The Illustrated Failure Of A Presidency... And Of A President

The President’s Prison

George Bush does not want to be rescued.

That is because George W. Bush is so egotistical, so self-involved, and so immune to the sense of reason that God gave a rock that he cannot fathom the reality that he, and his presidency, is in deep piles of manure, sewerage and slurry. He refuses to take note of reality because he definitively believes that God has chosen him to lead this nation. The problem is that he has failed to lead this nation. He has violated our Constitution and only has his fellow GOP members of the extremes, and the failure of the Democrats to choose a leader with some sense of ethics, to thank for not being called to task via the impeachment process. Since Dubya acts like a spoiled child, thanks to the way George H. W. and Barbara Bush failed to provide him with any sense of social awareness and compassion, the fact that he is in trouble doesn't register in his small-minded view of the world. Since we have failed to hold him accountable, he continues to thumb his nose at Congress, despite the growing disdain for him and his presidency, and the repeated calls for accountability from the general public and those with a set of balls in congress (very few in number).

But his lack of awareness, lack of acknowledgment, lack of ethics, and delusions of specific calling from God, is ruining our reputation and standing in the world. In my years of training in martial arts I was impressed by a poster my sensei displayed on the wall. It read:

Now Put It Back: A young girl and her father were walking through a garden. The young girl picked a flower and asked her father to admire it. After a few moments of admiration, she turned to her father and asked him to put it back. Your reputation is a lot like the flower; once it is damaged it is almost impossible to restore.

George W. Bush could have learned a thing or two from my sensei.

The president has been told countless times, by a secretary of state, by members of Congress, by heads of friendly governments — and by the American public — that the Guantánamo Bay detention camp has profoundly damaged this nation’s credibility as a champion of justice and human rights. But Mr. Bush ignored those voices — and now it seems he has done the same to his new defense secretary, Robert Gates, the man Mr. Bush brought in to clean up Donald Rumsfeld’s mess.

First, I want to acknowledge that Robert Gates may be the first person in the entire history of the Bush administration to have the integrity and sense of ethics to actually tell his boss the truth and then stand behind it. General Colin Powell came close to doing so, but then fell back on his military training that dictates one does not question the judgment of the superiors. What Powell forgot is what every field commander knows, instinctively and by experience: sometimes the orders and actions coming from up the chain of command does not reflect the situation in the field. In other words, the top echelon of command doesn't often know its ass from its brass.

Gates may also be the smartest of all of Bush's cabinet members in that he has brought his views out into the open with media coverage. When Powell spoke to the problems in the Bush Doctrine, the invasion of Iraq, and the handling of international affairs, he did so in private, as most generals, cabinet secretaries, special White House advisers, and professionals would do. But Gates recognized that this "professional approach" has not worked to date and only media pressure has gotten any palpable results from the brain-dead leadership offered by Bush, Cheney, Rice, Gonzalez, Chertoff, et al. So he has, without being disrespectful or unprofessional, brought the issues he needs attended to out into the public view... which may or may not get Bush's immediate attention, but will bring to bear the negative media attention that Bush and his gang of fascist thugs, and the PR machine supporting them, have responded to in the past.

Thom Shanker and David Sanger reported in Friday’s Times that in his first weeks on the job, Mr. Gates told Mr. Bush that the world would never consider trials at Guantánamo to be legitimate. He said that the camp should be shut, and that inmates who should stand trial should be brought to the United States and taken to real military courts.

Again, I have to commend Secretary Gates for being astute enough to appropriately assess the situation and address it almost immediately upon taking office. It is just too bad that Bush is not bright enough, or aware enough, to see the only gem--however hidden from the rest of the world--that might exist in his entire administration... or his presidency.

Mr. Bush rejected that sound advice, heeding instead the chief enablers of his worst instincts, Vice President Dick Cheney and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

I have to admire an editorial that speaks volumes of truth!

Their opposition was no surprise. The Guantánamo operation was central to Mr. Cheney’s drive to expand the powers of the presidency at the expense of Congress and the courts, and Mr. Gonzales was one of the chief architects of the policies underpinning the detainee system.

Considering that this has been the team, along with the ultra-conservative extremists Ashcroft and Rumsfeld, that has led our nation, and Bush's presidency, to such a deep degree of disgrace, we need to really re-assess who it is that we elect into office at all levels of government, especially within our executive and legislative branches of the federal government. Given the candidates that have thrown their hat in the ring for the presidential race of 2008, we are not being offered a lot of choices in this regard. But we can definitely do better than what we have now, regardless of what idiot, despot or manipulative bastard we elect... and that brings us to the need to change the way we fund campaigns, choose candidates and eliminating the electoral college.

