Why not another Bush entry?
There's a discussion at another weblog, Pandagon, about whether President Bush should attend funerals or memorial services for our soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. I've yet to see an argument against the President attending such services that didn't seem like anything more than trying to defend and rationalize an indefensible position. The ways this President has failed to support the troops, whether those fighting in his war, or those who fought in his father's war, will be the subject of a future entry. In this case, though, attending services for the men who have paid the price for him having put them in harm's way would be a small but necessary signal of his gratitude for their sacrifice. Far more meaningful then "bring them on."
But that's not the part of the discussion that I want to address. A point is made that Colin Powell and Wesley Clark resisted going to war in Iraq and Bush was so gung ho for it because Clark and Powell have been in war, they have seen their comrades and those for whom they are responsible killed and maimed, and Bush has not, and that has colored their respective perspectives. I doubt that is the case, at least as it applies to Bush. There is nothing I have seen of the man that leads me to believe that he has the depth of intellect or character to doubt the rightness of his cause. He believes that he is an instrument of God, placed here to spread his warped vision of democracy and his horribly limited and warped version of freedom. Such a crusader would not let the blood spilt by others cause him to falter. I wonder if that belief in his own specialness also contributes to his seeming indifference to the suffering and deaths of the men and women serving and dying for him. Though they are mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, husbands and wives to others, to Bush they are mere instruments of his righteous might. If they must bleed for him to fulfill his destiny, so be it.
Do you sense that my impression of Bush is not improving with age?
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