Whatever Barack Obama is or isn't, a mystery we will get to unfold for many years, we know who George Bush is: a tragic figure. Look at him now. He's crumpled, thin, gray, and angry. I remember him eight years ago, vital and manly. His famous stubbornness now only thinly covers his own awareness that he has failed, which came out in the volatile press conference he held last week.
Bush's presidency offered the opportunity for a man to achieve greatness. 9/11 was thrust upon him. He understood the moment, as anyone would. He failed. I supported him in the war in Afghanistan but I watched as his weak mind was eroded away by the strong influences of the toxic buddha, Cheney, and the sinister hidden-agenda crowd, the neoconservatives.
After 9/11, the world was at our side. Iran helped us to go into Afghanistan to find those bastards. The Muslim world empathized with us.
Today the world despises us as torturers and invaders and wire tappers and renditioners, and we are at verbal daggerpoints with Iran, and Muslims see us as the latest reincarnation of the crusades. Pakistan is wobbling because of the extremist forces we have unleashed in the hellish destruction of Iraq, Afghanistan is a shell teeming with extremism, and of course Gaza is a smoking bloodsteeped ruin thanks to the rogue state we have enabled again and again under the vicious hypocrisy of the claim that We are for Palestinian sovereignty.
There were other tragedies, other great failures. Katrina, the financial meltdown of the last two years. A great statesman, even a good one, would have grasped the challenges and led the people. Bush lacked the largeness of spirit to do any of that. And that tragedy is ours. That twice the American people (more or less) thought that a goodnatured and likeable fellow who had the common touch and a less than common intelligence, was somehow worthy of the presidency. It's our dishonor. Bush distinguished himself most of all in the AIDS initiative in Africa, led by women execs he trusted, which demonstrates his inherent good nature and openness, but he was always too small a man for the most demanding job, and that was obvious to everyone, including the reporters who babied him for years and murmured about him in silence. His powers of mind barely outstrip a simpleton's. Today he looks crushed, and no wonder. He's going to stumble into old age with none of the nobility of his father, but denial, chainsaw brush clearing, and friendly interviews that reveal the depths of his rage, and, hopefully, condemn the neoconservatives as the intellectual drug-peddlers they are.
The only reason Obama will be sworn in today is because of this tragedy (one that Hillary Clinton shared with Bush), and because Americans understand how much that tragedy has hurt our image in our neighborhood, the world. The wild excitement in Washington isn't about Barack Obama as such, though god knows his elevation is inspiring, and yes, it's a story about race; but the real excitement is our reclaiming our ideals after the terrible debasement of the last eight years. Because I love this country, I believe the American promise will survive this era, but history can be ruthless, and we'll just have to see. I'll be celebrating with tears today, the tears that only a true tragedy can produce. (Philip Weiss)
The Myth in the Middle East, Israel.
link to takimag.com
/>
Even worse, the Israelis have sometimes repaid American support with arrogance and contempt. Recently, Ehud Olmert boasted of how he telephoned George Bush in the middle of a speech and told him to instruct Condoleeza Rice to have the United States abstain from voting on a Security Council resolution we had helped draft. In the ‘90s and into this decade, Israel sold sensitive military technology to Red China, and in the ‘80s Israel recruited Jonathan Pollard to spy against us, with some of the information Pollard stole from us quite likely ending up in the hands of the Soviet Union. At first, Israel denied any involvement with Pollard, but Israel eventually admitted that Pollard was in fact an Israeli agent, not a rogue operative, even though Israel has ignored our requests to account for everything Pollard took. In a way, though, it is hard to blame the Israelis for their contempt for American politicians. In 1967, Israeli airmen and sailors killed 33 American sailors and one civilian during the attack on the USS Liberty, and wounded another 171 American sailors. Even though the Secretary of State, the CIA Director, and many at the National Security Agency all believed the Israeli attack on the Liberty was deliberate, not a mistake, a view confirmed, according to a 2007 Chicago Tribune article, by several former American military and intelligence personnel who had access to NSA intercepts of communications to the Israeli pilots attacking the Liberty, Israel paid no political price. Indeed, Washington ordered the recall of planes sent by the USS America to defend the Liberty, and none of the citations awarded the survivors of the Liberty, including the Medal of Honor won by her captain, even mentioned the identity of the nation that attacked the ship. It is hard not to have contempt for America when we behave like that.
