Contributors

Monday, May 19, 2008

The Big Lie

Last Thursday, President Bush was in Israel and addressed the Knessett, the country's legislature, to mark the 60th anniversary of the formation of the Jewish Homeland. Towards the end of his speech he said the following:

Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: "Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided." We have an obligation to call this what it is – the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.

The very night that President Bush made his speech I was sitting in the stands of my daughter's baseball game. A fellow parent and I were discussing our favorite television shows. She told me how much she liked 24 and I told her I was addicted from day one. She, being a conservative, looked at me, surprised, and said, "Wow. I didn't think a liberal would like that show."

Thus, we see how effective The Big Lie can be.

The Big Lie came up in comments recently and I really wanted to craft into a full blown column. I have to thank President Bush for providing me with an excellent opportunity to illustrate how the Big Lie works.

I find it hilariously ironic, on a number of levels which I will illustrate, that President Bush brought up Hitler while telling a "Big Lie." For you see, dear readers, it was Adolph Hitler himself that came up with the concept of the Big Lie. From his book, Mein Kampf

therefore, in view of the primitive simplicity of their minds they more easily fall a victim to a big lie than to a little one, since they themselves lie in little things, but would be ashamed of lies that were too big. Such a falsehood will never enter their heads and they will not be able to believe in the possibility of such monstrous effrontery and infamous misrepresentation in others; yes, even when enlightened on the subject, they will long doubt and waver, and continue to accept at least one of these causes as true.

In this case the Big Lie is that "some people" (meaning Democrats) who talk to our enemies are appeasers.

In listening to President Bush's speech, clearly he, and his merry band of cronies and pundits, don't have a fucking clue what appeasement means nor do they know what talking means. Let's consult the dictionary, shall we? Just as an aside, the simple fact that I have to explain this infuriates me, quite frankly, but when people with the emotions and intellect of eight year olds are running the country and supporting this president, I guess one must oversimplify.

appeasement: (noun): the policy of granting concessions to enemies to maintain peace.

Now, let's use it in a sentence.

Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain of Great Britain thought that a policy of appeasement would contain Adolph Hitler. By allowing him to take over small countries like Czechislovakia, Chamberlain thought Hitler would be satisfied.

How about talking?

talking: (verb): to speak or discuss; to give expression in words

And let's use it in a sentence.

President Reagan spent a great deal of time talking to the former Soviet Union. It was these talks, combined with America's overwhelming ability to outproduce the Russians, that led to the end of communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.

So, I think we can all see that appeasing your enemy is not the same as talking to your enemy.

What we can see is a Big Lie that comes, ironically, right out of Hitler's playbook. During World War II, the United States Office of Strategic Services prepared a psychological profile of Adolph Hitler, which stated:

His primary rules were: never allow the public to cool off; never admit a fault or wrong; never concede that there may be some good in your enemy; never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.

Little did the OSS know, lo those many years ago, that they would be describing, in complete perfection, the conservative movement in this country sixty years later.The above paragraph sums up exactly how Bush et al operate and his speech last week further exemplifies this fact. Talking is appeasement, gol darnit, and if you don't subscribe to the Bush Doctrine, than you are weak and an appeaser! They have been very successful at doing this, hence my friend at the baseball game thinking a liberal wouldn't like a show like 24. She, by her own admission, spends her days listening to the "tap into your inner rage and pass it off as fact" talk radio hosts. They have convinced her that they are the keepers of the truth and the other, "liberal" media is all lies and propaganda.

Great....

So, President Bush, and other conservatives, want the country to believe that someone like Barack Obama would appease terrorists 0r terrorist states. This is a lie. To begin with, Obama is on record as saying that he won't diplomatically engage any terrorist groups like Al Qaeda and he won't recognize Hamas until they recognize Israel. As far as actual countries go, someone like Senator Obama knows that appeasement and talking are not the same thing. The two don't correlate and, if anything, the United States NOT talking with Iran has produced disastrous results and made them more influential in the region. He knows that if the Allies had spent more time talking to Hitler and studying him (reading Mein Kampf, maybe) rather than granting him concessions, we might have entered the war earlier and been able to prevent some bloodshed. So, we really need to start talking with Iran and re-establish full diplomatic ties with them. Both Secretary Rice and Secretary Gates, two member of Bush's cabinet, agree. Also, very ironic!

