As one listened to the President of the United States, last night (September
11, 2006), memories of a funny movie kept creeping into one's conscious. It
was about pampered teenaged girls who lived to take their Mom's credit cards
to the shopping mall after school each day, and was appropriately titled,
"Clueless!" It was a palliating notion. The reality was rather bleak. The
other quite-beside-the real-point notion was that any conscientious speech
or debate Professor in America would have graded the effort an absolute
failure. Few College Freshman could have put on a more pathetic
performance.
There was so much wrong with the speech that it would not justify any
comment at all, were it not being delivered by a President of the most
powerful Federation of States that the World has ever known; by a President
armed with nuclear weapons and a military budget that dwarfs that of any
other leader on the planet. Moreover, a President who claims to be keeping
America safe, when he has until only the past few months virtually ignored a
flood of incongruous immigration, across our Southern border.
We list but some of the more dangerous errors in logic:
1. The claim that our battle with the Terrorists behind the attack five
years ago will be the defining conflict of the 21st Century.
2. The claim that the War must continue until either we or the Terrorists
destroy the other.
[This sort of delusional, "Drama Queen" hyperbole only helps the present
gangs of Terrorists recruit new blood; while, to the extent that anyone in a
leadership position actually believes that the President actually believes
it, undermines confidence among our natural allies. There is no way that a
group of international outlaws without even a true homeland can possibly
threaten the continued existence of any major Western power, much less the
United States of America. To compare the threat of cave hiding fanatics to
that posed by Germany and Japan in the 1940s, or that posed by the Communist
Empire in the 1950s through 1980s, is, to understate the matter, absurd.]
3. The claim that by staying in Iraq, long after we overthrew the
antagonistic Government, we are taking the War to the Terrorists, in a
manner that somehow makes it less likely that they will come here.
[The President fails even to differentiate between the various types of
armed resistance that we are encountering. This is not merely sloppy
analysis. It is truly "clueless," since these are supposed to be part of
the force that would--according to his argument--otherwise be coming here.
Certainly those who are attacking our armed forces--as opposed to attacking
other Iraqis--would traditionally be characterized as "guerrillas," not
"terrorists." There is absolutely no reason to assume that "guerrillas"
resisting a foreign occupation are likely candidates, absent that
occupation, to sneak into a Federation, 5 to 8,000 miles away, and commit
suicide in order to terrorize other people as a way of making a religious
statement.
While there are also those who have come in from outside Iraq and have
employed terrorist tactics against both Americans and sympathetic Iraqis,
indeed openly identifying themselves with the known Terrorists, there is no
evidence to suggest that these are there as an alternative to sneaking into
the United States. The functions of those in Iraq are not similar to the
carefully trained group that accomplished the disaster on September 11,
2001. By all indications, that particular project was several years in
development--again, this foe does not have the remotest semblance of the
capacity of any major power, except in the mind of the President. What
evidence is there--or by what logic can he hypothesize--that anyone being
trained for another dramatic attack on American civilians in the United
States, has been sent instead to Iraq, rather than simply sent over our
Southern border, which does not have even 10% of the armed protection
provided American personnel in Iraq.]
4. The claim that introducing Democracy (by armed force) is some sort of
magic cure all for ideological antagonism.
[The abject stupidity of this has been explored by us in several previous
essays. This is the same theme that the President sounded in his Second
Inaugural Address, where he used the word "Freedom," in at least six
different and conflicting senses in another short speech. We posted a
staged debate on that, putting portions of George Washington's celebrated
"Farewell Address" in juxtaposition with the Bush speech, and letting the
reader decide whose argument was the correct one. (See
http://pages.prodigy.net/krtq73aa/debate2.htm.) We have also explored the
whole issue of whether Democracy can work in a Third World Nation with a
multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, population
(http://pages.prodigy.net/krtq73aa/third.htm). Of course, Democracy does
not necessarily work well in the First World either. Hitler came to power
in Germany by means of the Democracy known as the Weimar Republic.
Apparently, the President has not bothered to actually learn very much about
the great struggles of the 20th Century, to which he sought comparison in
his "clueless" speech.]
5. The claim that we need political unity in order to wage a successful war
on Terrorism.
[While it would certainly be advantageous to get most of us on the "same
page" with respect to any problem, it is childish, playground hysteria, to
suggest or imply that there should not be a serious debate on the tactics to
be employed in any project involving the use of military force. Whether or
not we remain in Iraq one day longer than
absolutely necessary to see that it does not collapse into chaos, is a
legitimate issue. Whether we insult over a billion people by suggesting
that we have a role in changing their culture--something which beyond
question helps the Terrorists recruit--is a legitimate issue (that is, if
rejecting the President's abandonment of the traditional American policy of
treating others with respect, is not self-evidently the wiser course). And
where and to what purpose we commit our armed forces is a legitimate topic
for debate.
The President's integrity, judgment, patriotism and competence, are all
called into
question by his failure to effectively defend the Southern border. His
appeal to our
sorrow over the losses on September 11, 2001, should not divert anyone's
attention from all of the things that he has not done--which he clearly
should have done--in the interim.]
These are the random thoughts of this Conservative Republican from Ohio, on
the day after another pathetic, "clueless" performance from one for whom we
once had high hopes.
William Flax
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