Mark Drolette

Is fascism really all that bad?

Amidst all that’s been written about Newsweak’s agreement to now let the Bushies vet its reporting in the wake of the magazine’s article about Guantanamo Bay interrogators’ rather rude treatment of the Quran, a particular piece by Terence Hunt of the Associated Press about the whole unholy affair caught my widened orb. After carefully unsnagging it, I focused it as well as I could on a few quotes that were real eye-poppers (as if that’s what I needed at the moment). To (nit)wit:

Hunt quotes Scott McClellan, White House press secretary, thusly:

“The report had real consequences. People [in Afghanistan] have lost their lives. Our image abroad has been damaged. There are some who are opposed to the United States and what we stand for who have sought to exploit this allegation. It will take work to undo what can be undone.”

You know, I think McClellan is the only guy almost alive who could make me miss Ari Fleischer. Each is a bald-faced liar, but watching Scotty-boy dissemble for the administration makes it all the more evident that Fleischer actually had a natural-born talent for prevarication. It was even somewhat entertaining at times, in a guilty pleasure sort of way, watching Ari lie through his teeth. With McClellan, I just want to punch him in them. Having said that (thank you for listening), the sickly laughable hypocrisy saturating snotty Scotty’s admonishment of the wayward Newsmeek is so obvious, we’ll just move on here to our next gem, as reported by Hunt:

“McClellan said a retraction was only ‘a good first step’ and said Newsweek should try to set the record straight by ‘clearly explaining what happened and how they got it wrong, particularly to the Muslim world, and pointing out the policies and practices of our military.’”

So let me get this straight: the main function of American media is not to report facts, but rather to promote the gory glory of America’s globe-straddling, imperialistic death machine, otherwise know as the United States military?

Just so long as we’re clear.

This actually might be a good place to pause and ask: did Newspeak get the story wrong? Well, yeah, obviously they did. I mean, come on: Who other than an America-hating commie gay-lover would believe that a member of the honorable U.S. military could even consider throwing a Quran into a toilet? Yes, we all know America has gone to war under false pretenses, killed tens of thousands, wounded countless others, destroyed a country, tortured prisoners, murdered civilians outright (in addition to killing them, all in good faith, of course, as “collateral damage”), infuriated Muslims all over the globe, intentionally alienated longtime allies, precipitated a spike in terrorism worldwide, and ripped off millions of dollars from the Iraqis while purportedly helping them, but, really, now … desecrate the Quran?

Please! That would be over the line.

Moving backward, er, sideways, uh, forward, here’s Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, according to Hunt: “It’s appalling that this story got out there.”

“Appalling” is not the first word that comes to mind; “miraculous,” maybe.

Per Hunt, Rice again:

“‘I do think [the article has] done a lot of harm. Of course, 16 people died…’”

So Condi weeps for 16 dead Afghanis. Touching. However, since the U.S. has slaughtered at least 100,000 Iraqis in its imperial land/oil grab on her watch and I don’t remember ever hearing her express similar concern for those poor souls, I do believe that if world domination were a poker game [and some would say it is], I bet her bet would go something like this: “I call your 6250 dead Iraqis with my one dear, departed Afghani.” (At least we now know the approximate rate of exchange.)

Lastly, Rice out-Rices herself:

“‘…but it’s also done a lot of harm to America’s efforts’ to demonstrate tolerance and breed goodwill in the Muslim world.”

I’m sorry. I must’ve missed our noble efforts at selflessly helping our Muslim friends these last couple of years while I was busy being preoccupied with occupied Iraq.

On second thought, though, maybe ol’ Bird’s Nest Hair actually has a point here. Perhaps it’s not so strange, after all, to wonder why Iraqis (the ones who haven’t yet died from bombs, bullets, cholera, or depleted uranium poisoning) aren’t just a little more grateful for America’s big-hearted attempt to rid their country once and for all of weapons of mass destruction, er, smash Al-Qaeda with whom Saddam Hussein was working closely, uh, bring democracy, yeah, that’s it, bring democracy to their now rubble-strewn and cluster bomb-blanketed land. After all, if the Chinese someday invade and occupy our country for our own good after pulling the financial rug out from underneath us by suddenly calling in the mountains of U.S. Treasury bills we continually sell them to prop up our bankrupt economy, I’m sure we’ll all be in the streets singing their praises to high heaven.

Dontcha think?

