Letter to a Friend who Defends Bush and the War:

Hello my Friend,

I'm getting confused by just what is confusing about my messages about Bush, his crimes, and why what is being televised on C-Span 2 is so important! But perhaps my comments are going where all critical concerns with this mis-administration goes, and I hesitate to pursue an issue that will lead to hard feelings, but the situation is so dire that I must offer very brief and general comments in reply to your points in defense of the lies that led Bush to take this country to a folly of a war. Read the Downing Street Memo! Do not let the talking heads on Fox (or for that matter CNN and the broadcast networks) define what this memo means. Gosh darn it, read it yourself.

Undoubtedly there is a variety of quite different social contexts in the U.S. (to say nothing of the rest of the world), and we deal with the situation in which we happen to find ourselves. Declaring that there are no elites or that we live in a so called color blind society is to misunderstand the very nature of American society in 2005.

My point was that this social diversity opens a diversity of possible tactics that might move the country closer to social change, and I sense you don't disagree with that possibility.

If true, it implies a lot of careful social analysis that must take place in an era of the sound bite. We must carefully think about the sorry state of politics, truth, and the media, but I'd repeat the point in my earlier message that it probably requires defining the relation between any particular tactic/social milieu, and the global situation.

You point out that the general public as a whole doesn't expect the a social change, let alone a "revolution against Bush," the far right wing, and the religious right about to occur around the corner, and I have to agree. I agree that current trends "may continue for some time," but my gut feeling is to react to this somewhat less pessimistically: a) while the U.S. seems headed in a frightening direction, my daily focus is more international, which helps compensate the applauding American press and the overwhelming far right wing focus.

b) If one is involved in the struggle against Bush and far right wing on a daily basis, and that struggle has a useful outcome, it reduces one's pessimism (although whether that struggle really helps move us toward kicking that bum out of office and into prison where he belongs is another question), and c) I don't think we should live for the "revolution against Bush" (how ever necessary and desirable that would be), but for the development of a living and vital opposition to the far right! Who blithely dismiss any criticisms.

Yes, people who say they favor these moves against Bush and toward impeachment appear to be a small minority, although probably that number would be greater if instead of getting a media that is in the pockets of the far right and Bush and his cronies -- who can stand behind a flier of 'Mission Accomplished' while service women and men are dying and continue to die every day! -- we had a real media that asked hard questions!

If we asked the average person on the street what they think about the war and explained to them The Downing Street Memo and more, I have no doubt that they would at least call for an investigation of Bush and the lies that led to war. Are there any higher crimes than the wanton death and destruction of the men and women who serve in the military throwing their lives away on lies and more lies.

To suggest that the ruling class which Bush come from does not control or exercise economic power startles me, for that's what I thought capitalism was all about these days... Monopolies, oligopolies, and religious-republican elites. I suspect I know where you are coming from, and it would be fun and instructive to debate such philosophical issues, but I think I would be run out of town if we did. In the end, all I can do is encourage you to read and think for yourself.

Read AfterDowningStreet.org! Read it now!