A Day in the Life of Chaos

Gore Vidal This week we lost an intellectual giant. Gore Vidal died.  Love him or hate him there was no question he had a mind larger than most.  From literature to politics and opinion Gore Vidal had a talent for the artistry of the mind.  He was a devout liberal who believed in a progressive society and often frustratingly to conservatives found a way to represent his opinions with logic and fact. He was an eminent historian and wrote several comprehensive novels.  The grandson of a blind Oklahoma Senator Thomas Gore, he lived a gifted North Eastern life.  Despite his privileged when it came time to enter an Ivy League University he instead chose to be a warrant officer in the United States Navy during World War II.  He followed in the footsteps of his father who was an officer and flight instructor at the United States Military Academy.  He was filled with contrasts.  He had both male and female lovers and while labeled a liberal actually considered himself a conservative. 

One of the most frustrating things about being a Liberal is patience.  We are so desperate in our conviction to our beliefs that we want the world to shift over night.  We want peace, justice, compassion and civility to arrive like a torrential rain cleansing society of injustice and malaise.  We are filled with hope yet the very hope we cling to lays the ultimate seeds for much of our eventual frustration and dismay.   When we elect a candidate based on a message of hope and change we tend to envision it as if we are buying a product.  We simply have to take it home, open it up and we can sample the fruits of our labor and our money.  We hope it will be deliciously sweet, filled with all the promises that were made.  Often however, as the metaphor would come to suggest the flavor is much more complex. Little in America changes quickly. We always like to think it will yet we live in a system that for better or for worse does not allow this.  It can be frustrating at times as we se