07 June 2007
Our own Pinochet?
Yes, the Disaster in Chief is pretty much done as a relevant political force. I think Tuesday night's Republican debate, in which virtually every one of the 36 Republican candidates for president distanced his white, wrinkled self from W, was the final nail in the coffin. Every single major and minor domestic effort he has recently made in Congress has died on the vine (immigration now, too). His popularity is at rock bottom. He's even losing some of his base. Certainly he has zero chance at attaining a level of popularity that might in any way give him even the smallest amount of political capital. So, point is, he's not even a lame duck, he's a dead duck.
That said, he's still got his somewhere between 28 and 35 % support out there. They're not going away. To stand with this guy now, after everything he's done, you have to really really love him, deify him even, see him as some sort of savior, or at least, noble defender of some core belief or principal. If Bush went on TV tomorrow and declared HIMSELF the Worst President in History, these people would still love him.
Hold that thought a second, and consider something. Today, a grouping of the world's most important and effective human rights organizations have used the media to call for the end to the secret detentions of 39 people. Among these are several children. Yes, we have reached the point where the United States is disappearing people, pulling them from their homes and jobs and whisking them away, destination unknown.
This might seem like a strange and terrible new trend, but it is not new to many countries. Among them, Chile suffered from this practice for decades under Pinochet. I have a particular knowledge of what happened in Chile, as I studied there and have read and written extensively about it. The family with whom I lived there was exiled shortly after Pinochet's coup; they were lucky to get out in time, lest they too become disappeareds (a fate which tragically befell many of their friends). They lost contact with so many people when they left, and upon their return, found that many people had figured they (the family) were themselves disappeared.
The loss of a loved one is a tough thing for anyone to deal with. But what happens when a loved one is disappeared is far worse: he or she is brutally kidnapped at the hands of government thugs, often in front of children. No cause for detention is given. No information on whereabouts is provided. The family and friends of the disappeared go weeks, then months, then years without knowing anything. It is like death, but without the closure that death provides. It is in itself a horrific form of torture.
Pinochet's henchmen did this in the name of "saving democracy" and the Chilean people, ostensibly from the looming Marxist threat supposedly presented by the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende. Bush's henchmen do this in the name of "saving democracy" and "freedom" from the looming terrorist threat supposedly presented by these men and women whose language they do not speak and whose culture they do not understand. I do not dispute that the US government might have good reasons to think these people are involved in terrorism against the United States; what I do dispute, wholeheartedly, is the need to defy the very ideals our nation was founded upon in the process of detaining, questioning, and holding them.
Now returning to those unwavering Bush supporters: clearly, this news will not sway them, will not turn them against our near-authoritarian president. They believe in him, and trust everything he does. As I consider them, try to understand them, and our role in our society, I cannot help but see so many parallels with what I saw in Chile. There, during the 1973 Pinochet coup, the same arguments were made. Slowly, many people realized how horribly Pinochet had led the country astray. When "democracy" began the process of reestablishing itself, in the late 1980s and early 90s, many citizens utilized the (semi) free press and the (semi) independent judiciary to spread the truth about the past and to seek justice. The truth did indeed begin to sway even some who had supported Pinochet. But, just as many ignored it, or continued to try to discredit the truthspeakers. They continued to stand by Pinochet.
Over time, this amount of people dropped to somewhere between 20 and 30% of the population (though another 20% called Pinochet a bad man but sought no justice). But those supporters continued to deify him, hold them up as a savior, a model Chilean. They fought every single effort to undo his policies and to correct the historical record. They were what Dick Cheney might call "dead-enders". To this very day, with Pinochet dead, with a largely strong and free government in place, and with the true whereabouts of many of the disappeared finally discovered, they continue to praise him.
So where will Bush's own dead-enders wind up? Now, I realize that Bush has not disappeared American citizens (at least to our knowledge) and that we do not have American families dealing with grief on the level of what hundreds of thousands of Chileans had to. However, the Bush apologists are just as bad as those of Pinochet. Even as we as a country try to move forward, beginning in 2009 with our Democratic president, these dead-enders will still be a vocal force in our society. They will fight efforts to examine the truth about 9/11, the Iraq Debacle, Abu Ghraib, and our own policy of disappearing people. Our nation will continue to deal with the consequences of all of these things as well (as many often point out, our policies have become a better terrorist factory than anything Osama could have hoped to himself build).
