President Bush's Armageddon - by Nicholas F. Benton
"The US presidency is a perfect place for a madman to be. He sounds smart. He sounds sincere. He looks you in the eye, and by golly, he must be right because, well, look at where he is! People think that nut cases are confined to drooling derelicts hugging inner city gutters or middle management types at their firm. The weird thing about our free market society is that, at least sometimes, the crazier one is, the higher one can go.
In the case of George Bush, the topography of the inner workings of his grey matter is revealed in the turn-key phrase, “the conflict between competing ideologies,” that he employed repeatedly yesterday. In short, this is what makes him tick. The president remains gridlocked, mentally, by this notion that there is a cosmic struggle out there that transcends normal, pragmatic considerations and will not end until….well, that’s a good one to put to the president.
The phrase, “A conflict between competing ideologies,” is subtly but profoundly different than “a conflict between different cultures,” “perceived self-interests,” or, most correctly “economic differences.” Each of the latter three can be overcome by discourse, negotiations and peaceful policy shifts. But to claim that there is the evil infidel out there who can be vanquished only by a final and complete conflagration that drives them forever from the face of the earth is an end-game scenario that spins off any measure of reality into the realm of pure fantasy."
No comments:
Post a Comment