Unfortunately, paleoconservatives are almost the only ones on the right who seem willing to voice concerns about such affronts to American honor from Israel. During the 2008 campaign, at a forum sponsored by a pro-Israel group, veteran Democratic operative Ann Lewis, who was advising Hillary Clinton, disagreed with an Obama adviser who had suggested that the United States might wish to distance itself from certain policies of Israel’s Likud party: “The role of the president of the United States is to support the decisions that are made by the people of Israel. It is not up to us to pick and choose from among the political parties.” Lewis was applauded by those in attendance, and the representative of the McCain campaign at the forum did not criticize Lewis for suggesting that the role of the president is to act as a rubber stamp for the Knesset. Most American conservatives seem incapable of offering anything except the most tepid criticism of Israel or her zealous supporters. NRO was silent about Olmert’s recent outburst, and I do not recall much criticism of Ann Lewis’ strange interpretation of Article II of the Constitution on the right. Deroy Murdock criticized the effort to secure the release of Jonathan Pollard because it “foolishly reinforces the anti-Semitic stereotype that American Jews share dual loyalties between the United States and Israel,” and Jonah Goldberg opposed Pollard’s release, which was being demanded by the Israel government, because “Pollard disgraced himself, America, and Israel by spying on the US,” which is rather like saying that the reason Alger Hiss deserved to be imprisoned was because he disgraced the USSR. Of course, the real reason to oppose releasing Pollard has nothing to do with stereotypes or the disgrace he brought on Israel. Pollard should not be released because he betrayed America and compromised our national security at the behest of a foreign power, namely Israel.
Bravo, Phil!
the constitution of the united states with the bill of rights has served as the barriers that have kept us safe thus far from tyrants and despots, lets guard it zealously.
freedom from governments overeaching power.
http://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/young_americans_for_liberty/
Young Americans for Liberty is the continuation of the Students for Ron Paul organization which had established chapters nationwide during the election. While many if not most American youth remain sympathetic to Obama, this enthusiastic group of young libertarians and conservatives will spend inauguration day passing out literature on college campuses nationwide, explaining how Obama doesn’t represent any change at all. Calling the event “Real Change Requires Revolution” the group’s website states that Obama “promises more foreign intervention, more socialism, more restrictions on our civil liberties, and a greater disregard for the Constitution.” While the mainstream Right remains silent on Bush, yet won’t shut up about Obama, these young peoples’ goal is to convince their peers that the incoming president won’t amount to much precisely because he will be much like the last one. Their message is not only Right, but refreshing.
"[V]ital and manly"? "[I]nherent good nature and openness"?
A benevolent, forgiving, humane post from Phil, but "The Nation" got it right in 2000 with the cover that showed Bush as Alfred E. Neuman:
Bush is and always was a shallow egomaniac: careless, heartless, sadistic–loving to destroy, torture, and kill.
See also Justin Frank, "Bush on the Couch."
Alfred W Bush Parody
http://www.thenationmart.com/wcome.html
It will be interesting to see if Obama too is all hat. Does he have even
a little of Ron Paul in him? His record does not show it. How about a bit of Dennis Kucinich? Maybe. If he does not do something grand
about Gaza, he will be seen as just another cog.
Excellent comments on Bush.
