A Very American Coup
By Jim
Smith
The office of President was not
on the ballot in November. Yet it was around that time that a sitting president
began to feel the power oozing out of the White House.
Things began happening that George Bush
said would never happen. Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of War, was fired.
“Mad John” Bolton’s confirmation hearing by the Senate was
quietly dropped. The rumblings and grumblings of Deadeye Dick Cheney (who
can’t be fired) have become less and less frequent. And
what-to-do-about-Iraq became a subject for civil discussion for the first
time.
The “Adults” who
really run the country have stepped in and taken a hand in its day-to-day
operation. Bush has long been an embarrassment to them, and now he’s
become a liability. The superrich in this country, which includes the Bush
family, have decided that the current president has not been a good steward of
their far flung interests. Georgie is on the verge of blowing their control of
Middle East Oil, and with it, the U.S.’s ability to run a worldwide
empire.
Young George (from the
viewpoint of the Adults) has tried to run the country as if he was not
responsible to its Board of Directors. Over the past couple of months, they have
made it clear to him that he is not the Decider after all.
What a scene it must have been when
the Adults, or “the men in the shadows,” as Jackson Browne calls
them, met with Pappy Bush. There may have been arguments as a father defended
his idiot child.
But in the end George
H.W. Bush threw in with class, not his kid. The toll it took on him was visible
for all to see - over and over - as he broke down on TV, Dec. 4 (two days before
the Iraq Study Group report was made public). If you missed it, check
YouTube.com for “Bush cries.” Some have speculated that Bush broke
down with regret that George, not Jeb, had become
president.
In any case, the elder
Bush’s Consiglieri, James Baker, has become the spokesperson for the
Adults. This is welcome news for those who think George W. Bush is some sort of
aberration, and that if he was out of the picture everything would be fine. For
the rest of us who see Bush, however ineptly, carrying out the orders of the
most voracious and predatory ruling class in history, it’s time to
worry.
The Iraq Study Group is not a
peace effort. They admit to consulting with 136 experts and leaders, including
our own Jane Harman. Yet, not one of the 136 is anyone associated with the peace
movement. They did not talk with Ralph Nader, Cindy Sheehan, former UN weapons
inspector Scott Ritter, and certainly not to any Army Sergeants or Privates who
have been in Iraq and know what's really going on better than the Generals.
The Adults are not about to lose their
grip on the Middle East, no matter how many 9/11s are the result. While there
may be differences in strategy and tactics between the Texas Oil Billionaires
and old Wall Street money, they are in agreement that they must maintain their
grip on the world’s population.
The unanimity on this point is
reflected in the unusual step in shedding the facade of the two-party system for
a one-party declaration of the Iraq Study Group. Five Democrats and five
Republicans made up the ISG, which can also be considered the public Board of
Directors for the Adults. And like most corporate boards, it even had a token
woman and African-American on its
board.
As Antonia Juhasz wrote in the
Los Angeles Times, Dec. 8, “it’s all about oil in Iraq.” The
ISG report urges the privatization of Iraq’s oil and its control by
foreign (read American) firms.
The ISG
report is about institutionalizing aggressive actions like “this
decade’s war” as the ISG calls it, rather than flying by the seat of
the pants as Bush has done. This is spelled out in Recommendation 75: “For
the longer term, the United States government needs to improve how its
constituent agencies— Defense, State, Agency for International
Development, Treasury, Justice, the intelligence community, and others—
respond to a complex stability operation like that represented by this
decade’s Iraq and Afghanistan wars and the previous decade’s
operations in the Balkans.”
So
it’s just a “stability operation,” not an illegal invasion,
not a war crime, not an impeachable offense, as we were so naive to believe. It
wasn’t any of these violations of international law that has caused the
Adults to intervene. It was bad management of crucial assets, even if they
don’t belong to us.
The Adults
seem to reject Bush’s resort to brute force when such time-tested methods
as bribery, puppetry and covert action might have served better. A few hundred
million dollars in Saddam’s hands might have ensured his loyalty better
than the billions spent on the occupation. And besides, then it would have been
Saddam’s headache to deal with the
fundamentalists.
