DETROIT -- President George W. Bush is a better actor than his director, Vice President Dick Cheney. Watching the two chumming it up with Democratic congressional leaders was the true measure of their relative theatrical skills.
Bush did his best to pretend he respects democracy and that quaint Article I of the U.S. Constitution that describes the powers and authority of the Congress. So accustomed to being the undisputed "decider" with the gelded Republicans running Capitol Hill, Bush now is forced to deal with Democrats who believe Congress is a co-equal branch of government, not the handmaiden of the executive.
Cheney couldn't even feign respect for that principle. He tried to smile, but his body language said it all. "You mean we're actually going to deal with these people," he thought to himself. He's the chief proponent of the radical unitary-executive theory, which claims the president can do anything he wants, especially in times of war -- declared, or just proclaimed, as the Busheviks prefer to do.
Cheney cued Bush on the idea of a monarchical presidency with no accountability to Congress, the courts or, of course, the people. Their systematic trampling on constitutionally protected rights, their addiction to government secrecy and their passion for all things unilateral spring from this despotic, un-American notion.
Cheney is already nostalgic for the wonderfully subordinate legislative branch departing Senate Majority Leader Bill "Dirty Hands" Frist and House Speaker Denny "What Page?" Hastert dutifully provided. The hos on the Hill performed every important trick the Johns in the White House solicited.
Frist and Hastert deserve a disgraceful little footnote in history for presiding over the most fiscally irresponsible Congress in memory, one that entirely abrogated its oversight responsibilities and became totally subservient to the executive branch in exchange for Bush's support for their greedy pork-barrel projects.
After spending months smearing the Democrats as terrorist-coddlers and cowards, Bush shrugged off his gutter tactics as "just politics." What the hell. It's OK to accuse your opponents of ignoring national security, favoring terrorists and being surrender monkeys for Osama bin Laden. In Bush's perverted view of public life, that's just routine behavior, and now, as he cavalierly noted, "the election is over. It's time to move on."
Bush's own post-election analysis was an insult to the American people. They just don't understand how wise he is and how they should respect his sparkling leadership. "I thought when it was all said and done," Bush whined at a news conference, "the American people would understand the importance of taxes and understand the importance of security."
Those ignorant buffoons. They don't understand why borrowing money to give tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans and burdening our children with unconscionable debt is such a swell plan.
Those same nincompoops don't understand why invading Iraq -- a nation which posed no threat to our security -- killing hundreds of thousands of people in the process, at a cost of $8 billion a month, creating and fostering a new generation of terrorists, and alienating the rest of the world is not a fabulous strategy to make our nation more secure. Come on, people, wake up and understand.
Cheney is less resilient than Bush and he is fuming over the sacking of his friend and mentor, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. This is the first major decision Bush has made without big Dick's approval, and the veep is angry and resentful.
Rumsfeld resorted to his signature arrogance and condescension, even as he was forced to walk the plank. Iraq is a "little-understood, unfamiliar war," he huffed. What the most incompetent and bull-headed military leader in modern times crafted is simply too "complex for people to comprehend."
The American people understand and comprehend Bush and Rumsfeld's war. They, at long last, understand what a horrible blunder invading Iraq was, and recognize those who sold it lied and created an intractable mess. All that remains is how tragic the extrication will be.
Losing your delusional identical twin and partner in incompetence is painful. Cheney will spend the rest of his term locked in the bat cave, going on drinking-hunting trips with his rich pals and counting his money from Halliburton dividends.
He and Rummy have neighboring retirement homes on Maryland's eastern shore, where they will spend their time sipping scotch, sharing war stories and rationalizing their failures and the horrors they brought the nation and the world. They will never forgive Bush for Rumsfeld's ignominious departure.
But Rummy may be hiding from the sheriff, the jaws of justice snapping at his heels. Lawyers for the Center for Constitutional Rights have filed a complaint, and a German prosecutor is considering criminal charges against Rumsfeld. He's accused of personally approving torture and abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and the American-run gulag in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
German law recognizes jurisdiction for war crimes and human rights abuses. Rumsfeld may find himself in the same boat as former Chilean dictator Generalissimo Augusto Pinochet and former secretary of state Henry Kissinger. Pinochet ordered thousands of murders, kidnappings and the torture of his political rivals during the decades of his reign of terror. Kissinger's hands are bloody for ordering the assassination of a Chilean military leader, which paved the way for Pinochet's coup.
