Enabling the Dry Drunk's Grand Gamble

I recently revisited my original anti-war protest page from March 17th, 2003, to see how well my own words have held up. In my estimation they hold up just fine. I stand by them. Perhaps the most relevant words you'll find there are these:

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Consider, if you will:

American citizens don't need an "intervention" from the Bush Administration.

The world doesn't need, and isn't asking for, lesson after lesson from America in a kind of "global tough love."

One culture, "SuperSized for Everyone," is an insult to any thoughtful human being, and ignores history altogether.

When the Consent of the Governed has been beaten down into a kind of "world-weary/duck and cover" Exhaustion of the Governed, when the breadth and depth of corruption runs so deep that it creates the worst "domestic fissure/meltdown of checks and balances" since prior to our own Civil War, and when Consent has been reversed to allow ANY Administration to then grant Limited Consent back to the Governed, it should surprise no one that a heartbroken Citizen might comment..."George W. Bush has created a New Imperial Presidency with the face of Ronald Reagan and the dark heart of Richard Nixon."

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Based on my years playing music for crowds full of drunks, people in various stages of recovery, and well-balanced folks both young and old, I've seen signs of what is commonly referred to as a "dry drunk" in BoyGeorge's behavior during many unguarded moments. And with today's pitiful misuse of psychotherapeutic terms (see "psycho babble"), and the public disclosure of once-private themes from Alcoholics Anonymous, it seems that The Boy has surrounded himself with "enablers" who have no intention of recommending that he "make amends."

Let's take my statements for your consideration one at a time:

American citizens don't need an "intervention" from the Bush Administration.

We didn't need a deepening of the hardball partisanship we've witnessed since 2000. We didn't need to ignore the real crisis in Medicare in favor of an artificially created "crisis" in Social Security. We don't need to prevent Medicare's ability to negotiate with the drug companies for lower prescription drug prices. We don't need to cut funding in other social programs in favor of "faith-based" initiatives that help blur the line between church and state. And we certainly don't need the new bankruptcy bill that rewards wealthy players who know how to work the system while punishing middle income citizens overburdened with medical costs and other unexpected debts. But that's what BoyGeorge's "intervention" has brought America.

The world doesn't need, and isn't asking for, lesson after lesson from America in a kind of "global tough love."

While there are good arguments to be made for invading Afghanistan after September 11th, the reasons for going to war with Iraq have evaporated at every turn. Weapons of mass destruction? Nope. An "ally of Al Qaeda?" Nope. Saddam gassing his own people? Yes, but back in the 1980's when he was still our buddy. Mass graves? Yes, but again, mostly as the result of DaddyBush's decision to allow Saddam to keep his helicopters and other weapons after the Gulf War so that he could slaughter the Shiites in the south and force the Kurds in the north up into the mountains, in the early 1990's.

And what do we find today in this new dynamic of democracy? A nervous Turkey looking on as the Kurds make a play for the northern oil fields and continue their quest for autonomy. Syrian Baathists sympathetic to Iraq's Baathists and Sunni minority. Iran's attempt to infiltrate the as yet unfriendly Iraqi Shiite majority. A large majority of Palestinians living in Jordan where we train Iraqi police and soldiers, instead of training them in their own country. Repressive regimes in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, relatively unchanged as a result of our "liberation" of Iraq. The PR exploitation of the death of Arafat in Palestine, and the assassination of the former prime minister in Lebanon. Let's not forget that Syria has been "withdrawing" from Lebanon for 14 years or more. Or how about calling France and Germany "old Europe," and the UN "irrelelevant." Or nominating John Bolton as ambassador to the UN, an avowed enemy of the institution who once said that the UN could lose the top ten floors of the building and it wouldn't make a difference. Perhaps the nomination of Paul Wolfowitz as president of the World Bank will send a message to our allies, ala Robert McNamara. Just a few examples of the kind of "tough love" shown by BoyGeorge's policies.

One culture, "SuperSized for Everyone," is an insult to any thoughtful human being, and ignores history altogether.

The Bush Doctrine of preemption, along with the ideals professed by the Project For the New American Century (PNAC),which includes signatories Elliott Abrams, Gary Bauer, William J. Bennett, Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, Eliot A. Cohen, Midge Decter, Paula Dobriansky, Steve Forbes, Aaron Friedberg, Francis Fukuyama, Frank Gaffney, Fred C. Ikle, Donald Kagan, Zalmay Khalilzad, I. Lewis Libby, Norman Podhoretz, Dan Quayle, Peter W. Rodman, Stephen P. Rosen, Henry S. Rowen, Donald Rumsfeld, Vin Weber, George Weigel, and Paul Wolfowitz, seem to have forgotten or disregarded several key elements of human behavior. Aside from the outright betrayal of America's historical relationships with other countries, these advisors have made one stupendous mistake. They believe in the insane notion that you can IMPOSE DEMOCRACY on another country, by force if necessary, and with complete disregard to that country's culture and history. It should be obvious to any high school civics student that democracy and the imposition of democracy by force are completely antithetical to one another. How these longtime D.C. insiders missed such a fundamental fact is beyond me. And today, The United States is as despised around the world as the Soviet Union was at the peak of its power.

When the Consent of the Governed has been beaten down into a kind of "world-weary/duck and cover" Exhaustion of the Governed, when the breadth and depth of corruption runs so deep that it creates the worst "domestic fissure/meltdown of checks and balances" since prior to our own Civil War, and when Consent has been reversed to allow ANY Administration to then grant Limited Consent back to the Governed, it should surprise no one that a heartbroken Citizen might comment..."George W. Bush has created a New Imperial Presidency with the face of Ronald Reagan and the dark heart of Richard Nixon."

The Patriot Act, including "sneak n' peek" searches, and John AssCraft's wishlist known as the "Patriot Act II" which was broken down into riders inserted into various Bills, have succeeded in deeply eroding our civil liberties. The Department of Homeland Security, with its color-coded alerts and window dressing protections of our country has succeeded in sucking the money from the States' budgets for first responders, while ignoring the necessary security upgrades to our ports and railroads.

And we now allow American citizens to be labeled "detainees," locked away without access to legal counsel or simple visitations for years. How was this approved by the "consent of the governed?" It wasn't.

I repeat, as I said during a viewer call-in to C-Span's Washington Journal in early 2002, "George W. Bush has created a New Imperial Presidency with the face of Ronald Reagan and the dark heart of Richard Nixon." 2006 is right around the corner. And 2008 isn't far behind. Turn off your television, throw out the newspaper, and start digging for the truth yourself. The links provided at my protest page and here should provide you with a good starting point for your own personal research and evaluation. Enough with GannonGate, Armstrong Williams, Karen Huges, Karl Rove, and Senators like Joe Lieberman who cave in at the worst times imaginable. Who gave these assholes their "consent" anyway? Not me, and certainly not millions of other Americans. Oh how I wish one of The Boy's enablers would offer him a drink. C'mon, fall off the wagon, BoyGeorge, won't ya? We'll take you home to Crawford and tuck you into bed. Failing that, perhaps a "check-up from the neck up" with Stuart Smalley might prevent you from engaging in "stinkin' thinkin'" leading to a "shame spiral" that could reveal the fact that "denial isn't just a river in Egypt."
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Text and selected links of original protest page also appear here.