March 20, 2004
The Great Bush Hoax
Half the country has been fooled by the Great Bush Hoax. The other half saw it for what it was when it was launched. The Great Hoax is the idea that any amount of money, soldiers, or equipment sent overseas could possibly win the War on Terrorism. If you are a Bush supporter, you won’t want to read this, the inescapable logic of it will make you angry. For all others, the simple and elegant logic that follows will vindicate your gut feelings about this President’s foreign policy and War on Terrorism.
For centuries China had it’s warlords who terrorized their feudal serfs into submission and taxation. The armies of the warlords were terrorists. Ancient Greek history is full of myth, legend, and history regarding terrorists and terrorist tactics by opposing armies. The great Roman Empire ended with the terrorism from the likes of the Visigoths and Huns who with their hit and run tactics, drove fear into the hearts of Roman legions. They did so effectively that Rome actually hired (bribed) the terrorist leaders to join Roman campaigns, only to see the terrorist tactics grow by throngs hoping to get bribed by Rome also.
The Medieval period saw one of the greatest terrorist movements in all of history played out by none other than the Roman Catholic Church via the Inquisition. The epitomy of terrorism was defined during this period. Then there was the conquest of the America’s which brought terror in the form of disease, alcohol, land theft, and habitat and cultural destruction. In the 1940’s and 50’s terrorism was unleashed on 10’s of millions in Germany and Russia by monsters named Stalin and Hitler. In the 1950’s the U.S. saw the growth and perpetuation of a form of terrorism that lives in infamy and is learned by every Congress Man and Woman. That form of terrorism was called McCarthyism and Commie Witch Hunts. And let us not forget the Ku Klux Klan.
Even today we have numbers of terrorists in the USA, serial murderers, freeway marksman killers, Timothy McVeigh, and a young lad arrested just last week with 20 or so homemade bombs and a firearm on his high school grounds. They all have an agenda and a common means of carrying it out. Strike fear in the hearts of others. The point of this history recital is simple. The President of the U.S. says he will win this war on terrorism. That is as bold a lie as has ever been told by a sitting President. Humankind carries with it, terrorism, wherever societies emerge. There has always been terrorism in the world, and there will always be terrorism in the world. No amount of money, equipment, or soldiers sent overseas could possibly hope to end terrorism in the world any more than it could hope to end evil, greed, and corruption.
The War on Terrorism will become a terrorism of its own making as the war takes more and more thousands of innocent lives. The lives of children, mothers, and fathers who happen to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, like the Afghani children killed by U.S. troops in December, or the countless thousands of innocent Iraqis who died in the wake of Bush’s campaign against Saddam Hussein. As long as this war on Terrorism is fought as a military campaign, instead of an intelligence and police campaign, millions of innocent people will live in fear of the war coming to their home despite the fact that they have nothing to do with terrorist activity.
The Europeans (save for Tony Blair) differ with Bush’s military campaign against terrorism. They are going to deal with terrorism as an intelligence and police issue rather than indiscriminately bomb and kill 10’s of thousands of innocent bystanders overseas in the name of liberating them or defending ourselves. The U.S. is becoming increasingly isolated by world opinion, thanks to the Bush Administration. The world was behind us in our invasion of Afghanistan, the U.N. assisted us in Afghanistan, because a direct assault upon our people originated in Afghanistan. Such a retaliatory attack was also seen as defensive by the rest of the world and therefore justified.
And then, the Bush Administration took advantage of the sympathy of foreign nations for our plight on 9/11 to carry out plans laid down in the 1990’s to seize a military hold on the middle east, to obtain revenge for an assassination attempt upon G.W. Bush’s father sanctioned by Saddam Hussein, and to spread American military might around the globe in an attempt at no less than world wide military strike domination. What the rest of the world sees, but this Administration does not, is the simple fact that to secure our people against terrorist attacks from abroad, we must secure our borders.
When Bush’s Administration places the bulk of its military spending, equipment and personnel overseas to fight terrorism, the people of the rest of the world ask how can such action be committed in the name of war against terrorism? It is obvious to them, that if defense against terrorism is our real objective, we should be placing that money, equipment, and personnel on our own borders, in our shipping lanes and in our airports. The way to defend against terrorism is to keep terrorists from getting in, in the first place. Yet every objective review of domestic defense against terrorism reveals we are as vulnerable today as we were on 9/11. Therefore, it is inescapably logical to conclude that our efforts overseas have some other agenda than defending ourselves from terrorists.
