Hate Bush? Nah. Can't Be Bothered.

Right wingers often try to defuse criticism of The Leader by accusing critics of being "Bush Haters." Talking heads of the O'Reilly, Krauthammer, and Jacoby ilk hurl the term like a thunderbolt from Olympus. I guess to them (and all "right-thinking" people like them) hating Bush is on par with hating apple pie, Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother Theresa.

My own reply to the "allegation" of Bush hating is, "No." My reaction to Mr. Bush is on the one hand, a profound and an anguished embarrassment, and on the other thorough-going outrage. When you consider the line of Presidents from Washington to Clinton and find George W. Bush there, it's a total mismatch. He just doesn't belong. Of course, Right Wingers will quickly point out that Bill Clinton doesn't belong there either, but I'll refute that. There are many things that you can legitimately lay at Bill Clinton's doorstep, but he was no lightweight. He had a vision, he had the political acumen to survive breathtaking adversity (often of his own making), and he was unfailingly well-spoken and clearly focused on the issues of his time.

George W. Bush, from the first moment I became aware of him, failed my own personal smell test. For a time I couldn't figure out what bothered me about him. I finally fell back on my 20 years as an airline airport supervisor. In dealing with many angry, frustrated and often volatile people, I developed a keen nose for sensing a phony. And that's what bothered me about George W. Bush. The man is a phony.

His biography explains a lot. He is the scion of a wealthy New England establishment family. His grandfather and father were wildly successful, both in business and politics. He is likely not one who learned to take "no" for an answer. His journey through the Ivy League was preordained and funded both financially and academically by family tradition. His military obligations were dealt with as such families deal with those things: Calls were made, strings were pulled, outcomes were secured. Even irresponsibly walking away from the commitment was rewritten and covered up. Later, various ill-starred business failures were cushioned, resolved and reversed by the omnipresent family retainers.

Simply put, this man is a spoiled brat with a hyper-developed sense of entitlement. His biography was easy to revise and refashion into the Right Wing idol he is today. His past peccadilloes were simply "not discussed" because they happened "before he found Jesus." (Try and imagine that working for Bill Clinton.) He ran for President in 2000 as a "compassionate conservative" who assured America that he was a moderate, a centrist who would bring respect back to the Presidency.

In short, George W. Bush is the result of packaging, of product placement, of costuming and makeup. His persona was created to gratify the various right-wing appetites for an action figure that would poke a stick in the eye of the hated "liberals." Whether his political views were thoughtfully arrived at and genuinely held, I have no way to know. Whether his religious conversion, his finding Jesus, was bogus and a political calculation, I would not presume to guess. However, when cast against the backdrop of the rest of his life and his actions of late, one has to think that it's all about appearance, about selling the product, about controlling the agenda.

Almost everything George W. Bush did after taking office belied his moderate campaign assurances. One of his first appointments was John Ashcroft as Attorney-General, a certifiable right wing extremist and religious fanatic to boot. To date, he has done nothing to demonstrate any integrity, any honesty, any acknowledgement that he only holds office with the support of a scant 50% of the population. Yet he has recklessly and ruthlessly implemented an extremist and esoteric agenda which clearly benefits only a small clique of wealthy and powerful interests.

It would be very easy to "hate" George W. Bush, but that would give him far too much credit. He is a figurehead, a puppet and a shill for the corporate elites who paid for his elevation to office and whose interests he so fervently promotes. Hate in that context is simply not a useful tool to express ones view of Bush.

Embarrassment is unavoidable. That the packaging worked, the contrived religiosity sold and the strained "authenticity" was bought hook, line and sinker by half of this country is profoundly disillusioning.

Outrage is almost automatic. One can scarcely glance at Bush's trail of blunders, favoritism and perversion of our institutions and history without feeling a withering and intense outrage that this wonderful country has fallen into such unworthy hands, that this land for which so much blood has been spilled has fallen into the grip of Philistines whose only thought is to promote and enrich themselves.

As the old saying goes: Don't get mad, get even.