What will be our own process of national reconciliation? Chileans have largely been unable to fully reconcile their past, and it continues to haunt them today. I fear that much the same will happen here. That 30% will do whatever it takes to falsify the legacy of our own Pinochet.
That said, he's still got his somewhere between 28 and 35 % support out there. They're not going away. To stand with this guy now, after everything he's done, you have to really really love him, deify him even, see him as some sort of savior, or at least, noble defender of some core belief or principal. If Bush went on TV tomorrow and declared HIMSELF the Worst President in History, these people would still love him.
Hold that thought a second, and consider something. Today, a grouping of the world's most important and effective human rights organizations have used the media to call for the end to the secret detentions of 39 people. Among these are several children. Yes, we have reached the point where the United States is disappearing people, pulling them from their homes and jobs and whisking them away, destination unknown.
This might seem like a strange and terrible new trend, but it is not new to many countries. Among them, Chile suffered from this practice for decades under Pinochet. I have a particular knowledge of what happened in Chile, as I studied there and have read and written extensively about it. The family with whom I lived there was exiled shortly after Pinochet's coup; they were lucky to get out in time, lest they too become disappeareds (a fate which tragically befell many of their friends). They lost contact with so many people when they left, and upon their return, found that many people had figured they (the family) were themselves disappeared.
The loss of a loved one is a tough thing for anyone to deal with. But what happens when a loved one is disappeared is far worse: he or she is brutally kidnapped at the hands of government thugs, often in front of children. No cause for detention is given. No information on whereabouts is provided. The family and friends of the disappeared go weeks, then months, then years without knowing anything. It is like death, but without the closure that death provides. It is in itself a horrific form of torture.
Pinochet's henchmen did this in the name of "saving democracy" and the Chilean people, ostensibly from the looming Marxist threat supposedly presented by the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende. Bush's henchmen do this in the name of "saving democracy" and "freedom" from the looming terrorist threat supposedly presented by these men and women whose language they do not speak and whose culture they do not understand. I do not dispute that the US government might have good reasons to think these people are involved in terrorism against the United States; what I do dispute, wholeheartedly, is the need to defy the very ideals our nation was founded upon in the process of detaining, questioning, and holding them.
Now returning to those unwavering Bush supporters: clearly, this news will not sway them, will not turn them against our near-authoritarian president. They believe in him, and trust everything he does. As I consider them, try to understand them, and our role in our society, I cannot help but see so many parallels with what I saw in Chile. There, during the 1973 Pinochet coup, the same arguments were made. Slowly, many people realized how horribly Pinochet had led the country astray. When "democracy" began the process of reestablishing itself, in the late 1980s and early 90s, many citizens utilized the (semi) free press and the (semi) independent judiciary to spread the truth about the past and to seek justice. The truth did indeed begin to sway even some who had supported Pinochet. But, just as many ignored it, or continued to try to discredit the truthspeakers. They continued to stand by Pinochet.
Over time, this amount of people dropped to somewhere between 20 and 30% of the population (though another 20% called Pinochet a bad man but sought no justice). But those supporters continued to deify him, hold them up as a savior, a model Chilean. They fought every single effort to undo his policies and to correct the historical record. They were what Dick Cheney might call "dead-enders". To this very day, with Pinochet dead, with a largely strong and free government in place, and with the true whereabouts of many of the disappeared finally discovered, they continue to praise him.
So where will Bush's own dead-enders wind up? Now, I realize that Bush has not disappeared American citizens (at least to our knowledge) and that we do not have American families dealing with grief on the level of what hundreds of thousands of Chileans had to. However, the Bush apologists are just as bad as those of Pinochet. Even as we as a country try to move forward, beginning in 2009 with our Democratic president, these dead-enders will still be a vocal force in our society. They will fight efforts to examine the truth about 9/11, the Iraq Debacle, Abu Ghraib, and our own policy of disappearing people. Our nation will continue to deal with the consequences of all of these things as well (as many often point out, our policies have become a better terrorist factory than anything Osama could have hoped to himself build).
What will be our own process of national reconciliation? Chileans have largely been unable to fully reconcile their past, and it continues to haunt them today. I fear that much the same will happen here. That 30% will do whatever it takes to falsify the legacy of our own Pinochet.
Labels: disaster in chief
¶ 12:45 PM 2 comments
