I keep getting asked by members of the Far Right why I should care about pointing out the past of Bush’s administration. After all, history is history, and nothing can be done to change it.
As much as I’d love to use the old cliché “Those who fail to study history are doomed to repeat it,” this little axiom seems lost on them.
The far right refutes it by claiming that it’s a cliché and is no more relevant than any other. I suppose when the man you voted for turned one of most popular personal axioms into “fool me once shame on, shame on you. Eh, fool me, you can’t get fooled again,” I suppose you tend to discredit clichés outright in hopes that Bush won’t mangle any more of them.
I know there are people who naïvely believe this country’s leaders will never steer them wrong, but the fact of the matter is that several instances in the past few years have led us to believe that while power corrupts, absolute power is still pretty neat for those who have it.
There are those of us on the Liberal Left who believe that Bush is not only misled, but also could be wantonly driven to further his own goals while remaining completely apathetic to the plight of millions. Apparently, this makes us profoundly pessimistic, while it could be argued that our proponents are so naïve that they refuse to admit that a man of questionable motives could be elected to the greatest position of power our country offers.
The only way to judge whether a man is good or evil is to consider the history of the man, something that the Right wants us to ignore. Because I am unable to read Bush’s mind, this is the only indicator I have to judge where he falls in this binary “good” or “evil” meter.
For example, Bush has assured us in his Iraq “Surge!” Speech, that “there will be no surrender ceremony on the deck of a Battleship,” apparently choosing to land his plane on the deck of an aircraft carrier with a poster saying “Mission Accomplished” instead.
Eventually, you have to look at the spirit of what he said, and realize that he was wrong. Bush can still be technically correct while being completely, and totally, baselessly wrong.
You can debate that to hell and back and we will still get nowhere. How about 18 months ago when Bush said “sending more Americans would undermine our strategy of encouraging Iraqis to take the lead in this fight… [and] would suggest we intend to stay forever.”
Bush can’t admit when he’s flip-flopped, and instead, his only statements were to the effect of taking responsibility for the mess we’re in. Unfortunately, one can only take responsibility for a fault if they were willing to do the right thing in the first place.
Finally, Bush has said that anyone questioning his plan, if not his motives, is irresponsible. On a Jan. 13 radio address, Bush stated “But those who refuse to give this [escalation] plan a chance to work have an obligation to offer an alternative that has a better chance for success. To oppose everything while proposing nothing is irresponsible.”
What he fails to mention is that Mission “Stay the Course, Again, for the fourth year in a row even though it’s clearly not working” isn’t one of those better alternatives.
The Democrats have offered countless counterproposals, while the American people realized the power of choice in alternatives they have last election day. Despite the fact that the power and freedom to vote is in and amongst itself a cliché we’ve been hearing a lot recently, it is a cliché for a reason.
Here’s to hearing it over and over again.
Originally printed in the Daily O’Collegian, January 16h, 2007.
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