In other words: A discussion of The Bush Administration
A Conservative Columnist Slowly Awakens to Reality
THE BUCK STOPS -- WHERE?
WASHINGTON -- The spirit that characterized the successful Truman presidency has long been encoded in the simple phrase "The Buck Stops Here." President Harry had it right in the middle of his office, where no one could mistake his mood or what he meant.
...
Given the historical popularity among Americans about Harry's little sign, it is not unfair, when you look at the Bush administration today, to realize that not only does the buck not stop in the Oval Office, but that it stops way, way out there.
Americans involved in the most heinous and sexually perverted torture of Iraqis in Baghdad? The buck went into a virtual tailspin; like a tornado, it whirled around the Oval Office, through the secretive lair of the secretary of defense, across the hoary offices of the U.S. Joint Chiefs -- and then landed in the lap of Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top commander in Iraq, who was suddenly replaced in what was deceptively described as a "normal rotation."
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President Bush's speech the other night did not clarify things all that much, either. He spoke of "absolute sovereignty" and "full sovereignty" for the Iraqi people after June 30. Apparently, he would have us believe that "the buck" is really about to be transferred to Baghdad from the super-secretive Pentagon civilians around Donald Rumsfeld, rather like passing a mace from monarch to monarch in olden times to embody the passing of power. (Will they perhaps carry the buck aboard a troop plane, or by caravan across the desert from Jordan to Baghdad? Will the country's new "president" place it prominently in his "sovereign" office, as did our Harry?)
But as analyst Zbigniew Brzezinski asks: "How can the Iraqi government have 'full sovereignty' with an American proconsul in a fortress in Baghdad and our military in charge? How long do we stay, and with what intent? With this language, we are again undermining the credibility upon which we depend. The most we can ask is a modern, reasonably stable Iraq that will not escalate into a 'national liberation struggle' against us.
"Using this Aesopian language is perhaps good for those converted in the U.S., but not for the international community."
So the buck does not stop with language, either. In fact, the language of this administration, especially among the authors of this war, such as Pentagon civilians Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith and Richard Perle, has become almost Soviet-like in the repetition of its obvious untruths and in its clear intent to deceive, or at least now mollify, the American people.
- rob 1:06 PM - [PermaLink] -
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