American History part 4 -- From Carter to Obama

This is taking longer than I anticipated. I guess 250 years is a long time. 
1. From Revolution to Fracture
2. From Civil War to World War
3. From Roar to Reagan
__________________________

18. But the real shift came with Ronald Reagan

But first, we should mention Jimmy Carter. Before Reagan swept in with a cowboy hat and camera-ready smile, there was a one term Democratic president. He was a soft-spoken peanut farmer from Georgia, quite unexpected really. Sincere. Intellectual. Doomed.

He called himself a "born-again" Christian, the first president to say somethng like that. Of course, that didn't mean anything in my Christian circles. After all, he was a Democrat. We always had a reason to vote against a Democrat even before Roe v. Wade. The reasons changed, the vote remained the same. After all, we humnans are herd animals.

Carter promised honesty after Watergate, and he delivered. He was a truly honorable man. Thus of course, doomed. 

He was everything Nixon wasn’t. He was transparent, humble, moral. Maybe too moral. Can you be moral and be president? He told Americans we were addicted to consumption. He asked us to turn down the thermostat. He wore sweaters on TV and talked about rising above our national gloom. 

Meanwhile, inflation soared. Gas lines stretched for blocks. Iran took Americans hostage and wouldn’t let them go. In one of the final acts of his presidency, we botched a rescue attempt and lost 8 servicemen in the process.

Carter did broker a landmark peace in the Middle East between Egypt and Israel. An astounding achievement. Since Israel had declared itself a state in 1948, there had been little but war and hostility with its Arab neighbors. But that diplomatic triumph was overshadowed by domestic frustration. What Americans remembered was inflation, gas lines, and the failed rescue of hostages in Iran -- not the breakthrough at Camp David.

He was a good man in a bad moment. Far too boring. Far too intellectual. And America wanted a showman, not a sermon.

19. Reagan was charming, confident, camera-ready. He talked about America like it was a sunset movie. He said the government wasn’t the solution. It was the problem. Sounded good to people who were tired of the government telling them what to do (especially when it came to blacks).

Reagan marked the end of a decades long flipping of the parties. The Democrats had once been synonymous with Jim Crow and "state's rights," a tool to keep the blacks in their place. Now the Democrats had somehow become the champion of civil rights and voting rights. And the Republicans, once the party that had freed the slaves, now found itself now the champion of state's rights and resistance to these developments.

They called it Nixon's "southern strategy." Appeal to the disaffected Democrats in the South who were angry over the changes the rest of the Democrats were leading nationwide. It worked. By the end of Reagan's presidency, many of those who were once southern Democrats had become southern Republicans. Reagan himself had once been a Democrat.

By the 1980s, what remained of the earlier Republican Party’s identity was its loyalty to big business and deregulation. As Hoover had said, "Let the markets self-correct." Now Reagan put a new spin on the economics of the 20s.

"Trickle down economics." If you slash taxes on the wealthy and on big business, their increased investment in the economy will "trickle down" to the ordinary person. That was the concept. With more money in hand, businesses will raise wages for their workers. Their increased wealth, the theory went, would eventually drip down to the rest of us.

It has never seemed to work, although two more Republican presidents since have also tried it. Each time, the pattern repeated: tax cuts for the wealthy, soaring deficits, and eventually, economic trouble. Reagan's own Republican rival, George H. W. Bush, famously called it "voodoo economics" -- before becoming Reagan's vice president, and later, president. 

The rich got richer. Wages stagnated. And despite the promises, prosperity never quite trickled down.

20. Perhaps the most significant piece of Reagan's puzzle was the full alignment of evangelicalism with the Republican Party. Evangelicals in the North had long leaned Republican, while many Southern evangelicals had historically voted Democrat -- the party of segregation and state's rights. 

That all changed in the late 20th century. The issue that fused evangelicalism with the Republican Party was abortion. It became almost unthinkable for an evangelical to vote for a Democrat. The thing is, many southern Democrats initially supported Roe v. Wade. The outrage came later. Something deeper was going on.

What was it? Southern evangelicals had been angry about the federal government telling them to desegregate their schools and allow interracial dating in their colleges. But instead of defending segregation outright, they shifted that anger to something with stronger moral force: abortion. “The government can’t make me accept Black children at my private school” became “The government can’t make me accept abortion.” It was the same defiance -- repackaged around a more righteous cause.

While southern evangelicals had first been ambivalent even supportive of Roe v. Wade, it now became the sure sign that God was totally aligned with the Republican Party. Democrats were sheer evil.

Reagan welcomed the rise of a new force in politics: the Religious Right. Evangelicals, once wary of politics, got organized. They saw a country slipping away -- too secular, too sexual, too progressive -- and they made a deal. Vote Republican, and we’ll fight your culture wars. “Family values” became their brand. They didn’t just want to save souls. They wanted to shape policy.

And Reagan delivered. Not just with rhetoric, but with judges. Policies. A whole new political theology.

In the meantime, other biblical values were gutted. Reaganomics gutted public programs. The mentally ill were turned out into the streets as government funded facilities were closed. The war on drugs targeted Black and Brown communities. The AIDS crisis was ignored as thousands died. Many thought that gay people were being punished by God and getting what they deserved. It took the possibility that "normal" people would get AIDS to see any action.

But the story America told itself was that the country was back on track. Prosperous. Traditional. Strong. Becoming great again.

Reagan had changed the playing field. Now, freedom meant tax cuts. Patriotism meant military strength. The government could control people's moral values (but never corporate power). The backlash had become the blueprint.

Just like that, the gospel got a party platform. And the party got God's vote.

21. In 1989, the Berlin Wall fell. The red star dimmed. The Cold War was over.

Reagan gets a lot of the credit. The Soviet Union just couldn't keep up with his spending on defense. Communism is a failed economic system, and they finally gave up.

The Berlin Wall cracked open like an eggshell. East Germans streamed west. The Iron Curtain rusted into memory. Within two years, the Soviet Union was gone, collapsed under the weight of its own contradictions, corruption, and economic stagnation. For nearly fifty years, America had shaped its foreign policy, its budget, its fears, its identity around this one opponent. And now the opponent was gone.

It was called the "end of history." Capitalism had won. Democracy had won. America had won. There would be no more ideological battles, no more existential threats. The world would now become a free market shopping mall. And the United States owned the mall.

But history doesn’t end. It just changes costume.

With the Cold War over, the military budget didn’t shrink that much. But the mood changed. America relaxed. It seemed like we had earned our happy ending.

