Day of Reckoning for the Current Occupant

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" Zepp " <zepp

Wed, 15 Mar 2006 18:20:55 -0800

[Zepps_News] Garrison Keillor | Day of Reckoning for the

Current Occupant

 

 

 

 

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/031506T.shtml

 

 

 

Day of Reckoning for the Current Occupant

By Garrison Keillor

The Chicago Tribune

 

Wednesday 15 March 2006

 

Spring arrived in New York last week for previews, a sunny day

with chill in the air, but you could smell mud, and with a little

imagination you could sort of smell grass. I put on a gray jacket,

instead of black, and went to the opera and saw Verdi's " Luisa

Miller, " a Republican opera in which love is crushed by the

perfidiousness of government. A helpful lesson for these times. I am

referring to the Current Occupant.

 

The Republican Revolution has gone the way of all flesh. It took

over Congress and the White House, horns blew, church bells rang,

sailors kissed each other, and what happened? The Republicans led us

into a reckless foreign war and steered the economy toward

receivership and wielded power as if there were no rules. Democrats

are accused of having no new ideas, but Republicans are making some of

the old ideas look awfully good, such as constitutional checks and

balances, fiscal responsibility, and the notion of realism in foreign

affairs and taking actions that serve the national interest. What one

might call " conservatism. "

 

The head of the National Security Agency under President Ronald

Reagan, Lt. Gen. William Odom, writes on the Web site

NiemanWatchdog.org that he sees clear parallels between Vietnam and

Iraq: " The difference lies in the consequences. Vietnam did not have

the devastating effects on US power that Iraq is already having. " He

draws the parallels in three stages and says that staying the course

will only make the damage to US power greater. It's a chilling

analysis, and one that isn't going to come from the Democratic Party.

It's starting to come from Republicans, and they are the ones who must

rescue the country from themselves.

 

I ran into a gray eminence from the Bush I era the other day in an

airport, and he said that what most offended him about Bush II is the

naked incompetence. " You may disagree with Republicans, but you always

had to recognize that they knew what they were doing, " he said. " I

keep going back to that intelligence memo of August 2001, that said

that terrorists had plans to hijack planes and crash them into

buildings. The president read it, and he didn't even call a staff

meeting to discuss it. That is lack of attention of a high order. "

 

Over the course of time, the Chief Occupant has been cruelly

exposed over and over. He sat and was briefed on the danger of a

hurricane wiping out a major American city, and without asking a

single question, he got up from the table and walked away and resumed

his vacation. He played guitar as New Orleans was flooded. It took him

four days to realize his responsibility to do something. When the

tsunami killed 100,000 people in Southeast Asia, he was on vacation

and it took him 72 hours to issue a statement of sympathy.

 

The Republicans tied their wagon to him and, as a result, their

revolution is bankrupt. He has played the terrorism card for all it is

worth and campaigned successfully against Adam and Steve and co-opted

whole vast flocks of Christians, but he is done now, kaput, out of

gas, for one simple reason. He doesn't represent the best that is our

country. Not even close.

 

He openly, brazenly, countenanced crimes of torture at Guantanamo,

Abu Ghraib and Bagram. He engaged in illegal surveillance, authorized

the arrest of people without charge and " disappeared " them to foreign

jails. And he finagled this war, which, after three years of violence,

does not look to be heading toward a happy ending. And now it's up to

Republicans to put their country first and call the gentleman to account.

 

The Current Occupant is smart about handling a political mess. The

best strategy is to cut and run and change the subject. You defend the

Dubai ports deal in manly terms until you lose a vote in a House

committee and then you retreat - actually, you get the Dubai people to

do it for you - and that's it, End of Story.

 

Harriet Miers was fully qualified one day and gone the next.

Social Security was going to be overhauled to give us the Ownership

Society, and then the stock market went in the toilet and Republicans

got nervous, and suddenly it was Never Mind and on to the next new thing.

 

Let's bring the boys home. Otherwise, let's send this man back to

Texas and see what sort of work he is capable of and let him start

making a contribution to the world.

 

Garrison Keillor is an author and the radio host of " A Prairie

Home Companion. "

 

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