The Bullshit Observer

Making sense of Obama and Bush

The following is an edited version of William Pfaff's article in Truthdig. Pfaff is a frequent contributor to the New Yorker Magazine. 

The Bush government seemed not merely indifferent to the ancient political and moral aspirations of the American nation, but hostile to them as obstacles to the national power and aggrandizement they unscrupulously pursued, at the cost of tens of thousands of American and foreign lives, and to the greed that motivated most of those who were the public face of the government and the economy of the United States during this period.

One cannot ignore the fact that we the people were their enablers during the last eight years. George W. Bush was not an unpopular president until it became apparent how badly he had failed the American nation. Even then, aggression and torture remained instruments of national policy, and were defended by professors, judges, editors and eminent commentators, and even provided a profitable theme in American popular entertainment.

It is inconceivable that this could have taken place during the time of the first Roosevelt, or under Lincoln, to take just two of the men of whom the Republican P arty has been the most proud. Can you imagine it under the commands of George C. Marshall or Robert E. Lee?

Authority must have a moral foundation, and has to be voluntarily accepted, being different from power or violence, which compel order in society (or are meant to do so).

Bush II exercised violence—inspired by an infantile political Manichaeism concerning “Islamic terror”—and a lawless foreign policy that further divided the nation, bringing us to where we are today. The United States became an enduringly divided nation, which has lacked a legitimate, unifying and governing political and moral authority and order.

This, I would say, is what elected Barack Obama. He radiates seriousness, adulthood, confidence and mature values. He is a unifier, not a divider.

No one can say what will come of his presidency. Can he restore national union, a sense of national purpose, a public and governmental morality that the people will accept? Let us pray that the answer is yes.

What I hope we, as a nation, take away from the past eight years is that we had a moral breakdown, that it was temporary, and that we were able to learn from it.. Today Obama announced that Gitmo would be shut down and that rendition policies would be halted. I have to also believe that spying on Americans will also cease. A good first step.

I like this Obama fellow.

Hey Barack, Don't Look Down!

Since he ws elected, and even before then, Barack Obama has come to represent a lot of things to a lot of people. He has become a living icon of the restoration of the United States we once admired. An icon representing the rejection of the cynacism, rampant profiteering, and lawlessness that has leaked out of DC and infected the whole world. He is being revered as a savior before he even steps into office. A Jesus-Buddah-MLK.

No doubt some people are hoping he can reverse global warming, feed the hungry, cure the sick, bring about world peace and invent a tomato plant that thrives in winter.

Today, I saw a several childrens books honoring his name and story.

World, you've gone way way too far. Not only is he just a man, he is a politician. He hasn't even begun the freakin' job. He will soon show you what he is made of and I'm afraid he's not the Midas you were expecting. He's no messiah. He's not even an Oprah.

That said, he's no G.W. Bush, which I think is where the original spark of enthusiasm came from. He does appear to be a moral man and I do think we will repsresent a significant, positive change in the way this country operates.

Furthermore, I do not want to diminish the significance of having, at last, a black/mixed race/different looking president. It is a historic time and I'm glad he's in the White House and not John McCain and the Alaskan hussy.

But I do worry about how high the world has built him up. There are very smart political hitmen that work for the conservative wing of our government who have taken character assasination to high art. Barak Obama will be an easy target sitting on that shakey pedastal and there is a long long long way to fall.

World, I urge you to temper your enthusaism with a heaping helping of realism. It'l ll be better for you in the long run and it'll be safer for Barak Obama.

Brand America

For those of us who've lived and worked outside the US, we understand how a county's brand perception can have a direct impact on our well-being. Rightly or wrongly, how you are regarded within a foreign society is partly related to how your country is regarded throughout the world (particularly if you're not fluent in the language).

For the last 6 years, our name has been mud.

But the deterioration of brand America has much broader implications from an economic standpoint. A country's brand perception often influences the sale of their goods. It can play a subtle, but very real role in whether US companies get contracts in other countries - or even the proper licenses and certifications to conduct business. It can effect whether consumers in other cultures buy our goods. It can play into negotiations. Bad brand perception can be detrimental to America's standing in business communities within these other countries. It can influence whether foreign companies enter into partnerships with American companies. Our country's continued prosperity is partly tied to the health of our national brand.

