Missiles erupt from American warships to strike Damascus, and Brian Williams of MSNBC calls the sight “beautiful.” He’s denounced, of course. The chemical attack on Syrian civilians, many of them children, by Bashar al-Assad outraged Americans of every political inclination; but the president’s eye-for-an-eye response—or what he’d clearly like to have Americans applaud as an eye-for-an-eye response—disgusts many of us as a tone-deaf glorification of violence.
Maybe if he’d said ghastly beauty or the like, we’d have cut him a little slack. But probably not. Bringing in Cohen sealed the case against him. “Note to Brian Williams and MSNBC,” said a representative comment on Facebook: “Bombs are not beautiful, and Leonard Cohen was anti-war. He was being sarcastic.”
I’m guided by a signal in the heavens (guided, guided)
I’m guided by this birthmark on my skin (guided, guided by)
I’m guided by the beauty of our weapons (guided)
First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin. . .
