arch/ive/ief (2000 - 2005)

  A protester marching in San Francisco had a sign with a picture of a pretzel morphing into a peace sign. It read: Bush, choke on this!
  My placard read simply, Impeach Bush! Others of the signs were not so generous. The most profoundly ad hominem sign, the most personally damaging of them all, towards the president? A depiction of George W. in a Nazi uniform, his face set behind red circles, and the target—his temple. What an attack! The sign seemed to me a call to assassinate Bush, whom the protester apparently believes is a modern day Hitler. I doubt it. Really, is this a fair comparison? Both have pre-emptive doctrines in common, a misplaced will to power....but if nothing else, Hitler had style. Truth is, most of us non-violent, peace-loving, left-wing protester types love to abuse our pretzels, er, I mean, our presidents.
  Like most people in the sixties, I grew up to respect authority (Did I say the ‘60's?). Naturally, even if one did not like the man who is president, you should respect his office. So it follows that I might dislike him while offering the guy many laurels of respect, and honor.
  But no more! This child of the sixties has been through enough! And Clinton, not Bush was the final straw. The two men—though on two sides of the same fence—get no respect from me! And if you notice, both men elicit incredibly personal reactions among their detractors, and supporters.
  Both Bill Clinton and George Bush seem very aware of the powerlessness of the individual in our modern democracy. Clinton cynically rented out the Lincoln Room like it was one of those motels rooms you stay in by the hour, to corporate sleaze. And Bush? Jeb said he would deliver Florida, and boy did he ever!
  When I think of Clinton, I imagine him leading the troops blowing into a sax, and they're following him like a bunch of foot stompin' Pentecostals. Bush, on the other hand, well, I see that dry smile on his drawn face as he beats on a drum leading our Armed Forces into action, boom, boom, boom. No rhythm here! And he is dressed in black leather with Gott mit uns (God with us) stamped into the cold steel of his belt buckle.
  But Bush is not Hitler, just an amiable henchman in the ranks, wearing a dog collar that is attached to a leash. Is this ad hominem treatment, or what? Yes, I suppose so! Now let's pretend that this new (old) war in Iraq had nothing to do with settling an old Bush family score, American military outposts in the sand and oil beneath those sands, and pretend this were a 'just' war. I am still fairly certain that the image Bush projects would still abysmally fracture alliances, not to mention incorrigibly tick off Civil Libertarians.
  Beside Bush, the tin-pot dictator Hussein is lately a great statesman, suggesting that if it is good for Iraq to disarm, why not Israel…and the US? Next to the arrogant American President, this man who gassed his own people is a really warm guy, a humanitarian! Like Bill Clinton, he just wants to "talk it over." He is just that kind of guy, leading us across the bridge into the Twenty-First Century!
  While Bill was effusively spinning canned slogans back in the corporately owned Nineties, leading across the bridge into the corporately owned Twenty First Century, the Republican Party was in the Think Tank, consciously looking for a useful, patriotic puppy dog to front a Revolution. They were planning a new Pax Americana whose proponents, including the current Vice President, would remain in the background as the lines were handed to the patsy.
  Just watch Bush on that rare occasion he meets the Press! Questions are asked, and there he is flipping through his list of prepared answers. Seeing this on live TV, I must admit that I start to miss Bill Clinton's spontaneous answers, and outright lies!
  Some of us feel we have no voice in modern America, that the ‘system' is just too entrenched. But how do you speak intelligently into this while the people throw stuff at you, mad as hell, calling you an unpatriotic bastard?  
  Well, feeling personally assaulted, I'm tempted to personally assail the man in charge, George Bush, not to mention everyone else who has power over me, like the mayor, the police department, the CEO's…my wife (if I had one). My vote means nothing…so damn them all!

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