Unable to 'win', Bush Re-names the Enemy

Don Rumsfeld said that you go to war with the army you have --not the army you might want. Bush, losing his war against an enemy he didn't want simply re-named it. As a National Intelligence Estimate revealed that terrorism had gotten worse since 911, Bush renames an insurgency (against which it was losing) "al Qaeda in Iraq" against which he hopes to win. Re-naming is easier than winning. The GOP rationale goes like this: if the GOP can change the terminology, a war lost on the ground might yet be won in the focus group. It's the GOP way.

When people hear "al-Qaeda," it's natural that they think of Osama bin Laden and the Sept. 11 attacks. The insurgency, sectarian violence and opposition to the US occupation in Iraq are not about fighting al-Qaeda, but that's how Bush's fiasco there is being branded.

McClatchy Newspapers' Baghdad correspondent Mike Drummond exposed the sinister rhetorical shift, noting in a recent report, "US forces continue to battle Shiite militia in the south, as well as Shiite militia and Sunni insurgents in Baghdad. Yet America's most wanted enemy at the moment is Sunni al-Qaeda in Iraq. The Bush administration's recent shift toward calling the enemy in Iraq 'al-Qaeda' rather than an insurgency may reflect the difficulty in maintaining support for the war at home more than it does the nature of the enemy in Iraq."

--Al-Qaeda In Iraq Bush's Creation, Niagra Fall Reporter

"Al Qaeda in Iraq" might have been brilliant had it not been so transparent. In three little words, Bush wraps up a complicated lie of several hundred words. The man who "read three Shakespeares" and a Camus in a single weekend would have problems with that many words. Bush's consultants hope that just three little words might make the people forget that al Qaeda had not been in Iraq until the US attacked and invaded. It's the US in Iraq that is the problem, that has done the most damage, taken the most innocent lives. It is the US in Iraq which is a terrorist recruitment poster. Does it really matter what Bush chooses to call his victims?

Bush's response to criticism and opposition is typically GOP: blame the critics. About our nation's own intelligence agencies White House spokesman Peter Watkins is quoted in the Nation as having said "their hatred for freedom and liberty did not develop overnight. Those seeds were planted decades ago." This position is outrageous and incompetent. This utterly failed administration obviously lashes out blindly, stupidly at any criticism of his utterly failed and incompetent policies.

Though Bush has never been right, he is, like "big brother", never wrong. He's not "resolute", he's stubborn, stupid and pig headed. What are the odds that a man so lacking in talent or intelligence is so otherwise infallible and wise? Bush is wrong about terrorism. Bush's own criminal administration is the cause of it. He's not winning in Iraq, he's lost it. Winning implies an exit strategy that Bush doesn't have. Re-naming an "enemy" is not the same as defeating one.

For all those reasons, Bush's homestretch is no time to relax. Bush's zeal with respect to Islam consolidated radical theocratic zealots at home but inflamed and radicalized theocratic zealots abroad. Shakespeare was more eloquent. A plague o' both your houses.

His failure in Iraq and his sabre rattling toward Iran make this period the most dangerous in his occupancy. Despite having been thoroughly discredited --not by critics but by facts --Bush persists in waging a messianic campaign. Until a new GOP focus group had done its work, Bush called our enemies "evil doers". I always found it interesting that Bush targeted only those "evil doers" who were oil rich. Poorer "evil doers" get a pass. The lesson the world learned from Bush is simply this: if you wish to do evil, liquidate your oil assets.

If we can avoid a nuclear holocaust --despite Bush's best efforts to effect a nuclear armageddon -- it will be a relief to see the end of Dick "Darth" Cheney, a goulish, snarling specter of no humanity and less good will. The list of those already departed this evil administration include John Ashcroft, a baritone whose tones we could bear no more easily than his contempt for the rules of evidence, due process, and or freedom of speech. Also gone is Al Gonzales who got the job because Bush wished to appear friendly to the fastest growing population segment in the US. Gonzales was Ashcroft with a tan and just as much antipathy to the principles of our founding --the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the presumption of innocence.

It would seem that all Bushies have problems with the Fourth Amendment, about which the Bush line was that "reasonable suspicion" not "probable cause" was the standard upon which investigations and/or arrests were made. Not surprisingly, the Bushies are dead wrong. All one need do to end this stupid debate is to simply read the Fourth Amendment for one's self.

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Amendment IV, Bill of Rights, US Constitution

Given the record of this administration, this Orwellian nightmare, it is surprising that the actual text of the Bill of Rights is still available. Perhaps, the de-centralized nature of information is the only thing not anticipated by Orwell, who foresaw, it seems, every other outrage to civilization, Democracy, and the spirit of free inquiry and truth.

Bush who cannot pronounce "Machiavellian" ought not indulge Machiavellian machinations. That Bush thinks himself smart proves he's not. Bush labels "terrorist" anyone who disagrees with his stupid policies, his incompetent regime, his illegal war and occupation. Author E.L. Doctorow got it right when he called Bush the "unfeeling President". The lack of "feelings", the utter lack of empathy describes evil itself. And that's what he have soiling the White House with venom.

E.L. Doctorow: The Unfeeling President

Doctorow might have added that Bush is also lazy and incurious. His arrogance is inversely proportional to his intelligence. Many world leaders have been liars but none so transparent. I want to play poker with Bush and then retire. Bush will leave a legacy of state-approved torture, illegal wiretapping and domestic surveillance, concentration camps, kidnappings, the coddling of corporate polluters.

The Creation of Doctorow's "Ragtime"

Additional Resources

• E. L. Doctorow’s “The March.”
  by John Updike
• New York State Writer's Institute

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