Senator Obama also knows, as do I and some of you, that when Bush and cronies say stuff like this, it is actually a mask for incompetence. The real reason why President Bush doesn't want to talk with countries like Iran is because he doesn't know what the fuck he is doing. The real reason why the pundits echo Bush's sentiments is because these people are completely devoid of any sort of cultural intelligence (i.e. they are bigots). Obama knows that Bush et al. don't understand anything about diplomacy and, quite frankly, they don't care. Bush would rather take the easy route. His actions prove that he always has. Rather than do the tough job of combating Al Qaeda, he chose to attack a weak country for a cheap win.

Bush's statement on talking and appeasing also makes no sense when you consider that the next day he went to beg the Saudis for more oil. The Saudis, who still have hundreds of madrasahs in which the hatred of America is taught on a daily basis and who were responsible for 15 of the 19 9-11 hijackers. And what about North Korea? They are a state sponsor of terrorism and recently attempted to supply Syria with material to make a nuclear weapon. We just gave them a bunch of concessions, in the form of food and oil, and Bush has the gaul to say that he doesn't negotiate? Well, to be fair, he actually doesn't since, again, he doesn't know what he is doing and, is more or less, letting the Chinese and Asst. Secretary of State Christopher Hill handle negotiations.

Sadly, the irony doesn't end there. Standing in the Knessett, I wonder if George Bush thought of his grandfather, Prescott Bush, at all. In the 1930s, Prescott Bush was the director of the Hamburg-American Line, a shipping company between Germany and the United States. In 1933, members of this company attempted, unsuccessfully, to stage a military coup against FDR and install a military dictatorship. Prescott was also VP of A. Harriman and Co, an investment company and bank, during the 1930s. This firm was the main Wall Street partner of several German businesses and may have helped contribute funds to the Nazi Regime.

Perhaps the most ironic part of his whole speech was the following line, summarizing our enemy.

On the other side are those who pursue a narrow vision of cruelty and control by committing murder, inciting fear, and spreading lies.

Funny, isn't that exactly what he and his supporters are doing? They have a narrow vision of cruelty and control by committing murder in Iraq, they incite fear here at home with false alerts and sensational claims of WMDs, and they spread lies about fellow countrymen who have different ideas about how to solve the problem of global terror. They label them as weak and shout blatant lies over the airwaves regarding people like Senator Obama-lies which actually contribute more to degradation of our country while serving as a mask for their own total lack of intelligence.

Bush's speech at the Knessett was just another example of how much of a national embarrassment he truly is. The only thing he really accomplished, in my eyes, was proving how well he and his administration have adopted the same tactics used to fool an entire country into believing outrageous after horrendous lie.

Let's make sure that doesn't happen here.

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Stunning. This is very well written piece, Mark, that obviously required much effort.

When you think about it, what you say regarding the "mask of incompetence" rings true. Turn your dial to any right wing talk show host and what do they really have to offer in the way of detailed knowledge regarding some of our enemies? Just a simple caricature that makes us lose more and more ground everyday.

Solutions to these international issues require detailed analysis and a president who will take the time to read them and fully understand what we are up against. To engage in a dialogue with your enemy is to know your enemy and we are in desperate need of that right now.

Anonymous said...

Another fairly recent American president was truly the Great Appeaser.

This president okayed the sale of thousands of TOW missiles to Iran in exchange for the release of six American hostages who had been captured by Hezbollah.

This president stopped a bill in Congress to prevent the sale of WMD technology to Saddam Hussein, after Hussein gassed thousands of Kurds -- his own people -- in the city of Halabja. A crime for which Saddam was tried before his execution.

When Americans served as peacekeepers in Lebanon, Shiite terrorists bombed their barracks in Beirut, killing 241 servicemen. This president pledged that he would not cut and run. The vice president toured the site and said, we "would not be cowed by terrorists."

French soldiers were also attacked by the same terrorist group, and French President Mitterrand launched an airstrike against the Iranian Revolutionary Guard in the Beqaa Valley.

The American president ... did nothing. Four months after the attack all Americans were pulled out.

Which American president did all these things? Yes, it was the Great Appeaser, um, Communicator himself -- Ronald Reagan.