Still, the West squandered a rare opportunity. After communism collapsed, Russia stood at a crossroads. The hope was that it might join the democratic world. But instead of helping it build the institutions of a healthy republic -- courts, transparency, a free press -- we sent over economists with a Hoover-era playbook: unleash the free market and let it sort itself out. "Shock therapy." Let the "Unseen Hand" take care of it.

What followed wasn’t democracy. It was chaos. A handful of insiders seized everything: factories, oil, media. The state was gutted, and oligarchy filled the vacuum. Instead of freedom, Russia got a fire sale. Now there was a new ruling class wearing suits instead of party pins. 

And soon a new approach to war with the West.

22. Enter Bill Clinton.

He didn’t campaign on moral crusades. He wasn’t Reagan with a smile. He was Elvis with a saxophone. He was a Southern Democrat who talked like one of the guys but governed like a centrist economist. He promised to modernize liberalism. Make it leaner, smarter, more market-friendly. He called it “Third Way” politics -- not left, not right, just whatever works.

In practice, it meant welfare reform. It meant deregulating banks. It meant free trade agreements like NAFTA that promised more jobs but hollowed out whole regions. Clinton balanced the budget. He charmed Wall Street. In some ways he was a Republican in Democrat's clothing. He turned the Democratic Party into something that could win national elections again -- but only by sounding more like Republicans on economics. 

He had out-Republicaned the Republicans. A Democrat had turned his back on the unions and sent jobs sprinting to Mexico. Ironically, the budget balanced more than under any Republican president and abortion rates declined more too.

In the 90s, some of the biggest changes in human history in hundreds of years were rising. Technology boomed. The internet was born. Cell phones shrank. Cable TV exploded. For some, the 90s were prosperity and promise. 

But the other America -- the one that didn’t go to college, didn’t get stock options, didn’t get heard -- it began to simmer. And while the culture wars subsided, they weren't dead. They just put on different clothes.

Clinton’s presidency became a proxy battle over sex, morality, and the role of character in public life. His affair with an intern, and his bald-faced lie about it, became the stuff of impeachment. The outrage seemed real. Although it's easy to act with moral outrage when it's the other party. We're more apt to overlook moral failure from our own team. 

Outrage over Clinton was good political theater. The same party that had aligned with televangelists in the 1980s now used moral outrage as a sword.

Still, Clinton survived. His approval ratings soared. The economy roared. At the same time, cynicism deepened. The right had weaponized scandal. The left had compromised itself into confusion. There was money, there was power, but there wasn’t much meaning.

By 2000, a new millennium was beginning. But the fault lines hadn’t gone away. They’d just been covered over by Nasdaq stocks and cable news.

23. The year 2000 ended in confusion. Florida ballots. Hanging chads. A Supreme Court decision. It wasn't quite as dramatic as 1877, but the outcome remains questionable to this day. For sure, George W. Bush entered the presidency without winning the popular vote. Yet even in the Electoral College, the Supreme Court halted a recount in Florida with him ahead by just 537 votes. 

But he was a good guy. A good old boy. Someone you would enjoy having a beer with. How much damage could a president do? 

Then came September 11, 2001.

Terrorists flew planes into the Twin Towers. Smoke choked the New York skyline. The Pentagon was hit. A fourth plane crashed in a Pennsylvania field. Nearly 3,000 people died that day. Everything changed in a morning. The American psyche had dramatically changed.

The country united around grief. But that unity was quickly channeled into war. First Afghanistan. Then Iraq.

Afghanistan made some sense. After all, that's where the perpetrator was hiding, Osama bin Laden. We had worldwide support. The Arab world was more sympathetic to us than ever. It was a tremendous opportunity to end our long term differences.

Iraq was different. It had nothing to do with 9-11. The Arab world wasn't buying it. An opportunity for reconciliation turned into heightened alienation. Some holdovers from the Reagan era -- neoconservatives -- saw this as a chance to reshape the Middle East. It was probably well intentioned if culturally ignorant. Bush naively called "Mission Accomplished" 

We said it was about fighting terrorism. We said Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. It didn’t. But the war happened anyway. The military-industrial complex got its blank check. The media played along. The public, stunned and scared, mostly nodded. In my little town of 20,000, the mayor barricaded the courthouse in case of jihadists in Indiana.

America went from being the world's grieving friend to its unpredictable enforcer. Endless war became a business model. Fear became a political strategy. The Patriot Act. Wiretapping. Airport scanners. A surveillance state wrapped in a flag. Fear allowed all that.

At home, Bush tried Reaganomics 2.0. The economy soared -- and then crashed. Everyone loved deregulation until the housing bubble burst. Banks gambled and lost, but got bailed out. Homeowners didn’t. Ordinary Americans watched their savings disappear while Wall Street collected bonuses. It was 1929 with PowerPoint. Wall Street was rescued. The rest got a foreclosure notice.

And then came something no one expected.

24. Barack Obama.

A Black man (with a name that sounded a little too much like Osama) rose on a message of hope. He was calm, intellectual, composed. He spoke with clarity and conviction. He didn’t scream. He inspired. For a moment, it felt like the country might be ready to grow up.

Obama inherited a recession and two wars. He passed the Affordable Care Act -- a messy, compromised attempt at universal healthcare based on something Republicans had done in Massachusetts. He brought troops home. He stabilized the economy. He killed the real Osama. And in the process, he became both a symbol of progress and a trigger for backlash.

For millions, Obama was proof that the American Dream was still alive. That the words of 1776 still meant something. For others, he was the nightmare they’d always feared. Not because of what he did -- but because of what he represented.

They called him a socialist. They called him a Muslim. They said he was born in Kenya. Some didn’t even try to hide their racism. 

It was enough that gay marriage became legal during his presidency. No, he wasn't on the Supreme Court. He had nothing to do with making it happen. But for many it might as well have been him. 

The Tea Party rose, claiming to be about reducing the deficit -- a deficit that came back under Bush and was exacerbated by the bailouts of the recession. But mostly what the Tea Party did was grind Obama's movement to a halt. Attempts to fix immigration were stopped in their tracks, making the situation snowball into what we have today.

Every effort was made to sabotage the Affordable Care Act, as if there was something immoral about the government helping people get health care. Bring back Hoover and let the church do it. Better yet, make them get a job with good health care. In his last major act in Congress, John McCain stopped the repeal of the ACA by voting against his party, which was trying to kill it more out of vengeance than for a good reason.

