What's
Next For America?
By Paul Buchheit
18 July, 2007
Countercurrents.org
With the Bush Administration nearing its end, and criticism of America's
domestic and foreign policies at unprecedented levels, it is time to
devise a workable plan for our country's future. This is an attempt
to do so.
First of all, our next war
should be with Canada rather than Iran. Canada, our biggest oil supplier,
is building up military forces in the potentially oil-rich Northwest
Passage, in direct opposition to the anti-colonial spirit of our own
Monroe Doctrine. The elite in Canada see their nation as a rising energy
superpower. A war up north would serve the same purpose as a war in
the Middle East, but at a lower cost and with the advantage of keeping
our young men and women close to home.
Second, we should combine
two discredited entities into one new organization that can ensure free
trade and help reduce our deficit. The SCHOOL OF THE AMERICAS is a training
facility for counter- insurgency and torture techniques for Latin American
military personnel. The FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS would allow
us to "guarantee control for North American businesses over a territory
which stretches from the Arctic to the Antarctic." We should merge
the two into a new TRADE SCHOOL OF THE AMERICAS, which will train economists
in counter-insurgency and torture techniques, thus ensuring our control
over the system of subsidies and tariffs that make free trade beneficial
to America.
Third, we should provide
a graceful exit for our current administration to encourage them to
step down soon. Arrangements can be made with the textbook publishers
to write the Bush legacy into their books without the usual 50-year
wait. Phrases such as 'Mr Bush unified world opinion' would be sure
to capture the attention of future high school students without requiring
an understanding of the facts. The students will repeat with pride the
president's words that the Iraq War was "America's golden moment."
Finally, we should encourage
the President to put his memoirs in a book of Bush Literature (bushlit,
for short). A sample chapter is provided for his convenience:
Chapter 1: Iraq, From My
Point of View
It all started in the spring
of 2001, when Dick's task force met to discuss the situation over there,
using a chart called 'Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfields.' We were
courting the Iraqis, not fighting them.
I know the Downing Street
business looks bad. People say Tony and I planned the war ahead of time,
that we tried to 'fix the facts.' Well, of course, we wanted the facts
fixed in people's minds. Later that year, before the war, I distinctly
said "war is the last option for confronting threats."
When the war started we did
our best to end it quickly, to bring representative democracy to Iraq.
Sure the new organizational chart had no Iraqis on it, but remember
it took 7,000 years to build that country. I think I made it clear that
"the war in Iraq is really about peace."
What about the weapons of
mass destruction? I'll tell you, "I wasn't happy when we found
out there wasn't weapons." And who could have known that the weapons
of mass destruction and Al Qaeda would be found among our friends in
Pakistan?
The good people at Bechtel
and Halliburton helped to restore democracy in Iraq. With their assistance
we rewrote the constitution, trade laws, tax laws, and intellectual
property laws. Unfortunately we lost the Ministry of Education, the
Ministry of Trade, and the Ministry of Culture. But we saved the Ministry
of Oil.
I can tell you that "the
United States has no quarrel with the Iraqi people." I heard about
some study at, what, John Hopkins, that said 650,000 Iraqis have died
in the war. I'd have to question that. Anyway, as Colin once said, "It's
really not a number I'm terribly interested in." I have other things
on my mind. "You know, one of the hardest parts of my job is to
connect Iraq to the war on terror." And what about all the Americans
who are still alive? I know my good friend Henry was supposed to have
said "Military men are just dumb stupid animals to be used as pawns
in foreign policy." I'd have to disagree with that. But like my
dad said, "I will never apologize for the United States of America
- I don't care what the facts are."
Let me just summarize all
this: "It's bad in Iraq. Does that help?"
References:
1 "Canada puts muscle
behind claim to Northwest Passage," Seattle Times, July 10, 2007
2 Linda McQuaig, "Holding
the Bully's Coat: Canada and the U.S.
