Tuesday, January 13, 2004

A Fantasy Press Conference with Dubya   Where are the weapons of mass destruction? Did a senior official blow the cover of a CIA operative because her husband revealed some politically inconvenient facts? Who was the culprit, and why didn’t Bush demand to know who he or she was? Who met with Dick Cheney and his national energy policy taskforce back in 2001? Why did it take 13 months to launch an investigation into the 9/11 attacks, 74 days to launch an investigation into the leak that blew the cover of a CIA agent, and 24 hours to launch an investigation into Paul O'Neill? Is American democracy  an open form of government where information is public, or is there such an overwhelming need for secrecy that criticism or dissent should be considered unpatriotic? Does the Bush family have a conflict of interest in Middle Eastern matters? Why was the opening portion of the preliminary report on causes of 9/11—which concerned Saudi Arabia—blacked out?  The goal the United States hopes to reach in Iraq -- a successful counterinsurgency that does not drag on for years and does not involve a large amount of killing -- has never been achieved by any army in history. Why will it succeed this time? Why is the government withholding names and other details about hundreds of foreigners who were detained in the months after the  September 11,  2001 attacks?  Why did the White House tell the EPA  to downplay concerns about  air quality  and toxic contamination in lower Manhattan following 911? Am I more or less likely to believe in the veracity of future government-agency reports? Why did the administration edit out material about global warming from an EPA report? Why did the government remove from the  U.S. Agency for International Development Web site remarks by an administration official that had badly understated the cost of Iraqi reconstruction after 911? What would George Orwell say about this? If this government tells me I have nothing to fear from the US beef supply and Mad Cow disease, should I believe them? If we’re in an economic recovery, where are the jobs? (Total employment fell last year by 331,000 on top of a 1.5 million drop in 2002.) The last time employment, as measured by the survey of 400,000 establishments, declined for two consecutive years was in 1944 and 1945 as war production wound down.) Is prosperity, as Herbert Hoover constantly assured the American people, “just around the corner?” Why did a recent IMF (International Monetary Fund) report warn that the U.S. deficit and proclivity for borrowing will drive up interest rates around the world, thereby threatening the global economic  recovery and U.S. productivity growth? Is it possible to invade a country and impose democracy in a place where nothing like it has ever existed before? Can you think of a comparable example in history? If the administration was unable to persuade such familiar institutions as the U.N. Security Council or the established governments of France, Germany, Turkey, Russia, China—even Canada that the Iraq invasion was justified last March, then how did it expect to handle Iraq's feuding opposition groups, Kurdish separatists, and myriad ethno-religious factions, to say nothing of the turbulence throughout the region? For 1991 Desert Storm, the U.S. footed 1/10 of the cost; our allies picked up the remaining tab. For the 2003 Operation Iraqi Freedom adventure, do you think the U.S. has the budgetary resources, the military manpower, the international legitimacy (especially in the region), and the political wherewithal to go all the way to the finish line alone?    1:14:11 PM