Gun violence had dropped to historic lows during the Clinton years, thanks in part to the federal assault weapons ban. But under President Bush, the Republican-led Congress let the ban expire in 2004. The floodgates opened. Assault-style weapons returned to the shelves, and gun violence has climbed ever since, with school shootings especially rising in popularity. That lapse let a genie out that we may never get back in the bottle.

We say that people kill people, not guns. While that is true, the correlation lands the blame for our current crisis squarely on 2004 and a Republican Congress.

25. Conspiracies were increasingly America's favorite brew. The undercurrent of white grievance found a new fuel source. Facebook and Twitter rose to the challenge, and feeble minds were putty in the hands of foreign social media accounts.

Obama tried to lead from the center. His presidency was more careful than revolutionary. But just his presence in the White House felt like too much for some. Too much change too quickly.

He wore a tan suit. Scandal. He put Dijon mustard on a hamburger. Un-American. He cried after a school shooting. Weak.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party kept shifting. Reagan’s dog whistles had become bullhorns. Moderates were pushed out. The word “compromise” became a slur. More than any other single force, Fox reshaped America. Rupert Murdoch skillfully wielded it as a propaganda channel -- it was forced to admit in court that it was actually more entertainment than objective news. Meanwhile, innocent minds were manipulated into outrage at whatever Fox wanted them to be upset about.

Birtherism. Fake news. Online rage. The internet wasn’t just connecting people. It was radicalizing them. And cable news wasn’t informing people. It was inflaming them.

By the end of Obama’s presidency, America was breaking.

The backlash wasn’t just political. It was cultural, racial, psychological. The mere idea of a changing America -- less white, less Christian, more complex -- was enough to ignite a movement. One that would soon storm the stage in a red hat. 

Gen Eds H2: From 9-11 to the Present

This election year is the strangest I can remember. I think it's fair to say there has never been a candidate like Donald Trump in my lifetime. How did we get here?

Today I start looking back through world history. See my previous post for my basic framework. I am starting from the present and moving backward, and I am starting from my present. When I say "my" present, I recognize that I am an American of European descent. So that is the best place for me as narrator to start.

This is a series of posts on World History, the second topic in a series called, "General Education in a Nutshell." These are ten subjects you might study in a general education or "liberal arts" core at a university or college. The first topic in the overall series was philosophy.
__________________
1. In the previous post, I presented a rationale for the way I am approaching world history. As we start today, I want to mention two key components of my analysis. The first tool is what I am calling "pivot points." Certainly any decision we make, even the smallest ones, can have massive repercussions for later history. But I am going to focus my analysis on what I consider to be the most crucial points where history would be massively different if the event had not occurred or had happened differently. [1]

The second tool I want to use is the "counterfactual." What might history have looked like if the event had played out differently? Of course we cannot know for certain, but these thought experiments help us reflect on the real impact of the pivot point on the course of history.

Each week we will start at the moment before a major pivot point. We will start with the question, "How did we get here?" Then we will proceed back to what seem to be the most important pivot points in that period of history. Of course there are an infinite number of things going on at any one time. Any selection of certain events means we are "de-selecting" an almost infinite amount of other events. Only God knows all the events, characters, and settings in all their details and proper relationships.

Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders
1. This is the most unusual election of my lifetime (2016). In Bernie Sanders we had a candidate who called himself a "democratic socialist," which is truly strange given the negative connotation the word socialist has had throughout most of twentieth century US history. [2] Meanwhile, Donald Trump, a businessman, has managed to undermine the entire Republican establishment with a campaign that has channeled the anxiety and anger of a demographic whose default dominance in US society seems to be steadily diminishing.

How did we get here?

2. It is interesting to say, but I don't think the election of a female president would truly reflect a change in the current trajectory of American history. Clinton represents the current momentum of history and Sanders perhaps an accelerated version of that momentum (possibly where the trajectory is currently headed). It more seems like the election of Trump would represent a turning point or at least a turning blip.

[Turning blip option: Constantine made Christianity legal in AD313. The trajectory was then toward making Christianity the only legal religion, which happened under Theodosius in 380. But there was a "push-back" emperor, Julian "the apostate" (361-63). For a brief time, the empire went back to its non-Christian, "pagan" roots. But he was a last push back, a blip rather than a turning point.

Similarly, Bloody Mary (ruled 1547-58) tried to bring England back to Catholicism after her father left the Roman Catholic Church. But it was only a blip. When her sister Elizabeth became queen in 1558, the Protestant trajectory of England was ensured.]

If Trump were elected, it is not clear that he would ultimately change the current trajectory of American culture--at least not without a violent and devastating hand. It is more likely that he would prove to be a blip on the current trajectory. At the moment, it is looking as if he will be defeated. But many things can change in 89 days.

Supreme Court Obergefell Decision
3. The first pivot point I want to mention is the 2014 Obergefell decision of the Supreme Court. This decision afforded gay marriage the same status as heterosexual marriage in the United States. The decision did not come out of the blue. It represented the culmination of over a decade of legal back and forth on the subject, with some states having opened the door to gay marriage and others passing laws against it.

[The speed with which this situation has changed is striking. As an opinion, I tend to see movies and media as the most significant trigger of these changes. They have created a climate of acceptance that not only humanized what had largely been a distant concept, but they have encouraged individuals to be open in a way that had previously been rare.]

Obergefell put into effect a trajectory that was already well in play in American culture. However, it has had a seriously disorienting effect on a certain segment of the American population, not least conservative Christianity. Although the Trump campaign has publicly supported the current trajectory on this specific issue, the insecurity and anger on which his campaign feeds was greatly fomented by the Obergefell decision, IMO.

3. As our first counterfactual, we can ask this question: Would Donald Trump be the Republican candidate if Obergefell had not taken place? Was this Supreme Court decision the straw that broke the back of a camel that had been watching as America became more and more what Trump has called, "politically correct"?

Opposition to "political correctness" has been a key feature of Trump's campaign. In this category we might place a number of current trends and factors that play into his push-back against the cultural trajectory: 1) the empowerment of gay Americans and transgendered individuals under the law, 2) the rising dominance of the Hispanic demographic, 3) protests by the African-American community about violent treatment by law-enforcement, 4) an African-American president and the prospect of a female president, 5) increased negative pressure and rebuke in relation to language and actions that were once casual behaviors, and 6) a perception of increasing disadvantage at the same time that white males are being told they are privileged.

