America’s Catch-22 Election
By: Stone Washington 5/25/16
“The enemy is anybody who’s going to get you killed, no matter which side he is on.”
~Yossarian, Catch-22
“What we’re talking about is a fractured party. What we’re talking about is millions of people who’ve turned out to support Donald Trump, and now they’re saying potentially they’re going to try and take this away from Donald Trump at a convention. That’s not what we’re about. We’re supposed to be bringing the party together.”
~Corey Lewandowski, Donald Trump’s campaign manager
Summary to Catch-22
The famous novel written by author Joseph Heller (1961), begins in 1944, a year before the end of World War 2, at an Airforce base on the imaginary island of Pianosa off the coast of Italy in the Mediterranean Sea. It is a strategic location from where bomber planes are sent to destroy German troops in France and northern Italy. Capt. John Yossarian, an Airforce bombardier of the 256th Squadron, is in a hospital complaining of a liver ailment. He wants to be in the hospital for the very reason to avoid continual fighting in the war; to be grounded (removed from combat duty). He spends his days lazily censuring mail written by enlisted men sent to family and friends. Assisting him with his duties is Lt. Dunbar who believes he can prolong his life by cultivating boredom (making time appear to pass slowly). Yossarian is afraid of dying in battle, and believes the American political and military establishment is out to kill him by forcing him to fight in the war. Cleavinger, one of his squad members, believed Yossarian to be crazy, pointing out that the Germans were shooting at everyone, not just at Yossarian. Yossarian won’t be allowed to fly if he’s stoked up on missions or generally insane. Yossarian’s squadron comprises of Orr, a tinkerer who has transformed their rough tent into a comfortable domicile; Havermayer, the head bombardier who never takes evasive action, often endangering the lives of everyone in his formation; McWatt, a pilot who flies his plane low to Yossarian’s tent to scare him, Natley, who is McWatt’s well-bred roommate in-love with a prostitute in Rome, and Appleby, a master Ping-Pong player.
Soon Yossarian learns that Clevinger has been declared missing in action after a bombing mission, and rushes to see Doc Daneeka, a hypochondriac flight surgeon with the power to ground men by deeming them unfit to fly. One can only be grounded by either completing the required number of flight missions or being declared insane. The doctor tells Yossarian that Col. Cathcart has raised the number of required missions for a completed tour of duty from 45 to 50, therefore, Yossarian must continue to fly since he only has 44 missions. Then Doc introduces the notion of “Catch-22” to Yossarian: A flier can be grounded if he is crazy, but if he asks not to go on any more missions, he is considered sane, not crazy, and thus cannot be grounded–
“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one’s safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn’t have to; but if he didn’t want to he was sane and had to.”, Doc Daneeka explained.
“That’s some catch, that Catch-22,” Yossarian observed. “It’s the best there is,” Doc Daneeka replied.
Yossarian speaking with Doc Daneeka about “Catch-22”
Following the ‘Catch-22’ Paradigm, since Yossarian asked to be grounded, he is therefore defined as not crazy, and must continue to fly. Another member of Yossarian’s squadron is Hungry Joe, who poses as a photographer for Life Magazine taking lewd pictures of women. He loves bombing missions and has the tendency of having nightmares and screaming in the middle of the night every time he nears the required number of missions to be relieved of combat duty. However, when the number of missions is raised, he becomes happy again. Another member of the squadron include, Chief White Halfoat, a half-blooded Indian, Aurfy (whose real name is Aardvaark), Yossarian’s navigator, Milo Minderbinder, the mess officer, and Maj. De Coverly, the one-eyed executive officer in charge of R & R (rest and recreation) activities. The squadron commander is Major Major (last name is Major along with his rank of Major).
Yossarian had frequent flash-backs to the “Great Big Siege of Bologna”, that occurred in May 1944. The soldiers had dreaded being involved in the mission, and the situation was further intensified by rain storms and an epidemic of diarrhea, secretly caused by Yossarian who instructed the cook to put detergent in the batch of sweet potatoes. Another instance where Yossarian avoided the mission was when he secretly moved the Bologna bomb line. Earlier in the war, Yossarian had been a brave and cautious bombardier, striving to hit his target on his first attempt. On one occasion at the bridge of Ferrara, he even flew over his target twice to make sure it was completely bombed. After this instance he was promoted and even rewarded with a medal. But with the arrival of the Great Big Siege of Bologna, Yossarian had grown to lose his nerve. On one mission, he ordered Kid Samson, his navigator that day, to turn back to base because his intercom was broken. While spending the afternoon relaxing at a nearby beach, Yossarian soon learns that the planes have changed course and were scheduled to bomb Bologna the next day. To make matters worse, Yossarian was chosen to be the lead plane. The mission was dangerous, as German flak (anti-air craft fire) was everywhere, and some of it came through the floor of Yossarian’s plane, ripping up many of Aarfy’s maps. Orr was also hit and forced to crash-land. After the mission, Yossarian decided to take a recreational leave to Rome; but when he returned to the base he found that the number of required missions had been raised from 35 to 40.
