Editorial

Asleep at the wheel would be the kindest thing to say about George W. Bush, the current president of the United States of America. But unfortunately that phrase doesn’t adequately illustrate the inadequacy of this particular president. Nonetheless, it is time to call Mr. Bush to account.

This man has forced the nation to violate virtually all of its history-long principles; America is currently engaged in a pre-emptive war that was initiated by calculated administrative propaganda. In blunter terms, the American people and the world at large were lied to in order to justify an invasion of Iraq.

The man who orchestrated the airplane attack on the twin towers in New York on September 11, 2001, is known to the entire world. This president, George W. Bush, declared that Osama bin Laden and his followers would be tracked down and brought to justice, ‘dead or alive.’ But then Mr. Bush forgot about Bin Laden, saying not too long ago that he “doesn’t think about him much” at this point because he’s insignificant.

Bin Laden and his minions seem to be significant enough, however, to have created a terrorist Super Bowl in Iraq.

Common sense would have led America to use the overwhelming world support it gained after 9/11 to root out Bin Laden, his personal followers, and his Taliban cohorts wherever they existed. But Mr. Bush and his neo-conservative ideologues, who seem to have a hidden agenda with a view to a new world order, discarded such an approach. And to achieve their goals, anything goes; lies, manipulations, obfuscations, treasury looting and a shifting of wealth to the upper classes are all acceptable under a veneer of religious righteousness and zealotry.

And now, as a national tragedy becomes an international disgrace, we see how little the Bush Administration cares for Americans; United States citizens are of as little concern to George W. Bush and his administrators as Iraqi civilians or Afghani villagers.

“I know that those of you who have been hit hard by Katrina are suffering. Many are angry and desperate for help,” declared George W. Bush this week, explaining that “the tasks before us are enormous, but so is the heart of America.”

Platitudes and generalities have always worked before, so why shouldn’t they work now?

Perhaps because finally all Americans can see how the Bush Administration fails to function on the behalf of the United States and its citizenry. And that casual, laissez faire attitude – a hands-off, everyone fends for themselves viewpoint when it comes to serving the public, but a big government view when handing out help to the defense industries and wealthy corporate stockholders – has allowed America to fall further in the eyes of people throughout the world as one of the nation’s greatest and most historic cities was lost in a scenario that could formerly only be imagined in a Third World country.

What a scene to show the world: People dying in the streets, bodies floating in fetid water, lawless thugdom taking hold, and average people crying out for help that doesn’t arrive from only a few miles away!

Hurricane Katrina wasn’t a surprise!

Everyone knew it was approaching the Gulf Coast and would wreak havoc from New Orleans through Mississippi. But George W. Bush was cutting wood and other ‘recreating’ tasks, enjoying his latest month-long vacation in Crawford, Texas. He apparently didn’t think, or care, about what might happen along the Gulf Coast.

If Mr. Bush was a responsible president, the national guard from many states would have been on stand-by, along with the specialized units of the regular military, and resources would have been pulled together in advance of the destruction.

But Mr. Bush is not a responsible president, and his actions amid this tragedy show that fact once and for all.

Days after the tragedy, and many, many hours after a full scale federal mobilization should have been underway, George Bush decided to cut his month long vacation short by two days and return to the White House. It’s hard to imagine that he cut his vacation short because of empathy, but it’s easy to imagine that he cut it short because political pressure and public criticism was building.

He should have been back in the White House orchestrating the federal efforts prior to Hurricane Katrina making landfall. That’s what would have been expected from other presidents, so why not expect it of the born again, religiously sensitive Mr. Bush?

Wouldn’t it be reasonable to assume that a deeply religious man who is in power would take every step necessary to protect human life; after all, this is the man whose administration wants to curtail all abortions, limit contraception, and even opposes stem cell research that might cure nightmarish diseases such as cancer in order to assure that no life is interrupted, even in the most obtuse manner.

But cynicism blanketed by a cavalier, cowboy demeanor is the order of the day.

The same attitudes that resulted in the looting of the national treasury, so that the surplus left by the Democratic administration of William J. Clinton has been turned into a massive deficit, and the U.S. has become an international debtor nation, was reflected in what happened when the U.S. Corps of Engineers asked for $62.5 million for work on the New Orleans system of levees. The Bush Administration cut the request to $10.5 million.

Since taking office, Bush has largely frozen Corps of Engineers funding, along with cutting public service programs everywhere. So now, Mr. Bush says the federal government response “has not been acceptable” in this crisis.

Well, the hard and final truth is that Mr. Bush’s presidency is not acceptable.

It is time for Congress to convene hearings – which the Republican Congressional majority has shown a great aptitude for when pursuing Democrats for sexual peccadilloes rather than high crimes – and put America first for a change.

It is time to consider impeaching George W. Bush for high crimes and misdemeanors.

Mr. Bush initiated pre-emptive war based on what is now acknowledged virtually everywhere as falsified information.

Mr. Bush failed to capture and hold accountable the terrorists that were behind 9/11, while at the same time throwing away legal due process and illustrating a willingness to condone torture.

Mr. Bush sat like a deer in the headlights after learning about the 9/ll attacks and continued to read to school children, and then went into hiding for hours. But that didn’t stop him from acting swiftly to allow a number of Bin Laden’s family members who were here in the U.S. to be given VIP status and fly back to Saudi Arabia even though other flights were grounded in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.

The Bin Ladens weren’t even questioned before being allowed to leave under federal government protection.

In the recent tragedy, he couldn’t leave his vacation to oversee rescue efforts in the worst natural disaster in decades, perhaps centuries.

Mr. Bush has done nothing to stop big oil from further exploiting American citizens after Hurricane Katrina. Exxon Mobil Corporation alone has recorded $7.64 billion in profit – profit – in the last four months! And this during an administration where both the president and vice president are oil executives who it is reasonable to conclude understand the energy business better than most politicians.

Mr. Bush and his administration alienated the nation’s allies and made the United States appear to be a pariah nation to its enemies. The moral values that America has stood for internationally have been discarded, and the nation’s enemies are using the Bush Administration’s actions as proof of why the country must be attacked when and where possible.

Mr. Bush and his administration are unbothered by scenes of devastation usually only associated with Third World nations, and now Americans are witnessing the phenomena of nations like El Salvador offering to send troops to help restore order. An English newspaper, in a front page story, asks: “How can the US take Iraq, a country of 25 million people, in three weeks but fail to rescue 25,000 of its own citizens from a sports arena in a big American city?”

Mr. Bush, in what should be considered a shocking, revolting remark, this week “chuckled” as he stood on the tarmac at New Orleans International Airport and talked about how he recalls New Orleans fondly from his drinking and partying days. As Maureen Dowd of the New York Times reports, he then noted: “You know, I’m going to fly out of here in a minute, but I want you to know that I’m not going to forget what I’ve seen.” Conveniently, however, Mr. Bush was kept out of sight of the huge triage center filled with injured and often dying people inside the terminal.

It seems absolutely clear that George W. Bush will ultimately be revealed as the worst president in American history. He has diminished the nation internationally, trampled on the country’s values and its law structure, run the economy into overwhelming debt, engaged in economic and legislative class warfare, and shown absolute contempt for other Americans, especially Americans who are not of his social and economic class.

Mr. Bush should be impeached, and if the members of the Republican Party and their majority in Congress ever hope or expect to have stature again, they can no longer condone the policies and actions of this president. Impeachment proceedings should begin immediately. Mr. Bush should not be allowed to blindly drive the nation further down the road to the oblivion that awaits failed nation states.