CULTURAL REVOLUTIONSrnTHE MEDIA told us that “critics warnrnbombing alone won’t budge Milosevic,”rnso when bombing alone did budge him,rnthe media told us ’twas a famous victory.rn”It worked!” gushed Mara Liasson of NationalrnPublic Radio as the G-8 peace accordrnwas announced in early June.rn”Clinton is vindicated, and Gore is lookingrngood again… . Clinton was right!”rn”Bombing alone” broke the Serbianrnresistance, and little wonder. An elderlyrnman in Belgrade, Aleksandar Stamatovic,rntold an Associated Press reporter, “Thatrnagreement was the only choice. Therernwas no other—they were killing us.” It isrnutterly amazing the results you can getrnwhen you’re willing to bomb civiliansrnand their power grids and water suppliesrnindiscriminately. Why bother withrnmoral cover? After all, it worked!rnBetween 5,000 and 30,000 peoplernwho were bothered by the allies’ conspicuousrnlack of moral cover gathered at thernVietnam Veterans’ Memorial on Saturday,rnJune 5, then marched to the Pentagon.rnThey should have marched tornFoggy Bottom, where this operation wasrnincubated for many years before the militaryrnwas ordered to drop it down thernhatches. The misdirection of thernmarchers was symptomatic of a more seriousrnproblem with the march, and by extensionrnwith (what’s left of) the oppositionrnto the current regime in this countr}’.rnThe largest contingent at the marchrnrepresented hard-bitten, old-guard factionsrnof what was once, long ago, thernNew Left: Workers’ Worid Part}’, SocialistrnWorkers Party, Fourth International,rnand so on. In other words, the “blamernAmerica first” crowd, for whom Kosovo isrnjust Addendum #999 to be tacked ontorntheir long-drawn-up indictment of racist,rnsexist, homophobic, capitalist, imperialist,rnmilitarist America—folks who havernhung in there long enough to see theirrnwildest, darkest charges finally coiue truern(even a stopped clock . . . ) . These losersrnwere politically marginalized years ago,rndepasses par I’histoire, and won’t everrncatch up.rnSerbs, other Slavs, and a few Creeksrnwere the next largest contingent, as bloodrntold, followed by pacifists and greens, andrnfinally a motley crew of hippies andrnpunks. Around such a coalition no vitalrnmovement can be built in this countr’, asrnwe have seen again and again. The media’srnportrayal of the Vietnam War andrnthe anti-war movement on TV forcedrnU.S. withdrawal from that conflict, butrnthe media aren’t playing it that way now.rnThis time, in the endgame of nations,rnthe media are all wide, dewy eyes andrnblissed-out smiles and breathy, bubblyrnvoices like a commercial for term-life insurance.rnPower politics don’t raise a singlernfamous-anchor eyebrow. Machtrnmacht Recht—it worked! Nice guys finishrnlast—Clinton was right! We’re in therngame, playing hardball with the big boysrnin the major leagues!rnIn the film noir Body Heat, RichardrnCrenna portrays a rich and evil businessmanrnwho sneers to small-time shysterrnWilliam Hurt, “There are two kinds ofrnpeople in the world—a s, and thosernwho are willing to do what it takes.rnWhich kind are you?” (I will not rent thernmovie again to render the lines exactly.)rnCan’t you just hear Clinton saying somethingrnsimilar to Vince Foster during thatrnlast long phone call the night beforernVince lost what it takes to stay alive? Andrnisn’t that really the distinction betweenrnthe lords and the little people?rn”The best lack all conviction, whilernthe worst / Are full of passionate intensit)’,”rnYeats sensed on the eve of World WarrnI. Many years earlier, Nietzsche foresawrnthe emergence of men beyond good andrnevil who would run roughshod over arnworld tenderized by generations of Christianrnmorality. Kosovo is immoral! —Itrnworked! Oppressive! —It worked! Exploitative!rn—It worked! Unjust!—Itrnworked!rnNATO’s global managers have fullyrnrecovered from the “sickness” of Christianity,rnas Nietzsche would put it, and arernabove and beyond any appeal to ethics orrnmorality or any law you care to cite, spiritualrnor temporal. Moral constraints, likernpaying taxes, are for the little people. Effortsrnto shame them into being nice willrnnot work. Bombing them would workrn(bombing, mirabih dictu, works like arncharm on anything!), but they seem torncontrol all the bombs now that TimrnMcVeigh’s been put away.rnThere are two kinds of people in ourrnshrinking, massifying world: the bombersrnand the bombed. Therefore, shouldn’trnwise and caring parents devoutly strive tornplace their children in the bombers’rnranks? In a worid with many Kosovos yetrnto come, isn’t it dangerous to weaken andrnconfuse a child with moral qualms?rnClobalism means that Earth’s six billionrnwill virtually all be reduced to little people,rninfinitesimal people; and it meansrnthat your child will have only about a onernin three million chance of being elevatedrnabove “target” statLis.rnSauve qui pent.rn— MariaTi Kester CoombsrnOUR CULTURAL DISORDERSrnweren’t caused by the Supreme Court’srnprayer decisions —I’ll admit it. The implicationrnthat school prayer, by fortifyingrnYoung America, might have forestalledrnthe rampage at Columbine High School,rnand those rampages preceding it—well, Irnwouldn’t push the matter too far, that’srnall.rnStill, it’s nice to see the American CivilrnLiberties Union, prissy proponent ofrnforcible church-state “separation,” rebukedrnby Joe and Mary Doaks. It happenedrnthis spring at a rural high school inrnMaryland. Following a kind of popularrnuprising in support of prayer, the ACLUrnbecame righteously indignant and spluttery.rnJust my kind of uprising!rnOrdered to keep prayer out of thisrnyear’s commencement exercise lest therndelicate sensibilities of a lone senior bernaffronted, sniff, sniff, the school lamelyrnagreed. The ACLU was helping the student:rna towering presence for one localrnschool board to take on.rnThen, during a moment of silence inrnthe ceremony, someone in the audiencernbegan intoning the Lord’s Prayer. Hundredsrnjoined in. Officials on the stagernjoined in. It was like the long-sufferingrnFrench patriots in Casablanca joiningrnPaul Henried in drowning out DiernWacht am Rhein with the Marseillaise.rn”Thy kingdom come, thy will berndone” —whether the ACLU likes it orrnnot. So arrest us! the audience, in effect,rnwas saying. Feed us to the lions!rnThe senior whose theological scruplesrnconcerning prayer had provoked thernwhole episode stalked out angrily, laterrnspending some time in a squad car afterrnhe was denied readmission. (The guardsrnsaid they were afraid he would cause arnscene. Hadn’t he already?)rnAt ACLU headquarters, brows werernfurrowed. “The real loser,” said spokes-rn6/CHRONlCLESrnrnrn