By David Epstein
Now this is just too much. Bush gave a speech the other day comparing our present situation to what the US faced prior to World War II and the Cold War. The point was apparently to put pressure on Democrats who are making too much of minor issues like torture and basic civil liberties, denying him the unfettered authority he claims is necessary to fight the Global War On Terror.
We need a history lesson here. In World War II the US fought against totalitarianism and evil with freedom and regard for human life. In the Cold War we fought Socialism and Communism with multiparty democracy and free markets. In both cases we triumphed due to -- *not* despite -- our fundamental values. When we failed to act in accordance with these values, like making pacts with tin-pot third world dictators, evidence shows that we harmed both our cause and our image.
Now Bush wants to fight a war on hate and terror with -- with -- with torture and wiretapping? With extraordinary rendition, unreasonable search and seizure, and late night visits to the hospital bed of a very sick man? By alienating the allies that stood by us during World War II and the Cold War itself, all because they wouldn't believe our *wrong* intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction? The effrontery of it all -- the administration violates everything we as Americans hold dear, and then dare to call their opponents unpatriotic.
What Bush and his crew don't understand -- what they seem incapable of comprehending -- is that we win great battles by staying true to what made our country great in the first place. Liberty and open government and checks and balances are not impediments to fighting wars, they are the preconditions for doing it right. An executive branch that walls itself off from all checks on its authority will sooner rather than later make mistake after mistake and fail spectacularly to achieve its goals.
Why did we come to this point? That's actually one the history books will have to sort out. Right now the most likely explanation lies in the fact that key actors in the administration, notable Rove, saw the war on terror first and foremost as a tool for reelection. That meant keeping the public scared about the size and nature of the threat facing us, and above all not allowing another attack within the US. Those were the overriding concerns; civil liberties and our image abroad never even came into the equation.
Whatever the history books say about this, they will point to the last four years as an unmitigated disaster, the moment when we collectively lost our soul and our love of freedom. Whether we can recover from this debacle, only the future will tell.
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