In fact, the more I think about it, the more I see that folks like Rice and McClellan are just naturally doing and saying what representatives of any fascistic regime would say and do. In a weird sort of way, they’re actually being up front about how today’s American press really operates.

All Americans know the traditional media in this country are owned, in classic fascistic fashion, damn near lock, stock, and barrel by the extreme right wing. Well, all Americans, that is, except for the millions who don’t know it (which would be pretty much the same ones who still believe their ballots count; ah, yes, fixed elections: another hallmark of fascism).

But here’s the thing: Look at how happy the ostrich people are! Compared to us, that is. Yes, us: the folks who continuously fret and fume about the incessant government propaganda emanating from America’s TV stations, radio channels, newspapers, and the like. When was the last time you can remember not having that sick little twist in your stomach or hearing the doom-laden thought in your head that goes: “Man, I can’t believe how much my country has gone to utter hell”?

What I’m saying is that when Rice tells you it’s appalling that Newssqueak published a factual story or McClellan says it’s the media’s duty to instruct the world to worship America’s big, hard guns, they’re actually being honest about the current state of the state in spite of their naturally dishonest little selves. Isn’t it time, then, to call off the whole charade, call a spade a spade, and get on with living in totalitarianism’s shade? (A poet I’m not, but that’s OK; fascism disdains the arts and intellectualism, anyway.)

Just think how freeing it would be to finally quit expending all of that energy trying to pump air into the decidedly dead duck that once was our dear democracy. I haven’t admitted this before, but it’s not easy constantly coming up with new, clever names for the loonies in charge. I often revert to “Bushies,” but that has always seemed far too cutesie to convey the sheer evil it represents. “Busheviks,” which is popular lately, is excellent, but I didn’t think of it, so no dice there. What’s left? Bush pigs, Bush dogs, Bush monsters, Bushwhackers, Bushitters … ? See what I mean? My well of creativity, she does not runneth over.

What it relief it would be just to watch WWF instead.

I’m tellin’ ya, this fascism thing has got a lot going for it. No more sleepless nights worrying about things like: “nuclear options,” insolvent pension plans, the problems facing organized labor (no unions, no problem!), who to vote for, destructive nationalism, what religion the new addition to the family will be (‘cause, under fascism, there’s basically only one; one guess), whether corporations will always stick it to the populace (they will, thus serving another basic tenet of fascism: the indistinguishable co-mingling of corrupt corporate and government interests), etc. Short of us going all Founding Fathers-like and whippin’ up a second American R-word (unlikely), all of that stuff -- and more! -- has either happened, is happening, or is gonna happen.

So why the heck stew over it?

Can you imagine all the time we would save if we just figured it was a lost cause and quit fighting -- you know, like the Democrats in Congress? I get giddy just thinking about it. For instance, how many hours a day now do you figure you spend on the Internet or are otherwise similarly engaged, trying to ferret out just a few more kernels of truth? Under fascism, you can throw such cares away and watch the hours return to you like magic, thus making it possible for you to pedal your bike to your third job without worrying about being late or take that Mandarin class in anticipation of our eventual joyful liberation.

Oh, the advantages of fascism! What in the U.S. military-dominated world took me so long to see them?

Not so endearing enduring U.S. military bases in Iraq

It’s not easy writing about something about which I know very little, but I’m going to try anyway. (Hey, you, in the back. I heard that. It has too stopped me before.)

What I think I’m talking about are the fourteen permanent U.S. military bases currently under construction in Iraq. Yes, that Iraq, the country from which we will militarily withdraw just as soon as we get the word from the completely-free-of-U.S.-influence Iraqi government telling us to go (Look for snow in Baghdad that day.)

Well, “go,” that is, except from the fourteen permanent U.S. military bases currently under construction there. But why quibble over semantics when we’re all occupiers and occupied -- I mean, friends -- here?

I’ve tried to learn more about these bases from my elected “representatives,” but, for some reason, it’s almost like no one in our government wants to talk about them. Weird, huh?

E-mails to both senators have gone unanswered. I expect that from the Republican, Dianne Feinstein (yes, I know her stationery says she’s a Dem, but anyone familiar with her politics knows the printer must’ve goofed), but it is strange I’ve not heard back from Barbara Boxer, especially since last year her campaign contacted me about seemingly every fund-raiser in the state, no matter how distant -- gigs with cute, down-home names like “Bowling for Barb in Bakersfield” (a scant 300 miles from my home). (I kid the good senator; she actually receives a Drolette Honorary Lifetime Pass from Truly Sharp Criticism for being the only solon with ovaries big enough to try to at least delay the final nail from being hammered into our republic’s coffin on January 6, 2005.)