Empire" (Doubleday, 2007)
3 School of the Americas
Watch, 2007 (http://www.soaw.org/new)
4 Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer,
"School of Assassins: The Case for Closing the School of the Americas
and for Fundamentally Changing U.S. Foreign Policy" (Maryknoll,
New York: Orbis Books, 1997)
5 "Our objective with
the FTAA is to guarantee control for North
American businesses over a territory which stretches from the Arctic
to the Antarctic, free access, over the entire hemisphere, without any
difficulty or obstacle, for our products, services, technology and capital."
-- Colin Powell, 2002
6 "20 or 30 years from
now historians will look back on the mission to Iraq as America's golden
moment." -- George Bush, Annapolis, May 27, 2005
7 "Crude Dudes,"
by Linda McQuaig, The Toronto Star, 20 September 2004
8 Maps and Charts of Iraqi
Oil Fields," Judicial Watch
(http://www.judicialwatch.org/iraqi-oil-maps.shtml)
9 "When “Old News”
Has Never Been Told" July/August 2005, By Julie Hollar and Peter
Hart, fair.org
10 "Why did attorney
general support such a weak and dismal argument?" The Guardian,
February 23, 2005
11 "Book: Bush, Blair
were set on Iraq war despite UN," Chicago
Tribune, February 11, 2006.
12 "Ex-C.I.A. Official
Says Iraq Data Was Distorted," by Scott Shane, New York Times,
February 11, 2006
13 "War is the last
option for confronting threats." -- George Bush,
Radio Address by the President to the Nation, December 7, 2002
14 Department of Defense,
Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance, New York Times,
7 May 2003
15 Chart shown in New York
Times, 7 May 2003; Source: Department of
Defense, Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance.
16 "The war in Iraq
is really about peace." -- George Bush, after
visiting wounded troops on April 11, 2003
17 "I wasn't happy when
we found out there wasn't weapons." -- George Bush, Second Presidential
Debate, Washington University, St Louis, 10/08/04
18 "Pakistan and the
True WMD Threat," by Robert Scheer, Los Angeles Times, December
7, 2004
19 "U.S. Aborted Raid
on Qaeda Chiefs in Pakistan in ’05," by Mark Mazzetti, New
York Times, July 8, 2007
20 "Al Qaeda-Pakistani
ties deepen," by Gretchen Peters, The Christian Science Monitor,
March 06, 2003
21 "An Ordinary Person's
Guide to Empire," by Arundhati Roy (South End Press, 2004)
22 "Americans defend
two untouchable ministries from the hordes of looters," robert-fisk.com,
04/14/03
23 "The United States
has no quarrel with the Iraqi people." -- George W. Bush, United
Nations General Assembly, September 2002
24 "Updated Iraq Survey
Affirms Earlier Mortality Estimates," Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School
of Public Health, October 11, 2006
25 "It's really not
a number I'm terribly interested in." -- General
Colin Powell, asked about the number of Iraqi people killed in the
1991 Desert Storm fighting
26 "You know, one of
the hardest parts of my job is to connect Iraq to the war on terror."
-- George Bush interview with CBS News' Katie Couric, Sept. 6, 2006
27 “Military men are
just dumb stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy.”
- Henry Kissinger, quoted in "Kiss the Boys Goodbye: How the United
States Betrayed Its Own POW’s in Vietnam," by Monika Jenson-Stevenson
& William Stevenson, McClelland & Stewart Ltd., 1999
28 "I will never apologize
for the United States of America - I don't
care what the facts are." -- President George H. W. Bush, 1988
29 "It's bad in Iraq.
Does that help?" --George W. Bush, when asked by a reporter if
he was in denial about Iraq, Washington, D.C., Dec. 7, 2006
Paul Buchheit is a professor with the Chicago City
Colleges, the founder of Global Initiative Chicago (GIChicago.org),
and the founder of fightingpoverty.org.
[email protected]
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