April 19, 2004
Bush - When Does The Wave Crest?
There's been so much stuff coming up about Bush's criminality that it really is quite amazing to witness how... tolerant the nation is. It's like one of those massive storm waves that you keep thinking is about to crest until it swells a bit more and you realize it wasn't even close.I'm only in my low thirties and don't know anything about Watergate. I don't have a sense of how big things have to get before the structure of an administration starts to crumble.
But we all have this feeling of frustration sometimes - "What does it take for people to wake up?" We hunger for some sort of validation, some sort of mass movement, some sort of collective motion that feels unbidden, unplanned, emergent. Something to show that a nation's integrity really does lie beneath, and under certain circumstances, will stir.
I don't know if this is just such a thing. But I see hints of a paradigm shift, or at least I hope I do. Whether it's witnessing some of my favorite bloggers rethink their views about what is partisan and "beyond the pale", or whether it's just my hope that things have to crumble sometime that makes me believe a shift is starting to happen, it has an effect on me. I feel like I need to see something happen soon. I need to see what happens when a mountain of lies finally starts to fall down, when truth rises up from underneath to cause a symphony of controlled destruction. I need this because to imagine this perversion continuing is sometimes just too much to take.
God. They're both about elections, but Watergate was only bugging a political headquarters. Bush has a deal to work with terrorism sponsors to manipulate oil prices. I ask again, What does it take for people to wake up?
Agree. The Saudi story should be big news. Finally picked up by CNN, link on their home page right now, to this story:
http://money.cnn.com/2004/04/19/news/international/election_saudi/index.htm?cnn=yes
There are a great number of people whose political calculus is to guess which of the two political flavors is in their best interests. For example, there are a great number of people of modest means in rural America who believe that whichever party is in power will enrich itself and it's corporate sponsors at the country's expense, but at least the Republicans will let them keep their guns. When people have taken up residence in an ideological bunker for their self-interest, they can play remarkeable tricks of self-delusion to stay there. I know people who still believe that Nixon was wrongly hounded from office by a biased media, and who think that Bush is a strong and courageous leader who is being mistreated by the press.
Posted by: Pat Fitzgerald at April 19, 2004 09:00 PM