And in fact, that is the conclusion the people of the rest of the world are coming to. As recent headlines reveal that heads of state are beginning to realize what the people have known, as Spain, Honduras, and more to come announce they are no longer to be counted in the coalition of the willing. They recognize the absence of WMD in Iraq, combined with our utter and almost complete disregard for allocating our national resources to our own border defenses, amounts to a Hoax played upon the sympathies of peoples around the globe. A hoax which uses 9/11 and the war on terrorism to cover a far more sinister and dangerous agenda of spreading military strike capability around the globe and having the ability to aim that might into the heart of any city, hamlet, or neighborhood in the world.
If President Bush is reelected, it is the U.S. which will be viewed as the spreader of terrorism, as it continues to fail to rally other nations into its hoax. Bush will in the next four years, leave the U.S. military spread out in the world posing the largest threat to the peace and safety of billions of other people in the world as well as to our own troops. We may easily become viewed as the greatest terrorist threat in the world under another four years of this war fixed administration.
President Bush is not looking to make the U.S. a terrorist. He is not looking to become the greatest fear of peoples throughout the world. He is not bankrupting the American tax payer with grandiose plans of becoming King of the World. He is honestly trying to do what he believes is right for his family, for his friends, and for his country. The problem is, he is afraid. And like all bullies, fear motivates him to overreact, to offend as defense, to harm others first lest he be harmed. All bullies are basically cowards and their irrational behavior is designed to mask their fear. President Bush is just such a man. With the best of intentions, he has become the most aggressive, most deceiving, and most unpredictable U.S. President the World has seen in a very, very long time.
Our nation cannot afford the consequences of another four year term by President George W. Bush. Half the voters in this country understand that. The question is will the other half be capable of seeing through the hoax before it is too late. November will tell.
Posted by David R. Remer at March 20, 2004 04:24 PMVery good article David and an enjoyable read. Your point about Bush trying to do the best for his country and simply over reacting may be true, however, I feel that others in the administration do not have the best of intentions. Certain interests dominate them too greatly and it is not so much them but the other half you speak of that scare me.
Posted by: Adam at March 20, 2004 04:51 PMImpressive David! One can sense the strong conviction in your writing.
As to that other half of America, clarity is problematic. They are the Fox News viewers, Rush listeners and easy fodder for Karl Rove. They live life as premium Gold plus cable viewers with Golden Girl reruns and wrestling as more desirable choices to discussion on the future of this country.
Posted by: Bert M. Caradine at March 20, 2004 05:18 PMIt is ironic that such arguments and elucidation will have little, to no effect on swaying the other half’s vote. The words need to be spoken nonetheless.
Thanks Bert and Adam.
Posted by: David R Remer at March 20, 2004 06:03 PMsigh :( The problem with American politics is that a large portion of the country thinks that the republicans are all stupid and fooled and a large portion of the other side thinks the democrats are idiots and out to undermine this country.
Whats more ironic is that the people who like Ralph Nader and the people who like Rush Limbau dont see they are ultimately two sides of the same coin. I will admit it, when i was young I used to listen to Rush and believed that the left were all “fooled” , and now that I have heard the rhetoric from the other side with just as much vigor, I see it for what it is. Neither side is “fooled”- they each have an agenda and each have a spin machine thats out to make the other side look as bad a possible, like they will ruin the country. I heard it all from the right in the 1990s, I have heard it all from the left for the last two years. the right is convinced Clinton damaged this country greatly, the left is convinced that Bush has. Whatever, I dont buy it. There are strong philosophical difference between the two parties (i agree with the republicans on economic issues, and neither party mainstream on social issues), but neither side is going to destroy or undermine america.
Our country has been through its share of bad president, and its been through its share of good ones, and its always been fine- in my view, Bush is just about bellow average, just like Clinton was. There are plenty of good reasons for supporting either of the candidate for president, and the country will be just fine either way. I do not happen to like either of them, but this country will continue to do well no matter which of these guys becomes president (not because of them, but mostly despite them).
Posted by: Misha Tseytlin at March 20, 2004 06:19 PMIt is good to see, Misha, that idealism still lives. I too used to believe that no party or individual could do permanent harm. Then the 60’s happened and our government did great harm to our society that we still, to this day, have not recovered from. We also came to the brink of nuclear holocaust despite all efforts to avoid it. We still argue about exit strategies, and long term civil engagements, and we know Governors are capable of using their power over the national guard to aggress and even kill unarmed American citizens. Now we have a President who feels the need to turn federal powers of surveillance and searching of private property loose on American citizens. It is possible to destroy this country by bits and pieces one of our founding fathers said (Madison I believe).
