it's the truth, stupid

In today's column the occasionally brilliant Jon Carroll, daily wit for the SF Chronicle, would like you to know that the Emperor Has No Clothes:

People with something to hide usually try to hide that something. Not a remarkable leap of logic, but lots of people are refusing to make it. The Bush administration doesn't have anything to hide, it's just, let's see, behaving prudently, or protecting executive privilege, or refusing to speculate.

That last excuse is used for the question, "How much is the occupation of Iraq costing?" The Defense Department refuses to speculate. I mean, the Pentagon brass could look at the invoices and the pay stubs and get a rough idea, but they're unwilling to do that.

Why? Because they want to protect the president. Why? Because he has something to hide. He has consistently lied to the American people about how much the war would cost -- and how long it would last, and why we were fighting it, and, gosh, just about everything.

Now I'm well aware the Bushies aren't the first lying bastards we've seen in the White House, and yes, prevarication runs left, right and center on the political spectrum. But this time it's worse than usual. There is a surreal quality in the way that bold untruths are told, then covered over with halfhearted excuses and intellectual dishonesties -- it's as if they know that we citizens will see right through the ruse, and at the end of the day we just won't care. Or, as Carroll concludes:

I'll take the Frappucino, please, heavy on the nepenthe.

Wake up, people, the truth is calling.

Posted by Gene at August 18, 2003 10:41 PM | TrackBack