But some naifs still cling to the notion that George W. Bush isn't like them; that his affected Texas twang and aw-shucks deprecation somehow make him more veracious and less crassly avaricious than his Vice President and Defense Secretary, although his patina of patriotic morality is quickly evaporating in the ongoing revelations of his determined deceptiveness.
It's easy for people to forget that there was no national groundswell of support for Bush to run for president in 2000; indeed, most had never heard of the feckless two-term Texas governor before 1999 when he announced his candidacy.
A confluence of unique circumstances placed Bush in high office, aside from ideologically-motivated judges on the U.S. Supreme Court: One was, of course, Karl Rove and his Nixonian eagerness to play any loathsome political trick to advance the interests of his candidate, some of them so low even veterans of the rough-and-tumble of Texas politics found them shockingly debased; another was Bush's willingness to be used by Rove, a malleability legendary in the political world and a subjugation so blatant that few question the plausibility of Rove's sobriquet 'Bush's Brain'; then there's Bush's anxiousness, apparent his entire life, to letting himself be peddled to the highest bidder; this is not unusual in politics, a profession rife with ethical prostitutes, but Bush family influence, coupled with Rove's penchant for unconscionable mendacity and the corporate money his utter lack of principles attracted, set into motion Bush's occupation of the White House. Rove built the present 'base' of the House of Bush on the exploitation of his marionette's hyped-up Christianity, the defrauding of true conservatives (many of whom are now abandoning the Bush wing of the Republican Party), the unrepentant and false smearing of any opposition, the intimidation and collusion of the mainstream media, the careful manipulation of reassuring images, and the sorcery of thematically-tested words.
Today, George W. Bush is the epitome of the empty suit; it is difficult to imagine that he believes anything of what he is told to say any more than an AOL announcement can be said to have ethical convictions as it happily pronounces, "You've got mail!"
But Bush does have this: Adherence and loyalty to his 'class' -- that would be the global corporatists that the Bush family have always profited from representing. From the Saudi Arabian Royal Family to the headquarters of the World Trade Organization to Houston's Petroleum Club, the business interests of this small band of wealthy moguls trump the national security of any country, even the United States, and, hence, we have this current contretemps over administration of six of the largest ports in America. It would seem to be a simple matter: No nation with past ties to terrorists should be allowed influence of any sort over our ports, no matter if they do currently pay lip service to our government. But not in Bush World, where the flow of money respects no national boundaries or niggling issues of security.
This is Bush's true job: To advance the interests of his wealthy patrons under the guise of protection from foreign enemies with a staged backdrop of the stars-and-stripes of conservative patriotism. A theory has even been promulgated that the invasion of Iraq was, in reality, designed not to increase the flow of oil from the Middle East, with Americans in charge of the substantial Iraqi contribution, but to strangle the spigot, thereby leading to higher oil prices for Bush's friends in corporations here and on the 'Arab Street.' Viewing the steep rise in oil prices and record profits of the oil giants, this hypothesis demonstrates increasing validity.
Yet there's another dimension to Bush's perfidy, one outlined on Keith Olberman's MSNBC "Countdown" show on Feb. 22nd by David Sirota: If the U.S. government begins examining corporate contracts for their impact on our national security, all kinds of worms may slither out of the can, including the deals American companies habitually make with China -- an undemocratic current rival and potential future aggressor -- and other nations, like Saudi Arabia and Dubai, who still have not entirely separated themselves from the religious zealotry that has led to terrorist attacks around the globe.
Billions upon billions of dollars are involved with this nasty business, and the global corporatists are not going to permit their peculiar notions of 'free trade' to be interfered with by Congress -- why a case could even be made that the outsourcing of American jobs and manufacturing is a matter of national security, as it saps the economy of our own country, thereby weakening our ability to defend ourselves due to the diminishment in our tax base and reduced capability of producing our own weaponry.
On the ports deal, with his own party ablaze in opposition, Bush will likely back down and change the subject, finding some other way of rewarding his corporate masters in the UAE, but let's disabuse ourselves once and for all of the notion that Bush is anything but an empty suit animated not by a concern for his country, but for those 'free market' global corporatists who installed him in office with their money, and the misbegotten power that that money confers.
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They'll All Be Called Camp Freedom, No Doubt...
Where the varieties of dissenters from the Bush World Order will learn to respect liberty and their wonderful government by engaging in healthy all-American activities like 'waterboarding' and 'cheerleader piling.'
Don't worry, though; the camp 'counselors' will send home glowing monthly letters of your progress to compliment those cheery postcards you're forced to write every week.
Or else your family will be reassured by government 'medical personnel' that you're recovering from bird flu nicely, although you're still too sick to speak to them directly.
"A Halliburton subsidiary has just received a $385 million contract from the Department of Homeland Security to provide 'temporary detention and processing capabilities.'
"The contract -- announced Jan. 24 by the engineering and construction firm KBR -- calls for preparing for 'an emergency influx of immigrants, or to support the rapid development of new programs' in the event of other emergencies, such as 'a natural disaster.' The release offered no details about where Halliburton was to build these facilities, or when...
"'Almost certainly this is preparation for a roundup after the next 9/11 for Mid-Easterners, Muslims and possibly dissenters,' says Daniel Ellsberg, a former military analyst who in 1971 released the Pentagon Papers, the U.S. military's account of its activities in Vietnam. 'They've already done this on a smaller scale, with the 'special registration. detentions of immigrant men from Muslim countries, and with Guantanamo.'"
-- Peter Dale Scott "Preparing for martial law? Homeland security contracts for detention camps."
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