Are there any people out there still scratching their heads about President Bush’s inaugural address?
It sure sounded eloquent, even poetic at times. It was dressed up. Like Bush was.
But what did it mean? In my book, when the going gets tough, the tough turn to poetry.
What I want to know is how he managed to go through 20 minutes of speechifying and not mention his big blunder that is the Iraq War directly. Maybe even to say, “I’m sorry, I blew it. I won’t do it again.”
Instead we get this indirect talk that may take some deciphering.
As an ardent Bush watcher, I’m as capable a translator for our community as anybody. Let’s start with his opening salutation. “Vice President Cheney, Mr. Chief Justice … distinguished guests and fellow citizens.”
Suddenly it’s an exclusive club. He said, “Citizens.” Not green card holders. Not immigrants who aren’t sure they want to be Americans. Or those in the process of becoming citizens who have been screwed over by the inadequacies and inanities of U.S. bureaucracy.
Don’t you think he should be using the term “the people” of the United States, meaning “everyone on U.S. soil”?
It’s a fine distinction. But as soon as he says the word “citizen,” you know some people don’t count. He’s saying, in the nicest way, if you aren’t a citizen, you’re dog crap.
Here are some other phrases used by the president and what I think he really meant to say if he said it in plain English.
“After the shipwreck of communism came years of relative quiet, years of repose, years of sabbatical. And then came a day of fire.”
Wow. According to my Cliffs Notes, The New York Times, the president was referring to Sept. 11, 2001. He was not referring to a big fire in Chinatown or something like that.
Notice, too, the phrase “the shipwreck of communism.” Capitalism, too, had its shipwreck moments during those years. When the recession teetered toward depression in the late ’80s and into the ’90s, a lot of Americans were on the rocks.
And that phrase, “years of relative quiet, years of repose,” … God, he made peace sound yucky. How can you do that unless you have the heart of a war-mongering imperialist?
The clear and frank Bush should have said, “After the Cold War, and America stopped playing outright nuclear poker with China and Russia, we had peace. A great, wonderful, prosperous peace. America was coming back from deficit years into surplus years thanks to the Clinton administration’s fiscal policies. All the rich and even some of the poor were back on their feet. But as businesses expanded their global capitalism into foreign markets, our success bred contempt among those we misunderstood in the Middle East. Our neglect of this fomenting hate for America is what brought on the terrorist acts of Sept. 11.”
If he were smart, he’d throw in a mea culpa here. “How deeply I do regret how we have lost that sense of peace and prosperity. Instead we live in a strange parallel world where we enjoy our normal lives here but wreak havoc across the world, bombing and killing, risking young American lives in the process. Boy, have I blown it.”
Instead, Bush continued with his pretentious speech that lead him to his justification of four more years — of war.
Bush: “For as long as whole regions of the world simmer in resentment and tyranny prone to ideologies that feed hatred and excuse murder, violence will gather and multiply in destructive power and cross the most defended borders and raise a mortal threat. There is only one force of history that can break the reign of hatred and resentment and expose the pretensions of tyrants and reward the hopes of the decent and tolerant, and that is the force of human freedom.”
What he means: “People are mad at America and want to kill us. So we’ll kill them first.”
Bush: “From the day of our founding, we have proclaimed that every man and woman on this earth has rights and dignity and matchless value because they bear the image of the maker of heaven and earth.”
What he means: “You know I mean God and not Buddha or Allah, don’t you.”
Bush: “America will not impose our own style of government on the unwilling. Our goal instead is to help others find their own voice, attain their own freedom and make their own way.”
What he means: “We don’t do shotgun democracy. But is it our fault that in Iraq, they like to kill their announced candidates? Those crazy knuckleheads. They’ll love democracy once they get the hang of it.”
Bush: “All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: the United States will not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you.”
What he means: “But not if you don’t have any oil. Any oil in Darfur? Got to have oil. If you got something we want, we’ll be there for you, baby.”
Bush: “Americans, at our best, value the life we see in one another and must always remember that even the unwanted have worth. And our country must abandon all habits of racism because we cannot carry the message of freedom and the baggage of bigotry at the same time.”
What he means: “The unwanted have worth as long as they’re not Jose Padilla, dirty bomber. Or a Guantanamo guy. And about racism — like that phrase, ‘baggage of bigotry’ — paid for it myself. The truth is I can afford only one big hypocrisy at a time. I’ll give up racism here for racism abroad. But at a billion dollars a week, this war’s going to kill me.
Brace yourselves. Here comes four more years.
Reach Emil at emil@amok.com.