Dan Froomkin's column has just some gems of Bush speak. He's been in Europe the whole week and therefore subjected to journalists questions. And not softball ones either.
Reading Bush always angries up the blood, but this week's column is chokful of Bush's-Theories-of-Americanism.
My (least) favorite snippet. Judge American not by what we do, but what we do.
"My only point to you is, is that yes, I mean, we certainly wish Abu Ghraib hadn't happened, but that should not reflect America. This was the actions of some soldiers. That doesn't show the heart and soul of America. What shows the heart and soul of America is the sacrifice of our troops willing to defend our country and liberate 50 million people, or the generosity of America when it comes to providing money for HIV/AIDS in Africa, or the fact that America feeds more of the hungry in the world than any other country. That's the true America."America: Our good outweighs those torture pictures, really!
I think if I had the time I could demostrate that every single one of those statments is actually demostrably false in a way. "Liberate 50 million people." From their homes and sense of security maybe. Money for HIV/AIDS, as long as you don't include anything about family planning.
But Bush still won't own up to the fact that Abu Ghraib was actually "gov't" policy. The only part that wasn't was the picture taking.
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"But Bush still won't own up to the fact that Abu Ghraib was actually "gov't" policy. The only part that wasn't was the picture taking."
This 'open secret' is perhaps what is most disturbing. I think most people understand that torture is being sanctioned, and that the executive branch gets to decide who deserves to be tortured. I think Americans now understand that people can be 'disappeared' to countries that will do the torturing for us. That these things are happening is horrendous. That people know they're happening and do nothing - it's inexplicable and grotesque.
We are really going to have to work hard to redefine what it means to be the 'good guys' if we want to keep the white hat...
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