LYING LIARS AND THE LIES THEY LIE…
July 10th, 2006
A generation ago Republicans called on President Richard Nixon and told him it was time for him to resign. At what point will this generation’s Republican leadership make that lonely trip to the Oval Office and ask President George Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to submit their resignations?
Nearly six years into his disastrous presidency, there are few who have not awakened to the realities of the lies. The president who promised to restore honor and integrity to the White House has instead laid a mantle of shame over our First Residence.
From Andrew Sullivan:
The second fascinating and completely convincing narrative is about the remarkable decision of Muammar Ghadafi to give up his entire WMD program. At the time, the president credited it to the psychological impact of the war to depose Saddam. He claimed it scared Ghadafi into compliance. Back in the days when I trusted president Bush’s words, I echoed this analysis. It was a lie. I apologize to my readers for echoing it. It turns out Ghadafi had been entrapped by careful intelligence work long before the Iraq war was launched. The timing of the announcement was choreographed coincidence.
In the last few years, I have gone from lionizing this president’s courage and fortitude to being dismayed at his incompetence and now to being resigned to mistrusting every word he speaks. I have never hated him. But now I can see, at least, that he is a liar on some of the gravest issues before the country. He doesn’t trust us with the truth. Some lies, to be sure, are inevitable — even necessary — in wartime. But when you’re lying not to keep the enemy off-balance, but to maximize your own political fortunes at home, you forfeit the respect of people who would otherwise support you — and the important battle you have been tasked to wage.
I know that Sullivan will be vilified for this statement. I know that there will be some crawling things that will poke their heads out from under their safe rocks and impugn his words because he is a gay man. I know that he will be tagged as someone who was only posing as a Republican while plotting to aid our nation’s enemies.
I don’t care. Reasonable people can no longer justify what President Bush has done to our nation.
I know that Sullivan will be vilified for this statement. I know that there will be some crawling things that will poke their heads out from under their safe rocks and impugn his words because he is a gay man. I know that he will be tagged as someone who was only posing as a Republican while plotting to aid our nation’s enemies.
I’m not gonna villify Andy for any of that. No, my problem with Andy is that it’s taken him — what? three years? five? — to see what’s been pretty obvious for a while now. And in that time he never missed an opportunity to slime people who were perceptive enough to notice huge problems with the Bush agenda early on — problems that nowadays seem to come as something of a revelation to Sullivan. He still slimes people who have the temerity to point out hard truths.
Of course, nowadays Sullivan’s catching all sorts of abuse from the right-wingers who are still trapped in the kind of thinking that any good Bolshevik would appreciate. Andy may be surprise by the turnabout, but should any sentient being find it remarkable? The mainstream right wing has been trading in manufactured outrage and the language of the blood feud for years. If Andy’s surprised that now his former allies berate him, what’s that tell you about his judgement, his insight?
As far Sullivan’s sexual preferences go, look, I don’t care about which gender he prefers, nor does any critic worthy of consideration. But ask yourself: If Sullivan didn’t have the whole Catholic Gay Tory Brit performance artist schtick going (whoa, dude, he’s a walking oxymoron! wowza!), do you honestly believe that he’d be doing any better than maybe writing advice columns for some “alternative” weekly?
Shalom Sglover,
That is has taken Sullivan a long time to change his point of view is of less importance to me than the fact that he has changed it. The importance to me lies in his high profile.
There are important issues on which I have gone back and forth during my life. Reasonable people are subject to reason, which can change as new data is assimilated.
I think Sullivan, because of his status as a Catholic Gay Tory Brit gets a platform to express views that many others can’t. I also think there is value here for people who hold the same opinions that Sullivan articulates, but who may feel isolated and unsure about expressing themselves.
B’shalom,
Jeff
Andy is 1 VERY smart guy. …A very talented writer. But when a person’s mind is trapped within a myth, it’s usually impossible to accurately perceive those events that threaten that myth. And what a comfortable myth it was – A wild west morality play , unemcumbered by facts, in a world populated by ersatz human beings . These people do not matter, therefore, and we may kill, or commit any sin against them with a clear conscience. Charachatures dont bleed, dont love their children, dont react to violence that we humans do.Plus they’re just plain stupid….This is the way I view the bubble that righties live in. We’ve allowed them to take our country to a very dark , and evil place. Andy – and ALL those who claim to be journalists – bear a unique responsibility to speak the truth, even if belatedly. It’s refreshing to see that at least one of them has.
That is has taken Sullivan a long time to change his point of view is of less importance to me than the fact that he has changed it. The importance to me lies in his high profile.
Understood. But I’d be a lot more inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt if he’d done the same. Andy wants a free pass for cute stunts like imputing treason to “fifth columnists” like me — informed laypeople who dispassionately (and correctly) deduced that the Iraq adventure would inevitably lead to a situation with no good options. Many war advocates managed to argue with sceptics without implying they were traitors. Sullivan wasn’t one of them.
Of course, that’s what happens when you emote (often hysterically) rather than reason. But that’s Andy.
Welp, that’s my Sullivan-bashing quota for the week. Thanks for the reply!
Shalom Jimbo,
First, thank you for stopping in, for readng and, most importantly, for taking the time to write a comment.
What you say is true, you’re absolutely right.
Humans are very good at maintaining their myths because to refute them is to admit previous error;and we do hate being wrong. Only individuals of Character are able to move beyond the myth.
B’shalom,
Jeff
Shalom Sglover,
That’s true. You’re absolutely right.
In an exchange of rising emotions lots of words get hurled that never should have been uttered.
I’m not trying to give Sullivan a pass here, but I am willing to accept a sincere apology. The key to any apology, of course, is that repeat behavior negates future apologies.
How Sullivan speaks and writes in the future will tell us if his apology is sincere. I’m willing to allow him that much.
B’shalom,
Jeff
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