My congressman, Democrat Robert “Don’t Ever Rock the Boat” Matsui, to whom I sent a similar query, has since died, which, given past experience, probably doesn’t affect my chances one way or the other of receiving a response from his office worth a damn.

I also e-mailed the Department of Defense (DoD). So far, Rummy is mum. No dummy, the bum.

So: What made me first suspect that certain administration insiders harbored deluded dreams of indefinitely installing, and then keeping, American military personnel in Iraq? Call it intuition. That, and the following item from the Project for the New American Century’s (PNAC) September 2000 report “Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century”:

“Indeed, the United States has for decades sought to play a more permanent role in [Persian] Gulf regional security. While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein” (page 14).

I know that’s kind of vague, but, hey, if there’s one thing my mom taught me when I was growing up, it’s how to spot a thinly-veiled attempt to take over the world, just as I was always told the nasty Soviet Union was trying to do. Her warnings really weren’t so different, however, from the good counsel of any era’s responsible American mother (though a current savvy one would no doubt drop the last two letters from “U.S.S.R.”).

PNAC’s cracked attack-Iraq tack explains Dubya’s sudden out-of-left-field post-9/11 insistence that it sure would be swell to shell hell out of the fell Hussein, lest Saddam blanket the U.S. with n-bombs from Manhattan to San Francisco (the latter undoubtedly garnering a couple of “aye” votes in the War Room), or kill thousands of Americans by showering them with chemical and biological weapons delivered via Iraq’s vast collection of two, maybe three, plywood-and-baling-wire drones.

Since a five-minute Internet search would have divulged the real reason America’s nutcase neoconpoops craved invading a country that posed absolutely no threat to the U.S., i.e. to move troops out of one oil-laden country with ties to Al-Qaeda and 9/11 (our friend, Saudi Arabia) into another oil-laden country with no connections to Al-Qaeda and 9/11 (our enemy, Iraq), I thought it would be only a matter of time before a reporter somewhere who knew how to work a mouse would look on PNAC’s website and dutifully report to the American public the gross sham the Bushites were perpetrating.

Yet, here we are, years down the various-body-parts-strewn road, and there’s been barely a peep from the cowed sheep comprising the sorry American corporate media. Very little material has, uh, materialized regarding the bases.

The first article about them I remember reading was written by Christine Spolar of the Chicago Tribune in March 2004. She leads: “From the ashes of abandoned Iraqi army bases, U.S. military engineers are overseeing the building of an enhanced system of American bases designed to last for years.”

Later, she writes that “U.S. engineers are focusing on constructing 14 ‘enduring bases,’ long-term encampments for the thousands of American troops expected to serve in Iraq for at least two years” and

“‘Is this a swap for the Saudi bases?’ asked Army Brig. Gen. Robert Pollman, chief engineer for base construction in Iraq. ‘I don't know....When we talk about enduring bases here, we're talking about the present operation, not in terms of America's global strategic base. But this makes sense. It makes a lot of logical sense.’”

It was quite a while before I heard the bases mentioned again, and, considering the setting, my jaw literally fell from my face when it happened. (Don’t you hate it when someone uses “literally” incorrectly? So do I. That’s why I would never do it. My jaw has since been successfully reattached, thank you.)

The mentioner: Senator John “You Bet Your Ass There Really Is Something To All That Skull-And-Bones Crap” Kerry (D-MA); the scene: last year’s first fake presidential debate (it can’t be a real one if our ballots don’t count -- and they don’t).

Per the senator: “And I think a critical component of success in Iraq is being able to convince the Iraqis and the Arab world that the United States doesn't have long-term designs on it. As I understand it, we're building some fourteen military bases there now, and some people say they've got a rather permanent concept to them.”

Gad! What a bombshell, I thought. What followed, though, was even more stunning: Instead of moderator Jim Lehrer pouncing on this like a real journalist would do in one of those museum animatronic dioramas that shows what real journalists used to look and act like before they became extinct, he instead asked Kerry a real softball question: “Senator, what do you think of real softballs?”

After the audience’s tittering finally subsided (despite appearances, a not-so-sophisticated bunch, that group), the moment was lost. The rest of the “debate” was consumed primarily by George W. Bush (who wouldn’t recognize a time clock if one was impaled squarely on his pointy [numb]skull) insisting no fewer than eleven times throughout his petulant performance that just whatever it is the hell he does sure is a lot of “hard work.”

