Written: 01/14/2005
In October 2004, Ron Suskind wrote an article in the New York Times Magazine examining how President Bush’s faith influences his policy. He quotes former treasury official and advisor to Reagan Bruce Bartlett speaking about Bush:
“He truly believes he’s on a mission from God. Absolute faith like that overwhelms a need for analysis. The whole thing about faith is to believe things for which there is no empirical evidence.”
Later in the article a Bush aide draws the line in the sand:
“The aide said that guys like me were ‘in what we call the reality-based community,’ which he defined as people who ‘believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.’ I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. ‘That’s not the way the world really works anymore,’ he continued. ‘We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'”
George Orwell couldn’t have said it better himself.
Bush lives in a faith-based world. In this world, truth is relative and appearance is reality.
In Bush’s world, anyone not a true believer in his policies doesn’t have a seat at the table and any strong dissent is corralled into “free speech zones” out of sight and out of mind (like the flag-draped coffins returning from Iraq). Within this bubble, not only does Bush isolate himself from any dissent, he isolates himself from the media (in both his personal consumption and his exposure to questions from the Press).
In Bush’s world, you are either with him or you are with the “terrorists” thus formulating the dangerous equation: Bush policy = patriotism. This has allowed his supporters to brand any opposition as “un-American” and “treasonous” which they have done with a McCarthy-like fervor.
In Bush’s world, Clear Skies means more pollution, Healthy Forests means clear cutting, and No Child Left Behind means destroying the public school system. Bush doesn’t see any contradiction in giving up our freedoms to fight those who supposedly hate us for them, claiming himself a Christian who feels it is better to do unto others (with violence) BEFORE they MIGHT do unto us, or believing that “when you are talking about war, you are really talking about peace.”
In Bush’s world, tax cuts are justified either because there is a surplus or because there is a deficit, just like the invasion of Iraq is justified whether there were WMD’s and a connection to al Qaeda or there wasn’t. Since he feels neither he nor his team has ever made any mistakes, then whatever actions he takes must be right. The justification can always be remade to fit the circumstance as needed. Or as Joshua Micah Marshall has said, “the policy is the parent of the rationale.” After you understand that, everything else makes sense.
In Bush’s world, the rule of law is just as malleable as justifications for war (from the Patriot Act to Gitmo to Abu Ghraib). Saddam was threatening world peace but we were liberators. Torture is what evil-doers engage in, but when we do it its merely isolated “abuse” by a “few bad apples.” And it is important to keep a tally on the deaths of Iraqis caused by Saddam but not those caused by Bush.
In Bush’s world, it makes sense to wage the vague “war on terror” because it gives a blanket excuse for any action associated with it, it makes it difficult to measure success or failure, and it cows much of the public with fears of unknown, faceless boogiemen.
The “war on terror” is an endless ticket to ride….
Shortly after the Suskind article, a number of people who rejected Bush’s Orwellian world picked up on the label given them from the Bush aide and began to proudly declare their membership in the “reality-based community” on websites and blogs (web logs) across the Internet. It has served as a unifying slogan for those patriots who still believe in Truth, Justice and American Ideals.
This is fine, as far as it goes, but until this loose-knit community of dissent can organize its message and direct its power into a force for action, its effect will be insignificant.
The reality-based community must come together like a virtual think tank with a consistent message and a developing agenda. It must become a community of mutual support and action. It must evolve into a force to be reckoned with.
It must claim a seat at the table.