Letters to the Editor
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Figuring out 'W'
Glenn,
Here is a somewhat whimsical spin:
The Decider
I am certainly not alone in wondering just what is (or has been) going on in Bush’s head. More people have conjectured on that than you can shake the proverbial stick at, including professional, as well as amateur (the rest of us!), psychologists.
A true cottage industry!
Here is a conjecture:
The President has been described, from pretty much the beginning, as one who would get a list of choices from his ‘expert’ advisors, and then choose one (or maybe one from column A and one from Column B.) More recently he has presented himself as ‘The Decider’.
Let’s take that for the reality.
There is a difference between working through material on your own - deciding within yourself what you think and then charting a course - and choosing something from a list provided you. (It is something like the difference between breeding, raising, training and racing a thoroughbred, and picking one before a race to bet on.) You are ‘personally invested’ in the former in a way you cannot be in the latter. True leadership could be proposed to consist of the former, and then, after collegial ‘peer review’, choosing a course. The strategy of choosing from a list can, over time, create a framework for your ‘experts’ in which they will never challenge you to think for yourself; they will just provide new lists. You never develop any personal investment beyond placing ‘the bet’. And, of course, one can incline towards placing a bet on gut instinct.
Sound familiar?
Perhaps someone (Condi?) should have made Bush write a ‘term paper’ on situations he faced, certainly on Iraq. Made to do that kind of ‘homework’, the president might have cultivated habits of personal investment conducive to more effective leadership. Lacking that, leadership can become confused with sticking with your bet, come hell or high water (or Iraq as it is, and Katrina as it was). The ‘quality’ of your leadership becomes solely a function of the resolve with which you pursue your 'selection': a curiously hollow kind leadership. No wonder people have trouble figuring out what is going on inside your head. You are just reviewing the lists and waiting for the diviner’s twitch of your gut.
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There Are Two Types Of People In The World
Those who believe there are two types of people in the world.
And those who don't.
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I agree
Except, Bush is evil.
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Ironically?
One of the best explanations as to why such cartoonish slogans find such appeal comes -- ironically -- from Noam Chomsky...
Why the ironically? Chomsky has always analyzed events from the point of view of motives, profits, history, etc. You may disagree with him, but he does not claim that the US or Israel or whoever acts the way it does because they are just evil, or anything like that.
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Bush as figurehead
The question of what motivates Bush is probably moot. All evidence indicates that he personally is not the force behind the policies and actions of his administration. So attempting to explain those policies and actions in terms of what motivates him is an exercise in futility.
First, consider what we know of Bush the person, based on insider accounts of his administration and of his public appearances -- especially his occasional responses to unscripted questions. The insiders report that Bush is generally a non-contributor in White House meetings, and that when he does speak it is only in general slogans. That there is no depth of understanding or analysis, or interest in same. Then, when one analyses his responses to unscripted questions about, for example, why we invaded Iraq, his answers are not only on an elementary school level, but his manner as though he were talking to a small child. The indication is that this is how these points were explained to him.
So, we know Bush isn't the person making the decisions. His handlers have apparently convinced him that he is some kind of hero, leading an army of good against and army of evil, and he seems to enjoy that role. But unlike Reagan, who also had elements of being a figurehead, there is no evidence that Bush ever asserts himself over his two most trusted advisers: Cheney and Rove.
The question, instead, should be what "truly motivates" those who make the decisions for Bush? That is a complex story. On the one side there is Cheney, who's worldview, based on his written and spoken statements over the decades, is one with a bias towards using military force to assert dominance and to secure what he sees as U.S. interests. His long tenure in the energy industry certainly influences his thinking about the importance of the middle eastern energy reserves. He's also very comfortable with a highly stratefied society, and has never shown even the slightest interest in human rights (consider his vote against the resolution condemning apartheid in the 1980s).
Rove, on the other hand, does not have a history of interest in foreign policy, but does have a long history of successful dirty politics. I say this not as an accusation, but really as a statement of fact -- and his personality is such that he probably would not only agree with that assessment, but be proud of it. As some of the first term Bush administration insiders have indicated, the Bush administration has no policy mechanism, everything is evaluated based on the political equation. Certainly this is by Rove's design.
Together, Cheney and Rove have made a team, and apparently divided the power reigns roughly along the lines of foreign (Cheney) and domestic (Rove). Bush is just their front man.
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It's more complicated than that, but I don't think people want to hear it
I know, Bush is so bad, we tend to idealize Clinton and reject any idea that his policies enabled Bush.
But when you build a government policy on lies, when telling the truth stops being considered the morally right thing to do -- then bad things are going to happen.
The policy of the ONDCP under CLinton was that lying is morally right as long as the lies are meant to "send the right message" about drugs.
Variations on that little idea that lying to the public is right when it serves a government policy agenda now seems to power the entire Bush presidency.
But it was drug policy under Clinton where this noxious neo-morality that seeks to improve the world through deliberate lies was born.
I don't see anything getting better no matter who gets elected in 2008.
I don't see Americans as people who can solve real problems using real facts any more.
I think we've become so addicted to "sending the right message" that we've just completely given up on placing any inherent value on the truth just because it's true.