The
Coup
The Adults are getting better at
separating presidents from the power. When John Kennedy decided to remove U.S.
advisors from Vietnam, and talked rashly about breaking the CIA into a thousand
pieces, the response was brutal and bloody. It caused a trauma from which the
country still hasn’t
recovered.
Trauma number two was the
removal of Nixon. While not as bloody as the Kennedy Assassination, the proposed
impeachment and subsequent resignation of the president caused a loss of belief
- well deserved - in the American system that was nearly as devastating as that
in the wake of the Kennedy
shooting.
The Adults have learned that
preserving appearances in the affairs of Empire is all important. In the late
80s, the Reagan administration was caught red-handed in an illegal
arms-for-hostages trade, called the Iran-Contra Affair. Then, a committee of
Adults, called the Tower Commission, convinced the public to accept
Reagan’s excuse that he “just didn’t remember.” Vice
President Bush’s role was covered up, even though Reagan said the VP knew
about the scheme. A new team was sent into the White House to run the
country.
The contradictions inherent in
maintaining the facade of democracy in the reality of a worldwide Empire run by
a small elite (the Adults) is getting harder to manage. In fact, every
presidency since Eisenhower has finished badly, or has survived only one term.
Kennedy was shot, Johnson had to decline to run again, Nixon resigned, Ford was
appointed, Carter survived one term, Reagan ended in scandal, G.H.W. Bush was a
one-termer, Clinton was impeached but not convicted, and G.W. Bush is fast
becoming a figurehead.
While Bush may
seek to strike back at the Adults, he seems to be without resources. The
military top brass doesn’t like him, ditto for Intelligence, many in
Congress were elected on an anti-Bush platform, and the executive office,
itself, is divided. Josh Bolten, the White House Chief of Staff, who was
formerly at Wall Street’s fat-cat firm, Goldman Sachs, seems to have
become the Adults watchdog there.
Why
and when did the Coup begin? The beginning dates back to, at least, last March
when the Iraq Study Group was created, without the approval of the Bush
administration. A short time later, Josh Bolten replaced Bush loyalist Andy Card
in the White House.
Reasons for the
Adults to begin the unseating of a president probably include the following, as
well as reasons none of us peasants know
about:
• The growing quagmire in
Iraq and Afghanistan. By 2006, it didn’t take a foreign policy expert to
figure this one out.
• The lack
of success of the Bush Administration on a whole variety of foreign and domestic
policy initiatives, including those having to do with North Korea, Iran and
Latin America.
• A seriously
weakening economy with massive deficits in trade and the federal
budget.
• Loss of control of the
number one client state, Israel. The tail began wagging the dog, drawing the
U.S. in even deeper in the Middle East
quicksand.
• The agitation by
Cheney and the neo-conservatives for some sort of military attack on Iran. Bad
plan. Iran is equipped with state-of-the-art cruise missiles that could take out
the U.S. fleet that is bottled up in the Persian Gulf. Further, it could seal
off the Straits of Hormuz from whence comes the oil on which modern economies
run. Another reason to get control of Israel before it does something rash to
Iran.
• The mass peace sentiment
expressed in the November election. While the Adults could care less which party
controls Congress, or the White House, for that matter, they do worry about the
growing disdain for imperial adventures by the
populace.
What happens next? Probably
more, not less, U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Efforts will increase to
find more loyal puppets in Iraq and Afghanistan who will do the U.S.’s
bidding. More money will be poured into the quagmire, although it will be better
hidden from the public.
If there was
ever any question that there would be more terrorist attacks on the U.S., the
recent statements by the Adults have sealed our fate. Terrorists and
liberationists alike now have no doubt - if there ever was any - that the Empire
has no intention of peacefully withdrawing from Iraq, or other parts of the
Middle East where it is not wanted. Once again, the U.S. is saying, “Bring
Them On!”
If history is any
judge, including Vietnam history, none of the various strategies and tactics
being bandied about Washington is going to work. The foreign invaders -
that’s us - will be tossed out on our ear after many more people die.
Unfortunately, our ruling elite seems incapable of learning anything, and
lurches from one debacle to the next. But what about the public? Are we also
incapable of learning? Bush won’t be dethroned no matter what. He is too
good a foil. But will we ever notice the bipartisan “men in the
shadows” who are pulling his strings?
Posted: Mon - January 1, 2007 at 08:05 PM