Heart of Darkness: The Bush Cult and American Madness

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Heart of Darkness: The Bush Cult and American Madness

Mon, 13 Feb 2006 16:09:49 -0800

 

 

 

 

 

http://empireburlesquenow.blogspot.com/2005/03/heart-of-darkness-

bush-cult-and.html

 

 

Tuesday, March 01, 2005

 

Heart of Darkness: The Bush Cult and American Madness

Originally published in The Moscow Times, Oct. 22, 2004.

 

Now we come at last to the heart of darkness. Now we know, from

their own words, that the Bush Regime is a cult – a cult whose god

is Power, whose adherents believe that they alone control reality,

that indeed they create the world anew with each act of their iron

will. And the goal of this will – undergirded by the cult's supreme

virtues of war, fury and blind faith – is likewise openly

declared: " Empire. "

 

You think this is an exaggeration? A typical bout of " liberal

paranoia " ? Then heed the words of the White House itself: a " senior

adviser " to the president, who, as the New York Times reports,

explained the cult to author Ron Suskind in the heady pre-war days

of 2002.

 

First, the top Bush insider mocked the journalist and all those " in

what we call the reality-based community, " i.e., people who " believe

that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible

reality. " Suskind's attempt to defend the principles of reason and

enlightenment cut no ice with the Bush-man. " That's not the way the

world really works anymore. We're an empire now, and when we act, we

create our own reality, " he said. " And while you're studying that

reality, we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you

can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's

actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do. "

 

Anyone with any knowledge of 20th century history will know that

this same megalomaniacal outburst could have been made by a " senior

adviser " to Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini or Mao. Indeed, as scholar

Juan Cole points out, the dogma of the Bush Cult is identical with

the " reality-creating " declaration of Mao's Little Red Book: " It is

possible to accomplish any task whatsoever. " For Bush, as for Mao in

the all-devouring Great Leap Forward, " discernible reality " has no

meaning: political, cultural, economic, scientific truth – even the

fundamental processes of nature, even human nature itself – must

give way to the faith-statements of ideology, ruthlessly applied by

unbending zealots.

 

Thus the reality-twisting assertions of Bush's ideologues: The

conquered will welcome their killers. The poor will be happy to

slave for the rich. The earth can sustain any amount of damage

without lasting harm. The loss of rights is essential to liberty.

War without end is the only way to peace. Corruption and cronyism

lead to universal prosperity. Dissent is evil; dissenters are " with

the terrorists. " But God is with the Leader; whatever he does is

righteous, even if in the eyes of unbelievers – the " reality-based

community " – his acts are criminal: aggressive war that kills

thousands of innocent people, widespread torture, secret

assassinations, imprisonment without charges or trial, electoral

subversion.

 

Indeed, the doctrine " Gott mit Uns " is the linchpin of the Bush

Cult. Tens of millions of Americans have now embraced the Cult's

fusion of Bush's leadership with Divine Will. As a Bush volunteer in

Missouri told Suskind: " I just believe God controls everything, and

God uses the president to keep evil down…God gave us this president

to be the man to protect the nation at this time. " God appointed

Bush; thus Bush's acts are Godly. It's a circular, self-confirming

mindset that can't be penetrated by reason or facts, can't be shaken

by crimes and scandals. That's why Bush's core support – comprising

almost half of the electorate – stays rock-solid, despite the

manifest failures of his administration. It's based on blind faith,

on poisonous fantasy: simple, flattering ( " We're uniquely good,

we're God's special nation! " ), comforting, complete – so unlike the

harsh, bewildering, splintered shards of real life.

 

This closed mindset is constantly reinforced by the ubiquitous

rightwing media – evoking the threat of demonic enemies on every

side, relentlessly manufacturing righteous outrage with distortion

and deceit – and by Bush's appearances (epiphanies?) at his

carefully-screened rallies, where even the slightest hint of

demurral from his Godly greatness is ruthlessly expunged. For

example, three schoolteachers were ejected from a Bush rally under

threat of arrest last week: not for protesting – they hadn't said a

word – but merely for wearing t-shirts that read, " Protect Our Civil

Liberties. " Thus the faithful " create the new reality " of undivided

loyalty to the Leader. And it's clear that the very idea of " civil

liberties " is now a dangerous blasphemy in the divinvely-sanctioned

Empire.

 

The dogma of Bush's godliness is no mere rhetorical flourish; it's

being forged with blood and iron. Consider General Jerry Boykin,

who, in uniform, toured churches across America, declaring openly

that " George W. Bush was not elected by the majority of the American

people; he was appointed by God " to lead his " Christian nation "

against Satan and the " idol-worshippers " of Islam, as Salon.com

reports. Bush then made Boykin the Pentagon's chief of military

intelligence – the point man for wringing information out of Islamic

captives in the " war on terror. " The result – confirmed even by the

Pentagon's own anemic investigations – was a military intelligence

system gone berserk, systematically torturing and occasionally

murdering prisoners who, as the Red Cross notes, were overwhelmingly

innocent of any crime. Bush signed orders removing these prisoners

from the protection of U.S. and international law; Boykin's boys

then visited divine wrath upon the heathens. But these atrocities

cannot be crimes, because Bush and Boykin are, in the general's own

phraseology, " Kingdom warriors " in the " army of God. "

 

This isn't " politics as usual " – not even an extreme version of it,

not McCarthyism revisited, Reaganism times two, or Nixon in a

Stetson hat. There's never been anything like it in American life

before: a messianic cult backed by vast corporate power, a massive

cadre of religious zealots, a highly disciplined party, an

overwhelming media machine and the mammoth force of history's most

powerful government – all led by men who " create new realities " out

of lies, blood, theft and torment.

 

Their " empire " – their Death-Cult, their power-mania – is an old

madness come again, an old heresy in new form, another outbreak of

the fever, the deep soul-sickness that devoured so many nations in

the last century. Now it's come to America. After decades of sliding

toward the abyss – blithely, blindly, drunk with corruption, letting

democracy and justice wither on the vine – now we are here at last,

in the heart of darkness.

 

Chris Floyd

 

posted by Chris Floyd at 5:00 PM