July News, Part One
Terrible news: my quiet and harmless neighbor, Goldie Weaver was savagely murdered June 28. I left for work in the morning with her resting in her web, and when I returned in the evening her web was gone, and one of her legs was broken on the stairs. I have no leads as to who may be responsible, but whoever might have done such a cruel thing surely has no heart. What makes this brutal act all the more tragic is that I had been planning to re-locate Goldie to a pleasant woodland spot to avoid her running into trouble when pest-control came to spray the apartment. I didn’t see any sign that pest-control was in the building, so I don’t consider them prime suspects. But I feel quite bad that I didn’t act sooner. Perhaps Goldie might still be alive.
I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 on June 26. I bought my tickets way ahead of showtime to avoid the certain sell-out. Arriving at the theater a half hour early, we still encountered a line that stretched all the way across the lobby. Apparently Bush-haters are a punctual lot. A well-mannered group as well, because there was none of the usual rudeness that typically enrages me and makes going to the movies an unpleasant experience. There were, of course, frequent gasps of astonishment and horror during the film’s numerous shocking moments; A great deal of laughter accompanied the film’s highlighting of Bush’s many foibles. It seems pointless to say that this movie “isn’t fair”. If by “unfair” you mean that the conservatives weren’t given equal time in the film to make their points, then, no, the film isn’t fair, and wasn’t meant to be. The fact of the matter is this: on almost every radio station and television channel in this country, the Bush Administration’s agenda has been discussed in terms bordering on unabashed praise. While many experts disagreed with the Administration’s claims of alleged WMD and Iraq/Al Qaeda ties, and while millions of Americans–and tens of millions of people around the world–protested, the media in this country acted as though it was its patriotic duty to side with Bush during his march to war. If people want to hear the Bush Administration’s point of view they need only turn on the television: it’s everywhere. It’s finally getting to the point where there is open opposition, but during the period of “major combat operations” and in the run-up to the war in Iraq, anyone who second-guessed the Administration was shouted down and accused of lack or patriotism at the very least, and, on conservative talk radio, of treason. So here we have a paradox, and that is that during the run-up to the war, if you were heard to voice opposition, you were ridiculed. Consequently, many legislators went along with it. Now, when the claims of the Administration all seem to be false (remember when Cheney repeatedly claimed that we knew with certainty exactly where the WMD were, and that we would be greeted as liberators?), and the predictions of the skeptics have all come to pass, legislators who now announce they were betrayed are reminded of how they once supported the war. Of course they once supported the war! Those who didn’t were subject to public humiliation.
I know that my statements appear biased against Bush. But it isn’t me who is biased against Bush. The facts are biased against Bush. I know that the Bush Administration has made countless statements that are patently false about Iraq, and just about every other subject for that matter. The media spends little time correcting these lies. When an article or report is written which serves to illustrate the misinformation, space is also given–in an effort to prevent the conservatives from crying “liberal media”–to present the Administration’s point of view, which, again, they use to spread more lies. That Bush’s approval ratings are at their lowest of his presidency is really no surprise considering the terrible events that are occurring because of his decisions. What surprises me is how they are not even lower. The reason they are not lower is because the Administration persists in deflecting responsibility, and continues to place blame on others. But a hard rain’s gonna fall, and Bush will eventually pay. They may never get what they deserve, but they won’t win in November. Mark my words: barring some sort of election trickery or terrorist act that results in widespread fear-mongering on the part of the Administration, Bush will lose. And it won’t be by the two- to three percent that some are predicting. It will be by ten- to fifteen percent.
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