Shades of LBJAT LEAST President Johnson was human enough to tell the press in a 1967 news conference: "I go to bed every night feeling that I have failed that day because I could not end the conflict in Vietnam."
That makes President Bush's press conference this week even scarier. Not once could he admit to a concrete mistake on either the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, or the invasion of Iraq under false pretenses and the current deadly chaos there. A reporter asked Bush: "With public support for your policies in Iraq falling off the way have quite significantly over the past couple of months, I'd like to know if you feel in any way that you've failed as a communicator?" Bush said: "Gosh, I don't know." Moments later, the reporter asked, "I just wonder if you feel that you have failed in any way? . . . Have you failed in any way to make the case to the American public?" The first words out of Bush's mouth were, "I guess if you put it into a political context, that's the kind of thing the voters will decide next November." It is 2 1/2 years after 9/11 and a year after the invasion of Iraq and Bush still cannot put the two deadliest events of his presidency into a personal and human context. He said the scene of dead people on televisions screens is "gut-wrenching." He bared no evidence that his gut is troubled by a single decision he has made. With dozens of US soldiers killed in recent days, Bush was asked about any comparisons of Iraq to Vietnam. He said, "The analogy is false." By his own words, the analogy is true. In defending an immoral war, immoral because it was based on an imminent threat of weapons of mass destruction that have not been found, Bush is repeating the worst of Johnson without a glimpse of the gut. Bush said: "America's objective in Iraq is limited and it is firm. We seek an independent, free, and secure Iraq." In 1966 Johnson said: "Our purpose is a limited one, and that is to permit self-determination for the people of South Vietnam." Bush said: "As a proud and independent people, Iraqis do not support an indefinite occupation, and neither does America. We're not an imperial power." In 1966, Johnson said: "We seek neither territory nor bases, economic domination or military alliance in Vietnam. We fight for the principle of self-determination -- that the people of South Vietnam should be able to choose their own course." Asked about the lack of weapons of mass destruction, Bush said: "Of course I want to know why we haven't found a weapon yet. But I still know Saddam Hussein was a threat. And the world is better off without Saddam Hussein. . . . There's a historic opportunity here to change the world." Continued... |