The presidency is not a no-nothing job.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtDSwyCPEsQ
obama and his chosen disciples will take us to where no american has ever thought they would go before….
first they came for the muslims, then they enlisted us all to protect our way of life…and before we knew it almost any dissent was a criminal act.
i dont know why you make such a big deal between the two parties any longer…they are both headed to the same destination, the only question is how to do it with a compliant populace, and that is by the pull and tug method.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtDSwyCPEsQ
I second otto's "Bravo!" and add my two cents in for optimism. We still have our crown jewels, our university system, and as long as we don't hock those, we can recover from far worse situations than we are in now. Maybe we'll even be able to :gasp: re-industrialize!
W. Bush is America's shame. Obama will do little to reverse the ignominy America has earned the past eight years because America's behavior during that time was consistent with the previous fifty years. Without asking forgiveness, the paying of reparations and a repudiation of using military violence, America will not reverse its past transgressions. Obama has indicated he will continue to use American power for the goals of established wealth, which neither helps the world or the American people. Good governance of bad doctrine will not save America.
I voted for Bush in 2000
Because I love this country, I believe the American promise will survive this era
– what 'promise'? emma lazarus's bullshit?
Phil, you describe the "financial meltdown" as though it is separate from 9-11. In fact, the "financial meltdown" is almost a direct consequence of 9-11. Sure other factors were involved such as weak mortgage underwriting standards and an over leveraged Wall Street. But I believe the government loosened up the standards because they saw the catastrophic hit taken by our economy on 9-11 and determined to pump the economy up by just about any means possible, including weakened lending standards. If you look back at Bin Laden's statements, didn't he express his thinking that by attacking the WTC he was attacking the capitalist society that enabled Israel? And also that by destroying the USA economically he would cause Israel to fail?
You might want to give a little more consideration to connecting these dots before you go calling Bush a simpleton. Bush may very well be a simpleton. He sure acts like one. But shouldn't any thinking person consider a range of motivations, including far flung possibilities as to blackmail regarding cocaine, etc?
In any event, do not separate the cost of an unaffordable war on terrorism from our economic collapse. They are part and parcel of the same thing.
I see in the faces and words of the media jews here in monkeystan that they regard Obama as a personal victory against ethnic european americans. The same faces who try to paint the massacre of palestinians as a normal fact of life and would be retorted in disgust at the mere thought of an israely-arab becoming president or prime-minister are in a somewhat demented Obama-induced extasy.
Poor America has now a society fractured beyond recovery, with a workforce of (relatively to Asia) declining strenght, intelligence and creativity; a president who already looks worn out, with a penchant for greats feasts while his country drowns in debt (I cannot imagine something more third-wordish than that).
Drink and feast today. Tomorrow America will be much smaller.
On a lighter note … read JMM's Talking Points Memo post In the Minds of Babes.
*********************
I just realized that all the hullabaloo over President Obama's blackberry was about concern for violating the Presidential Records Act. Silly me, I had just assumed that it was about protecting American national security.
Phil's post is a beautiful piece of writing. Sometime I want to hear Joachim Martillo's reasoning for his vote.
I agree with Scott.
I am proud I never voted for Bush. I always knew he was a simpleton goy frat boy. On the other hand, I admire Joachim Martillo's integrity and
courageous scholarship–tell us why you voted for Bush, JM.
I commend Martillo's initiative of making comments in Walt's blog. More people should know about his virtual colonial model (Judonia) which is way ahead of the current conspiratorial models used for explaining jewish power. Indeed there is a whole shifting in the ways the counter-jewish insurgency is operating which shows a greater sophistication of thought incompatible with the crude conspiratorial thinking. I believe something like Judonia is already part of the intuitive grasping of the question and I would very much like to see if humans could step up their understanding of it while allowing it to thrive as a positive force to counteract some of the limitations of the nation-state model. In my view Judonia is not necessarilly bad, but it must be understood and contained before it causes more damage.
I find Martillo's site interesting, but I'm not sure that a knowledge of obscure Jewish history is needed to noodle out what is in America's best interest, or to understand that Zionism, and the theft of Palestine, was trouble waiting to happen. America needs to drop the holocaust guilt and apply rules and logic to all groups.