Re-Re-Re-Re-Justifying the Iraq War:
Yesterday was one of those mind-boggling, stomach-churning, oh-shit-he's-really-our-leader days. In what was billed as a speech on "Comprehensive Immigration Reform," Bush spent half his time re-re-re-re-justifying the invasion of Iraq. Here he is, our goddamned President, having an acid flashback to 2002, talking about why we're at war: "[H]ere's the danger of having an enemy with a safe haven in Iraq, Iraq has got wealth. Iraq has -- had weapons of mass destruction and has the knowledge as to how to produce weapons of mass destruction. And the confluence of a terrorist network with weapons of mass destruction is the biggest threat the United States of America faces. They have said it's just a matter of time."

Who the fuck is the "they" there? Intelligence analysts? His cabinet? Or are "they" the terrorists themselves? 'Cause, like, that'd mean that a bunch of sexually repressed crazed religious fundamentalists are setting our foreign policy and dictating massive spending and loss of life on the part of the United States and...oh, fuck, the irony just made the Rude Pundit's nuts retreat into his body cavity in fear.

After having his WMD Tourette's moment, Bush put it out there about who's really runnin' the White House: "I based a lot of my foreign policy decisions on some things that I think are true. One, I believe there's an Almighty, and secondly, I believe one of the great gifts of the Almighty is the desire in everybody's soul, regardless of what you look like or where you live, to be free." Ergo, Jeeezus sez free the peoples so the peoples must be freed and Bush, with the big ol' earthly army, he's gots to do the freein' that Jeeezus (under the guise of his code name, "The Almighty") wants him to be doin'. C'mon, motherfuckers, does the man have to get the Rascals to spell it out for you? "Ask me my opinion, my opinion will be/ Nat'ral situation for a man to be free."

So here's where we are: a religious belief is the basis for Bush to wage war on Islamic radicals. Or, in other words, and here's the sphincter-reducing horror of it all: when Bush speaks to his base about the war, he simply confirms everything that forever-on-the-lam(b) Osama bin Laden said in his little "Nyah-nyah" to the West the other day.

But the President, he's a student of history, you know. Iraq needs itself some time, 'cause it's like the United States back in its beginnings. Spaketh Bush, "My Secretary of State's relatives were enslaved in the United States even though we had a Constitution that said all were -- that believed in the dignity, or at least proclaimed to believe in the dignity of all." Get it? Condi's black. Dunno what that has to do with forming a working government in Iraq, but, yup, Condi's black. Bush did not note that that same Constitution proclaimed that Condoleezza Rice's "relatives" were only worth 3/5 of a white person. The implication, of course, is that a nation, a people, indeed, individuals, recognize error and failings, taking steps to right what was wrong.

And Bush was given another opportunity to acknowledge mistakes when an audience member tossed him the softball question, "Now that you are President, and you've had a chance to go through the experience and you're in your second term, candidly, if you had it to do over, would there be anything that you'd do differently?"

Watching the President stumble through an answer to this was a little like watching a blind man left alone in the middle of an empty warehouse, seeing him move around like he's about to trip over something until he reaches the sweet safety of the constant wall he can lean against. First he threatened that he would still run for office. Then he fumbled around, saying, "I have enjoyed this experience in a way that's hard for me to describe to you. Listen, there have been some rough moments. But it is an incredible honor to serve our country." And then, aw, fuck, thank Christ, he found the wall, and turned the whole question into whether or not he'd've sent troops to Iraq, going on for-fucking-ever on how it was "the hardest decision" and how he tried to solve it "diplomatically," but, yeah, sure, there were some errors in "tactics," but, oh, sorry, he's getting into "minutia," which is just code for "I'm not answering your fuckin' quesion."

And then he went into monkeyfuck crazy land: "The fundamental question on the Iraq theater, though, is did we put enough troops in there in the first place. That's the debate in Washington. I'm sure you've heard about it. Let me just tell you what happened. I called Tommy Franks in with Don Rumsfeld and said, Tommy, if we're going in, you design the plan and you got what you need. I said -- I remember the era when politicians were trying to run wars, people trying to fine-tune this or fine-tune that. One the lessons of Vietnam, it seemed like to me -- still does -- is that people tried to make decisions on behalf of the military, which I think is a terrible precedent to make if you're the Commander-in-Chief. By the way, you can't run a war, you can't make decisions based upon polls and focus groups, either."

Really, and, c'mon, what else do you need to know?