Careless

The more you see of Bush these days, the more you wonder if he really just doesn't give a shit. Probably never has. This is all just a game to him. A big joke; and the joke's on us. No skin off his nuts; just ours. If you've ever seen that home movie of him as a teenager at a Bush family gathering where he vamps incessantly in front of the camera like a chimpanzee, then you've got the idea, the essence of his persona. Then there's the photograph of him, just after he was elected president, perched in the Oval Office desk chair and beaming up at his father with his classic shit-eating grin, like, "Gee, Dad, isn't this cool?" Since then, of course, we've seen him mangle the language and act just plain stupid every chance he gets. And then he just laughs about it, like he was perfectly normal. He might just as well be doing stand-up. But he can't do that either, really, because that takes talent.

He does seem to be pretty good at dominoes, though, or at least the domino effect, in the Middle East, for example, and even here at home where his policies, or lack thereof, have run the economy into the ground in just eight years. Oil keeps going up, along with the national debt, and, as a result, so do prices for everything else that depends on oil and gas for manufacturing and shipping. Then, add a little hedge fund finagling, with a dash of Wall Street corporate piracy, and consumer spending inevitably goes down. Row after row of dominoes all fall down, until we’re all laying flat on the board. Pretty much anything Bush touches seems to do that:

Three trillion dollars squandered and 4,000 American troops killed with 30,000 wounded five years after he declared victory in Iraq, not to mention all the civilians in the way; oil and gas at home pumping us dry; health care killing the middle class; higher education sucking up retirements; Wall Street hedging with the corporate baggers; our middle-class economy in contraction; our infrastructure groaning in every joint; homeland insecurity and telephone tag; reefer-mad law enforcement up in smoke; waterboarding on the Potomac; shooting people like ducks in Gosford Park.

You’d think he’d care about all this, wouldn’t you? But he seems to be just plain clueless. In fact, he seems so clueless, he doesn't even know he is clueless. And careless. Careless, clueless — clueless, careless. One leads to the other. And of course there’s careless, not being careful, and then there’s care less, in which case you just don’t care one way or the other anyway. What a legacy: the careless president who could care less. In any case, why should he care? He's set, for life — always has been, and apparently always will be. Are you?

No? You don’t say. Then join the club and consider this: Maybe he’s not so careless after all. Maybe his clueless fumbling is just an act, a distracting cover for a hidden agenda that benefits a covert power structure of wealth and influence, not to mention control. And this oligarchy has very little to do with the greater goals of democracy or the public interest. They could care less. In other words, as long as their power sustains their own material interests, why would they care about anything else?

When asked about the 4,000 American troops killed so far in Iraq, Vice President Cheney’s response was, “So?” And then on another occasion he added that, after all, they had volunteered. Well, have you ever heard Cheney, or Bush for that matter, ever utter a word about humanity or justice? They only speak of democracy in jingoistic terms of military confrontation and the threat of terrorism. First they terrorize us with the threat of terror, and then they wage war against false enemies to keep it all going. Smoke and mirrors. What a racket.

Ears

So Ted Kennedy is supporting Barack Obama, along with Caroline, Patrick, others in the clan, and assorted gushing glitterati all giggling on the platform with Oprah and Michelle, not to mention select press pimps, to climb aboard the Oprama gravy train. Would you say this move is more personal than it is political? Or do you think there might be a little political paternalism at play here? You know, “Let’s adopt Barack and make him our boy, our favorite son, so to speak, so we can make him our candidate,” which not only would seem unseemly to Hillary, not to mention Bill, but also probably improbable. To the Kennedys, though, the Clintons really do seem to be rivals if you think about it — and you know they do — and Barack is young enough, and sweet enough, and possibly pliable enough to become one of them instead of one of theirs, at least as long it suits him.

Is this the beginning of the end for the Democrats again? Whatever, it appears to be another chink out of Democratic Party solidarity. First Kerry, then Lieberman (irrelevant as he was), and now the Kennedys. Not that solidarity is such a good thing; if you don’t stir it occasionally, it solidifies. But this Obropera somehow seems childish — if not churlish, even hyperactive — and certainly self-serving for the cast. The more things change, the more they seem to stay the same. Politics is nothing if not self-serving. In the end, the real issue may turn out to be that Obama’s ears are just too big.

Oprama

Today in Idaho, Barack Obama addressed a crowd about the Second Amendment, and in acknowledging his downstate Illinois constituents, he said, “I have no intention of taking away folks' guns.” He actually said this with a very noticeable good ole country boy accent, except that it came off more as a parody of the way he must imagine they talk. Another actor, just like Reagan. Let’s hope that’s not the only dimension to his trajectory.

And then, tonight on ABC-TV News, David Muir asked him about his relationship with Oprah Winfrey. “We know that Oprah is coming back out on the trail for you and I'm curious how does this work?” Muir wondered. “Do you call Oprah and say this is the 11th hour, it's awfully close in California, we could use your help, how does this all go down?”

“Well, Oprah is a good friend,” Obama explained, “so we've been talking throughout this campaign and you know actually when was Caroline Kennedy, traveling, she had the idea of maybe doing a women's event in California and that Oprah might enjoy participating as well and Michelle, we are going to send out... I will not be there... this is going to be a women's event in California and I think that they're going to have a great time, but it's indicative of, I think, the momentum that we're seeing all across the country.”

“Do you actually pick up the phone and call her?” Muir continued.

Obama hesitated, smiled, and then said, “Yes, I do.”

Imagine that. If he becomes president and has a question on his mind, do you think he’ll be calling Oprah? Oh, boy, more show business. Does this mean we’re going to get Dr. Phil blowing in his ear too? Or, in another leap of fake, imagine this, if you can: Secretary of State Oprah Winfrey, jetting around the globe with Gayle by her side, or how about Ambassador Phil McGraw, in Baghdad, of course, where else, scolding naughty Sunnis and Kurds in that big new embassy Bush built.

“Are we there yet?” Who said that? Is that you, Ted?