Killer Klowns
Oscar Wilde in his novel Picture of Dorian Gray created the indelible image of the ageless man whose sins, increasing with age, do not show on his face but on the face of his portrait. It is a pity that nature does not provide us with such a guide so that we could look at each other and easily see what deeds are written there. Politicians are the Dorian Grays of our moral lives. We look at them and know very well that they are corrupt, heartless and self-seeking, but amazingly their faces are blank slates. They ratify a system of hypocrisy and duplicity which we are desperate to preserve, otherwise we too should be caught out. It is a version of the emperor's new clothes but in this case we are staring at a monster rather than a fool and very few have the courage to point it out.
The present scandal over the lane closings on the George Washington Bridge last September and the role that New Jersey governor Chris Christie played in those closings presents us with the newest example of malfeasance in high office. Of what that malfeasance consists is still to be determined. Did Governor Christie actually have a direct hand in the lane closings which were used as a retributive measure against political opponents or did he simply preside over an administration encouraged and permitted to take such steps? There is little doubt that persons closest to Christie and his administration ordered and coordinated the closings, apparently as political retribution targeted at those who would not endorse Christie for governor in the then upcoming elections.
Many people shrug this episode off as simply political business as usual. It is far more serious than that. Corrupt politicians who take kickbacks or sell or trade favors do the public a serious disservice which when taken together weighs the system down with inefficiencies and costs. The closing are of another order of magnitude. Traffic was backed up for hours causing harms that are heartbreaking. Obviously, when the business of life is delayed for thousands of people on the busiest bridge in the United States, there are going to be effects ranging from fairly trivial to the fatally serious. Emergency vehicles were stymied in their movements. Schoolchildren on buses were delayed during the first week of school. A story of a fellow unemployed for a year on the first day of a new job driving into Manhattan arrived to work late. One can only imagine the catalog of woe caused by these delays. Certainly traffic jams are common and when they occur the same results are expected. What should not be expected is that those delays and their melancholy results are caused by those in whom we place our civic trust. But since the people delayed were driving from the New Jersey side to New York, there is the irony that many of those delayed went to the polls the following November and re-elected Christie as their governor, without knowing, of course, he may have had a hand in their discomfiture. Given the nature of the American electorate at this moment, it would not be a surprise if a Killer Klown might not win an election by appealing to those who are so frightened of Taxes, they would gladly embrace Death.
