hugo chavez is slated to become the next twenty-first century undead...(kim jong il beat him out for first but it's still a podium finish )...bolstering an iffy secular religion with a mummy is a longstanding tradition among teleologists of many stripes...american presidents have jesus to protect their fundamental political and philosophical tenets ( pretty much rooted in something vaguely described as "market mechanisms"...a sort of catch-all designation for anything that buttresses the position of the hegemonic culture )...with a population so deeply inculcated with consumerist ideals and so willing to go into debt to bolster "consumer spending" and the fear of a vengeful, old testament jehovah sending then to eternal hell for being frugal they have little need of mummies ( although i am fairly sure ronald reagan is a sort of ideological mummy that bogus politicians and the ever loathsome pundits call on when the herd begins to rumble...and john mccain may be a mummy...hard to tell )...mummies have their uses...that's clear...but they can also become an embarrassment...stalin didn't last long next to lenin ( and there are repeated calls to bury the original undead most years ) and you have to wonder how the chinese will continue to reconcile the dichotomy of an embalmed mao and his legacy of red guards and cultural revolution with an increasingly capitalist economy...ho benignly validates vietnamese sweatshops in the name of a socialist revolution...anything can be perverted by capital...earth day as a marketing tool? "green" doesn't have anything to do with protecting the environment...everything humans do is deleterious to the environment...but that's another blog...the point is any hegemonic culture will engage in the most bizarre behavior if the elites that control it believe it will reinforce their rule...even creating a cult of the undead...there is no dignity in politics...no fucking ethics either.
