Gang,
Kamiya (below commentary) lays it out quite well, here.
http://archive.salon.com/opinion/feature/2003/09/04/un/These guys, Bush, Cheney, all the duplicitous neo-cons have failed in every aspects of their "policy" towards Iraq, Afghanistan, bin Laden, Hussein, foreign policy, and making this country despised the world over. Yes, it's quite a failure.
Or it is?
This is a wonderfully informative article, but as Captain Mike has been asserting all along, these guys' "incompetence" only manages to serve their ultimate goal, the larger view, the "big picture." My assertion is based upon what I believe is the true m.o. of the Bush Cartel. And a cartel is what they are.
If you look at the history of the Bush family, and even more particularly, at Junior's business history, the Bushes have a long history of fucking up. All three of Junior's companies have failed miserably, Arbusto, Harken, and Spectrum 7. But not without Bush turning a handsome profit. Bush cashed out quite nicely just before the companies tanked and the investors, employees, and stockholders were left holding the bag. This is a pattern with them, and they've continued their m.o. with the American Presidency.
It doesn't matter how much, how often, how badly, and in how many areas - the economy, foreign policy, domestic policy - Bush fucks up. As long as they profit handsomely, nothing else matters! As I've always maintained, The Bush Family is not a 'political' family, but rather a 'cartel,' or business machine. They are, quite literally, sharks. Like that description in JAWS, "the perfect eating machine." They are a money-making machine, no matter what the repercussions are to anyone else around them, whether they be stockholders at a failed oil-drilling company, or the entire economic bottom 99% of all Americans. Bush was installed in the White House by his daddies' friends on the Supreme Court, much like Daddy Bush installed him to run Harken Energy, KNOWING FULL WELL, that Junior would run the company into the ground, but not before sucking all the money he could out of it. And like sharks, they must keep moving, or die. The Bush Cartel must keep moving, keep sucking up money, no matter how much damage they do the US economy, the environment, the US taxpayer, social programs, national security, or the delicate global balance. They simply will not stop.
Thusly, we have Bush's strategy with Iraq. It WAS all about the oil. Not completely, entirely. But 90% of it was. Do your Captain Mike research into "Peak Oil." The world's dwindling petroleum and natural gas supplies are gonna start to bite us in the ass and never let up, starting with this very first decade of the new millennium. And it will never stop. It will only get worse. All the oil and natural gas that exist on the planet has already been discovered, and almost all of it has been tapped. The main goal of the Bush "Presidency" and the Invasion of Iraq was to take over the oil supplies, and to control the spigot. There's also the very real benefit of having the companies owned by Carlyle Group like United Defense, making millions and billions on weapons. (Daddy Bush works for Carlyle!)
Thusly, we had the 9-11 Hoax to fool the world and the US public that we needed to go into Afghanistan where a much-needed pipeline had to be built to suck up the last-discovered reserves in the Caspian Basin. Thusly we have the Phony "War on Terror," (see Meacher
http://www.guardian.co.uk/september11/story/0,11209,1036588,00.html), and the completely bogus need to "protect" America by invading Iraq.
If you look at Bush's "failures" in both Afghanistan and Iraq - as both countries have been officially dubbed "quagmires" - just about everything has indeed GONE WRONG except for one tiny little matter...THE OIL PIPELINES! Afghanistan has been thrown back to the wolves, the Taliban is assuming power again, as the US troops have been concentrated on freshly-built bases that mirror the exact route of the natural gas pipelines. Iraq is heading by way of Afghanistan. Not because of the neo-cons' "arrogance," or their "lack of an exit strategy," because there simply isn't one. We're building permanent bases in the Middle East to stay! So what if it's become a new hotbed of terror. More Terror = good for Bush. IT keeps us all scared and distracted. That way no one is talking about the oil that both Cheney's company and the Bush Family company, The Carlyle Group have managed to secure for themselves. Who gives a shit that Iraqi's don't have electricity? Hell, who cares that our troops don't have adequate drinking water, supplies, or functioning weapons? We're dealing with the Bush Family Eating Machine. Bush cut veteran's benefits, and now he wants to cut federal worker overtime pay. There goes millions of potential votes for Bush in 2004
An act of Re-election suicide on Bush's part? Again, they don't give a shit! It's no way to run a company, is it? It certainly isn't any way to run America, or Iraq, or Afghanistan, is it? But Bush got away with running his companies the exact same way, and came up aces. The Bush Cartel got what it wanted, and when they get "kicked out" on 2004, it'll be all the sooner that Cheney can go back to heading up Halliburton and bringing home 36 million dollars a year. Bush & Co. wanted to get it all done in one term, before the American People fully caught on.
It you lift the veil of your assumptions that Bush as President wants to "do well," and "serve and protect the Constitution," and "bring honor and integrity" back to the White House, then it's possible to cut through all the bullshit about what you've been taught in school about government, and what all the cable news channels have been feeding you. Bush is NOT President for the betterment of America or the world. Bush is President to suck all the money they can out of the economy, to solidify their power with their corporate base, and to use The United States Troops as their own personal mercenaries to go around the world, taking over other countries, and seizing their oil supplies. Which The Bush Oil interests WILL CONTROL as the coming permanent oil crisis wreaks havoc upon the world.
Get over your "trained response" that Bush wants to be a "good President." He's been a shitty one, and it doesn't matter. They've looted the Treasury, trashed Social Security and most social programs, destroyed the environment, and grabbed the second-large reserves of oil on the planet, with our troops poised to take over the rest in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Columbia, and Venezuela.
Hell, just look at the US economy. We Americans automatically "think" that Bush is doing his best job, that he's trying to help create jobs. Did it ever occur to you that they're doing they're ruining the economy ON PURPOSE? Everything he's done, most notoriously by handing out trillions on tax breaks to the wealthy in an already crippled economy, has only made it worse. We still think that he's "screwing up," as opposed to screwing us royally. Come on! Do you think he do a better job of screwing it up if he actually "tried to?" (which he really is)
Bush's Presidency may be the "worst Presidency in US history," according to Nobel Laureates and Helen Thomas; his term may be labeled a "failure" by all future pundits and historians; indeed, Bush may leave the White House, as Gore Vidal says, "the most hated President ever," but do you really think The Bush Cartel really will fucking care? They'll be laughing all the way to the bank.
This "failure," while ruining the rest of the country and its citizenry, has uncannily managed to accomplish The Bush Cartel's wildest financial dreams. DO ANY OF YOU think that they care that you hate them?
Lift the veil of your assumptions about what you ASSUME the Presidency is SUPPOSED to do for the American people, and all of what I'm spelling out for you starts to make incredibly, perfect, nihilistic sense...
Captain Mike
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