A brand that Bush and Cheney have completely trashed.

With Abu Ghraib torture photos, Guantanamo Bay's stain on due process, and the U.S.'s perceived ineffectiveness from Iraq to Hurricane Katrina, Brand America is hurting bad.    

Perhaps an important questions we should be asking ourselves is this: "Is the way that we're conducting this war on terror, our stance on the environment, our unwillingness to sit down without pre-conditions, and other policies counterproductive to the wider agenda of the nation?" I'm not saying our goals are wrong necessarily. I'm not saying we should back down. But the tough-guy cowboy screw-you-all politics of the White House is a style that is doing far more harm than good.

As for the brand implications in the upcoming elections, I think Americans would do well to choose the candidate that will protect their interests while working to restore their relationships. In other words, the candidate most unlike Bush. Someone with a smooth touch, a silver tongue, a persuasive ability. Someone not John McCain.

Barak Obama and the Arab Question

Republican campaign worker Gayle Quinnell, 75, says she compiled 3-pages of information at her local library in Shakopee that supports the assertion that Barak Obama is an Arab - a classification that she apparently equates with being Muslim (even though one is an ethnicity and the other is a religion.) So she asked McCain about it. McCain says in short, "Not true." But in an astounding act of willfull ignorance, she still believes it is true.

In other news, Rensselaer County in upstate New York printed ballots with the name Barak Osama on them. "Oh whoops," they said. "Totally just an honest typo." Of course, dear reader, I'm sure it was an honest typo. As you can see on your keyboard, the "s" and the "b" are right, um, next to....uh, never mind. You can tell Rensselaer County what you think of their little "mistake" over here.

Clearly the ignorant, white-trash, fear-based, bigot voter demographic is really the GOP's for the taking. You don't even have to pander to them. Basically, anyone who relies on Jeff Foxworthy to tell them whether they're a redneck, is going McCain/Palin for sure.

This just in: it's actually McCain whose citizenship is at issue. Here's the video on that

Aaron Sorkin's advice to Barak Obama Via Fictional Character

(copy/pasted without alteration from the New York Post Op-Ed Columnist Maureen Dowd)

A hypothetical conversation between Jed Bartlet, former President of the West Wing, and Barak Obama....

OBAMA The problem is we can’t appear angry. Bush called us the angry left. Did you see anyone in Denver who was angry?

BARTLET Well ... let me think. ...We went to war against the wrong country, Osama bin Laden just celebrated his seventh anniversary of not being caught either dead or alive, my family’s less safe than it was eight years ago, we’ve lost trillions of dollars, millions of jobs, thousands of lives and we lost an entire city due to bad weather. So, you know ... I’m a little angry.

OBAMA What would you do?

BARTLET GET ANGRIER! Call them liars, because that’s what they are. Sarah Palin didn’t say “thanks but no thanks” to the Bridge to Nowhere. She just said “Thanks.” You were raised by a single mother on food stamps — where does a guy with eight houses who was legacied into Annapolis get off calling you an elitist? And by the way, if you do nothing else, take that word back. Elite is a good word, it means well above average. I’d ask them what their problem is with excellence. While you’re at it, I want the word “patriot” back.

McCain can say that the transcendent issue of our time is the spread of Islamic fanaticism or he can choose a running mate who doesn’t know the Bush doctrine from the Monroe Doctrine, but he can’t do both at the same time and call it patriotic. They have to lie — the truth isn’t their friend right now. Get angry. Mock them mercilessly; they’ve earned it.

McCain decried agents of intolerance, then chose a running mate who had to ask if she was allowed to ban books from a public library. It’s not bad enough she thinks the planet Earth was created in six days 6,000 years ago complete with a man, a woman and a talking snake, she wants schools to teach the rest of our kids to deny geology, anthropology, archaeology and common sense too? It’s not bad enough she’s forcing her own daughter into a loveless marriage to a teenage hood, she wants the rest of us to guide our daughters in that direction too? It’s not enough that a woman shouldn’t have the right to choose, it should be the law of the land that she has to carry and deliver her rapist’s baby too?

