killing an arab

When I first heard that President Bush’s summer reading included Albert Camus’ The Stranger, my first thought was, “Yeah, right.”

My second thought was, “He chose it because it’s really short.”

But it didn’t hit me until last evening—when I was at the Loser’s Lounge battle of the bands: The Smiths vs. The Cure—what the most ridiculously obvious reason was: it’s a story about a guy who kills an Arab for no reason!

(And no, the Losers didn’t have the guts to perform that song—wimps!)

And, yes, that should have occurred to me without a musical cue except. . . except. . . except I still don’t believe Bush really read The Stranger! And what good does it serve to have his spinners tell us that the Prez’s summer reading included a book about an empty soul who frittered away his youth, picks a fight with Arab strangers, and later callously shoots one of them for the heck of it? To continue the sad metaphor, while sitting, devoid of remorse, in a prison cell, awaiting execution, he can think of little else beyond the cheers he might receive as he’s led to the gallows. Is this what the White House wants us to think about? Is this the image of George W. Bush we are supposed to take to bed at night?

It’s like some Nietzschean homeopathic cure (no pun intended). Tired of George Bush, true believer? Try George Bush, existentialist hero.