BLOOMINGTON — Scott Ritter’s a big man who looks like he might work for
the mob cracking skulls for a living–or maybe just for pleasure. Even tossing
back beers at a hotel bar in Bloomington, Minnesota, on the eve of the Republican
National Convention, his eyes gleam with dangerous intentions, and when he speaks,
it’s with the measured precision of a career military man. He doesn’t want
anybody to be confused about anything he says. Except of course when he wants to
confuse you.
“Who are you,” asks the bartender, a boyish, good-natured
fellow who jokes with his customers like the sad comics working out their
laugh-less routines in the bar’s adjoining comedy club. “I keep hearing people
say you’re somebody I should know.”
“Hey, I’m just another beer drinker,” Ritter says, emptying
a Sam Adams and returning to his previous conversation.
“That’s the former U.N. arms inspector in Iraq,” interjects
a scrawny, mustache-wearing salt-of-the-earth type at
the end of the bar. “That’s Scott Ritter.”
Ritter, who is 47, but with enough baby fat in his cheeks to
pass for a man 10 years younger, had just returned from a relaxing cruise to
Barcelona and Gibraltar where his kids enjoyed having their pictures made with
the monkeys. He wants to climb Everest next, but he’s waiting for his 50th
Birthday. He doesn’t care that the notorious peak can kill the most experienced
mountaineers, burying them under tons of snow and rocks. Neither is he concerned
that at higher altitudes some people just drop dead when the blood vessels in
their brains unexpectedly explode. Ritter’s had staring contests with the likes of Saddam Hussein and George W. Bush. He’s not afraid of any
mountain.
The bartender’s jaw goes slack and he continues his genial
interruption. “Was it really necessary for us to go into Iraq?” he stammers
warily, delivering another round of drinks to the big man and his attendants.
Ritter’s lips twist themselves up into a familiar smirk as he launches into a
blood-and-guts lecture about the absolute need to engage militarily with our
enemies coupled with a thoughtful and thorough deconstruction of everything that
went wrong in Iraq.
“It wasn’t worth a single drop of American blood,” Ritter
said. “And how many of our troops have been killed now?”
Since leaving Denver on Friday nearly every conversation
I’ve encountered has been about either the war in Iraq or religion, calling to
mind Reagan’s 1985 quote to People Magazine where the old wager of secret
and illegal wars,(perhaps already in the horrible early grips of Alzheimer’s
disease) said the generation that came of age during his administration might
very be the one to witnesses Armageddon.
On the plane from Denver to Salt Lake City I sat by Rocky
Twyman, a 59-year-old African American gentleman in a blue dashiki who,
unsolicited, professed his terrifying love for Barbara Streisand. He said he
was an organizer of the Pray at the Pump movement, and that he has been
traveling around the country to worship near service stations, and ask the good
Lord to bring down the price of fossil fuels.
“Wherever we’ve gone the price has come down,” he said.
“Even Jay Leno’s made jokes about us.”
In Salt Lake City’s immaculate airport, while waiting for a
connecting flight in the awe-inspiring shadow of the mountains the Jesus talk
got even more serious. I overhear a young photographer talking to a pinch-faced
woman, He’s frantically apologizing and justifying his decision to support
Barrack Obama for President with a detailed account of his personal “prayer
life.” Nearby a squat overweight woman asks her traveling companion what he
knows about the religious affiliation of John McCain’s surprise Veep pick, Gov.
Sarah Palin. Meanwhile on a variety of TV screens scattered about the waiting
area news stations are broadcasting swirling satellite images of Gustav, then a
category 4 hurricane heading toward the Gulf Coast, threatening to recreate the
horrors visited on New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina while a vacationing
President Bush strummed a guitar and nibbled on Birthday cake with GOP Senator,
John McCain.
The conversations and the imagery eerily call to mind
recent behaviors by Stuart Shepard who now leads Dr. James Dobson’s Focus on the
Family, a conservative organization known for finding family-friendly
justifications for the worst of George W. Bush’s policies. Shepard called on the
Christian soldiers affiliated with his organization to pray for storms to gather
over Denver on the night Obama was scheduled to accept the Democratic nomination
at Invesco Stadium. And storms gathered all right, just not where Shepard
wanted them.
“There’s really no differences in the policies of Barack
Obama and John McCain,” says a spiky-haired 20-something in a black LA Lakers
T-shirt, whose non-discussion of the issues was rare in the airport only because
it has nothing to do with war, heaven, or the end of time.
Only two days earlier, in his address to the crowd gathered
at Invesco Stadium, Al Gore spoke about how effectively the Republicans were
able to spread the fallacious meme that he and Bush held nearly identical policy
positions in 2000. History it would seem, can’t wait too terribly long between
reruns
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with Barack Obama,
but his association with a radical like Jeremiah Wright worries me,” said one
middle-aged white man in a cowboy hat to another middle aged white man in a
cowboy hat. “And I just don’t see him as a commander in chief. I don’t see him
planning a war.”
War, Jesus, Jesus, war. It’s enough to make any sentient
being long for the salad days when the Republicans only cared about small
government and tax breaks for the rich.
The Mall of America Ramada Inn is a mess of disconcerting
contradictions. The newly renovated hotel has been given an authentic vintage
makeover and although everything is fresh and sparkling the Charles
Eames-inspired décor blends with Native American motifs to cast a Johnson-era
spell. The Tennessee and Alaska delegations are staying here as are various
anti-war groups including Veterans for Peace. Some eventual uneasiness assured.
Ritter wasn’t just holding down a barstool when his cover
was blown (not that he ever minds having his cover blown). He was brainstorming
with his business associate Jeff Norman. The two were planning an ambitious
project to assist Veterans returning home from Iraq, which neither man was
currently at liberty to discuss on the record. Once his attention is turned to
the horrible mistakes made by the Bush administration–an administration that
attempted to destroy Ritter’s credibility–he’s an unstoppable force. The hulking
ex-marine lambastes Bush and Cheney, and expresses serious doubts about McCain’s
surprise running mate. Condi Rice, he says, is both the worst National Security
Director and the worst Secretary of State in History.
“Yes, she even makes Madeline Albright look good,” Ritter
says with a smirk, contemptuously describing Clinton’s head of State as a
useless fundraiser who was rewarded for her loyalty and hard work with a
position she wasn’t prepared to occupy.
“One more question,” said the bartender. “Any tips on how
to cope with all the obnoxious Republicans I’m going to be dealing with this
week?”
“Scott is a Republican,” Norman answered, both eyebrows
raised. Ritter just chuckled, and steered the conversation back toward the awful
and unnecessary war in Iraq: a war he did everything in his power to stave off.
He shakes his head in dismay as he considers the saber rattling rhetoric his
fellow Republicans have taken up in regard to Iran, and Russia.
“You know that when Russia went into Georgia President Bush
said that in the 21st Century nations no longer invade other
sovereign nations,” Ritter said, his voice dripping with and contempt.
“Jesus,” said one of the bar patrons as the irony sunk in.
Jesus indeed.
— Chris Davis
