learning from history is for the unexceptional and bush as proliferater-in-chief...

as a friend from an earlier generation once said, it is as if in their youth his generation was in a horrific car crash...and now they have been asked if they want to do it all over again. even Bush is unwittingly (as if he ever does anything with knowledge and intelligence) beginning to recognize that sad reality. this week he visited those damn commies in Vietnam and said some interesting things that so sound like they are condemning his actions one must wonder just how incredibly clueless this pathetic shell of a leader is...

"it's just going to take a long period of time for the ideology that is hopeful, and that is an ideology of freedom, to overcome an ideology of hate" Bush told the Vietnamese...which was only slightly ironic for the fact that he was talking to the very people that spent decades fighting the forces of the United States and a puppet government for their freedom...it was, however, amusingly poignant to the current situation we find ourselves in within America and the fight for the ideals that define America and Americans against the powers that be in the GOP and their efforts to utilize fear, hatred, racism, totalitarianism, and just about every other un-American ideology you can think of to maintain hold on power.

the president came painfully close to acknowledging how back-ass-ward his policies are when he informed the Vietnamese (as if they weren't aware of the situation) that "for decades, you have been torn apart by war...and today the Vietnamese people are at peace and seeing the benefits of reform." interesting how the president almost noticed that the vietnamese people were not seeing peace and the benefits of reform until the decades of war against the United States government and its proxies ended...if only the simpleton could take the next step in logic and recognize that tearing a country apart by war only delays reform.

so the lesson that Bush apparently takes from Vietnam is that freedom takes time...but he fails to acknowledge the other crucial parts of that lesson, that outside occupying and imperialistic powers inevitably stunt the growth of freedom and often find themselves fighting an unwinnable war with a military might that is unbeatable...or perhaps that the domino effect was a bunch of horseshit (which would be a nice lesson to remember now that the reason for the occupation in Iraq is to "not lose" and avoid the entire region falling into chaos). but then what do you expect from an administration with a secretary of state that declares historical parralels are not helpful as condi rice did. so there you have it...these bozos are flouting the fact that they do not study history, have not learned a damn thing from it, and continue to tempt it in disastrous ways...American Exceptionalism at its best - who needs to examine history and its trends? afterall, there is no way American Exceptionalism will lead to the same results that Roman, Spanish, Dutch, German, English, French, etc. exceptionalism lead to...because they weren't really exceptional...only we are.

remember that pesky little treaty which limited the number of nuclear powers in the world and which everyone hoped would lead to the end of nuclear war and its threats...if anything you will likely remember how Bush did everything in his power to dismantle it...the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. well, as if failing to live up to our end of the bargain and expanding rather than retracting our arsenal while developing new and improved "usable" nukes and refusing to assist other nations in peaceful nuclear development was not bad enough, as if pulling out of the treaty was not bad enough...Bush and his boys are intent on assisting India with bulking up their nuke capabilities...India, a non-signatory to the NPT...India, the same nation that is perpetually on the brink of nuclear war with Pakistan in one of the most unstable regions of the world...that India. and so now Bush has not only looked the other way as Pakistan went proliferation happy and provided technology to anyone and everyone (including the "axis of evil") he is pushing to further nuclearize the region. because that is exactly what this world needs...more nukes near the middle east...and the US supporting more nukes in the middle east if the nation happens to not contain an arab majority while threatening war if it does have an arab majority.

but then if your policies make you and your friends obscenely rich and you will likely be dead or too old to care when the world falls apart because of them you don't really have to look past the next quarterly report from KBR and its progeny...

holding on for tomorrow...