Pinochet has already been charged in Spain, but his age is sparing him the prosecution and prison he deserves. Kissinger won't travel to several countries, fearing prosecutors with memories will slap him with arrest warrants. The German prosecutor may also be considering criminal charges against Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and former CIA director George Tenet for their roles in the torture and abuse programs. Whatever crimes their minions may have committed, Bush and Cheney are even more culpable.
It was not at all surprising that Bush lied through his teeth when -- just a week before firing him -- he told reporters Rumsfeld was doing a "fantastic job" and he planned to keep him on through the remainder of his term. He said this while lining up Rumsfeld's named successor, former CIA director Robert Gates, for the job.
The lie, which Bush admitted, was true to his mendacious mind. He justified the naked deception as noble in purpose, saying he didn't want to "inject a major decision about this war in the final days of the campaign."
When I heard it, I thought, well, finally one of the network types would label what Bush did as the lie it was. "President Bush lied when he said he intended to keep Donald Rumsfeld on as defense secretary for the remainder of his term, but the president said he did so for a good reason." Those are truthful words. ABC's Charles Gibson, NBC's Brian Williams and CBS's Katie Couric could have delivered them with ease. But the mainstream media cowards balked again, choosing to regurgitate the White House talking points and Bush's claim that he wants a "bipartisan" approach to Iraq and other issues.
The Democrats have a great responsibility to bring some sanity and decency to our national public discourse that the Busheviks and their media allies have so damaged.
Some advice for the Democrats:
Jack Murtha should be picked as the Democratic majority leader in the House, not his rival Steny Hoyer. Murtha's dramatic defection and criticism of the war was a turning point that roused public opinion. He is frank, and his military credentials are impeccable. Hoyer is far too cozy with lobbyists and corporate interests.
Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden will chair the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and he's already announced there will be hearings on the Iraq fiasco. That's a good thing. The problem is, the always-verbose, often-pompous Biden will conduct the hearings.
I suggest the first witnesses ought to be Biden himself and New York Sens. Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton. They can testify under oath why they voted for the war in Iraq in the first place, a terrible mistake none of them has acknowledged so far, and why they insist the issue is the way the war is being conducted, not the invasion and the stupid strategy and aggression they authorized.
Their usual argument is that they "trusted" Bush would exhaust all other means short of war. Their real reason was covering their political hides. "We're tough on terror, too" they branded themselves, even when the facts didn't support their stance.
Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W. Va., who will take over the Senate Intelligence Committee from that despicable coverup artist Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., should quickly wrap up the panel's investigation of the administration's use and manipulation of pre-war intelligence. The task should take about one week. The conclusion will be simple: George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and their confederates twisted, shaped and distorted government intelligence reports to support their preconceived notion that Saddam Hussein's Iraq posed a threat to our national security.
They lied to draw our nation into a war that had nothing whatsoever to do with the 9/11 attacks. The invasion was part of a bizarre plan the neocon nuts hatched long before bin Laden's mass murder. Reshape the Middle East. Assert American supremacy in the region. Make Israel more secure. American volunteers -- none named Bush, Cheney or Rumsfeld -- would die for the experiment.
Iraq's oil was already in their crosshairs. The rich bin Laden, driven by his own Wahhabi fanaticism, the Saudi royal family's state religion, just happened to walk into their game and gave them the bloody shirt to wave they needed for a war that otherwise would have been impossible to sell.
Nancy Pelosi, our next speaker of the House, had the good sense to vote against the war. She is a bright, practical politician and the first woman and Italian-American to lead a branch of our government.
Pelosi has a great challenge, which she is certainly capable of handing. She has an easy act to follow. She will begin cleaning up the corruption and thuggery the Republicans brought to the House. Her toughest task, though, may be trying to teach all those WASP boys in the executive branch what good government and decency are all about.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | November 14 2006 |