In consequence of these forces, a rising anger and anxiety has built within a certain segment of the American population. The animus of Trump's campaign toward illegal immigrants, toward all Muslims, and toward refugees relates at least in part to this racial insecurity (we will mention the terrorism component in a moment). Trump himself has occasionally moved beyond individuals in these categories who are threats to decry individuals who are legal and even war heroes. [3] These moments in the Trump campaign suggest that it is not merely illegal immigration in play or merely Islamic terrorism that is the driver but race itself at least to some degree.

Video of the deaths of a number of African-Americans at the hands of law enforcement have set in motion first a "Black Lives Matter" movement protesting the way African-Americans are treated by the police. But the shootings of certain police officers have provided others with fodder for a counter protest ("Blue Lives Matter" or "All Lives Matter"). Long standing stereotypes are in play, fueling anger on all sides. Certainly some of those who support Trump are fueled in part by this aspect of our current situation.

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS)
4. The recent surge in Islamic terrorism is also a major factor behind the current climate of insecurity. ISIS coming to dominance in 2014 is seen by some as a major failure of the current Obama administration.

A number of factors seem to have combined to empower ISIS, which previously was informally called Al-Qaeda in Iraq. One was certainly the withdrawal of troops by the Obama administration in 2011. Iraqi forces were simply not strong enough to resist ISIS when it stepped into a power vaccuum. The US likely resisted intervention at first because of the prevalent view among experts on the Middle East that US involvement usually creates as much future difficulty as it solves current problems. Similarly, there is the matter of giving space to Iraqi sovereignty. Nevertheless, the US resumed its military involvement in Iraq in 2014 when ISIS' forces had advanced so far as to put significant Kurdish territory in danger in the northeast part of Iraq.

5. Another factor in the rise of ISIS is what has been called the Arab Spring. It began in Tunisia in 2010 and spread to Egypt, Libya, and Syria. While the idea of democratic overthrow of dictatorships might seem desirable, the results have not been entirely positive, to say the least. Democracy without guaranteed rights for minorities usually becomes a situation where the majority party oppresses minorities.

In Iraq, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein led to a civil war between Shi'ites and Sunnis, with the Shi'ite now playing the role of the party in power where the Sunnis had been before. In Egypt, the army ended up taking back over the government because the democratically elected Muslim Brotherhood began to impose Islamic law on the entire population. In Libya we had the death of Ambassador Stevens at Benghazi in the chaos after the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi. Meanwhile, we are currently watching "democracy" erode the rights of minorities in Turkey.

By the time these revolutions reached Syria, the US was much more hesitant to get too involved, and Russia would soon take the side of the dictator in question, Bashar al-Assad. A stalemate would ensue that created a vacuum into which ISIS began to insert itself. Those inclined to support the jihadist cause flocked to Syria to join in the cause and be trained by ISIS.

Some of these jihadists have returned to Europe, along with the flood of refugees from the Syrian crisis. We have seen recent terrorist attacks in Belgium and France associated with such individuals.

6. ISIS has arguably facilitated the rise of home grown terrorists. Al-Qaeda did not have a fixed geographical location, but it was still strongly located first in Afghanistan and then Pakistan. When it pulled off the 9-11 attacks, it sent people here.

But ISIS has catalyzed lone terrorists who have no direct connection with ISIS and yet are nevertheless following its lead. The recent shootings in San Bernadino and Orlando may have involved multiple factors, but the example of ISIS is surely one of them. We should expect to see more because it is virtually impossible to identify such individuals until they strike or are about to strike. [4]

Something should be said about the rapid development of social media. It featured prominently in the Arab Spring. It may have stopped a 2016 coup attempt in Turkey. It has been a key trigger for outrage at police violence and thus the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement. It is playing a significant role in the 2016 election and in world events today. It is having a profound effect on history.

The Great Recession of 2008 
7. If racial and national insecurity have created a climate in which a Donald Trump could become a candidate for president in 2016, the economic crisis of 2008 was the backdrop to the 2010 and 2012 elections in the United States. This economic crisis came on in the last year of Bush's presidency and some of the emergency actions that were taken in late 2008/early 2009 were taken jointly by the outgoing Bush and incoming Obama administrations. TARP, the "Troubled Asset Relief Program," was passed by Congress a month before the 2008 election.

By that time President George W. Bush had become deeply unpopular as a result of the prolonged Iraq War, the longest war in US history (with military action still continuing today). Obama won the 2008 election handily as a result. But the bail out of the auto industry, banks, and "too big to fail" corporations like AIG was seen as unfair by many when some of them had arguably played a role in the origins of the crisis.

The Iraq War, the beginnings of the bail out, and perhaps other features of the Bush era left a 10.6 trillion dollar deficit to Obama the day he took office. Continued bailouts would drive this figure much higher. [5] This economic situation gave rise to a subgroup within the Republican Party called the "Tea Party," for whom fiscal responsibility became the focal concern. They swept Congress in the 2010 election and were a major factor in the nature of the Republican primary in the 2012 election.

8. The idealism of the Tea Party in the face of the veto power of President Obama has resulted in six years of intense gridlock in Washington. One of the most defining features of Obama's administration will likely prove to be the passing of the Affordable Care Act (somewhat derisively known as Obamacare). While some of the individual components of this sweeping health care legislation are popular (no denial on the basis of pre-existing conditions, ability to keep children on a parent's plan till they are 26, 20 million more people insured), it has been widely unpopular in certain circles. Among those who previously had good insurance, it is widely blamed for a significant increase in health care cost.

This act was created during 2009 when Democrats had overwhelming control over both houses. However, it nearly did not make it fully through the system when Ted Kennedy died and was replaced in a special election by a Republican, which made it possible to filibuster any modifications to the legislation. This was ironic because Kennedy had long been one of the strongest proponents of health care reform. Nevertheless, the bill had already gone far enough through the system that it could be passed without modification. For the next six years the repeal of Obamacare would be a major goal of Republicans and a Congress now controlled by Republicans.

The deficit has been a major concern of the Tea Party for the last six years. On more than one occasion, what had been the routine increase of the debt ceiling was blocked by filibuster in protest of an ever increasing deficit. [6] In October 2013, the government actually shutdown for 16 days as this group in Congress refused to authorize the funding of several parts of the Affordable Care Act that were then scheduled to go into effect.

9. Different causes for the global Great Recession are often mentioned. Perhaps there is some truth in all of them. For example, a climate had persisted for some time in which large numbers of housing loans were given to individuals who were not likely to be able to pay them back. Similarly, a "housing bubble" was in play, where loans could be taken out on property that far surpassed the actual value of the property.