The future needs hope, and those with a sense of idealism carry that hope into the future. The future also needs memory, history, and extreme skepticism to keep abuses of power at bay. It will take both kinds if we are to have a future.
Posted by: David R. Remer at March 20, 2004 08:44 PMGreat article David. Me and mine are continually dismayed that supposedly intelligent people would follow someone so lacking in depth, wisdom, and a basic understanding of the world outside his social standing. Bush is an average man who ascended to the Presidency with the help of those who put their own narrow self interests above those of the country. Whatever happened to honor?
What is even more dismaying is the support he still garners despite the almost daily revelations of his administrations lies, deceit, and underhanded double-dealing coated in the painted of patriotism. Shame, on him and his lousy lot of arrogant, condescending self-righteous puppeteers, and shame on those who would still vote for him.
Good call Misha. It’s just so easy to focus on the negative that it seems most people choose that path. For those of you who truely believe Bush will destroy America, look at the Reagan and Nixon presidencies. The more I study them the more flabergasted I am at their policy decisions, easily as outrageous. Yet we all survived. I am liberal, and I also have an extreme distaste for the Bush Administration, that is why I will vote against him. But I still have faith in Democracy (I know, Bush didn’t win, he’s manipulating and fooling everyone, too much money, blah, blah, blah), but no matter what, power will shift. Soon (perhaps 1 or 4 years) I’ll be moderately content with some democratic president who does things a little different, all the conservatives will scream about, but still doesn’t face the real structural problems that need solving, i.e. real campaign finance reform, some way to break the republican/democrat duopoly. To those who believe that world can’t survive Bush, please find a conservative friend who is intelligent and really try to understand their vision, it might give you a shred of hope.
Posted by: Adam Crossley at March 20, 2004 10:13 PMAdam, there are points of no return for nations to go beyond. Many, many a nation has come and gone for having gone beyond its point of return, economically, culturally, and politically. The USSR, Yugoslavia and Iraq are the most recent examples. Their countries are only ghosts of their former existence and these nations will not be able to resolve their difficulties in the foreseeable future. That means generations of suffering and loss.
It can happen to the U.S. and may well be happening as we speak, economically and politically. Points of no return. If one is not looking for them, one can step across them without ever knowing one has done so. That just seems foolhardy to do when ample warnings and signs are given. But, like I said to Misha, the future needs those full of hope and faith, as well.
Posted by: David R. Remer at March 21, 2004 02:12 AMGreat article, David. You’re right about the points of no return. As far as our civil liberties go, I think 9/11 was one of them. Now that government airport security officers are searching luggage on international flights without the owner’s consent or even their presence (they do leave a little note in the bags), it’s all downhill from there.
Hopefully we can turn things around. I’m willing to live with a slightly higher possibility of being a terrorist victim in return for my privacy.
Lee, I agree entirely. If the war on terrorism is going to take a very long time to win as the President indicates, then the loss of our former freedoms and liberties by the Patriot Acts and executive orders will also be gone for a very long time - if they are ever returned at all.
You are right, when frightened people trade freedom and liberty for security, they can easily step down onto the slippery slope which dictates that more security will come from more authoritarian government. We have seen this phenomena all too often in S. American countries. Ultimately it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy but the enemy without that so scared them is replaced by an enemy within which they charged to protect them.
Posted by: David R. Remer at March 21, 2004 01:32 PMMr. Martin, thank you. Many who follow Bush follow his party do or die as many liberals follow theirs. Many others follow Bush because he promises security and they have a choice, believe the promise or live in fear. Their choice is obvious. Some follow Bush unaware or unconcerned by many major issues, they focus on one or two single issues like Pro-Life or opposition to social programs and follow him for that issue alone.
And there are many other reasons others follow Bush and believe in him. It is a democracy, and they have every right to their view, opinion and vote. Democracy succeeds mostly because the people perceive they have more in common than they do differences. I do not know, but I strongly suspect that perception is changing. If it is true, our point of no return could come sooner than anyone expected.
Posted by: David R. Remer at March 21, 2004 01:42 PMExcellent article. This is why I’ll continue to argue that there cannot be a “War on Terrorism” and we should stop using the term. As soon as we argue about how to win a “War on Terrorism” we have given up critical ground. We can have a war on Al Queda and a fight against nuclear proliferation, but a “War on Terror” is a boundless, amorphous thing that can be warped to anyones fascistic desires.
Posted by: Al Maline at March 21, 2004 11:21 PMAnd a valid argument it is in my opinion, Al.
Posted by: David R. Remer at March 22, 2004 01:16 AM
