Monday, January 15th, 2007
The Little Dictator Who Could
Remember this quote?
If this were a dictatorship, it’d be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I’m the dictator.
Well, Glenn Greenwald points out just why The Most Holy George W. Christ’s political troubles just might bring out the dictator in him.
But more significantly, if the President wanted FISA changed, even radically, to vest him with still greater powers, the unprecedentedly compliant post-9/11 Congress was as eager as could be to grant all of his wishes and to give him whatever new powers he wanted. It did so repeatedly, at exactly the time (October, 2001) when he ordered eavesdropping in violation of the law.
In fact, Congress did amend FISA to grant expanded eavesdropping powers — in complete accordance with the President’s request — at the very same time Bush ordered illegal eavesdropping.
The reason Bush violated the law when eavesdropping is the same reason Lithwick cites to explain his other lawless and extremist measures — because he wanted purposely not to comply with the law in order to establish the general “principle” that he was not bound by the law, to show that he has the power to break the law, that he is more powerful than the law.
This attitude permeates everything the Bush administration does, and it shows. This arrogance, this hubris, this disdain for all rational counsel and advice, when evidenced in the leadership of the “free” world, is more than just an unpleasant personal quirk - it does severe damage to our democracy and our standing as the world’s last superpower, as the last six years should’ve shown to anyone not blinded by ideology.
Greenwald continues:
As John Dean demonstrated, a perception of one’s weakness and the resulting fears it inspires are almost always what drive people to seek out empowering authoritarian movements and the group-based comforts of moral certitude.
This attitude also permeates the minds of Bush’s most ardent followers, from pundits on right-wing hate radio to conservative bloggers, and has lately taken on an eliminationist bent. For a more salient example, just look at what happened with Spocko.
Greenwald concludes:
The most dangerous George Bush is one who feels weak, powerless and under attack. Those perceptions are intolerable for him and I doubt there are many limits, if there are any, on what he would be willing to do in order to restore a feeling of power and to rid himself of the sensations of his own weakness and defeat.
This is why Bush needs to be impeached NOW, before he does anything el-……oh, shit…
“I fully understand they could try to stop me,” Bush said of the Democrat-run Congress. “But I’ve made my decision, and we’re going forward.”
Shorter George W. Bush: “I’m the dictator, and what I say goes, you damn Dhimmicrats!!!!!111!11!!111!!1111!!” (Also note the lovingly-parroted conservative style of referring to Democrats - thanks, “librul” media!)
“You cannot run a war by committee,” the vice president said of congressional input (while shooting septagenarian lawyers in the face).
As opposed to how you’ve been running this war, Vice President Perma-Sneer? I believe Peter Jurasik’s character in Babylon 5 put it best. “Only an idiot fights a war on two fronts,” as you have already done with Iraq and Afghanistan. “Only the heir to the throne of the kingdom of idiots fights a war on TWELVE fronts!” Which is precisely what you are doing by escalating your Iraq debacle into a wider regional war.
