RW antiwar slam on Bush over Abu Ghraib "The Face of America"

[LondonAmerican]

http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/cgi-bin/hardright.cgi/2004/05/21/THE_FACE_OF_AMERICA

Interesting article from the paleo-conservative _Chronicles_ magazine. (Side note: there were _Kerry ads_ on this page.) Chronicles has always been opposed to the neocon faction of the republican party and generally anathema to freeper-types but although a minority faction of the right they do nonetheless have an influence. The fact that they are coming out so strongly against Bush, Cheney & Co. says a lot about Republican chances this November.

Anyway, the timing of this and the Sontag article is also interesting.

THE FACE OF AMERICA

America has a new face, a face that is on display on all television screens and newspaper front pages of the world. When I first saw the new face of America on Italian television in early May, I did not like it, and I did not like what I heard the Italians saying about us. At the site of a Roman village in Sicily, I saw a vendor trying to explain to an American lady: ”Bush. Iraq. Boom boom—bombardamenti. Boom Boom. Abu Ghraib. Nicht gut. Bush Scheiss.”

...

The public face of America has changed throughout my lifetime, like the Picture of Dorian Grey—with this difference: Dorian Grey had the sense and shame to keep the picture in the attic. We put our Rumsfelds and Kristols and Podhoretzes and Wolfowitzes, our Howard Sterns and Sean Hannitys up on the TV screen to show the world what we have become. God help us, because no one else can.

But the new face of America is not the glowering ugly mug of Richard Perle or the Botoxed smirk of the Democratic Party’s latest Ken doll, John Kerry. (It walks, it talks (sort of), it’s even more nearly lifelike than Al Gore.) It is not even that portrait of low cunning and sinister greed, the Vice President of the United States. The new America looks like Lynndie England and Charles Graner, a couple hatched in the trailer-court section of Hell.

...

The real test of character is for our leaders, and they have flunked. The defensive and resentful responses made by the President and his Secretary of Defense reveal that they are morally numb. Rumsfeld now says that publishing more photographs would only make things worse—yes, for him. This scandal—and the administration’s lack of a moral response—are a blot on this administration far darker than Nixon’s petty burglary or Clinton’s romps in the hay.

If Americans choose not to condemn the crimes committed in their name in a military operation financed by their taxes and supported by the votes of their congressmen, then they condemn themselves. And if they don’t think the entire world is looking down its collective nose at the moral sewer in which we live, then it is only because, like most Americans, they cannot read the foreign press.

...

[struggle4progress]

1. We need to listen to these people and try to understand them.

The collapse of meaningful dialog and the loss of any common ground is destroying political process in America. This article is often difficult to read, but surprisingly on Abu-Ghraib I really agree with the author.

[KillerWhaleConicals]

2. Face of America ...

I am not surprised at this response, not at all. Only because this is all too true. And to think that this administration is trying to go under the sewer, (once again) to cut a deal to escapte the prosecution they so righteously deserve makes it all the worse. The entire world is looking down at it's collective noses at us ... and We, the People, need to stand up and fight back ... not at the world, but at Bush & Co.. It's all too sad to think that someone could have brought us this low (and not just the dispicable people who carried out what they did in Abu Ghraib) ... is disheartening. On the other hand, this forum, and others like it is demonstrating that we can change that face that the Thief in Chief has given us! And we can do it here, there and everywhere. Indeed, these were crimes ... and to think otherwise is to maintain the attitude of the ostrich, and not look. WE NEED TO LOOK!!! And we need to yell louder than we did in the 60's over that other war which was unjustified -- as much as this one was. WMD's my bum!!! Thanks for the post!

[newyawker99]

3. Hi KillerWhaleConicals!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast: