Letters to the Editor
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War President
The other night, I heard Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. on the BBC. Vonnegut said that calling yourself "A War President" is like calling yourself "A Syphilis President." Think about it. Neither is a title one should be proud of. I think of President Bush as "A National Disaster President."
Greetings to the NSA if you happen to be reading this!
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adolescent as president
In a recent article in the New Yorker, about a miraculously gifted dog-trainer, a psychologist, or physiologist (or some hybrid of the two perhaps, I don't recall now), was analyzing the physical movements of this dog-handler, and noting the things that made him so effective in working with dogs.
In the same passage, this psychologist analyzed Shrub's movements when he gives a speech...it was very suggestive. Nothing new, really, just some insight that makes Shrub even more transparent than he already is.
Shrub gives a speech pretty much the way a not-very-gifted-or-mature 14-year-old-boy would give a speech. Primitive motions, a very narrow range of movement, limited and repetitious vocal and facial expression. It's worth reading this analysis carefully.
I've been convinced for a long time that, down deep, Bush is a person who never exited adolescence. He's one of those dangerous adults who is forever 14 years old. I've met a few of them in my life, and every one could probably have been diagnosed with a severe personality disorder.
I dunno what it was that did this to him (although being raised by his father and mother can't have been a very healthy experience..neither of those people seem to be very well bolted together) ... but the result is that we've been ruled by a 14-year-old boy for the last 6 years... a vengeful, angry, loutish 14-year-old, with the usual nasty friends vengeful 14-year-olds tend to have.
How our country came to this has been the subject of a lot of analysis, most of it insightful, but the fact remains: how could otherwise responsible people (read: highly-placed members of the GOP and five members of the SCOTUS) have allowed this kind of person to come to power? Were they so stupid that they couldn't see what kind of person this guy is? I mean, it was obvious in 1999 and long before to anyone who was paying even moderate attention to the man that he was dangerous, and had no business anywhere near the levers of power.
So... I can't help continuing to wonder what the hell happened back there in 2000. Were these people all asleep? Or did they really wish this disaster on our country? If so, they all should be tried for treason.
Our political system has been completely subverted, and if we don't want it to happen again we better start paying closer attention as a people..or else, the next time, we may get someone far worse.
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But why?
This is yet another in a long line of stories and commentary -- most of them, unfortunately, right on -- about the successful efforts of the Bush administration to subvert the Constitution. This is the only case, aside from winning elections, where they have shown any real competence at all.
But I have yet to see any of them address the fundamental question: why? Why are they going to such lengths to achieve a "unitary executive" presidency (read dictatorship)?
They will, after all, have to give all the power they have achieved to a successor administration in less than 20 months. That administration can and hopefully will toss all the Bush gains out.
It doesn't make any sense. Unless they don't plan on giving it up.
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Time To Stand Up
The Democrats need to nip this issue in the bud. War and terror do not allow Bush to subjugate the Constitution. He and Cheney deserve to be impeached and Gonzalez, Yoo, and Addington deserve to be charged and convicted of treason. Nothing in their grand theory of the unitary executive or unlimited, dictatorial war power resembles anything like the United States of America. They are traitors and should be treated as traitors. Traitorous dogs, all of them.
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The answer why (perhaps)
I think that the Republican elite believe that they can tear down and build up the operations of government as they wish. They spent the 80s and 90s telling us that government was the problem, not the solution, then after 9/11 told us that the government can beat terrorism, but only if we give it full powers and our blind trust. If a Democrat wins the White House they will simply go back to trashing "big government" and telling us that we can't trust a new round of Clintonesque bullshitters to do anything with the powers of the state. They are confident that said president will be as incapable of playing hardball as all the post-Johnson Dems have been. Therefore, they don't fear the wiretapping, blackmail, and Swiftboatian dirty tricks that I'm sure they are employing now to keep the Dems impotent. And, I think, the Republicans are rather confident that they can keep the White House in 2008 by mudslinging and fearmongering or steal the election in the Diebold machines or the Supreme Court. What the media folks refuse to acknowledge is that the men who run the Republican Party no longer play by the dull old rules of "win some, lose some" American politics. They have vast wealth and both governmental and economic power to protect, and they are not EVER going to allow that wealth or power to be seriously eroded or redistributed. The Dems are, consciously or unconsciously, complicitous in this, for reasons partially obscure but I think have to do with the fact that they are almost as dependent on the same rich and powerful donors as the Republicans. It's very disconcerting.
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War as easy sell
The "war paradigm" as expediency:
"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."
--Herman Goering at Nuremberg (as recorded by Gustave Gilbert.)