Ten years ago today
by digby
Jonathan over at Michael Moore’s place commemorates an anniversary that nobody else will:
Bush’s Greatest Lie Ten Years Ago Today:
Sending Americans into battle is the most profound decision a President can make. The technologies of war have changed; the risks and suffering of war have not. For the brave Americans who bear the risk, no victory is free from sorrow. This nation fights reluctantly, because we know the cost and we dread the days of mourning that always come.
Nice words. Americans love to believe they’ve been forced into doing things they wanted to do all along. But Bush and his cronies had been itching to invade Iraq for a very long time:
Two years before the September 11 attacks, presidential candidate George W. Bush was already talking privately about the political benefits of attacking Iraq, according to his former ghost writer, who held many conversations with then-Texas Governor Bush in preparation for a planned autobiography.
“He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999,” said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. “It was on his mind. He said to me: ‘One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.’ And he said, ‘My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.’ He said, ‘If I have a chance to invade, if I had that much capital, I’m not going to waste it. I’m going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I’m going to have a successful presidency.” Herskowitz said that Bush expressed frustration at a lifetime as an underachiever in the shadow of an accomplished father. In aggressive military action, he saw the opportunity to emerge from his father’s shadow.
And we all know about the dreams of Iraqi demaaahcracy from the neo-cons at the PNAC, most of whom were in the Bush administration. It was baked in the yellow cake from the beginning. 9/11 just gave them the pretext.
As I read this I was reminded of David’s piece below and my own oft-stated contention that President Obama and his team believe their own hype. Perhaps it’s a function of necessary ego for anyone who wants to wield this massive power to have such delusions of grandeur.
And honestly, it’s not just the presidents themselves. Bush’s followers were thrilled at “the opportunity to invade” and I don’t think they would have resisted him whether 9/11 had happened or not. Vietnam Syndrome haunted the American right and they were eager to vanquish it once and for all — under a Republican president, of course. And I recall a friend of mine saying before the 2008 election that Obama had to be elected because he was the only man in the country who could change Washington and bring the country together. Political delusions come in all shapes and sizes.
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