More complex was the new practice of bundling bad debt, where banks took collections of debts from bad loans and sold them to each other. This practice continues, leading some to suggest that the economic practices of Wall Street that at least partially caused the recession continue to pose a threat to the global economy. Bernie Sanders' campaign included a call for further regulation of Wall Street in these areas.

The Iraq War of 2003
10. Perhaps the most determinative event for the current world landscape was the war launched in 2003 against Iraq. Is it possible that this war was a greater pivot point in history than 9-11 itself? If we look at this event from a counterfactual point of view, the war arguably dragged on far longer than President Bush had originally anticipated. Indeed, less than two months after the offensive began, he announced that the mission had been accomplished (May 1, 2003) and that major combat operations in Iraq were ended.

Instead, the US would get mired in the middle of Iraqi infighting and insurgencies for almost nine years, with December 31, 2011 considered the final withdrawal. It is hard to imagine the profound effect this invasion has had on the world. More than 4500 soldiers lost their lives in Iraq and over 100,000 Iraqis. More than 1.5 million Americans served in Iraq during the almost nine year war. The impact of this service on families and on the soldiers themselves has been profound. It is easy to doubt if President Bush would have made the decision to go to war if he had known the way it would play out.

11. Again, it seems hard to underestimate the amount of hostility this invasion created in the Muslim world toward the United States. Most experts on the Middle East would argue that it is directly responsible for the exponential rise of terrorism in the last decade, creating a generation of potential enemies who would like nothing more than to destroy us. This is arguably the war with the West that Osama bin Laden had set out to ignite on 9-11. Without the Iraq War, there would have been no ISIS. Without the Iraq War, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would arguably not have been elected as president in Iran in 2005.

In the immediate aftermath of 9-11, the entire world seemed united behind the United States, including the countries of the Arab world. There was wide UN support for the overthrow of the Taliban in Afghanistan. The situation was quite different in the lead up to the Iraq War. Few major powers backed the US, and the case for war was thin, even though most of the world did believe Saddam Hussein had WMD (weapons of mass destruction).

It would turn out of course that Iraq did not have such weapons. But in the climate after 9-11, it would have arguably been suicide for anyone in Congress to vote against the war. Only those in the most liberal of districts or states could have voted no and hoped to be reelected. The Bush administration seems to have had a noble but naive hope that they could "liberate" Iraq and that the Iraqi people would flock to democracy, greeting Americans as liberators. Then, with an ally in the Middle East, the entire landscape of the region could be changed for the better.

Alas, it did not turn out that way. The culture of the Middle East turned out to be quite different than such Western expectations.

9-11
12. The attacks on 9-11 punctured the psyche of America. There had been no attack comparable to it since the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941. It was almost unimaginable. Some insignificant figure from the Middle East had somehow managed to take down the most prominent feature of the New York City landscape.

Before 9-11, security at airports was generally casual. You used to be able to walk back to the gate and see your family board the airplane. There was no Department of Homeland Security to coordinate the security organizations of the government.

After 9-11, everyone was paranoid. Where was a terrorist going to jump out next? The then mayor of Marion, Indiana actually barricaded the courthouse after 9-11, as if the Middle East cared about some obscure town in Indiana that no one has ever heard of. Air marshals were put on planes, and paranoid people like me were on constant look out for someone to try to take over the plane. We watched the video of planes flying into the towers over and over again in disbelief.

The sense that the world was a safe place was gone. There was a twinge of doubt that America was invincible. Someone needed to pay.

13. 9-11 interrupted what was arguably a lazy but steady progressive trajectory of American history. An event of this kind inevitably causes a surge of conservatism, for conservatism by its very nature is a protective stance. Christian college students at the turn of the millennium tended to be very interested in social justice and not particularly interested in the theological debates that evangelicals of earlier decades had conducted. In 2002, Robert Webber wrote The Younger Evangelicals, highlighting a generation of evangelicals who were quite different from their forebears in these ways.

9-11 did not eliminate that trajectory. There remains a strong strand of Christians under 40 who are committed to social justice and progressive causes. Many of them supported Bernie Sanders in the recent primary. Some of that age demographic also, disgusted by a surge of Christian fundamentalism, have become "nones," young people with no religious affiliation whatsoever. This is currently the fastest growing religious demographic in America.

But 9-11 also naturally caused a resurgence of Christian fundamentalism in various forms. The strong rise of hyper-Calvinism ("young, restless, and Reformed") in some circles is one example of a conservative backlash no doubt fostered in part by the impact of 9-11. Several Christian colleges have undergone theological purges of sorts in the last decade. The Christian classroom of 2016 includes not only the progressives I mentioned above, but zealous neo-fundamentalists as well. These are students who were only three or four when 9-11 took place, students whose psyche was arguably formed in the zeal of the post-9-11 decade.

Next week: History 3: World War II to the Millennium

Major Take-Aways

• There are often temporary reversals in the overall trajectories of history.
• It's best to talk through certain issues long before flash points take place.
• Democracy is not natural for many cultures. Great care must be taken when moving in that direction.
• Meddling in the affairs of other nations should be a last resort of action. Trying to fix other countries regularly makes things worse.
• Don't start a war as a strategy, only as a last resort.
• Deregulation has its limits. Unbridled capitalism does almost always lead eventually to economic crises.
• Don't over-react to terrorists. Over-reaction tends to play into their hands.

[1] I decided to call it a "pivot point" rather than a "turning point" because I am not necessarily meaning a change in direction. In fact, in some cases the event might have meant a change of direction if it had played out differently! As a pivot point, I merely mean that history would have looked quite different if the event had not played out as it did. A "turning point" usually assumes a change of direction.

[2] Marian Tupy suggests a more accurate term for Sanders would be a "social democrat."

[3] For example, when he suggested that a judge was being unfair to him because the judge was of Mexican descent or when he insulted the parents of a Muslim soldier killed in Iraq.

[4] The Constitution would prohibit any blanket action toward the Muslim community as Muslims and, in fact, the best way to stop such acts over time is for the Muslim community itself to identify such individuals among them. In the end, blanket targeting of the Muslim community is more likely to increase the number of future home grown terrorists rather than to diminish it.

[5] The federal deficit is 19.4 trillion dollars as I write this post.

[6] Filibuster can take place if the House does not have a supermajority of 60. It can thus keep a bill from even being voted on. The use of the filibuster by the Tea Party in Congress to prevent votes in the last six years is unprecented in US history. Increases of the debt ceiling are necessary in order to pay for budgets that Congress has already approved. In that sense, refusing to increase the debt ceiling prevents the government from paying its existing debts and commitments. It does not involve any new budgetary items.

