Two writers, one from the hell that is Baghdad under Bush and the other from the nascent Police State that is the US under Republican Emperor Dubya the Divine make the case for throwing the current bums out of power in Washington. Lew Rockwell:
Many bad things would happen under a President Kerry. But many horrible things have happened under the Bush presidency. This is a regime that has exploded government power at a pace I hoped we would never see again. Just once I would like to see one of the Bush supporters write something like:
It is true that he has expanded the budget at twice the rate of Clinton, that he has created the largest and most powerful new federal bureaucracy since the WW2, that he has imposed costly protectionist legislation, that he keeps prisoners of war in violation of international law, that he lied about Iraq, that he is personally responsible for the deaths of 1,100 US soldiers, and 15,000+ Iraqi civilians, that his war has inspired terrorism around the world, and that another four years of this can only mean more loss of liberty and more bloodshed. And yet, I support his reelection for fear of Kerry.
But the Bush supporters don’t say that. Instead they liken him to God. They consider him savior. They trust him with leadership. They really credit him with securing the country. They say that he is ruling in the name of liberty. It is remarkable, even demonic. The Bush regime isn’t just a group of leaders vying for our affections. It is the world’s leading example of the cult of power itself. Kerry may be dangerous but he heads no cult and commands no army of deluded religious fanatics willing to celebrate him as he leads the country into a totalitarian hell of endless war and central administration.
Nonetheless, this is not an endorsement. It is an anti-endorsement. Until the day of real freedom arrives, we need both parties so that they might fight among themselves. Better that they point their guns at each other than at us.
Riverbend, in Baghdad Burning:
Who am I hoping will win? Definitely Kerry. There’s no question about it. I want Bush out of the White House at all costs. (And yes- who is *in* the White House *is* my business- Americans, you made it my business when you occupied my country last year) I’m too realistic to expect drastic change or anything phenomenal, but I don’t want Bush reelected because his reelection (or shall I call it his ‘reassignment’) will condone the wars on Afghanistan and Iraq. It will say that this catastrophe in Iraq was worth its price in American and Iraqi lives. His reassignment to the White House will sanction all the bloodshed and terror we’ve been living for the last year and a half.
I’ve heard all the arguments. His supporters are a lot like him- they’ll admit no mistakes. They’ll admit no deceit, no idiocy, no manipulation, no squandering. It’s useless. Republicans who *don’t* support him, but feel obliged to vote for him, write long, apologetic emails that are meant, I assume, to salve their own conscience. They write telling me that he should be ‘reelected’ because he is the only man for the job at this point. True, he made some mistakes and he told a few fibs, they tell me- but he really means well and he intends to fix things and, above all, he has a plan.
Let me assure you Americans- he has NO PLAN. There is no plan for the mess we’re living in- unless he is cunningly using the Chaos Theory as a basis for his Iraq plan. Things in Iraq are a mess and there is the sense that the people in Washington don’t know what they’re doing, and their puppets in Iraq know even less. The name of the game now in Iraq is naked aggression- it hasn’t been about hearts and minds since complete areas began to revolt. His Iraq plan may be summarized with the Iraqi colloquial saying, “A’athreh ib dafra”, which can be roughly translated to ‘a stumble and a kick’. In other words, what will happen, will happen and hopefully- with a stumble and a kick- things will move in the right direction.
So is Kerry going to be much better? I don’t know. I don’t know if he’s going to fix things or if he’s going to pull out the troops, or bring more in. I have my doubts about how he will handle the current catastrophe in Iraq. I do know this: nothing can be worse than Bush. No one can be worse than Bush. It will hardly be fair to any president after Bush in any case- it’s like assigning a new captain to a drowning ship. All I know is that Bush made the hole and let the water in, I want him thrown overboard.
Both Lew and Riverbend emphasize the fact the fanatic partisans devoted to Bush are as dangerous and ludicrously delusional as Bush himself. The combination of this cultish “base” with the evil neocon infestation in positions of power in the Bush administration is clearly worse than the threat Kerry and his supporters pose. I’m with Jacob Sullum, who said “I’d like to see Bush lose, but without Kerry winning.”
May whoever wins be stymied with gridlock at every turn and depart office with as illustrious a list of achievements as Glen Garvin’s (answering Reason magazine’s poll, Who’s getting your vote?) favorite president:
Favorite president: William Henry Harrison caught pneumonia while delivering his inaugural address, lay in bed barely conscious for six weeks, and then died, his presidency having done hardly any damage to the country.
