2008 Woodie Awards
President Bush overstepping his powers
Issue date: 1/27/06 Section: Rocket Letters
To the Editor:
"If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." So said George W. Bush on Dec. 18, 2000. One might dismiss this statement by a president-elect as simply a careless expression of humor, but for the fact that he had publicly made a similar statement in 1998 while Governor of Texas and repeated it again in 2001. With the growing concern that he has overstepped his powers and violated his responsibilities as the leader of this nation, many are seriously asking themselves whether the intention of the extreme right-wing of American politics may well be one of instituting a type of dictatorship that hides behind a screen of fictional democracy that is manipulated by corporation-owned media and whose elections are run by computer-mastered voting machines.
When one considers the tragedy of 9/11, that federal officials knew the planes had gone off-course long before their crashes into the Towers and the Pentagon, yet no military response was mustered to try to stop them, he is led to wonder if there was any complicity in the attacks by people in our leadership. Particularly after finding that in 2000 the neo-con think-tank "Project for the New American Century" (many of whose members have high positions in the present Administration) stated that a Pearl Harbor type of event would be necessary to restore a desired level of funding for the military, and outlined a plan for military occupation of Iraq, doesn't one wonder what their long-range agenda may actually be?
And what is one to think of the analyses of the 9/11 Commission Report, which is riddled with falsehoods and glaring omissions, as made clear by scholar-philosopher David Ray Griffin's excellent book? Further, what are we to think of the Bush Administration's presentation of false information about Iraq as possessing WMD and being an ally of Al Qaeda, clearly protested as baseless by many patriotic and responsible persons in the CIA and even Bush's own staff prior to Congress's authorization of his power to attack Iraq and 'do all that is necessary' to wage an endless war on terrorism?
"If this were a dictatorship, it would be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." So said George W. Bush on Dec. 18, 2000. One might dismiss this statement by a president-elect as simply a careless expression of humor, but for the fact that he had publicly made a similar statement in 1998 while Governor of Texas and repeated it again in 2001. With the growing concern that he has overstepped his powers and violated his responsibilities as the leader of this nation, many are seriously asking themselves whether the intention of the extreme right-wing of American politics may well be one of instituting a type of dictatorship that hides behind a screen of fictional democracy that is manipulated by corporation-owned media and whose elections are run by computer-mastered voting machines.
When one considers the tragedy of 9/11, that federal officials knew the planes had gone off-course long before their crashes into the Towers and the Pentagon, yet no military response was mustered to try to stop them, he is led to wonder if there was any complicity in the attacks by people in our leadership. Particularly after finding that in 2000 the neo-con think-tank "Project for the New American Century" (many of whose members have high positions in the present Administration) stated that a Pearl Harbor type of event would be necessary to restore a desired level of funding for the military, and outlined a plan for military occupation of Iraq, doesn't one wonder what their long-range agenda may actually be?
And what is one to think of the analyses of the 9/11 Commission Report, which is riddled with falsehoods and glaring omissions, as made clear by scholar-philosopher David Ray Griffin's excellent book? Further, what are we to think of the Bush Administration's presentation of false information about Iraq as possessing WMD and being an ally of Al Qaeda, clearly protested as baseless by many patriotic and responsible persons in the CIA and even Bush's own staff prior to Congress's authorization of his power to attack Iraq and 'do all that is necessary' to wage an endless war on terrorism?
