Bush goes AWOL in 2003--and takes the country with him
Michael Moore and others argue that Bush went AWOL in the 1970s while he was in the National Guard. Now Bush is going AWOL again—and this time he’s taking the country with him. The US, alas, has gone AWOL from the global community.
We’ve become A one-note superpower , worries Fareed Zakaria.
A funny thing has happened. While the war on terrorism has dominated the headlines, the great engine of globalization has kept moving. rewarding some, punishing others, but always keeping up the pressure by increasing human contact, communication and competition. For almost every country today, its primary struggle centers on globalization issues—growth, poverty eradication, disease prevention, education, urbanization, the preservation of identity. On all these, America is now largely silent. "It's not that we don't worry about terrorism," a head of government (of a pro-American country) said to me. But for him, as for other leaders, it's not how he sees the world: "I have to grapple with a different set of issues. And I have the feeling that the United States has gone off into its own universe and cannot hear or say anything to me about my problems." There is a disconnect between America and the world. While Washington worries about traditional problems of empire—disorder on the periphery—there is a new globalizing world slowly taking shape, in search of leadership.
Not only does the current administration show no inclination to lead, but they haven’t even taken the dimensions of the emerging new battlefield. Bush & Co. are otherwise engaged: running up deficits, cooking the intelligence books, insulting the rest of the world, compelling our top stem cell research scientist to relocate to Britain, trashing the environment, and substituting crony capitalism for entrepreneurship. This time, Mr. Bush, the price tag for going AWOL is enormous—and we’re all going to end up paying for it.
The nothing-if-not-controversial Moore recently endorsed Wesley Clark for president. During a presidential debate in New Hampshire, presenter Peter Jennings asked Clark about his failure to distance himself from Moore’s AWOL accusations.
Clark, to his credit, tried to shift the emphasis from the 1970s back to Bush’s more recent derelictions of duty, such as the administration’s lack of post-war planning.
The 1970 AWOL saga, concerning the alleged misdeeds of one young man in 1970, was covered by the Boston Globe and several other publications in 2000.
But Bush & Company’s current AWOL problem goes deeper—and cries out for media coverage. Also, it would be a powerful talking point for Moore and his candidate-of-choice Clark.
6:16:32 AM 
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