©2006, UrbisMedia
The political Right loves sound-bites; simple phrases don’t over-tax the limited intellectual capacities of their constituents. Their latest, a knee-jerk response to any suggestion that the American troops/targets in Iraq should be withdrawn is that it would be “cut and run.” They like a phrase that suggests that it would be an act of cowardice to set a deadline for departure even though they can’t set a deadline for when the “war on terror” would be “won”. It also suggests that liberals favor cowardice, which fits nicely with their other little mantra “what would the liberals do?” Together they are enough to make a red-stater grab his rifle off the gun rack in his truck and run out and shoot an endangered species, just to show those pinko-commie liberals what brave guys those Republicans are.
Now just what would the triumvirs of our Iraq war know about cutting and running? We have Georgie-boy Bush who cut and ran from even his national guard service, refused to take his physical, and went to take up the good fight of who would pay for the next round at a bar in a neighboring state. Brave fellow, he. And Mr. Rummy, who found a way to wear a Navy uniform for a few years without ever getting near a combat situation; he didn’t have top cut and run because he was never there. Oh, and “The Dick” Cheney, who cut and ran to his political spin-meisters as soon as he shot a political contributor who must have an uncanny resemblance to a quail. The Dick is also a master at cutting and running from Draft Boards, which he did with a half-dozen successful deferments because he hand “more important things to do.” Bush-Rumsfeld-Cheney, cowards one and all.
These are just the kind of cowards who would also come up with the phrase—“a few bad apples.” You know, like “the few bad apples” (FBA) that pulled that nasty stuff at the Abu Ghraib. FBA provides a nice insulation for the cowardly-insulation from responsibility. By insisting that such incidents as Abu Ghraib, and now, increasingly, incidents in which innocents in Iraq and Afghanistan are killed, cover-ups like the Tillman affair and the killing and framing of an innocent Iraqi man by Marines, are aberrant behavior, allows the prevailing policies to continue and the blame goes no further than the few bad apples who take the fall. We’ve seen this time and again, and will see more of it. The Marines call for a “Few Good Men” apparently scooped up a “few bad apples,” and the Army has enlisted enough skinheads for a “white supremacy” division.
The lies, contorted reasoning, twisted logic, and deceptions to justify a misguided war of preemption are now spinning things out of control. The public, through polling, now mostly recognizes this—it is the so-called “insurgents” who are calling the shots (and taking them) in Iraq, and the Taliban and warlords who are back on the warpath in Afghanistan. Desperate for “victories” the FBA argument allows the cowards to turn up the American torture machine in gulags in Guantanamo, Iraq, Afghanistan and in secret locations, although the best they can come up with is arresting a bunch of alleged wannabe terrorists in Florida, who apparently planned to blow up the Hancock building in Chicago with C-4 laced with left-over Florida ballot chads.
The irony is that the more than a “few bad apples” in the highest ranks of the Bush administration have found a way of transferring the blame for the outfall of their ridiculous policies to the people who have to execute them. Condi Rice famously said that the failures in Iraq were mostly “tactical” not strategic. What the hell is this dumbo doing passing on military performance; she of the famous ”historical background” presidential briefing memo? But it put the blame at the bottom of the decision chain. And they try to blame the Democrats for not supporting the troops.
Rumsfeld’s cowardly observations on human behavior seem to derive blame from his folksy sociology. “People just do strange things” when you eliminate the government of their country and then stand around and watch them loot it. He says it as though it were an expected outcome. But then that was only a “few bad apples” among the Iraqis, wasn’t it.
When Abu Graib hit the screens they were quick to get their scapegoats to trial, low-ranked country people who would disappear quickly and easily. Military justice acts quickly when it is focused on FBAs. The FBAs at the top acted with dismay and outrage at the photographs that made their way around the world and created more terrorists and insurgents than any Al Qaeda appeal might have made. But they quickly characterized it as another anomaly, while at the same time trashed the Geneva Conventions and drafted memos expanding the procedures for torture, and shipping torture victims off on secret flights to secret torture locations. When it comes to detainees, they’re all bad apples.
When several retired generals criticized the conduct of the war and called for withdrawing the troops they were regarded as FBAs as well. Generals weren’t supposed to “go bad” and recommend “cut and run”; they’re supposed to be like Colin Powell and do their duty and remain silent or pass on misinformation in front of the United Nations. And speaking of the UN, what about France and Germany and some of those other “bad apples” who didn’t want to play along with Bush and the neo-cons and their “coalition of the willing”?
Scapegoating is the prime tactic of cowards. Faced with danger or the truth there are no bad apples who cut and run faster than Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld. That’s what happens when your “leadership” comes from the bottom of the barrel.
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©2006, James A. Clapp (UrbisMedia Ltd. Pub. 8.8.2006)