The Last Ten Years (Part 1)

With tomorrow being the ten year anniversary of September 11, I thought it was an appropriate time to reflect on the last 10 years or so.  I know these are sensitive and heavily debated issues, but I offer you my historical perspective.

November 2000
First, some background.  I couldn't decide who to vote for in 2000.  Even walking into the voting booth (then at Center School), I contemplated writing my wife in as a write-in.  I had the thought, "The country is pretty much running itself.  It doesn't really matter who the President is."  My Republican upbringing kicked in.  I voted for Bush.

September 11, 2001
9-11 changed everything.  No longer did I listen to morning comedy in the car.  Now I listened to NPR for any news I could get my hands on.  The climate of the news changed from hearing almost nothing international to a regular stream of news about places I couldn't then find on a map, like Afghanistan.

I've almost forgotten the climate of fear that immediately followed here in the States.  It's funny now but I felt the paranoia that led the then mayor of Marion to put concrete barriers around our court house.  I flew to Greece right before we invaded Iraq and was immensely paranoid on the plane.

It's hard to remember how we thought before.  I would never have believed someone could attack us here in that way before.  I really thought they were joking that morning when I heard about it.  No one ever worried about a plane getting hijacked back then.  Everyone wants to blame people after the fact.  We can't remember how we thought before.

2001-2002
We had the sympathy of the world.  There was broad international support for our invasion of Afghanistan and removal of the Taliban.  This was a great opportunity for us in the world, I thought.  So far so good.  

But then the Bush administration began to divert our attention to Iraq.  It has emerged after the fact that Powell and Cheney likely stood on opposite sides of this issue.  Most would say that history has vindicated Powell. The series of events that followed has taken a man I once hoped would be president and almost removed him from the public sphere altogether.

It would have been political suicide for anyone but those from the most liberal of districts to vote against authorizing President Bush to take action in Iraq.  It is a reminder in times like these where American emotions are on a similar high.  We're probably not thinking straight.  I have never been a big fan of Hillary Clinton, but I didn't hold it against her that she voted in favor of authorizing Bush.  It would have been political suicide not to.

I do not believe Ahmadinejad would have come to power in Iran if we had not invaded Iraq.  The people elected him in reaction to our impingement in the region.  I believe the horrible situation in Iran is thus one of many unforeseen consequences of the Iraq war.

2003
We invaded Iraq.  I remember thinking as Powell presented evidence of WMD to the UN Council that I sure hoped they had more evidence than he was sharing.  Funny not to present your best stuff, though.

I truly believe that Bush had very good intentions in invading Iraq.  Remember that there was a strong avoidance of the word "invasion."  People fought over a word that everyone now uses without thinking.

Almost everyone recognizes now that there was no connection between Al-Qaeda and Hussein.  Yes, Hussein was a very bad man.  Yes, most people were sure he had WMD at the time.  But the war in Iraq is a textbook case against pre-emptive war in virtually every situation.

I believe that what was behind our attack on Hussein was a well-intentioned uber-strategy for the Middle East.  With the Arab spring, it is possible that it is actually working, although ironically not at all like the think tanks of the time thought it would.  It doesn't justify invading a country out of the blue morally, but it is possible that our mistake will, in the end, lead roughly to its uber-objective: a region that is more friendly to us and somewhat democratized.

At the same time, I truly believe that Bush would not have invaded Iraq if he had known that mission was not going to be accomplished as quickly as he thought it was on that air craft carrier.  I pictured him making that decision with a heavy heart and only because he thought that it would not cause many American (or Iraqi) lives.  Unfortunately, he was massively, massively wrong.

My hunch is that he was culturally naive on a grand scale.  He thought that everyone wants democracy.  Only someone who doesn't know much about other cultures would think that.

2004-2007
I was in Germany the Spring of 2004.  I remember a concerned German at church saying something to me about us going into Iraq and I responded that I didn't think Bush had known what he was doing. I do believe that Bush was a lot wiser in his second term and that Cheney had less influence.  It must be nice to be a second term president who doesn't have to worry about re-election.

It seemed impossible that Bush would not be re-elected in 2004.  People like me were taking a lot of flack at that time for saying things everyone was saying by the 2008 election.  9-11 put us in a massive defensive and protectionist mode.  In my opinion, we still cannot quite think straight.  The anger and fear of that event have gone down, but have yet to return to normal levels.  And the economic crisis has in its own way refueled that same mode of thinking.

The rest of the story, as I see it, tomorrow...

FOX: "Bailout clipped taxpayers for $25 Billion"...

If you can't see, I'm smiling.  This FOX news article is about the fact that the current estimate for what the TARP bailout will cost the American people in the end is $25 billion.  The initial payout was $700 billion and the current final tally is half a previous estimate that was itself considered overly optimistic.

So what I'm smiling at is FOX's begrudging wording of the news in the worse way possible.  The news is that Bush/Obama's bailouts saved the economy and quickly stabilized the world economy for way, way less than anyone hoped.  The news is that Bush and Obama's decision was the right one and that FOX and the Tea Party were wrong on this one.

But I will take the faint praise of the FOX article anyway: "The bailout fund, known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program, became hugely unpopular with the public and in Congress. Advocates and even some critics, however, credit it for stabilizing the financial sector in the wake of Wall Street's meltdown in 2008."  Read between the lines: even economists who oppose the TARP bailout recognize that it stabilized the financial sector. 

The anger of the American people, at least on this particular subject, was misplaced, based on ignorance, and fanned by conservative rabble rousers who were wrong, at least on this one.

New York Times quotes...

... with which I agree. Nothing to gloat about here. It's like the oil spill. Mentally very happy to see it capped. Too emotionally drained from the cost to celebrate with much exuberance.
_________
From the NYT
... "The speech also made us reflect on how little Mr. Bush accomplished by needlessly invading Iraq in March 2003 — and then ludicrously declaring victory two months later.

"Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction proved to be Bush administration propaganda. The war has not created a new era of democracy in the Middle East — or in Iraq for that matter. There are stirrings of democratic politics in Iraq that give us hope. But there is no government six months after national elections.

"In many ways, the war made Americans less safe, creating a new organization of terrorists and diverting the nation’s military resources and political will from Afghanistan. Deprived of its main adversary, a strong Iraq, Iran was left freer to pursue its nuclear program, to direct and finance extremist groups and to meddle in Iraq...

"There was no victory to declare last night, and Mr. Obama was right not to try."

