An American spender

There's a lot to worry about.\nLike Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's nascent war on the Palestinian Authority, which began with the assassination of an Israeli cabinet minister last Wednesday. \nOr smallpox, which can't be detected for about a week, making it easy to spread throughout a large population. (Did I mention we are totally unprepared for such an epidemic? And that one of the symptoms is "severe bleeding?") \nOr the possibility of war between India and Pakistan (the latter apparently has few qualms about using its new nuclear capabilities). \nOr that The Washington Post reminded Americans in an article Sunday that "Airport Security Still Spotty."\nAnd finally, I'm awfully worried about President George W. Bush's recent pronouncement that we are what we buy.\nAt a meeting of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, Bush explained that the terrorists are trying to "shatter confidence in the world economic system." In The New York Times Sunday, Bush was quoted as saying to his Asian counterparts that "I'm here in Shanghai to assure our friends and to inform our foes that the progress of trade and freedom will continue ... The ties of culture and commerce will grow stronger."\nSo that's what was attacked, and that's what we're defending. I had a feeling it was something like that, ever since Sept. 12, when I started being told that it was my patriotic duty to buy more sports utility vehicles. \nDon't go to church or the synagogue. Go to the mall. Don't read the newspaper or Islam's holy scripture, the Quran. Read your Eddie Bauer Catalog.\nAnd for heaven's sake, don't try to simplify your life, spend more time with your family or get back to the basics. Instead, get a bigger, better television and use your cell phone a lot. \nOf course, this rallying cry isn't anything new. Ever since market analysts started using nasty words like "downturn," "slump" and "my career is over," we have been exhorted to spend, spend, spend -- even though we're awfully worn out and perhaps ready for a commercial-light millennium. It brings to mind a master training his bedraggled dog. "Come on, Spotty. You were rolling over so well yesterday. Show Mrs. Jones what a great trick you can do. Roll Over, Spotty. I'm going to tell you one more time, you little mongrel!" \nAs morbid as it is to think of oneself as merely a spending cog in the machinery of the new economy, it becomes even more so when politicians and commentators use a national tragedy to heighten the urgency of picking out a new winter wardrobe.\nIt was the day after the attacks when a media commentator from the British "Economist" suggested that, in addition to the sympathy everyone was expressing, the rest of the world was worried that in the wake of the attacks, America wouldn't want to shop as much. With real fear in his eye, he told CNN's Judy Woodruff that we were what fueled this keen global economy. \nAm I an American citizen or an American spender?\nI know where I stand with most of the people on television. Thank God I don't have cable.\nI've been watching the leaves change. After three years of being told how lucky I was to go to school in a place with such famed foliage, it took planes crashing into big buildings for me to really look up in the air at autumn's bright red leaves. Somehow, it helps me stop worrying about smallpox.\nIn another article in The Washington Post Sunday, Dick Cheney suggested we're going to have to live with a different kind of normalcy. If that normalcy means embracing the kind of beauty that you can't buy at the Gap, then I couldn't agree with him more.