Did Nixon die in prison for his crimes? Did Reagan? Is Oliver North behind bars? Bush sr? Cheney?

The people of the US have apparently already made their choice, otherwise all of these and many more would have been put away for their crimes against the constitution, laws, ideals and people of the United States. But that doesn't happen, does it? Eisenhower warned about the dangers of the military-industrial-complex back in 1961 [now called the neocons, but essentially the same people], and America yawned and went back to sleep. Bush stole two elections [one-and-a-half, at least], and the ruminants chewed their cuds and looked on.

It seems Americans have already made their choice. Democracy is often slow, inefficient, frustrating, and unhelpful in the accumulation of obscene wealth and power, so the people of the US have given up all but lip service to it. Might is right, power is all, greed is good, and the rest of us had better get used to it.

I imagine the ruling elites of the Mesopotamians and Mayans fed their populations the same sort of crud as their civilizations crumbled around them. I just hope you don't take all of us with you as you go...

I weep for America.

was more important than democracy, the law, the constituion or common sense. They almost won when they almost got Clinton out and the entire Republican establishment supported it. What would you expect them to do when they got amother chance, with one of their own in the White House (appointed by the supreme court acting under the influence of God, as the right wing has it), to save the country and the world from evil (blow jobs) oh yeah, and terrarisht evildoers.

While others on some of the liberal blogs are crowing about how Bush has gotten 'caught' with spying, torturing, etc - it is my feeling that he WANTS these activities to be made public - as a means - as Mr. Engelhardt put it so well - to 'move the presidential goalposts'.

If his activities remained secret - the expansion to his powers would be relatively TINY compared to if they are made PUBLIC and the Congress and American people back down and refuse to take action against him. Instead of gaining an inch he would gain a MILE.

As Mr. Engelhardt also indicates- the inexplicably incompetant attack on Iraq FINALLY has some sort of logical explanation - as a means for Bush to create a state of 'perpetual war' as a tool by which to rationalize a permanent seizing of authoritarian power for the office of the President.

As all these things seem to finally be coming into focus, my only remaining question is HOW exactly, Bushco has so COMPLETELY gotten the mainstream media to be his co-conspirators in all this

All power wanes, eventually. The Reichwing zealots will have their day in court. All of them. Abramoff is just the beginning.

to the right wing jihad against Clinton. After that they could never talk openly about what was going on without opening a discussion of their own complicity. The inability to criticise Bush was a continuation of that since the Bush campaign and the 2000 "election" was a continuation of the anti blow job holy war. Of course 911 enabled rightist partisans to vastly increase their intimidation of critics, such as they were and they never were much, in the media.

Couldn't all this stuff that is coming out about stovepiping intelligence, torture, secret eavesdropping, the War on Terror etc. just be the result of gross incompetence rather than any evil intent?

Here we have a president who does not give the impression of being an educated, cultured, well-read man with a sense of history. His close links with fundamentalist religion suggest a lack of familiarity with the eighteenth century ideas that underlie much of the Constitution. One gets the feeling that he has never even read Nineteen Eighty-Four, a key work necessary for the understanding of twentieth century history, and one that would surely have innoculated him against follies like declaring unwinnable wars agains undefined enemies.

While I acknowledge that he may be a poor public speaker due to nerves--but maybe much more on the ball in private--isn't his continued inability to speak the English language in a clear and logical fashion a sign that his thinking is also muddled?

While he may be, and surely is, poorly advised at times, it is he as CEO who is responsible for appointing the best people to advise him. If he is incompetent at picking the best advisors, he is going to end up making poor decisions.

If the US is rapidly becoming a one-party state--which it sometimes looks like--then the Democratic Party has a lot to answer for, because for the whole of Bush's presidency it seems to have forgotten that it is supposed to offer voters an alternative vision, not just go to Washington to have sex and get rich.

Then, we can ammend the constitution to give the President powers similar to those of other monarchs... like the Queen of England.

It is my understanding that the Constitution of the United States gives the power to declare war to Congress--not to the President. I am unaware that the Congress has ever declared War on Terror. If the Congress has not declared War on Terror then how can President Bush claim a right to exercise "war powers"?

THIS JUST IN!!! Politicians like power! Thanks for the eye-opener. Geez, you almost got scooped on that one.

What's the old saying?

"Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely."

But we let this happen again and again so isn't this more appropriate?

"Those who do not learn the lessons of history are bound to repeat them."

Or my personal favorite:

"The world is more fucking complicated than I thought, pour me another beer."

I'm surprised Mr. Engelhardt doesn't mention Bush's quote about how much easier it would be if he were a dictator. I have to disagree with a previous poster about 1984. George W. may not have read it, but his masters have. "War is Peace"? We have "War is Freedom". "Freedom is Slavery"? We have, "Freedom ain't free". "Ignorance is Strength?" Well, we have many instances of this. At every turn we hear that Bush has more information than we do. We should trust him to act in our best interests because we're under attack. Knowing that they've paid the Iraqi press for pro-American stories is apparently bad. The media risks American lives by reporting that they're spying on us. Do they redact history? Of course! From correcting Laura Bush's mispronunciation of Hurricane Katrina (she called it "Korrina repeatedly and they corrected her in the official transcript). To trying to convince the public we invaded Iraq for humanitarian reasons rather than the missing weapons of mass destruction.

They seem to have read a great deal about propaganda also. Didn't the Nazis employ the propaganda style of repeating and repeating a lie until the public believes it? Don't we have the proof that this administration has studied this from Bush's own words?

"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda."—Greece, N.Y., May 24, 2005.

It's scary to hear the words "propaganda" and "truth" used interchangeably. I can imagine someone (probably Rove) explaining to him how it works. He's not supposed to actually say it. He's too unintelligent to realize how bad it sounds to explain your strategy when it's identical to that employed by fascists. I've long thought, however, that many of the government "leaks" were done on purpose. You start with rumors to get the public used to the idea. Then deny, deny, deny. When the truth finally comes out, it's old hat. It's a rather daring use of the short attention spans brought about by our media. Every time there is a new revelation, I expect the public to stand up in horror; it never seems to happen.

I also wonder if they are incredibly short sighted. What happens with all this executive power if the democrats come back into power? I can only imagine that they plan to remain in power indefinitely. I think the problem is not that Bush and co. haven't read 1984; I think the problem is that few americans have read it.