AIG, UGH

By now everyone's heard that AIG, recipient of billions in the bailout, is paying millions in bonuses to the very department that caused its financial collapse. They're arguing that they legally have to pay them because of contracts made before their collapse... and they're arguing again that without paying these sorts of bonuses, they won't be able to retain the best.

Looks like there's little the rest of us can do but vent on this one. Even the Obama administration's hands seem tied by deals made by the Bush administration on this one. My predictable thoughts--apparently the "best and brightest" didn't do so hot these last years. I bet there are plenty of equally smart people looking for a job who'd be more than happy to take their jobs without the bonus. Frankly, I like teaching and writing, but give me two months in a room with the appropriate resources...

Of course many unlikely thoughts come to mind. Liquidate this "credit default swap" department and send all these bonus unworthy fools packing. Fire anyone who takes the bonus, etc...

Happy Inauguration Day!

No doubt there are different feelings out there about today, some overwhelmingly positive, some overwhelmingly negative, some apathetic, some pessimistic.

I am somewhat optimistic. Here are the top 10 things I'm glad about today, recognizing that many out there will have strongly different feelings:

I'm glad...

10. ... that I will now be able to look at Dick Cheney's house on Google Earth (... and that the Vice President is no longer a member of both the Executive and the Legislative branches).

9. ... that the most influential voices with the President's ear on matters of science now actually have degrees in science.

8. ... that the new President and Vice-President don't think they can ignore laws passed by Congress by writing secret notes to themselves.

7. ... that agents of the U.S. who torture prisoners will now be in big trouble rather than given a bonus (and that we won't be putting the names of our secret agents on Google Government).

6. ... in hope that Wall Street will have to follow a few rules, rather than basically being able to do whatever they want with everyone else's money without oversight.

5. ... in hope that we might move closer to everyone having health care and that we might address how to educate our children better, rather than just setting standards and punishing those who don't find a way to meet them on their own, with hopelessly disfunctional children.

4. ... in hope that we might try a little more diplomacy with realistic expectations rather than taking an all or nothing approach that, either way, raises up more future terrorists than it kills or starves.

3. ... that we have instantaneously regained significant moral standing in the world's eyes, a new opportunity to convince the world that we are a genuine force for good in a world full of evil.

2. ... that an African-American has been elected President.

1. ... that the country gets a new start, a hit of the reset button. In short, I'm glad for a change.

We don't know yet if Obama will be a good President or if he will be able to do any better than the Bush administration did with their circumstances. But we can hope.

Bush looks into the sole of the Iraqis

By now everyone has seen this clip of a man throwing his shoes at President Bush during his last visit to the country. The man calls Bush a dog and says several other things.

I don't know about the comedy scene last night, but a couple good puns on the Today show, as well as by Bush himself.

Bush said he didn't know what the man was saying, but he got a good look into his sole. Bush also was a good dodge.

This morning Meredith Vierra asked if this event "flies in the face" of the idea that Iraq is now at peace.

Not really a laughing matter--a big insult--but Bush's reaction was the best one, to have fun with it. What better way to trivialize a serious insult than by laughing at the man.

SNL: Bush endorses McCain and Palin

Life is going to be so dull after the election :-)

Monday Editorial: Far from a Lame Duck

Most presidencies are riding on fumes about now. I fully expected that at this time the Bush presidency would be rolling to its finish line in depression. I expected that if Bush ever had any moments of self-honesty, he would have to look back on the last eight years as the most colossal failure of a presidency, perhaps in US history.

Of course the current economic catastrophe has happened on Bush's watch. Although I don't have the knowledge to argue for it or prove it, my hunch is that we would not be where we are today if Gore or McCain had become president back in 2000, and probably not if it had been Kerry in 2004. Of course it is possible that some people wouldn't have experienced the same prosperity they have experienced these last 8 years either. I don't really know.

But one thing seems clear to me. The work Bush is doing right now may very well be the most important and enduring work of his presidency. There is a possible world in which it is what he does now that will define his presidency even more than the Iraq War or 9-11--and it may define his presidency very positively. For all my negative valuation of his time in office, he could actually tip the balance scales for me in the opposite direction.

In this respect, it is great that he is not up for re-election right now. He is able to do whatever he actually thinks is the best thing to do, rather than pander to the easily manipulated populace. His popularity is so low, he has no reputation to save. Everyone is ignoring him these days, even in his own party. They completely ignored him when the first bailout bill came around. They didn't even mention him at his own convention!

I for one am cheering him on. You go, Bush! Save the economic day for us and the world! I'm the forgiving sort.

Stanley Fish thinks I'll like Bush in a year...

You may or not like Stanley Fish, but man is he smart. This article is the kind of thing Keith Drury would write:

http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/28/george-bush-the-comeback-kid/

Quote of the Day: by Charles de Gaulle

Quoted on NPR today by Ted Koppel: "Men have friends. Nations have interests." The context was the then President of Israel objecting to France making nice nice with its Arab enemies. "I thought we were friends," said he.

If the US truly operates on principle, for freedom and democracy--and I have serious doubts that these are much more than rhetorical flourishes when it comes down to concrete decision making--it is alone. The rest of the world operates on Realpolitick.

This is, for one, why so much of the Bush administration's rhetoric has been "blah, blah, blah" from any insightful or realistic perspective. Ideas have force at the end of a gun. And it is also why the rest of the world has basically ignored Bush since he castrated himself in Iraq.

Bush to Bomb Iran?

A number of MSNBC commentators tonight, including Pat Buchanan who supports the president's surge in Iraq (although he thought the initial war was a mistake), believe that President Bush is preparing to engage Iran.

The argument is this:

1. Bush indicated that he has moved a carrier into the Persian Gulf to help stop those who are aiding Iraq. This can only refer to Iran.

2. Bush indicated that he was sending Patriot missles to the region. There's no need for such missles in Iraq--there's nothing by air the insurgents or factions have to use against us. On the other hand, Iran has such things.

3. The clincher is the fact that American troops stormed an Iranian embassy in the northern part of Iraq. This is technically an act of war, although Iran has not yet taken the bait.

The idea is that Bush is trying to provoke Iran into attacking us there so that we can bomb their nuclear facilities.

If this is true, what are we to make of it? It goes diametrically against the recommendations of the Baker commission, who advised the President to talk to Syria and Iran.

On the one hand, we might make this argument: the President knows more than we do; we should trust him. Perhaps this will pressure Iran into negotiation. Maybe finding a way to bomb Iran's nuclear facilities is better than them having them, which currently seems inevitable.

