 
"madman" who was somehow "dangerous" -- even without the 
weapons Bush had formerly insisted there was "no doubt" 
he possessed and was poised to use against us.

     Bush so richly deserves to lose this year's election 
that it would be a sweet pleasure to say Kerry deserves 
to win it. Unfortunately, he doesn't. He would merely 
offer a different set of evils.

     A few months ago, though it already seems longer, 
the Democrats, alarmed by Bush's appeal to Christians, 
were flirting with religion. Even Howard Dean was 
advertising his spiritual life, in the realization that 
God has a good reputation among Southern voters.

     None of that false piety for Kerry. He represents 
the grim secularism his party stands for -- a party 
organized around the principle that abortion, or 
feticide, the killing of human fetuses, is a "basic 
right." You can hardly even call him nominally Catholic. 
He doesn't bother with the old dodge of being "personally 
opposed" to what he politically supports. Unlike Bill 
Clinton, he doesn't quote, let alone carry, a Bible. For 
Kerry, religion is such an irrelevance that even lip 
service to it is unnecessary.

     The Democrats have abandoned even moral ambiguity 
about abortion. They regard it as a good, pure and 
simple. No opponent of abortion can think about seeking 
the party's presidential nomination. Admitting the 
slightest reservation about it would be fatal.

     Of course Bush attaches no urgency to abortion 
either. He lets on, to his Christian supporters, that he 
is more or less against it; and unlike Kerry he won't 
appoint overtly pro-abortion people to the Federal 
judiciary, hoping that this will be enough to satisfy his 
base, who by now have learned not to expect much.

     But Kerry is an aggressive secularist, as his 
positions (we can't call them convictions) on various 
issues show. This is no longer regarded as very 
scandalous or alarming. It's taken for granted. What else 
would you expect from a Massachusetts Democrat who 
habitually votes with Ted Kennedy and Barney Frank?

     This is what the two-party system has come to. If 
Kerry is the alternative to Bush, we must think of 
alternatives to voting.
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