Bush, Hussein and History

September 16, 2010 By Leave a Comment

By 2003, the United States had committed its armed forces to a pair of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Commander in Chief George W. Bush had led his nation into war, and while many in the international community objected to the invasion in Iraq, the American public initially supported the action.

America claimed to enter Iraq as it had other conflicts. America stood against tyranny and wanted to prevent another disaster like the Sept. 11 attacks. Saddam Hussein was a proven butcher. He turned on his own people to maintain his position as dictator for life, and Hussein had shown a willingness to use chemical weapons during his war with Iran. Painting Hussein as a villain, especially after the nation had been attacked, was not difficult. Proving that Hussein had the potential to be a danger to the United States was something different altogether.

The battle cry going into Iraq was that Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. This weapons were being held against the sanctions of the United Nations. With this weapons and with Hussein’s connections to the terrorist world, Iraq was a ticking time bomb that needed to be defused before the United States faced an attack that dwarfed what happened on Sept. 11. Or so was the message that the Bush Administration communicated to the American public. Bush even had Secretary of State Colin Powell address the United Nations with satellite photos and other intelligence to show that Hussein had an active and mobile chemical warfare program.

Finding the truth amid the information provided by the Bush Administration remains difficult even in hindsight, but fact and fiction in military intelligence remains something that can only be truly judged after the fact.

The American military remains in Iraq even though the quest for weapons of mass destruction has been long since abandoned. Did Bush err in invading Iraq? If the mission was finding weapons the answer is yes. The question then becomes; who is to blame? Did the Bush Administration push an invasion or was the intelligence flawed. This remains for history to decide.

Filed Under: General, Society Tagged With: , ,

George W. Bush Political Controversy

September 14, 2010 By Leave a Comment

George W. Bush wore many hats during his time in the Oval Office. He was parodied on Saturday Night Live as a buffoon. He was hailed by the Christian Right as the leader of their movement. And he was seen by liberals as a power-hungry politician who was owned by corporate interests. Of all the ways the media attempted to portray Bush, perhaps the most damaging was as an accidental president who earned his office only through luck and subterfuge. There was enough smoke allow the accusations to linger.

Bush won the Republican nomination for the presidency after a contentious primary against John McCain. McCain was an experienced Senator from Arizona and a Vietnam War hero. The McCain campaign attempted to portray their candidate as a pragmatic choice, who would not sacrifice his values for political gain. McCain spoke out against the Christian right. He spoke out against the Rev. Jerry Falwell, whom McCain described as an agent of intolerance. Bush capitalized on the rift between McCain and the Christian right. Bush won the nomination after engaging in controversial push polling techniques in South Carolina. The Bush political team pushed the perception that McCain had fathered a bi-racial child out of wedlock.

Many political observers attributed dirty campaign tactics to the influence of Karl Rove. Rove had developed a reputation of doing almost anything to ensure that his candidate would win. While the tactics used against McCain proved to on be a blip on the radar of media coverage during the 2000 presidential election, it established a pattern of controversy that would surround the Bush Administration heading into the general election.

The 2000 presidential election would prove to be one of the closest in history. Bush did not win the popular vote. The outcome hung in the balance as news networks declared Democratic candidate Al Gore the winner in the pivotal state of Florida before declaring it too close to call then switching to saying it was a borderline victory for Bush. The narrow margin ensured that Bush would be a controversial president, something his tactics did nothing to contradict.

Filed Under: General Tagged With: , ,

Quantum Chaos of Humanity

September 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment

The term equal has been tossed around a lot in mathematics. Most equations never find defined answer. If you look at the most complex equations, the equal sign is almost never used. M-Theory is still undefined. Quantum mechanics, Chaos Theory and Entanglement all have defined values, right? Think again. This matter has perplexed physicists for decades since Einstein, Heisenberg and Dirac hit the scene. Work finding answers in this field drove some of these brilliant minds to the brink of insanity. Wolfgang Pauli is one example of that.

Knowing this, try to use the word equality with the complex nature of humans. The definitions of gender roles have eroded for good or for worse. It depends on who you are and how you think. Definite has no place in human nature due to the dynamics of what humans are. Defining by race, social status, sex, religion or political viewpoint is volatile at best because no human can be pigeon-holed into a single definition. Acting without definition or hierarchy toward all humans, respecting differences and likenesses? That becomes the act that cures the pain—something that physicists can’t do with their numbers. Einstein knew that when he gave up his work. He admitted that the indefinable was in charge of the numbers that vexed him all his life.

Humans are not numbers.

Acting without defining, allowing each person to be treated with dynamic respect at all levels is an act that reiterates what scientists are discovering in Chaos Theory: the dynamics of the universe are clearly genius, but indefinable. Entanglement states that we are all connected. That means that giving to others is also giving to you. Online charity, giving to a cause, or giving to your daughter is giving to you as well. It is also the least definable power in the universe, and perhaps the greatest.

Enhanced by Zemanta
Filed Under: General Tagged With: , ,

Bush Took us to the Poker Tables

August 11, 2010 By Leave a Comment
Cover of "W. (Widescreen)"
Cover of W. (Widescreen)

If you are old enough to remember the beginning of the George W. Bush (also known as Bush II) presidency, you might remember that he just barely won the initial race against Al Gore. How our world would look now if that particular coin flip had gone differently, we may never be able to imagine. But the fact is, old Dubya accomplished a lot of things in his presidency that have drawn a lot of heat (and a lot of embarrassment) to the American people. When your leader nearly calls the British queen 200 years old in front of everyone, it does not say great things about your political or educational systems.

During Bush’s first few months in office, he was something of a non entity. He spent several months at his ranch, taking a vacation that some would argue he did not deserve in the first place. Shouldn’t a person do a lot of work, before they reward themselves with a vacation? But of course, after the terrorist attacks of September 11th, Bush beat the drums of war, and our revenge (which is showing no signs of slowly down 9 years later) began in force. Whether Bush performed a noble and necessary action, or simply took our national credibility to the poker tables and lost most of it, will be debated in scholarly circles until the end of time. But he certainly did create a lot of gold star Army mothers.

From the very beginning, the two fronted war that has expanded throughout Iraq and Afghanistan seemed like a massive use of American resources. Aside from simply making our entire country seem like a child flailing angrily at unseen enemies in the shadows, many young lives have been lost to this war. And the fact that the American people are paying billions of dollars to do so is yet another sad legacy of Bush.

Filed Under: General Tagged With: ,
Newer Posts »