20 January 2003

A Day On

It is the celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King's life today and we have a national holiday. I hope we consider the legacy of non-violence, and the remarkable success that Dr. King had in overthrowing the appalling system of American Apartheid. The doctrine of non-violent civil disobedience developed by Mahatma Ghandi and refined by Dr. King is the perfect offensive weapon against reasonable opponents who respect the rule of law. The Brits could not make Ghandi back down with all the might of Empire, and all the dogs and fire hoses in Selma only made American realize the intrinsic dignity of The Movement. In thinking about what is going on in the world today, I think Saddam Hussein should have taken a page out of the Montgomery Bus Boycott play-book and got a lot further than he did in all his regional wars and slaughter.

The saying is that we should consider this day not a day off, but a day on, to make some good work in the name of the martyr to civil rights. I don't know if I can do anything significant to the wide world this day, but I will remember.

I lay in my bed, awake at five, to see if it is a day on for the BBC.

It is.

Vicki Barker is back from holiday, and it is a busy already out in the wide world. She cataloged the chaos already underway, very much a day on internationally. In London, the Special Branch started the week early staged an early morning raid on the Finsbury Park Mosque and two adjacent buildings. They said the action was continuing action in the roll-up of people linked to the deadly poison ricin laboratory discovered in a Wood Green apartment two weeks ago. The mosque is the base of Sheik Abu Hamza al-Masri, leader of the group Supporters of Shariah, or Islamic law. They want Shariah to become the law of the land for Britain, one of the more looney examples of the xenophobic immigrants we have welcomed to the bosom of the West. The law enforcement community is even more energized since the murder of Constable Stephen Oake, who was stabbed after the arrest of three suspects in Manchester. Other prominent worshippers at the mosque include shoe-bomber Richard Reed, fai! led flight school student Zacharias Moussaoui and his two more successful brethren who seized the airplane headed to the Pentagon on 9-11.

Vicki did not say whether Sheik Masri was among those arrested, or what sort of activity was happening in the mosque at two in the morning. Official sources noted that the assault utilized battering rams, ladders and helicopters shining brilliant white lights on the scene. 150 law enforcement personnel participated, and they said they took pains to avoid the sacred precincts of the facility. Britain has arrested about 200 suspects since Sept. 11, most of them North African and predominantly Algerian. It is an interesting link between the largely Arab terrorists of al Qaida and the other ethnic Islamic groups. Many of the detained have been released without charge, though the number in confinement has surged since November.

A familiar voice from the wilderness also chimed in over the weekend. Osama drafted a rambling 26-page letter calling on the Islamic world to stop fighting with each other and get with the program against the Crusader coalition attacking Muslim nations. I am interested by the plea for unity, and hope that there is some sort of schism at work in the ranks of the terrorists. Or maybe Osama is getting disoriented. It is probably hard for him out there in the wilderness. I imagine things are uncomfortable for him under whatever rock he is hiding, listening apprehensively for the whisper of a Predator drone or the whoosh of an incoming Hellfire missile. I wonder if he ever considers that his Jihad would have been more successful if he had studied Gandi and Dr. King?

It's a day on in Baghdad, too. There is some embarrassed shuffling of feet at the Foreign Ministry. Some flunky failed to report another four chemical warheads which inconveniently turned up on unannounced inspection. "Aw, shucks," said an Iraqi spokesman, "they weren't filled, you know how hard it is to keep all this bugs-and-gas stuff straight." Hans Blix, the UN Chief Weapons Inspector, was stern with them. He was kind enough to reference the Security Council and not mention the looming legion of American and British forces just over his shoulder.

Saddam should remember the Bus Boycott and Rosa Parks. The 101st Airborne protected her, not the other way around. Listen up, Saddam, there is still time. I heard that the bus on which Ms Parks made her courageous stand had been purchased for $400,000 dollars. It had been stripped and used for a tool shed in Alabama. It is going to be refurbished and displayed in the Smithsonian Institution. It will be a crown jewel of non-violence when it is complete, the symbol of what a single person can do against the might of authority when her cause is right. It echoes across cultures and times. Remember the student in Beijing who stared down the tank column approaching Tienaman Square? The CNN clip of that magnificent fool, his name lost to history, is the essence of unarmed heroism. For him, at that moment, his life held less value then did the cause of freedom and human dignity.

Of course the Chinese went on and slaughtered the innocents in the square, just as Bull Conners and his henchmen let loose the dogs and water cannons on the marchers. But perhaps someday they will refurbish the tank that halted before the student and put it in a museum in The Great Hall of the People as a lesson in courage and dignity.

As for me, I failed to change the world or even made a significant symbolic act. I wasted an entire afternoon watching football and cataloguing digital pictures in my archive, looking at places I had nearly forgotten I'd visited. In the background. two teams that fly the Jolly Roger as their team totems clawed their way over their opponents and into Super Bowl XXXVII. The designation of the Super Bowl, in Roman numerals, is the last known application for that numbering system.

The Tampa Bay Bucs blew out the Eagles and despite a gallant performance, the Tennessee Titans went down in the Black Hole in Oakland. The Raiders will face the Bucs in the Super Bowl, Pirate versus Pirate, and let the hype begin. This is the first trip to The Show for the Bucs, and a repeat long denied for the Raiders. The Raider mystique beat Steve McNair, the Buc quarterback who played his heart out. I was pleased by the quality of the game and the outcome. I have always liked the Raiders, who have been known as a haven for has-beens and never-weres, malcontents and un-coachables. This Raider team is known as too old to win, just like George Allen's Redskins of yester-year, and for them there is no collective tomorrow. They do it now or it will never happen for most of them.

I acknowledge that, but am a Raider fan for this Super Bowl because the team is laden with alumni from my university. Charles Woodson, Heisman Trophy winner from Michigan and maybe the best defensive back in collegiate history, is a Raider. Marcus Scott is a wide receiver and in the backfield is Tyrone Wheatley, traded from the Giants last year to the Island of Misfit Toys. Another Wolverine, Scott Dreisbach, was a back-up Oakland quarterback until last year, and I know he is kicking himself for getting dropped from the roster, one year shy of a AFC Conference Championship ring and a shot at the Big Casino. He once connected for 203 yards and four touchdowns against Michigan State. The official motto in Oakland is "A commitment ot excellence," but I think the old Malcom X quote is more appropriate to the Raiders: "By whatever means necessary."

There is a dynamic tension in our recent history. Peaceful disobedience and righteous indignation at injustice are always in conflict. Patience in the face of evil is always hard. Charles Woodson and the Raiders may be a perfect symbol for America in this year of very forward foreign policy. I'm sure they are working down at the West Wing today, and for the Pentagon it is very much a day on, though probably not the way Dr. King would have done it.

And I'm sure it is a working day at Iraqi Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Office of Bugs and Gas. I'll bet Saddam is working today on what ever he intends to do around the time of Super Bowl XXXVII. I may paint my face for the big day, but whether it is silver-and-black, or just plain desert camouflage is entirely up to him. I'm pretty sure I know which way this is going, but Saddam ought to take a day off and think about it.