A World Gone Mad

The other day, in the wake of the war that erupted between Russia and Georgia, both President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice said something rather astonishing. They said that in the 21st century it was simply unacceptable that one country would invade another sovereign nation and occupy it.

Wow. Somehow the invasion and bloody occupation of Iraq must have slipped their minds.

Honestly, can you believe these people? Do they have no sense or shame at all?

Now, this isn’t a justification for Russia’s actions in Georgia (hopefully the President realized this was a country south of Russia and not a state south of South Carolina), but it really does make you wonder if Bush and Rice (a) think anyone is listening to them anymore or (b) think people are too stupid to see the obvious flaws in the logic. At the very least, couldn’t they phrase their comments in such a way so that they don’t look so stupid? At least the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations had the sense to say that such invasions have no place in the 21st century….in Europe.

More doublespeak came from our new attorney general who, in deciding no one would be prosecuted for the blatant use of political litmus tests in the hiring and firing of U.S, attorneys (i.e. only right wing ideologues faithful to the GOP need apply and, by the way, no lesbians), actually said, conveniently for the Administration, that not every violation of the law is a crime. Glad we’re clear on that. And torture isn’t torture if we redefine torture either.

If you watched Bush interviewed during the Olympics by Bob Costas what you saw was a man so smug and cocksure of himself, you had to wonder whether his arrogance is inversely proportional to his poll numbers. By now the litany of Bush’s grotesque and stupendous failings is so long it can make you crazy just to think about it.

One that somehow vanished in the news cycle last week is contained in a new book by Pulitzer-prize winning journalist, Ron Suskind. The Bush Administration, and Suskind makes it clear it had to have been Bush or his boss, Dick Cheney, ordered, in writing, that the CIA forge a document that turned up in Iraq, a document over the signature of a former Iraqi intelligence chief now comfortably retired with $5 million of CIA money, that links Saddam Hussein to Al Queda. They were so desperate to prove the case for war when no WMD were found, they stooped to this. I'm sorry, but if you;re going to send thousands of young men and woman to die in combat, then you ought to at least have the decency to make an honest case.

So, let us now remember why it was that the Republican-controlled Congress impeached Bill Clinton and we had a Senate trial, the first since Andrew Johnson’s. You mean to tell me that lying about...well, you know...is the type of high crime or misdemeanor the framers considered an impeachable offense and sending thousands to die on the basis of lies and misinformation is not? I wouldn't put that question to Bush's attorney general.

The world has been turned inside out. In Bush World black is white, up is down, and two plus two equals five. It makes me sick.