Marino, Moses and Manifest Destiny
Measure "A" Measured Up
An Opinion by Ray Cook
c-2009 RBC
At his inauguration, January 20, 2009, President elect Barak Obama with
his left hand upon a Bible held for him by his wife, Michelle, and his
right hand solemnly raised, swore to defend the Constitution of the United
States, "So help me God!" This essay will explain the relationship
between that event and a relatively minor one described by the Mill Valley
Herald, a local weekly in Marin County, California, in its edition May
13-19, 2009, in a front page article entitled, "Honoring the first Mill
Valleyans."
Mill Valley is a small city in Marin County, the first county north of San
Francisco across the Golden Gate Bridge. Mention is made of this
propinquity to assist readers in understanding the relationship of
historical events to their geographical setting.
Perhaps it would be helpful here at the beginning to remind ourselves that
the intrepid explorer Christopher Columbus, discoverer of the New World,
was sailing for the Crown of Spain, and that within California and which
occupy a conspicuous niche in its proud and eminent heritage are twenty
one missions built by Spain, stretching from San Diego in the south to
Sonoma in the north, a distance of nearly six hundred fifty miles, and
that after the Mexican revolution against Spain, California was part of
Mexico until 1848, when it was ceded to the United States by the treaty of
Guadelupe Hidalgo at the conclusion of the war with Mexico, which Mexico
lost.
A color photograph accompanying the Mill Valley Herald event mentioned
above had a striking inset of a newly emplaced bronze plaque in a tree
lined middle class neighborhood, and subject of the commemoration, "Chief
Marin, 1781-1839, Namesake of Marin County."
This relatively small, relatively obscure plaque, 12"x5", embedded for
posterity flush in the public sidewalk is a lightning rod for
contemplation, or contempt, as the mood strikes the beholder. It's text
reads:
THE COAST MIWOK NATIVE, HUICMUSE, WAS BORN HERE
AT THE TRIBAL VILLAGE OF NANAMAS. AT AGE 20, HE WAS
BAPTIZED "MARINO" AT MISSION DOLORES AND WAS LATER
KNOWN AS MARIN. HE BOTH COOPERATED WITH AND
DEFIED THE PRIESTS AND THE MILITARY, AT ONE POINT
HIDING ON THE ISLAND OFF OF SAN RAFAEL WHICH STILL
BEARS HIS NAME. HE DIED AT MISSION SAN RAFAEL.
Mill Valley Historical Society 2008
To parenthetically continue the theme of geography, Mission Dolores is in
San Francisco (founded 1776) and Mission San Rafael (founded 1817) is in
the city of San Rafael, the county seat of Marin County, six miles north
of Mill Valley.
I, as a long time resident of Mill Valley certainly would have been drawn
to this public commemoration of the Chief Marin plaque had I not been away
for several weeks on family business. In 1989 at an Indian Conference at
Humboldt State University in Arcata on the north coast of California, I
had presented a paper on the same panel with Greg Sarris, a young man who
went on to become a prominent Native American leader and educator and who
was one of the main speakers at the Chief Marin commemoration. Although
my paper may have raised an eyebrow or two at the time, it was otherwise
not a remarkable document . But now, juxtaposed with Barak Obama's hand on
the Bible as he was sworn in as President of the United States it has
acquired an unusual and interesting patina. Its title was, "Moses, the
Divine Right of Kings and Manifest Destiny. A layman wonders about these
things."
Now, Moses was an important character in the Bible. As a matter of fact…
Here I must beg the reader's kind indulgence and digress for a moment.
The Bible upon which Barak Obama swore his inaugural oath to God was
reported as having been the personal Bible of Abraham Lincoln. My own
family Bible is not as old as Lincoln's - not quite, but almost; my great
grandmother first inscribed it in 1886, only twenty-two years after
Lincoln's death. Like Lincoln's, mine is handsomely bound in leather and
it is safe to assume they are fairly similar in layout and text. The
first page inside the cover of the Cook family Bible is an etching of a
cherubic baby boy floating among some weeds in a wicker basket like the
kind my mother hung up the wash with, and a dark skinned maiden (as a
youngster I was in love with her because one of her breasts is hanging
out) is standing furtively among the tall weeds eyeing the baby floating
in the basket. The title beneath the etching informed me that this was,
"Moses Among the Bulrushes." The next page informs everyone in shrieking
red ink that this book is the "Word of God." ! ! (The exclamation
points are mine, because my father never let me forget it.) End of
digression.
