Voltaire was not a man of faith. He claimed that he prayed only once to God: "Oh. Lord, make my enemies ridiculous."
This prayer, Voltaire tells us wryly, was granted.
Freedom-loving, republic-preserving, excess in government-combating optimists in America have been similarly blessed.
Our enemies are again made ridiculous. The latest outrage might be the Bush appointment of neocon bully John Bolton as Negroponte’s replacement at the United Nations.
Arguably, this appointment is no worse than the outrage of Central American mobster John Negroponte as America’s representative to the United Nations and the president’s representative to 23 million occupied Iraqis.
Or is President Bush outdoing another of his outrageous outrages — that of appointing John Bolton to do arms control at the State Department in the first place?
Some see this as the continued rise of the neocons. But it looks to be just one more example of a pathetic and bankrupt George Walker Bush weakly showing gratitude for past neocon infusions of noble "missions" and counterfeit "courage."
Of course, to rational people, rewarding neoconservative policy failures and ideological idiocy seems unthinkable — mistakes and violation of the Constitution and other laws should be punished, the low and lying performers fired. But rational people miss the wondrous point of the Bush presidency.
It begins in the mind of poor George Walker Bush, and his life up to and including Texas governor. A morally impoverished Connecticut born and educated "Texan" with political bloodlines but no commitment to true conservatism, simmering with resentment of his Poppy and burning with embarrassment for one too many business failures, Dubya was a dream come true for neoconservatism — a populist born-again Christian with instant political name recognition, and yet as intellectually and morally hollow as a dry well.
Until George was adopted by the neocons, he had no identifiable sense of mission or moral courage. For neoconservatism, Dubya was the missing link. Here was mainstream acceptance, credibility, a promise of neocon dreams of transforming the Middle East into a vast security buffer for Israel, American oil, and the necessary Balkanization of aspiring Middle Eastern nation states, some increasingly uppity in their politics and economic perspectives.
Prior to his adoption by the neoconservative horde, George was the bad seed in a family that already seemed as troubled, lawless and whacked-out as any we might enjoy on reality television.
Like reality television, the entertainment is staged, and so is the neocon persistence in Washington. Staged, I mean. The show is just beginning.
The impossibility of intelligence reform — where ego driven mediocrities like Porter Goss reach the pinnacle of their career only to find the hours are long and that John Negroponte stands in his way at every turn — is another blessing God has granted those who love our vulnerable Republic. Trust that they will devour each other and the sounds of ripping flesh in the anterooms of the oval office will be music to the ears of those who suspect the politicization of intelligence is out of control.
Wolfowitz at the World Bank when that house of cards comes fluttering down? It couldn’t happen to a better guy. Global anti-Americanism compounded by extreme and unbacked American debt to those that do not enjoy our company, no longer buy anything we make, and don’t fear a military emasculated by morally festering occupations and cowardly senior leadership — I’d say the U.S., er…World Bank is in for some fun. Things have changed from the glory days of Bretton Woods and petro-dollar gluts. Who are we to begrudge such joy to Wolfie? Can no one rid us of this turbulent priest of neoconservatism? Indeed, the most loyal insiders will have done exactly that by sending the logic-impaired empire maker from the Pentagon into the doomed World Bank
Bolton at the UN seems hideous. But in the run up to the midterm elections — where so many conservatives and the Republican Party have already awakened to the present and future disaster of the radical Bush presidency — its assault on the taxpayer, the military, the Republic, other countries, its disregard for the bill of rights, State’s rights, and citizen’s rights. The UN — or rather having the UN to kick — is of huge political importance. The UN exists to be shunted, admonished, ignored — and what better man that Bolton to do it? Bolton will serve Bush well — by helping shift the 2006 Republican voter blame for all the failed Bush foreign policy and much of his domestic policy to other known "evil" entities.
It is sheer genius to send Bolton the Unbearable to the UN — where he will be sabotaged every moment, in a million invisible ways, even as he sleeps. More importantly, Bolton as influential neocon is done for by the very irrelevance of the UN to Bush policy development.
Consider the coming Goss-Negroponte festival of bloody backstabbing, the immense financial catastrophe waiting like smoldering coals for the blast of hot air that is Paul Wolfowitz, and the irrelevant-by-definition United Nations serving the far higher purpose of driving an already marginally sane John Bolton into muttering madness.
We are indeed greatly blessed.