I don’t know whether or not Governor Palin has the tenacity of a pit bull, but I know for sure she’s got the qualifications of one. And you’re worried about seeming angry? You could eat their lunch, make them cry and tell their mamas about it and God himself would call it restrained. There are times when you are simply required to be impolite. There are times when condescension is called for!

Yes, Sarah Palin, Apparently You Can Too

You can be uneducated, inexperienced and downright corrupt, but as long as you have the charisma, looks and gumption, you can do anything in America.

You can attend four different colleges in six years (one of which you basically failed out of), and no one questions your intelligence or commitment to achievement.

You can claim that being mayor of a town smaller than some high-schools, and then Governor of a state with about the same number of people as some cities, makes you ready to potentially be President, and people don’t piss themselves with laughter.


You can say you support the words “under God” in the pledge of allegiance because “if it was good enough for the founding fathers, it’s good enough for me,” even though the “under God” part wasn’t added until the 1950s and nobody calls you a fucking moron.

You can make fun of community organizers and the work they do, but accept without question the experience of a small town mayor and 18-month governor with no foreign policy expertise beyond a class she took in college and a distant view of Russia.

You can convince white women who don’t even agree with you on a single issue to vote for you and your running mate because you too have ovaries.


You can fire people who didn’t support your political campaigns or your personal agenda and not be held accountable for abusing your power.


You can take nearly twenty-four hours to get to a hospital after beginning to leak amniotic fluid, and still be viewed as a great mom whose commitment to her children is unquestionable, and whose "next door neighbor" qualities make her ready to be VP.

You can give a 36-minute speech making fun of your opponents, while failing to present a substantive policy position on any issue AT ALL, and still manage to be considered a breath of fresh air for your party and a viable second in command of the biggest world power on earth.

You can attend churches whose pastors say that people who vote Democrat or criticize George W. Bush are going to hell, and that the job of Christians is to bring Christian theological principles into government, and who bring in speakers who say the conflict in the Middle East is God’s punishment on Jews for rejecting Jesus, and everyone can still think you’re just a good 'ol church-going Christian and not a religious extremist wacko.

Yes Sarah, even though you really SHOULD NOT be able to do any of those things, apparently YOU CAN.

(this post adapted from an article written by Tim Wise entitled "This is your nation on White Privilege." Thanks to Christi for sending.)

What Would Republican Jesus Do?

I think it's fascinating how Neo-Cons have been able to woo the Christian people. Yet most of the things they do, believe in and stand for, save being anti-abortion, would be antithetical to the supposed teachings of the Christian savior. Trashing their God's green earth, warring with other nations without justification, cutting social programs, trash talking immigrants, greed is good, lying is good politics, and on and on. Hey Republicans, how about a little peace love and understanding? How about the ten commandments?

Can you even name the ten commandments? (thanks to sean for sending this my way).

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Rove Couldn't Make It

Congress subpoenaed Karl Rove in their investigation of the Department of Justice firings - alleging that the firings were politically motivated. Karl was, shall we say, otherwise engaged. A conflict came up. He was, well, overbooked..tied up...busy. The devil was calling a conference call of all angels of death and you just don't miss that. Or maybe he had a date with a white house intern. He had to wash his hair. You know, that one hair he has left on his evil evil head.

The White House has cited executive privilege in their explanation of why Karl didn't show. Executive privilege is just another way of saying, "The historical interpretation of the Constitution is a crock of shit and the President can do what he wants to do from now on." In reading the book Takeover by Charles Savage, it appears that the American President's interpretation of our Constitution would make him more dictatorial than the very monarchy that our founders were hoping to escape. See Fed 69. See the Declaration of Independence.

The term "The king emperor has no clothes," sounds truer and truer every day.

UPDATE: 7/21/08:

There's a movement afoot to try and get Rove put in jail. Rove technically was not part of the Bush administration when the congressional subpoena was issued and therefore the claim of executive privilege does not apply (so the argument goes). Here's a video put out by Brave New Films and endorsed by Credo to try and get him tried.

So George Bush and Tony Blair Walk Into A Gay Bar

Great music and mouth re-animation with Bush's and Blair's talking head shots. This post is too easy, I realize. But the video is worth it.