"I'm a war president. I make decisions here in the Oval Office in foreign-policy matters with war on my mind. Again, I wish it wasn't true, but it is true. And the American people need to know they got a president who sees the world the way it is. And I see dangers that exist, and it's important for us to deal with them."
- President Bush on
MTP
What does he mean by "war president"? Is he implying that he has some divine right to go to war, with no option for compromise? That war, and it's unnatural derivatives, are simply engrained into his genes? "What's that? The Yen is $.11 to the dollar? Off to war!" Perhaps he's conveying that he knows nothing else but war. "Def... i... cit? Whatever, not my department, I'm a war president." Well, that's fine, we're in war. Actually we're in a couple wars. Well, let me correct myself again, we're in a state of perpetual war against terrorism (cause you know how war never perpetuates terrorism, right?). So we do need a wartime president, I guess.
Furthermore, there's seems to be a discontinuity problem here: How can he know what kind of President he is, since it's not like he's had the job before? From my memory, foreign policy wasn't the President's biggest
forte during the 2000 campaign. (Lately, it's getting pretty obvious that military science isn't either.)
I think the night before the interview, the President was watching Godfather II, and mangled yet another phrase. Remember when Michael Corleone sends his old consigliere (in mafia terms, the most trusted advisor) away because he's in the middle of a gangwar and he needs "a wartime consigliere"? Maybe that's what he sees himself as. Funny, I always imagined Karl Rove as Bush's consigliere. By that analogy, is Paul Wolfowitz "Sonny"?
The policy of pre-emptive war, that's a mafia policy: Whack the other guy before he whacks you. That's basically how they're justifying it these days. Whatever he means, this November I think we're going to need a new "wartime consigliere". Because our current one? Fuggidaboutit.
