We often talk about individuals on this site, but less attention has been given to movements, and networks. We know that certain individuals decide things, that they testify certain ways, etc., but we don't speak about the network. Much of what the administration says is indefensible, including Tony Snow's snowballing (when he was 'in power'), but in Tony Snow and, with others, who is 'the voice'? And is 'the voice' the criminal? Or is there a larger movement, a network? I believe the evidence suggests the latter.
When Tenet spoke at a university, shortly before he left the CIA, he looked very evasive and suspicious to me, but then, I later see Tenet do something else, after he leaves, and seems to be an intriguing, collegiate guy. Mueller, with the FBI, as well, has had his fair share of suspicious acts, as far as I'm concerned, but I see him talk about something else and I think, this guy seems on the level.
I think that's what makes the case for something larger. And when you start to look closer, you see a pattern, a web of people, interconnected, and an ideology that fuels it, based on the religious-like system of Leo Strauss, using many of the propaganda techniques hammered out over the early part of the 20th century.
For the latter, you need only look at the list of propaganda techniques to see the parallels to the Bush admin, so close, in fact, that it seems a concerted effort: Definition of Propaganda
For the former, Leo Strauss, we see his hand in many of the more Kafkaesque elements in our present times. The Bush admin is not 100% Strauss, but Strauss forms a basis. We can see Strauss in the PNAC's more audacious tracks like "Rebuilding America's Defenses" and "Pax Americana". And we can see it in the "I dictate what is good and is bad" style of governing that Bush has been at the helm of, but which he is not the primary source.
Mukasey, Bush, Rove, Wolfowitz, 'the movement' feels they have permission to functionally dress things as good and bad for a purpose. When things genuinely bad happen, they are redirected to their good or bad. It's almost religious...
In this climate, individual morality is nothing-- easily cut through by their more massive good/bad world. Their good/bad is so massive, it could almost compete with Hollywood's good/bad narratives.
We call them ideologues, but I feel it more clear to say they are an administration using an invented good for an ulterior purpose.
And meanwhile, real good, real morality exists in us, and we struggle as individuals to have the press take our morality seriously. They think it is nothing, they see how easily this Straussian stuff cuts through it. You rarely hear of articles about the soldier's deaths, kidnappings, torture, the 'ghost flights', the brutality, incompetency, taking of property, intimidation, destruction, unlawful imprisonment, etc.
Yet, the tide is turning, and we see a new light opening up. Is it possible that it will all disappear? That we can go past this? It seems so. I feel there is a chance to look back at all this as a bad dream, a sequel to Orwell's 1984, which we read in that present, and say to ourselves "I can't imagine what that would be like".
Thanks for reading. Feel free to post, your thoughts are always appreciated.