The final interesting coincidence? The American hostages held in the American embassy in Teheran for 444 days were released on Jan. 20, 1981: Reagan's inauguration day.

Anonymous said...

I find it interesting that 24 is the favorite show of so many conservatives. They often cite it in their defense of using torture against terrorists. FOX apparently gave VP Cheney a full DVD set as a gift (for services rendered, I presume).

But my recollection of these episodes of torture is that they never really work. The first one, which I remember the best, was when they caught the terrorist minutes before the threat (bomb, whatever) was set to go off. Jack did all his typical torture moves, to no avail.

Then he threatened to kill the man's wife and children. That's when the guy caved -- not when he was getting his fingernails yanked out or getting waterboarded.

Torturing the guy himself was useless; killing those he loved, yeah, that worked.

Later memorable episodes of torture include Jack doing the deed to various friends, associates, brothers, husbands of girlfriends, etc. All of these were either useless because the person didn't know anything, or they lied, or didn't break.

And of course, Jack himself is tortured time and again by various nogoodniks, including the Chinese who are doing it just for kicks. They never break him and he always comes back ticking after the licking.

Torture never works against the truly evil guys. Oh, yeah, twisting the nuts of some pissant henchman gives them a diversionary clue, but those never really turn into anything useful.

And, really, it has to turn out that way for dramatic reasons. Because, in the end, torture is a narrative cheat. It's the easy (and despicable) way to get information. The good guys can't win by using the bad guys' tactics. Chloe has to do her technomagic and Jack has to outfox them. Only when the characters really earn their victories do they mean anything.

The political atmosphere is also rather curious for a "pro-conservative" show. Jack saves not one but two youngish black presidents innumerable times. The bad guys often turn out to be greedy American titans of industry (a la Jack's dad), shadowy right-wing groups or Nixonesque presidents using terrorists for their own goals.

Unknown said...

Hey Mark- this is Gina- this is a great post. It never ceases to amaze me- the blatant hypocrisy- and that the "liberal" media really gives this administration a pass...it doesn't help that the AMerican public has the attention span of a gnat and will forget this tomorrow, that is, if they even care enough to read about it now!

Anonymous said...

Well blk and I finally agree on something. You're damn right Reagan was an appeaser. If we had increased our forces in the Middle East and kicked some ass, we wouldn't be in the spot we are in now.

If Obama wins, it will be more of the same appeasing. I doubt McCain will be much better but at least he is talking the talk.

Anonymous said...

Markus bless you :) for your integrity, humanity, common sense, intelligence & sense of humour.

As blk mentions that's really interesting that 24 is supposedly 'one side's' (*sheesh*) favourite show, it's also ridiculous. i know at least 3 individuals in the mideast who would't miss an episode (i dont watch) and they love it, they also love the people & groups bush doesn't want others to talk to (aka 'appease') as mark rightly points out, this prez is mr propaganda clueless.

what i also find ridiculous is, prez bush lecturing the arab world about democracy, womens' rights and corruption (as covered by the news wires on sunday.) i imagine this to be the conversation between bush and his best buddy regimes in the Arab World which he & cheney regularly visist and perpetuate in power, against the will of the people: 'it's like, you stay in power so i can talk shit. cause you're the corrupt and undemocratic ones! So long as my people spend all their time and efforts making sure your people stay in power, i can invade and lecture your part of the world, whenever i want!' joanne

Anonymous said...

Nicely written, sir. I think this dust up between McCain and Obama illustrates how silly the right has become on the issue of foreign policy. Most of them know that Bush failed and that the rest of the country is aware of the failure. They are still trying to show the American people that they are tougher. I'm not sure we are buying.

I've also noticed the right wing loud mouths on the radio getting louder. They can feel it...they are becoming irrelevant.

Anonymous said...

Is it just me does McCain's strategy seem really tone deaf? The people of this country have seen the results of not engaging Iran. They are stronger than ever. I'm not saying that what Obama would have planned is a good plan either but you would think that McCain would come up with something that is different from both Bush and Obama.

Anonymous said...

Two days after Bush lectured the Knesset about "appeasement," Israel began peace negotiations with Syria.

This man is completely out of touch with reality. He's like a five-year-old in a perpetual temper tantrum.