In 2004, the GOP convention did its best to spook the electorate with fear of terrorism, a tactic that one speaker after another repeatedly condemned before the cheering crowd of apparatchiks (as beautifully depicted in this sickening two-minute video).
Now a Bush speechwriter, fulminating with spite at having been spurned by that same electorate, taunts Obama:
“President Obama has inherited a set of tools that successfully protected the country for 2,688 days — and he cannot dismantle those tools without risking catastrophic consequences. On Tuesday, George W. Bush told a cheering crowd in Midland, Tex., that his administration had left office without another terrorist attack. When Barack Obama returns to Chicago at the end of his time in office, will he be able to say the same?”
Thiessen is typical of one-time conservatives who have been seduced by proximity to power. Like his legacy-minded boss, simply cannot accept reality, including these basic facts:
His central fallacy is simple: he alleges that Bush has “successfully protected the country.” He defines “protection” much too narrowly. As Commander in Chief, Bush should have read the oath taken by every officer commissioned in the armed forces under his command:
“I, ____________, do solemnly swear, or affirm, that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”
Fact: Bin Laden spent half a million on 9-11, with the audacity of hope that Bush’s response would bankrupt America. It did.
Fact: 9-11 was not the most catastrophic event of the past eight years. Nor was the politically-derived collapse of our economy.
Fact: The most catastrophic event of the past eight years was the evisceration of the U.S. Constitution by a bipartisan gang of thieves and egomaniacs who show no remorse or regret for their crimes.
Fact: Bush did everything he could to destroy the fabric of comity among nations; now his spear-carriers spurn the option of their humble, honorable exit and instead fiendishly prepare to blame Obama for the consequences of Bush’s travesties.
Fact: Obama will create enough travesties of his own, thank you.
Fact: The same bipartisan peanut gallery that propounds fear of another 9-11 actually celebrates the 600,000 unnecessary deaths of the Civil War. Like Madeline Albright cheering the deaths of half a million Iraqi children **before** 9-11, these fanatics think those 600,000 deaths were “worth it.”
Fact: Our long national nightmare is not over, because the fulcrum upon which we must rely to leverage a recovery of our liberties — the Constitution — is ignored. All that are left are schoolyard taunts and mindless legacy-building.
10:51 am on January 24, 2009
