DEMOCRACY:
Government & Politics | December 29, 2005
IF
GEORGE
W. BUSH
HAD
NOT
BEEN
AN
UN-AMERICAN
UN-PRESIDENT
...
By
Douglas Drenkow, Editor of "Progressive
Thinking" As
Posted in "OpEdNews",
"Comments
From Left Field", & "GordonTalk"
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have been elected by the
greatest number of citizens voting for a candidate in the
presidential election, or at least the greatest number of
electoral votes cast based upon the popular vote; he would not
have been put in office by an
election rigged by his supporters who manufacture and operate
the electronic voting machines, with no paper trail to audit.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have led the international
community to condemn any actions even vaguely resembling torture
as patently inhuman and un-American; he would not have had the
man who would be his attorney general torture logic and
language and his
vice president speak passionately before Congress and the
public in pathetic attempts to justify and identify barbaric
practices as anything but torture, which not only offends any
being remotely human but also tends to yield information
that those being interrogated just believe their tormentors want
to hear.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have championed the
precious civil liberties that each of us as Americans is supposed
to enjoy, that every human being deserves to exercise (as the
administration repeatedly gives lip service to when waging war
overseas), and that our sworn enemies swear to extinguish in the
U.S. and the world; he would not have defied the explicit laws of the
land, written by the legislative branch and equally rightly
overseen by the judicial branch, in that most-American of
institutions — the
system of checks and balances — and he would have never even
dreamed of employing the most powerful intelligence operations the
world has ever known to go on fishing
expeditions through untold millions of personal and business
communications, almost all of which were made by innocent
citizens thinking, naively, that their privacy would never be
invaded except by court order, as guaranteed by the
Fourth Amendment to our once-respected Constitution.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have kept the
international coalition formed in the wake of our tragedy of 9/11
together, hunting down those who actually attacked us and
rebuilding societies we had to tear apart to root them out; he
would not have squandered international good will, thumbing his
nose at our traditional and new allies, calling them names, and
feeding them — and the American public and Congress — "cherry
picked intelligence," half truths, and outright lies in
order to lead our nation to war against a nation that never
attacked us — for reasons that range from the discredited or
imperialistic to petty or, most charitably, overly idealistic —
stretching our forces to the breaking point and, as a consequence
of scandalously poor planning, setting in motion a chain of
potentially catastrophic events in a strategically vital area of
the world over which we have precious little control.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have done everything in
his power to prevent the drowning of an American city or at least
have done everything in his power to save
its inundated survivors and rebuild
its vital, storied region; he and his subordinates would not
have installed in positions responsible for not only that but also
other concerns vital to America (such as protection
vs. an avian influenza pandemic or a bioterrorist attack)
cronies whose only "qualifications" for the jobs, often
taken at the expense of renowned experts in the fields, were their
purely political connections.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have focused on helping
our fellow citizens most in need — the grassroots of our
economy, to be perfectly dispassionate about it — including any
and all of us when facing medical
catastrophe; he would not have concentrated on enriching
those already rich, tried to gut
Social Security, promoted legislation that benefits
drug and insurance companies more than the seniors it was
purported to help, and sent his
vice president to cast the tie-breaking vote cutting off help for those
less fortunate than most (let alone those in the president's
inner circle).
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have practiced fiscal
responsibility, balancing budgets and continuing to amass
surpluses for our treasury, as did his predecessor; he would not
have put this country unnecessarily deeper in debt, particularly
to foreign powers.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have encouraged
legislation protecting our irreplaceable American heritage of
land, air, and water; he would not have done everything he could
to exploit
the priceless treasures of our nation as a whole for the
short-term greed of a few.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have demanded the
resignation of anyone in his administration who revealed the
identity of an intelligence agent, and thus her operatives and
contacts overseas, fighting terrorism, and encouraged
whistleblowers to come forth and help root out inefficiency and
corruption at all levels of government; he would not have fostered
a climate of stonewalling
and antagonism
towards those who speak the sometimes uncomfortable truth,
vital to our national security.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then he would have nominated for the
Supreme Court those whose primary mission in public life was to
protect the powerless from the powerful; he would not have
nominated those whose professional life was devoted to serving
the powerful, at the expense of the powerless.
If George W. Bush had not been an
un-American un-President, then his popularity might be growing,
not shrinking,
as he became respected for standing up for what is best in
America; he would probably not be increasingly
mentioned in terms of impeachment on a variety
of high crimes and misdemeanors (far more serious than Oval
Office hankie pankie).
So as the
GOP rats increasingly desert the sinking Bush ship of state,
allow me to wish you a happy midterm congressional election year
of 2006. And remember, it takes a village — or at least a
majority in one house of Congress — to raise a subpoena.
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