THE POTTYMOUTH LEFT

Tom links to this piece of anti-Bush bile. It's times like this that I'm glad I have a blog. Reading a piece like this is like being beaten with a club. A blog gives you a chance to offer a little token resistance, so you feel less violated. Just a few points.

A favorite moment for many featured John McCain growing apoplectic as Donald Rumsfeld and an entire tableful of army brass proved unable to answer the simple question Who was in charge at Abu Ghraib?

And yet John McCain, who suffered torture for five years in Vietnam, and therefore ought to feel strongly about issues of torture, and who has personal reasons to resent Bush, is campaigning enthusiastically for Bush. Apparently he is convinced that the chains of responsibility end well below the president, as I am. (Or maybe he remembers how Kerry's speeches were used against him by Vietcong torturers. But anyway...)

The Bush administration no doubt had its real reasons for invading and occupying Iraq. They've simply chosen not to share them with the American public.

On the contrary, Bush has proclaimed in speech after speech the value of freedom for every human being. I have oft been inspired by his rhetoric, and he deserves credits for most of the patriotic feelings I have felt in my life. My only regret is that people aren't listening.

This was not what the American electorate opted for when, in 2000, by a slim but decisive margin of more than half a million votes, they chose...the other guy. Bush has never had a mandate.

That argument has been obsolete since 2002, when he swept several Republicans into Congress on the tide the his massive, unprecedented personal popularity.

he has governed from the right wing of his already conservative party,

Would that were true! On the contrary, he has passed a massive new federal entitlement program, the prescription drug bill, expanded the federal role in education, increased spending broadly... he's a tax-and-spend liberal!

I trust George W. Bush. I trust him because I believe the dictum "innocent until proven guilty." And I have never encountered a politician in my life whom I trust more for his commitment to freedom and humanitarianism. On the facts, I trust more than I trust about 90% of newspapers. This is not a statement of naive faith. It's based on observation, analysis.

But these were the lines that made me saddest:

A fresh age appeared on the horizon, accompanied by the sound of scales falling from people's eyes. It felt something like a demonstration of that highest of American prerogatives and the most deeply cherished American freedom: dissent.

He's praising dissent, as if it's something new and brave, in the midst of the greatest tidal wave of opposition and hatred against a sitting president since Richard Nixon. "Dissent" has gained a propagandistic hegemony which I find rather terrifying. The real dissent today is to support Bush. It's more than I have the courage to do in most social or professional contexts.

This piece made me feel like I was sitting in a Stalinist show trial. Just because some of George Bush's critics show an inquisitorial ferocity that should have no place in our democracy does not mean you have to vote for him. My mother is rightly disgusted with the Bush-haters but still plans to vote for Kerry. Bush never shows anger or animosity, but all the same, when he promised to "change the tone in Washington," he forgot that it takes both sides to do that. Hopefully the voters will dish out some humble pie to writers like this come November, and help Bush to fulfill his 2000 campaign promise.