Vision Quest
President Bush was in Kansas last week and while there, gave what was viewed, at least by more than a few people, a controversial speech.
I watched the speech and I’ll admit – it was hard to focus on what was said. When listening and watching the president speak, it is an understatement to say that we are not witnessing one of history’s greatest orators. Watching this president speak is like watching an old lady in high heels, holding a bag of groceries, trying to cross a patch of ice. You want and hope to see her succeed, but it’s a brutal, near exhausting experience.
Afterwards, I scanned the news to hear other, presumably more informed opinions, regarding the speech. More than any other topic, the term “secret spying” was being bandied about.
This may seem like an obvious question, but isn’t spying supposed to be secret?
When you look at the history of America and the presidency during wartime, you will find that the “security vs. civil liberties” debate is a common one. I really have no problem with American spy agencies listening in on international phone calls they think they need to in order to keep our country from getting bombed again, particularly when we’re at war.
Remember, the same people who are convinced that the National Security Agency (NSA) is listening in on every conversation conducted by sister Susan, Phil and Don, Uncle Ernie and Auntie Gin, are the same people who ridiculed the American spy agencies for screwing up the pre-war intelligence. Most people don’t even know what the NSA is. They’re cryptographers…codebreakers. Bill Grigsby was a code breaker during WWII. No offense, but I’m not sure if the image of Grigs listening in on a phone call is scaring Al Qaeda into submission.
The security of our country should be treated with a little more urgency. It shouldn’t be that confusing. We’re fighting real battles, we’re dropping bombs and sending in the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines to kill enemies during a war yet lawmakers like Barbara Boxer and Hillary Clinton want to make sure that we’re giving them a little privacy when they make their phone calls? Both women would get plenty of privacy if Al Qaeda had their way – and they’d be covered head to toe in beekeeper suits.
Many pundits say that by the time Bush leaves office, he will go down in history as one of our worst presidents. These people say such things as if Jimmy Carter never existed. Worse yet, these people have inspired Carter to come back. The “crisis in confidence” president is at the top of the charts with his latest book which outlines just why he (still) thinks America sucks so bad. If that’s what we’re reading, these are truly dark times.
I suppose that the president has created most of his problems with the public perception because he, as mentioned before, is one of the worst public speakers in the history of the world. During WWII we had men like FDR and Churchill. Men who said we would not flag or fail, that our fight would go down in history as being one of our finest hours. Bush defines this war as a “bunch of folks who hate freedom.” This is hardly “remember the Alamo” caliber material.
We’re so desperate for leadership that many people are looking to calypso singers for vision. Why would anyone care about what Harry Belafonte thinks when it comes to the war against terrorism, particularly when Don Ho is still alive? Don doesn’t drink anymore, but I wager that the sight of Don Ho storming the mountains of Afghanistan or going door-to-door in the Sunni Triangle, singing “Tiny Bubbles,” holding a flaming Mai-Tai in one hand, surrounded by a bunch of scantily clad hula dancers would be enough to send Al Qaeda into convulsions.
Now THAT’s a vision.