Blast #162

                                                       Portraits of Amnesia
 
            If you have been watching (or streaming) television lately and you have caught any of the talk shows, afternoon or late night, you probably have noticed an old familiar face.  It’s been almost a decade since George W. Bush left office and there had been occasional sightings and interviews over the past eight or nine years but, suddenly, there he is, chatting it up with Jimmy Kimmel and dancing with Ellen.    He has a book to sell, of course, and that explains his presence on the shows.  Portraits of Courage: A Commander-in-Chief’s Tribute to America’s Warriors is a book of “sixty-six full-color portraits and a four-panel mural painted by President Bush of members of the United States military who have served our Nation with honor since 9/11—and whom he has come to know personally.” (www.bushcenter.org) That's what he’s selling and, while he comes off as folksy and avuncular while entertaining the likes of Kimmel and DeGeneres (and their audiences?), we need to remember who this is.  Let the following list serve as a reminder.    
       

•             This was our President when 9/11 happened.
•             He oversaw Colin Powell’s false testimony about WMD’s before the U.N.
•             He is responsible for the 4400  American deaths and 32,000 American wounded in Iraq.
•             He claimed “Mission Accomplished.” in a flight suit on the deck of an aircraft carrier.  We are          still there.
•             He was President when we learned about the torture at Abu Ghraib.
•             He told Michael Brown he was doing “a heckuva job” as he flew over the Katrina DISASTER in New Orleans.
•             He allowed Congress to spend weeks interfering in the life of Terri  Schiavo.
•             He oversaw the slandering of John Kerry during the 2004 election campaign.
•             His Vice President shot a man in the face!
•             His Attorney General had to resign because of firing 6 US Attorneys for political reasons and essentially forcing an unconscious John Ashcroft to sign an illegal warrantless wiretapping order.
•             He supported junk science’s contention that global warming was not real.
•             He supported “creationism” & "intelligent design"  in schools.
•             He abandoned the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change.
•             He oversaw “no-bid” contracts for American companies in Iraq.
•             He oversaw record numbers of American citizens living without health insurance.
•             He signed into law countless tax cuts for the wealthy.
•             He “outed” CIA undercover operative Valerie Plame for political reasons.
•             He did not catch Osama Bin Laden.
•             He vetoed Stem Cell Research.
•             He vetoed a ban on waterboarding.
•             He was President when we were paying the highest prices for gasoline in our history.
•             He appointed John Roberts and Sam Alito to the Supreme Court.
•             He supported a Federal “Defense of Marriage” Amendment.
•             He was responsible for record  trade and budget deficits .
•             He was responsible for “black sites” and torture (“extreme rendition”)
•             He was President when the economy collapsed in 2007.

            But now he’s just that funny guy who’s friends with the Obamas and paints childish portraits of American heroes.  His book, by the way, has NO portraits of Iraqis.  An estimated 175,000 to as many as a million Iraqis, mostly civilians, have died in a war that was primarily started because “he  (Saddam Hussein) tried to kill my Daddy.” 

            Need I say more?  Is Bush receiving these warm welcomes because even he looks good, given the current occupant of the White House?  Whatever the case, let’s not lose perspective and let’s not fall victim to historical amnesia.  Even in a short-attention span culture, a cursory look at the list provided here should remind us that it wasn’t that long ago that many of us were quite discouraged about our President and his actions.  In light of that list we should also wonder why our most recent President was so demonized by the Republicans.  Except, of course, as we watch the elected Republicans currently in office line up to kiss Bannon’s ring and toe his hyper-nationalist, “white, European, Christian” vision of our future, it seems obvious why they demonized Barack Hussein Obama, doesn’t it?