At the time when the novel begins (1944), Yossarian had returned to the hospital, seeking its safety over the battle zone. Back at camp, Col. Cathcart seeks to be made general and seeks to impress his superiors by raising the number of missions above the required amount by the 27th Air Force Headquarters. Chaplain Tappman had told Cathcart that Yossarian was openly displeased with the number of required missions being raised to 60. But the mere mention of Yossarian infuriated Col. Cathcart since he felt embarrassed when Yossarian tampered with the Bologna bomb line before the mission and when Yossarian circled the bridge at Ferrar twice. After this, there was a strange incident following the disastrous Avignon mission in June 1944, where Yossarian received the Distinguished Flying Cross, deciding to receive it naked, explaining how the blood of the radio-gunner, Snowden, had splattered on his uniform when he was killed, refusing to wear it when receiving such a distinguished award. After Avignon, Yossarian, Aarfy, and Nately travel to Rome where Natley desired to meet with a local whore whom he loved. She lived in a whorehouse owned by an old man, who always talked with her about his philosophy of war: “the trick to surviving wars was to lose them, not win”, he said. He used Italy as an example, which he accredited with losing wars for centuries yet always managing to survive. There, Yossarian, Orr and Milo shopped at local markets for fresh fruits prescribed to treat Yossarian’s supposed liver ailment. Milo had secretly ran a black market syndicate and had went through great lengths to sell weapons for extra profit that he even leased planes to the Germans and engineered bombs that the Nazi used to bomb Milo’s own squadron at the military base at Pianosa.
Soon after Col. Cathcart’s meeting with Chaplain Tappman, he orders another bombing mission. This time Yossarian is wounded in battle and wakes up in a hospital back at an Airforce base. The doctor diagnoses Yossarian crazy, after he continually has strange dreams, and orders him to be sent home. But during this process the doctor accidentally confuses Yossarian’s name with another patient, who is sent home in his place while Yossarian is ordered back into combat. Upon returning to base, Orr asks why Yossarian refuses to fly with him, and Yossarian is ashamed to reply that it is because he’s afraid. On the next mission Orr’s plane is shot down and disappears. Later on at the beach, McWatt takes greater risks in missions and continues to fly low to Yossarian’s tent. He spots the squadron and accidentally flies the plane to close to the ground, causing one of the propellers to slice Kid Samson in half. Horrified by this atrocity, McWatt further loses control of his plane and flies it against a nearby mountain, dying in the crash. As time passes it is found that most of Yossarian’s friends are dead from the war. When visiting the hospital, Dunbar mysteriously disappears (secretly abducted by angry doctors) after yelling a joke in the room where he visits Natley (who is there because he had been punched in the nose by Yossarian). Chief Halfoat dies of pneumonia in the hospital and Hungry Joe dies when his roommate’s cat smothers him. Natley, anxious to stay in Italy to be near his whore, volunteers for more missions. Cathcart accommodates him by raising the required missions to 70. But in his next mission, Natley is shot down and killed in the crash.
Yossarian decides to not fly anymore missions, and is soon threatened with a court-martial by his military superiors. One day Yossarian travels to Rome after hearing that the police in Rome have raided the whorehouse. Yossarian goes AWOL (an acronym for absent without official leave), searching for Natley’s whore. When journeying through the dark wet streets, Yossarian is introduced to the city filled with greed, poverty, death, sickly children, emaciated humans, and all types of crime. Checking into a hotel, he finds Aarfy who has raped a maid, and thrown her out the window, sparking criticism from Yossarian, who tells him that he can’t treat a human being so viciously. As he’s talking, the police bombard the room and arrest Yossarian for going AWOL, but strangely allow Aarfy to go free. Back at base, Col. Cathcart agrees to allow Yossarian to return home only on the request that he speaks favorable things about Cathcart and his assistant Col. Korn. Yossarian agrees to the demand. As he exits the room, Yossarian is suddenly stabbed by Natley’s whore disguised as a solider, causing him to pass out. Later in the hospital Chaplain Tappman tells Yossarian that Cathcart filed a report that he saved the colonels from a Nazi assassin.
Yossarian then thinks about Snowden as he was dying in the midst of battle. He contemplates the grotesqueness of war as he remembers how Snowden’s insides fell out after being killed. Yossarian then realizes that the message of Snowden’s death was that “man is garbage” when his spirit leaves his body. Yossarian is repulsed by his Catch-22 deal with Cathcart but realizes that if he goes back on his word that the Colonels will change their report on him supposedly saving them from the assassin. Suddenly the Chaplain bursts into the room reporting the news that Orr has been found alive in Sweden. Yossarian then understands that Orr had been practicing for an escape all along, which is why he asked Yossarian to fly with him. Yossarian then decides to travel to Sweden, despite the harsh consequences if he is caught. But he takes responsibility for his own life by attempting to do so. As he runs out of the hospital he finds Natley’s whore waiting for him, who again attempts to stab him. Her knife misses him by inches, allowing Yossarian to run off into the distance.
Message for Modern Day
The classic novel Catch-22 holds many significant similarities to modern day America, specifically within the 2016 Presidential election. The often hectic WW II Airforce setting represents the war-like struggle battled within the 2016 Republican Primary election. Captain John Yossarian represents Republican front-runner Donald Trump, who has above all expectations, outlived and overcame his 16 other Republican contenders in the Presidential race, just as Yossarian has outlived virtually everyone in his squadron during the war. Yossarian’s deceased squadron represents the 16 candidates who have dropped out left and right at the hands of Donald Trump; due to each member of the squadron’s incompetence or self-inflicted blunder in battle and/or by the sheer intensity of the war, just like the intense struggle within the Presidential election. Col. Cathcart represents the major faces of the GOP in politics, specifically Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, who has insultingly denied his much needed endorsement of Donald Trump’s campaign, despite Trump’s resounding success in the primary election, gaining the most popular votes in GOP History. Just like Ryan’s absurd denial of Trump, Col. Cathcart denies Yossarian the right to return home after fulfilling his required number of flight missions; Cathcart instead raises the number of required missions just to boost his own image. Backing Cathcart’s twisting of the military system are his higher ranking superiors he attempts to impress, who represent the GOP insiders and big money elitists (the system) seeking to twist the strings within the primary election, and have underhandedly worked to sabotage Trump’s campaign since his rise in August 2015.
Speaker Paul Ryan and Donald Trump
The process of “Catch 22”, a paradoxical situation binding an individual in a situation impossible to escape from because of contradictory rules, represents the “rigged” election process that Trump has argued against time and time again, where even if you win in a state primary’s popular vote, you may still lose due to the back-door swaying, bribing, and outright stealing of key delegates which you originally won. No matter how many times Trump wins among millions and millions of voters, in the minds of the GOP and establishment candidates who despise his success, he still loses. Natley’s whore represents the underhandedness of the many prominent Republicans openly denouncing Donald Trump, most notoriously Mitt Romney and William Kristol, who, like in the novel, have made it their cause stabbing Trump, (a fellow Conservative) in the back and similar to other Trump-hating Republican elite entities like National Review and various anti-Trump super PACs, embodies an unhealthy disliking of Trump that should be directed toward the Republican Party’s real enemies in the election: Democrat candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.
Like Yossarian battling to survive the dangers of fighting in a prolonged war with the odds of survival stacked against him, Trump battles the unfavorably high odds pitted against him by his political enemies to survive against the rigged rules of the 2016 Presidential election, and through defeating his large competition of other Republican candidates has proven himself to be an accomplished candidate worthy of seizing the Presidency. Like Yossarian going AWOL from the manipulation of the military, Trump goes AWOL from the conventional methods of all the other previous Republican candidates, solidifying his popularity behind his unpredictable motives (a powerful tool against his enemies), capturing the admiration and support of millions of new voters. Millions of Americans are angrily beginning to wake up to the corrupt crony disenfranchisement enacted by the Democrats in Washington and the soon to be fired Chairwoman of the Democrat National Committee, Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL), at the behest of candidate Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and the fraction within the Democrat Party.
We the People must come to vote for the man who knows America’s anger, frustration, and uphill battle against the rigged, corrupt system of career politicians who abuse the trust given to them by running the affairs of government to befit only themselves, line their pockets with lobbyist money, while cultivating the country’s issues to fall upon the backs of the people who elected them into power. Will we as Americans bravely stand with Donald Trump to battle against the corruption of the rigged political system? Or will We the People collectively fall prey to the supposedly inescapable trap of Catch-22 and forsake the 2016 election to the elitists in Washington by tearing down our only candidate left for nomination and Republican champion: Donald Trump, and in doing so handing the Democrats victory on a silver platter, as America and the World continues to burn and bleed?
This essay is based in part on a synopsis of Joseph Heller’s novel, “Catch-22” contained in, Dr. W. John Campbell, Book of Great Books: A Guide to 100 World Classics (Fall River, 2000), pp. 124-132.
Category: Commentary, Socrates Corner