Mr. Bush and his inner circle are clearly afraid that if Guantánamo detainees are tried under the actual rule of law, many of the cases will collapse because they are based on illegal detention, torture and abuse — or that American officials could someday be held criminally liable for their mistreatment of detainees.

Like the rest of the world, the officials and officers of the US government need to be just as accountable for war crimes, crimes against humanity and responsible on a national and international basis. Because we are a super power founded and based on certain principles, including the principle of establishing justice (as outlined in the Preamble of our Constitution), we have a higher level of responsibility than other nations. And if we expect the other nations of the world to adhere to sound reason, principles of justice, foundations of human rights and work toward making the world a better place, we certainly have an obligation to adhere to at least the same standard. But those of us that have lived the role of older sibling know that our parents held us to a higher degree of responsibility: that of setting the example for our younger, less capable, less experienced siblings. How much more so do we have such an obligation when we are the standard bearer of democracy and a nation proclaiming itself to be believers in God? For a "believer" to hold our highest office and act in a hypocritical manner--especially to the degree that George W. Bush has exhibited--undermines our standing, our principles and our authority to speak on world issues.

It was distressing to see that the president has retreated so far into his alternative reality that he would not listen to Mr. Gates — even when he was backed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who, like her predecessor, Colin Powell, had urged Mr. Bush to close Guantánamo. It seems clear that when he brought in Mr. Gates, Mr. Bush didn’t want to fix Mr. Rumsfeld’s disaster; he just wanted everyone to stop talking about it.

The problem is not one of retreating into an alternative reality, it is one of never leaving the fantasy reality that they believe exists, including the belief that God has anointed Bush and company to lead us into their reality:

"George [W.] Bush was not elected by a majority of voters in the United States. He was appointed by God" - General William Boykin

Coming from another of the anointed like Boykin, how could Bush not believe himself to be the anointed leader of the new promised land?

If Mr. Bush would not listen to reason from inside his cabinet, he might at least listen to what Americans are telling him about the damage to this country’s credibility, and its cost.

Since none of Bush's immediate or extended family is in danger of being blown to bits by an IED, or suffering from the lack of proper care from military and/or VA hospitals, he doesn't care about what other Americans are saying. Since he has held a silver spoon in his mouth since birth, and his family is making money off the price gouging proffered by the oil industry and their OPEC partners (especially the Saudis), and he will never have to worry about another bill over the rest of his life, George W. doesn't need to be concerned about the issues that face the average American, the poor, or those with their boots on the ground in combat areas. The dead, injured and disabled are nothing more than a means to an ends to Bush and company.

When Khalid Shaikh Mohammed — for all appearances a truly evil and dangerous man — confessed to a long list of heinous crimes, including planning the 9/11 attacks, many Americans reacted with skepticism and even derision. The confession became the butt of editorial cartoons, like one that showed the prisoner confessing to betting on the Cincinnati Reds, and fodder for the late-night comedians.

What stood out the most from the transcript of Mr. Mohammed’s hearing at Guantánamo Bay was how the military detention and court system has been debased for terrorist suspects. The hearing was a combatant status review tribunal — a process that is supposed to determine whether a prisoner is an illegal enemy combatant and thus not entitled in Mr. Bush’s world to rudimentary legal rights. But the tribunals are kangaroo courts, admitting evidence that was coerced or obtained through abuse or outright torture. They are intended to confirm a decision that was already made, and to feed detainees into the military commissions created by Congress last year.

The omissions from the record of Mr. Mohammed’s hearing were chilling. The United States government deleted his claims to have been tortured during years of illegal detention at camps run by the Central Intelligence Agency. Government officials who are opposed to the administration’s lawless policy on prisoners have said in numerous news reports that Mr. Mohammed was indeed tortured, including through waterboarding, which simulates drowning and violates every civilized standard of behavior toward a prisoner, even one as awful as this one. And he is hardly the only prisoner who has made claims of abuse and torture. Some were released after it was proved that they never had any connection at all to terrorism.

Still, the Bush administration says no prisoner should be allowed to take torture claims to court, including the innocents who were tortured and released. The administration’s argument is that how prisoners are treated is a state secret and cannot be discussed openly. If that sounds nonsensical, it is. It’s also not the real reason behind the administration’s denying these prisoners the most basic rights of due process.

In other words, Bush lied, our troops have died, and detainees have been denied basic human rights and justice.

The Bush administration has so badly subverted American norms of justice in handling these cases that they would not stand up to scrutiny in a real court of law. It is a clear case of justice denied.

Which is why the Bush administration doesn't want any of these folks to see a real court... it would expose the hypocrisy, frailty and deception that is the Bush presidency and administration.