BOSTON — Recently while browsing at the Boston University
Barnes & Noble, I serendipitously stumbled upon what might be
the first-ever liberal action novel, The Librarian (Thunder’s Mouth/Nation
Books, 256 pages, $13.95 paper).
Here’s how it happened: I was thumbing through Bill O’Reilly’s
new children’s book, and, in particular, I was giggling through the
following passage: “Here’s a big word for today:
dehumanization. When you are interested in someone only on
the basis of physique, you’re dehumanizing him or her, seeing that
person only as an attractive object…And guys, if you exploit
a girl, it will come back to get you. That’s called ‘karma.’”
Recent, widely read court documents bear this out, I believe.
Anyway, right about then a store clerk came to the table with a
woman and grabbed a copy of The Librarian enthusiastically
off the table. “It’s not as crazy as it sounds,” he said, handing
her the book. “You gotta read it before the election.” The woman
looked apprehensive, but my interest was piqued. Turns out it was
written by Larry Beinhart, author of American Hero, which
Hollywood transformed into the Dustin Hoffman vehicle, Wag the
Dog. The cover included a laudatory blurb from the New
York Times, and described the novel as a “thriller about
stealing the presidential election” with a president “who will
remind you of the Republican you love the most or love to hate the
most.”
Any takers? My guess is Beinhart is writing about Bush here.
Evidence? Fictional president Gus Scott is running in 2004 “as the
hero of his three wars,” Afghanistan, Kafiristan (??), and Iraq. He
“dodged” Vietnam by joining the National Guard. He gave tax breaks
to the rich and is in bed with big oil companies. Beinhart’s
President Scott has “two prophets,” Jesus Christ and Adam Smith,
and is himself actually controlled by the real world think tank and
lefty canard, Project for a New American Century, whose actual
reports are quoted herein. Scott’s constituency, or course, is made
up of more provincial types. As Beinhart puts it, “the flag wavers
loved him the way the NRA loves its guns.”
Take, for example, this bit of inner dialogue presented as the
unfiltered thoughts of a conservative:
“Soon there’d be nothing left, no place a man could roam, call
his own, them California people, movie and computer millionaires,
coming in, dragging government in behind them. Vaccinating. Forcing
schooling. Forcing the races to mix. Telling you what to think,
what to say, how to live, crowding in.”
It should come as no surprise that power-hungry Republicans
aren’t playing fair against the Democrats’ virtuous candidate, Anne
Lynn Murphy, a former nurse who gained national prominence as an
Oprah-esque television show host. (Ugh.) Murphy catapults to
frontrunner status by calling President Bush — er, I mean,
President Scott — a coward for not going to Manhattan on the
morning of September 11, and also for skipping Vietnam where she
herself served as a nurse. The American people suddenly realize
that Democrats are the real warrior class and vote for Murphy is
droves.
HERE’S WHERE IT GETS good, especially for readers who found the
twists and turns of None Dare Call It Conspiracy too tame
for their tastes: When it becomes clear to Republicans they are
going to lose the election to the Democrats, Patriot Act-armed
Homeland Security goons are first sent to Florida to start race
riots to suppress the black vote and then, when that fails, they
blow up the Statue of Liberty and a nuclear power plant. (I realize
this is a work of fiction, but haven’t the Democrats been trying to
take credit for the Department of Homeland Security for the last
two years?)
In the middle of this, a mild mannered liberal librarian
discovers that not only are the Republicans behind this current
spate of attacks, but they also purposely let September 11 happen
to sate their imperial ambitions. Only the sheer idiocy and racism
of the American people is keeping this a secret.
“Al-Jazeera…suggested that it was probably
homegrown Americans. But nobody listened to Al-Jazeera;
they were Arabs, after all.” No, the only one who can save America
now is someone with nuance and an academic background; someone who
understands that the war against terrorism is really a war against
Republicans.
Like most action heroes, this librarian is a tortured soul. But
he’s tortured in a very politically correct way. For example, when
he and some of his fellow librarian accomplices are on the hunt for
disguises, they argue about whether to shop at Wal-Mart or not. He
keeps relating parts of his new life of espionage to his favorite
Woody Allen movies. At one point, while making a tight escape from
the Homeland Security brown shirts on a bus, the librarian stops to
wonder, “Is Woody Harrelson right? Should all our diesels be
converted to burn vegetable oil, most particularly hemp oil?” Even
in a life or death situation, the environment comes first. Then
there are the endless lectures disguised as dialogue about tax cut
cabals and the “real effects” of conservative social policy.
DESPITE SOME UNINTENTIONAL laughs, The Librarian is a sad
and turgid affair. Far too long at more than 400 pages, it feels as
if it was nevertheless rushed out to shelves for the election
season before an editor got a go at it. The characters are so
woodenly partisan — unholy demons on the right; angelic
peacemakers on the left — that it is impossible to take them
seriously even for a moment. But, then, quality doesn’t seem to be
the point here. The book reads more like a crude inside joke. It’s
the world liberals would like to see echoed in the New York
Times when they wake up tomorrow morning: Republicans Unmasked
as Root of All Evil: Homeland Security, Military Being Disbanded;
New, Thoughtful Defense Based on Poetry and Good Vibes Wave of
Future; Librarians and Academics Cheered in Streets.
In the hands of a great writer, perhaps even a yarn so
outlandish could have seemed possible rather than simply silly.
After all, Tom Clancy turned a mild-mannered analyst into
certifiable action icon, and a believable one at that. Instead,
Beinhart has convinced some poor schmuck working at Barnes &
Noble that Republicans committing terrorist attacks against
Americans to retain power is “not as crazy as it sounds.” Seeing
such long-whispered conspiracy theories in print may be gratifying
for those who cannot control their antipathy towards our current
president, but it certainly isn’t for the objective reader.
But kudos to Beinhart at any rate. At least he labeled his book
a work of fiction.