On January 20, 2009, when Barak Obama placed his hand upon the Bible, the
image of baby Moses in the Bulrushes commenced blinking in my mind like a
filigreed casino marquee and I'm wondering, what the hell does Moses have
to do with all this? Fast forward now to the commemoration of our Chief
Marin plaque and wonder along with me, just what the hell DID Moses have
to do with the our President's inauguration? After all, isn't the Bible
more or less a history of tribes of people who wandered around the Middle
East thousands of years ago, their adventures, and misadventures? Would
it not have been more fitting if Obama had placed his hand upon a dream
catcher or perhaps some history concerning Geronimo, or Sitting Bull, or
Cochise, or Crazy Horse, or Red Cloud, or Tecumseh, even Buffalo Bill, or
SOME icon representing the ground upon which he stood? More fitting
perhaps, but as implied in my paper twenty years ago, not consistent with
powerful and determined forces around us everywhere.
So we have Moses – front and center, taking his bow in the spotlight.
At this point, Opportunity and Duty seem to have converged, making it
awkward to continue without at least a terse admission of my biases: The
important ones are contained in my conviction that although I mourn for
everyone who perished 9/11, I do not miss the World Trade Center in
Manhattan because I saw it as a monument to the conquest, rape and plunder
of the Western Hemisphere, a victory whoop over the ancient cultures it
had replaced. The existence of which Moses had not the slightest inkling,
but he knew well that he had a divine mandate to "be fruitful, and
multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over
the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living
thing that moveth upon the earth." (I'm not making this up. It's in
the Bible.)
Thus do I believe that when Barak Obama placed his hand upon the Bible at
his inauguration, he in fact as well as in metaphor not only explained to
the world America's doctrine of Manifest Destiny, he reaffirmed America's
commitment to it.
* * * *
Enter now, Measure "A"
The Chief Marin (Marino) plaque dedication mentioned earlier was not the
only event I missed while away from home in May 2009 on family business.
On May 5, 2009, the Marin County Board of Supervisors conducted a PUBLIC
hearing to decide whether or not a vote should be held to levy an
additional tax on real property in the specified district within Marin
County where I live. It was item 18 on their agenda that day.
After returning home in May and taking up the old routine again, I don't
recall if I remembered there was to have been a public hearing or whether
I read about it in our community association newsletter, but I logged on
to the County Board of Supervisors' web site to learn the outcome. The
on-line minutes of that meeting had an actual video of it, which consisted
of testimony by County staff, two officers of the community association
and one other person, all in favor of the additional property tax. (Bear
in mind this was May, 2009, when the major news was still about a
seriously compromised economy.)
Amazing. Astonishing ! When the video was over, it was as though I had
beheld a fraternity party and someone showed up with another keg of beer.
One of the principals had so much of the heady brew as to become the
proverbial 'lampshade on the head' life of the party, metaphorically
speaking. Hard to believe. Until one realizes that the will of most good
Americans was long ago captured and enslaved by flag and Bible, and that
they can no longer distinguish between "enough" and "more." So when the
opportunity arose to say, "No, we have enough taxes," there was not a
voice to be heard.
The vote was unanimously in favor, and a resolution passed authorizing
Measure "A," and stating this to be the verbatim wording of the ballot:
To maintain open space, reduce wildland fire hazards, maintain and improve
trails and parks, and to renovate and update the Community Center to make
it safe and accessible to all within County Service Area #14 – Homestead
Valley – shall a special tax in the amount of $125 per year per improved
parcel with an annual inflation increase of 2 percent, be levied
commencing in fiscal year 2009/2010?
(This, in ADDITION to $115,000 annual revenue already received for those
purposes, and curiously enough giving top billing, that is first place in
the wording, to fire hazards and trail maintenance, even though the
resolution establishes that the Community Center gets the lion's share of
the funds.)
