I spent six years in the United States Coast Guard. Yes, I know... the ugly runt of America's armed services. Right out of boot camp I was assigned to the Cutter Cape York, a 95-foot patrol boat out of Key West, Florida. I've got a lot of stories and will tell them at the drop of a hat, but not now.
What was drummed into our heads, especially in basic training, was an all-consuming reverence for the chain of command. The chain is everything. It is a continuous, identifiable line of accountability from the deck swabby or infantry grunt all the way up to the President of the United States. That's why they call the president Commander In Chief. He is accountable for everything that happens down the chain, which includes the disgraceful conditions not only at Walter Reed, but at VA hospitals across the country.
Now let's get to our Commander In Chief's greatest failure. I believe that history will judge George W. Bush primarily on the basis of the war in Iraq, and history will not be kind. First, he and his administration, if you believe a single word out of their lying mouths, were fed bad intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons capabilities, and acted, they say, on what was the accepted wisdom from the people who spy on the world for a living. Why don't I believe it? Simple. If your cause is just, you don't have to crush doubters into frightened silence. The White House, presumably under the direct supervision of Number Two in the Chain of Command Dick Cheney, pimp slapped Joe Wilson for daring to whisper that the Emperor has no clothes. The low rent bastards went after the man's wife, for crying out loud. That action alone tells you that they don't believe this bullshit themselves, and are fighting desperately to protect a lie.
Even if you are a Bush fan, and have somehow convinced yourself that this war is somehow peripherally, convolutedly connected with the attack on 9/11, you can't be happy with what's going on over there now. Again, from a historical standpoint, if this is his response to a vicious frontal attack, then it's an embarrassment. It's an aimless, pointless exercise in bungled strategy. 'Shock and Awe' my ass.
We've blasted away half of Iraq, plunged the country into civil war (with us in the middle), and aren't any closer to getting out of there than we were a year ago this time. And this is after we punched a bunch of holes into Saddam's sons and the old man himself was hanged on You Tube.
Now President Bush is shocked, shocked that a new Democratic congress, elected by a country sick of listening to bullshit, would withhold funding and start demanding end dates. How could these guys not have seen it coming? Are they really that dim, or do they only excel at crushing their fellow countrymen and the Constitution?
Who elected this gang who can't shoot straight? In the case of Dick Cheney, you can take that literally. Perhaps if he had gone to war himself instead of hiding under his dorm bed, he might be more familiar with firearms. Now he and his boss, who proudly served in the Texas Air National Guard once in a while, occupy the top two spots in the chain of command, those symbols of patriotism and sacrifice to whom all servicemen aspire. President Bush's smiling portrait hangs in every administration building of every U.S. base, fort, camp, airbase and station of every service branch everywhere in the world, including VA hospitals.
He owes something to every man and woman who looks up at that portrait. So far, it is a debt unpaid.
