| I couldn't have said it better myself. A few months ago I happened upon a blog at which had been left a comment to the effect of one day, perhaps 20 years from now, the Bush presidency will be vilified, and Bush himself shown to be a strong leader and visionary who wasn't afraid to take a risk. Of course he wasn't. It's not HIS head on the block. He's going to be out of here in a year or so and someone else will be left with the monumental task of clearing up the cluster-f*ck that is Iraq and fixing the devastating debt this subhumanoid moron has left us with. As I have said before, I do not envy this person his or her job. Meanwhile, we are not only left with a crippling debt and a pointless, expensive and deadly war (that has resulted in the deaths of thousands of the very people it was supposed to 'save', by the way, many of whom were killed as the result of poor intelligence pointing out a 'terrorist hideout' that just happened to be full of unarmed innocent people), but our international reputation is, in fact, ruined. People of other countries see the US as a bully, an oppressor and an outlaw who ignores the UN and has forsaken the decency required in the Geneva Convention for vigilante justice. The reasons for such widespread hatred of us have little to do with religious intolerance (though, granted, the 'impose sharia law on the entire world' crowd does loathe us primarily for that reason, they are but a small portion of the people the Bush administration has pissed off) and far more to do with the ridiculous way the Bushites have gone about things. Let's say fictional President X of Nowhereland decided to invade the US. The time he spent between his mind hatching the plot to invade and the actual execution of said invasion is approximately four weeks, and the motivation is personal interest, only it's justified to the citizens of Nowhereland as a necessary evil. They have WMDs, says Pres. X.
They were in on an attack that crippled this country for weeks, says Pres. X.
They are planning to use nuclear technology to attack us again, says Pres. X. All of this later turns out to be untrue. But in the process of learning this the military of Nowhereland has cost his country thousands of lives and billions in property damage. They have also cost themselves thousands of soldier's lives and run up a debt so ridiculously, outrageously high that not only is the surplus that existed at the beginning of President X's adminstration gone, his country is trillions of dollars in the hole. Trillions. Because President X in essence told the UN to fuck off, he was going ahead with said invasion regardless of their concerns and advice, he has alienated most other nations including those who used to be supportive of his country and his people. Allies become enemies who refuse aid and publicly speak against President X and his strongarm tactics. Then it becomes known that President X couldn't care less about treatment of POWs and some members of his administrations say the use of torture is an okay thing as long as it yields the information they want and the general view of the Nowhereland citizenry (the majority, who helped elect this misguided man), is agreement with this policy. This same majority supports President X because he agrees with their religious views and goes out of his way to promote them at every opportunity in spite of the fact that it directly violates national policy against establishing a single, nationally recognized and priviledged religious tradition, whose adherents enjoy rights of religious expression that other groups do not (or can not). President X claims that his god - the god of Nowhereland's majority religion - tells him to do things and his supporters admire him for it while condemning the actions of other leaders who do the same because these leaders do not belong to the same group that President X and his followers wish to have established as the only free and recognized religion in their own country. Would we not hate them if the roles were reversed? Would we not see them as an evil empire which needs to be destroyed? So is it any great shock that most of the free world despises us right now? Americans were angry with the French when they refused to back us in invading Iraq, and now we see that this was quite possibly the best thing they could have done for their citizenry and their financial future. In so doing they took a hit to their international reputation for awhile but when the dust settled they did not have a huge loss of life and funds to contend with and the overall negative view of them has largely shifted. In short, the French were right. They helped us during the Revolutionary War and during WW2 but had the courage and intelligence to keep themselves out of this one. Foresight rather than hindsight. So what happens now? I shudder to think. Bush and co. have less than a year left to rule. I refer to it this way because he and his administration care nothing for the desires of the citizens of this country unless those desires are religious in nature. He panders to the majority and shows a clear bias because he knew he needed them to stay in office, and he needed their support for his disastrous and unnecessary (and illegal) war. Thus far his motto seems to have been 'go big and lie'. It makes sense that he will 'go out big (and still lying)' as well, and I can't help but wonder what the human cost of that will be. Ten months from now can not come soon enough. Most of the potantial candidates for both of the major parties are walking disasters. This has got to be one of the most despicable lineups of people ever considered for the job, several of whom have taken Bush's example and begun pandering to the religious right. I do have some sympathy for Romney. Don't get me wrong, in no way do I feel that he is qualified to be president, but I can't help feeling a bit sorry for him. He's the odd man out. Who knew that in order to be qualified to lead you not only have to be christian, but the right type of christian? I'm sure Romney was shocked to learn that his religious beliefs would trump his political record and views on important political issues. They have taken to persecuting their own for political gain. Such a sterling example to set before the rest of the world. I hope whomever does inhabit the office next is objective enough to put his or her religious sensibilities aside and do the job as expected. I also hope they bring heavy equipment and a construction crew. There's an awful lot of repair and rebuilding to be done. | 