The machinery of the election had been set in motion, and rumbled
ominously onward like… – no, it didn't rumble on at all – it wafted
silently onward, like the fabled fog of San Francisco, a MAIL ONLY ballot
( the first one in my voting history of over half a century, that I know
of anyway ) and I awakened one morning enveloped in this unfamiliar fog,
utterly disoriented, visibility zero, a real-life twenty first century Rip
Van Winkle (my personal hallmark is a long white beard, which my wife
hates.)
Those whose lives are enriched by attending board meetings and community
get-togethers may have been aware all along that an election concerning
money was in the air, but my timid and reclusive nature usually finds me
alternative outlets for social intercourse, and I did not share this
enlightenment on current events.
I betook myself to the office of the Registrar of Voters to find out
precisely what was up. Egad! A fox or a wolf or a coyote or something
seemed to be eyeing the henhouse. Some of my friends and neighbors had
decided to rearrange the community furniture to suit themselves and send
me the bill ! There would be no polling places, the ballots would be
mailed out 29 days prior to Election Day (August 25, 2009) and
continuously during the 29 day period before the election and would have
to be in the Registrar's office by 8:00 pm on Election Day.
When my ballot arrived with the mail around July 30th, the accompanying
Voter Information Pamphlet included one official Argument in Favor of
Measure "A", and the statement, "No Argument Against Measure "A" Was
Submitted."
Well, Mister Alone and Befuddled, what now?
A two thirds majority of votes cast was required to pass Measure "A", and
"Mister Alone and Befuddled" did what he could to encourage other voters
to see things his way, namely that one should live within one's means.
But Measure "A" passed anyway by the narrowest of margins, and for
whatever contentment it can bring, not by the landslide by which it
otherwise would have passed. The winners engineered for themselves an
income stream from property tax money, with an automatic annual increase
of 2 percent, no matter what, from now until the end of eternity, to
rearrange the community furniture to suit themselves and they don't care
where it comes from. Nor apparently do those who for their own reasons did
not vote, which amounted to more than half the 1704 Registered Voters.
According to what logic, then, does Measure "A", Measure Up to "Marino,
Moses and Manifest Destiny ? " Mr. Alone and Befuddled reasons thus:
According to the very simple logic that in nature there exists a stratum
of humanity obsessed with money, which he identifies as the "Disciples of
Progress." This peculiar stratum of humanity apparently extends across all
racial and cultural boundaries, and was even observed in the Bible to have
existed then.
The perseverance of the "Disciples of Progress" in their quest for always
more money brought them to the Western Hemisphere in the fifteenth
century, and for the then inhabitants of the Western Hemisphere it has
been downhill ever since.
According their own literature, those who advocated for Measure "A" must
have more money, and for that noble conviction any self respecting
"Disciple of Progress" would turn handsprings.
Ergo, Measure "A" measured up. Manifest Destiny was on a rampage.
Only this time, we're the Indians.
* * * *
One must, I believe, if one is endowed with a survival instinct, reject
Measure "A" as misfortune rather than accept it as a desirable or even as
an inevitable by-product of evolution. Any moment in which opinion is
expressed is but a perceived instant in the advance of evolution, and if
one includes in evolution what has gone down in the history of humankind
as civilization and accepts it without qualification as progress, then one
must also accept the advance of cancer as progress. Ergo, if one argues
in favor of civilization and still prefers to behold nature in serenity
but yet accepts traffic jams and mob scenes at public beaches as
inevitable in the advance of culture, I must quarrel and beg to say rather
than the advance of civilization we are perceiving its decline.
Measure "A" was not about money.
Measure "A" was about MORE money.
If there were such a thing as a CT Scan for political novelties, and one
could peer into the labyrinthine guts of the Measure "A" monster, one
would recoil in shock and disbelief at the advanced stage of cancer that
afflicts it.
The Disciples of Progress are having their way, and the future looks
pretty grim.
Epilogue
A History of the Western Hemisphere – in One Sentence
There once existed in the Western Hemisphere an established order of human
habitation which, through discovery, invasion and conquest has been
violated, corrupted and subordinated by foreign orders of human
habitation, whose beliefs and practices have brought the entire human race
to the brink of perdition.
Ray Cook
Mill Valley
September
2009
