Aldonza or Dulcinea

Of the Broadway Musicals I have been privileged to see, one of the standouts was Man of La Mancha. The lyrics are inspirational, none more so than as Don Quixote sings with the low born Aldonza. To him she is Dulcinea, his queen, his lady, his true love. She begins with as poor a self image as one can imagine, a self described whore. By the time they finish singing his belief in her has transformed her. She becomes Dulcinea. Don Quixote may have been tilting at windmills, his name has certainly entered the lexicon as champion of the hopeless cause, but I think deep down inside most of us are pulling for him. Dulcinea may not exist but the idea of her can make the world a better place.

I’ve been thinking about Dulcinea recently as two very different views of America and her place in the world begin to crystallize. One view is of a sick society in desperate need of reform on issues ranging from foreign policy to energy to racial relationships. The other holds to a more traditional view of an America that has met every challenge in the past and whose best days are ahead of her. I suspect most Americans fall somewhere in the middle, but with a pronounced tilt toward optimism, proud of our country. That’s why we were shocked at Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s anti-American tirades. It’s also one reason we hold much of the mainstream media in such low esteem. The constant drumbeat of what’s wrong with America is offensive.

That’s been especially true of their disgraceful attempt to paint the war in Iraq as a catastrophe, and to produce one in the process. As the situation on the ground steadily improves, they have shifted focus to the lack of political progress, and as Iraqis make said progress, they ignore it, mindlessly repeating the mantra of proclaimed chaos. This week the news should have been that Iraq has now satisfactorily met 15 of 18 congressionally mandated “benchmarks” as assessed in the required quarterly report from the White House. Brit Hume correctly predicted on Fox News that only his channel would make it a headline. All three broadcast networks ignored it, as did the New York Times and the Dallas Morning News. The Associated Press carried the story but with an inane lead about how the next US president will have to deal with the painfully slow pace of the Iraqi government. Democrats who stipulated the benchmarks in the first place now dismiss them as false standards. These people have neither shame nor intellectual integrity. That they have the effrontery to call themselves patriots adds insult to injury.

Speaking of patriotism, this week we were also treated to the spectacle of a major presidential candidate insisting that he would not tolerate having his called into question. That he found it necessary to defend it suggests he recognizes it has already been called into question. It’s going to take more than a flag pin on his lapel to address those doubts. His explanation that his patriotism is of a different and more sophisticated kind doesn’t help either. We know a patriot when we see one, and we recognize unpatriotic rhetoric when we hear it.

It is the energy issue however that I expect will prove the most divisive in this election cycle. One side sees an America that has been bent on destroying the earth and only drastic revisions in our lifestyle can save it. If it requires major economic disruption, that is a price that must be paid. The other sees an overreaction, a technological issue not that different from problems we have overcome before. As fuel price shocks cascade through one industry after another we will have to decide if we are more comfortable with Dulcinea or Aldonza.