On the other side, we trusted Bush once already--they have WMD's, they have mobile labs, they're getting uranium from Niger, they're helping Al Qaeda, they'll welcome us with flowers, it's in its last throes, mission accomplished...

This was all wrong. Colin Powell resigned, Generals have resigned, half the Republicans on Capitol Hill have left Bush's side. Gerald Ford disagreed, Bush junior refused to ask for his father's advice.

Somehow the Baker commission seems a whole lot more credible to me about now. God help us all.

Bush's Iraq Speech

It will be interesting to see how Bush's speech tonight will be viewed with the hindsight of history. It has to be the first or second most important speech of his presidency to date.

My impressions and reaction:
I agree with Bush that there are scary prospects for an Iraq right now without American troops. I think he's right that Malaki's government would collapse and the civil war would become much worse and anarchic. I agree that Iraq would become an even greater haven for terrorists. Let me also note that Bush himself has created this situation. Iraq was no safe haven for terrorists under Hussein. I think Basra and the Kurdish north are much better now than they were before, but Baghdad is drastically worse. And since Baghdad is the nexus of Iraq's place in the political map of the region, that makes the current Baghdad far more dangerous to us now than it was under Saddam.

Having said that, good luck on his proposal having any real effect. The only real hope I heard in his speech were the things he said he would hold Malaki accountable for: policing of groups like Al Sadr, oil for the Sunnis, rebathification. If Bush can get the Iraqis to do this, this would be significant.

But I doubt 20,000 troops will accomplish anything lasting at all. Perhaps Bush should have one last shot, although I mourn the billions of dollars and extra 1000 American lives it will waste in the process. I hope it succeeds.

Bad tastes in my mouth: Principally two. First, the problem in Iraq is not terrorism and the terrorists are not the primary problem right now. The problem are the Shiite death squads and people like Al Sadr. I have no idea how to reign them in. They're good at laying low until we leave, and we simply cannot stay forever. They're the ones who lynched Hussein.

The second taste is this impotent talk about freedom and the talk of brave Iraqis. Who are they? The ones sneeking around dragging Sunni's out of their houses? We are neck deep in real politique here. Drop the vacuous ideological rhetoric that means absolutely nothing about now.

These are not democrats. This is a tribal group culture. Our freedom is great and would be great for them. But they aren't built to want it. They don't draw paintings of liberty valiantly holding the flag amidst the death around her.

Fact, Fiction, and Spin: Recent Bush Rhetoric

I don't have time to pursue specifics, but here is my evaluation of some recent "Bush Rhetoric," coming from Bush himself, Cheney the Snake, and Rumsfield the Blunt.

Cheney: Still playing the "fight them over there so we don't have to fight them here" card.

Spin and Fiction. The people we're fighting in Iraq would not have come here anyway, and the plots to come here are just as in process as they would have been otherwise. "Al-Qaeda in Iraq" was independent of Al-Qaeda to begin with and asked if they could join. Most of the fighting right now isn't even insurgent fighting. It's Shiites fighting Sunnis and visa versa.

Bush, Rumsfeld: It would be perilous to withdraw from Iraq without leaving the country stable.

Fact. It would be very undesirable to leave Iraq in its current state. It would almost certainly degenerate into civil war and what would emerge is a Shiite power aligned fully with Iran, with perhaps a Kurdish nation to the north. Of course I get irritated with slogans like "cut and run," because they play on most people's inability to grasp complex situations with multiple variables. So we assign simple labels to things and then pretend like it's an all inclusive answer.

Bush: History will see that we've done a good thing here.

Fiction. History will consider Bush a farce and the primary cause of one of the most perilous world situations in the first half of the twenty-first century. Sure, 9-11 was the spark, but the current situation is mostly the result of Bush's response to the war. For those who want proof, it is easily at hand:

After 9-11, Before Iraq War
Al-Qaeda a marginal group that most Arab states reject

After the Iraq War
Al-Qaeda becomes a unifying force among "Islamo-fascist" groups, disempowered groups gain power over moderate groups, a whole next generation of youths come of age under extreme anti-American rhetoric.


Before Iraq
US sympathetic regime in control of Spain

After Iraq
US sympathetic regime voted out


Before Iraq
Moderate government in control in Iran

After Iraq
Extremist government elected in Iran, one with which we may soon find ourselves at war, yet we don't have the resources to deal handily with it because we are bogged down in Iraq


Before Iraq
Turkey, a vibrant allay

After Iraq
Turkey a tenuous ally having to deal with increased "Islamo-fascism" in its own borders


Before Iraq
At least American conversant Fatah in leadership of Palestinian authority

After Iraq
Hamas elected to leadership of Palestinian authority


Before Iraq
American in many places thought "fun," "Hollywood," "John Wayne," not really taken seriously but liked

After Iraq
America considered scary, a threat, an imbecile with a really big gun. Bush rhetoric of axis of evil leads N. Korea and Iran to even more aggressive pursuit of nuclear weapons


Before Iraq
France, Germany vote with US like Britain

After Iraq
Increasing resistance to US proposals, increased talk of a need for the EU, China-Russia-Chavez to be counterbalance to a dangerous USA


In the light of recent Lebanon crisis
Before: Lebanon run by a US sympathetic government

After: Hezbollah with increased clout in part by association of Israel's tactics, America's tactics in Iraq, America's carte blanche support for Israel.

So I'm going with "fiction" on the idea that history will smile at all on George Bush. Sorry Charlie, your historical goose is cooked.


Bush, Cheney: The Democrats are weak on defense. Elect Republicans.

True, but spin. Again, this plays on simple minded Americans who can't handle complexity--this is the "fallacy of composition"--generalizing something that is true of a part and applying it lock, stock, and barrel to the whole. I guess most Americans aren't smart enough to handle this very difficult concept: whether an individual is weak on defense or not depends on whether that individual--Republican or Democrat--is weak on defense.

Having said that, I do think in general that Republicans tend to be stronger on defense than Democrats. But I don't vote for a party. I vote for individuals.

Bush: If you don't support the Iraq war, you don't understand the war on terror or you are weak on terrorism. If you don't support my way, the Islamo-fascists will blow up your house.

False, spin, sometimes true. First there's the fallacy of identifying the war on terror with the war in Iraq. You could be entirely for the "war" on terrorism and be against Bush's way of prosecuting the war and the war on Iraq. That's why I'd vote for John McCain today.

And that's the way I see it, Thursday, August 31, 2006.