Though Lehrer’s reputation as one of the few remaining legitimate journalists sadly disappeared that night faster than the truth upon a Republican’s arrival, I figured some reporter or columnist somewhere still would grab the reins offered by Kerry and ride with that big horse -- sort of like analogously hopping up on a tall, swift steed and galloping away, wild and unfettered, giddily feeling the wind blowing one’s hair back into a perma-coif not unlike the one adorning the senator’s head, not knowing the exact destination but nonetheless saying “the heck with that, partner” and doing it because, darn it, it’s simply the right thing to do.

Uh, my delirium soon passed when I came to and realized two things: a) half a tab will do just fine next time and b) I live in 21st century America, where the compromised and corporatized Fourth Estate merits the third degree for its second class treatment of the First Amendment.

Search the papers, Internet, and TV as I may, there was nary a whisper about the senator’s surprise slip. I don’t remember exactly what else was going on in the “news” at the time, but the media were obviously otherwise occupied, no doubt hot on the trail of, say, some married white socialite tragically shunned from East Hampton society after declaring she was bearing the love child of her seventeen year-old Puerto Rican pool boy, the actual conception of which was naturally all captured on video and available already online for the amazingly low price of only $19.95 (while supplies lasted).

Even alternative news outlet pickin’s have been slim, with, as far as I’m aware, only a handful of germane articles appearing here and there. Perhaps the most recent is from Joshua Hammer in Mother Jones (March/April 2005), in which he reports:

“Over the past year, the Pentagon has reportedly been building up to 14 ‘enduring’ bases across [Iraq] -- long-term encampments that could house as many as 100,000 troops indefinitely. John Pike, a military analyst who runs the research group GlobalSecurity.org, has identified a dozen of these bases, including three large facilities in and around Baghdad: the Green Zone, Camp Victory North, and Camp al-Rasheed, the site of Iraq’s former military airport. Also listed are Camp Cook, just north of Baghdad, a former Republican Guard ‘military city’ that has been converted into a giant U.S. camp; Balad Airbase, north of Baghdad; Camp Anaconda, a 15-square-mile facility near Balad that housed 17,000 soldiers as of May 2004 and was being expanded for an additional 3,000; and Camp Marez, next to Mosul Airport…”

Hammer writes later: “How long is ‘enduring’?…Retired Marine Corps General Anthony Zinni, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East from 1997 to 2000, recently predicted that American involvement in Iraq would last at least 10 more years. Retired Army Lt. General Jay Garner, the former interim administrator of reconstruction efforts in Iraq, told reporters in February 2004 that a U.S. military presence in Iraq should last ‘the next few decades.’ Even that, some analysts warn, could be an underestimate. ‘Half a century ago if anyone tried to convince you that we’d still have troops in Korea and Japan, you’d think they were crazy,’ says Pike…Suspicions also run deep both inside Pentagon circles and among analysts that the Department of Defense is pouring billions of dollars into the facilities in pursuit of a different agenda entirely: to turn Iraq into a permanent base of operations in the Middle East.”

Hammer also reminds us the lucky recipient of “at least $4.5 billion [going toward] construction and maintenance of U.S. bases” is, of course, “the giant defense contractor KBR (formerly Kellogg, Brown & Root)…” (KBR is a subsidiary of Halliburton; ‘nuff said.)

Pretty damning stuff. But, because I believe in corroboration, I decided to go straight to the source: I called the White House. The following is my best recollection of the conversation (if you’d like a verbatim rendition, I’m sure there’s a tape of the call lying around D.C. somewhere; check with Homeland Security first):

Me: “May I speak with the president, please?”

Operator: “He’s out of the country right now.” This was good news, ‘cause it sounded like if I left my number, he’d call me once he got back. I was heartened.

“May I speak with George W. Bush, then, please?”

There was a pause. “The president is out of the country right now.”

“But isn’t that Dick Cheney? Everyone knows he’s really the president, right?”

This time, the pause wasn’t followed by a response.

I immediately changed course since Mom, in addition to warning me about the Russkies, taught me to quit while I was behind.

“Maybe you can help me, then. I’m looking for information about the fourteen permanent U.S. military bases being constructed in Iraq.”

He gave me a DoD link (www.defenselink.mil). I thanked him, and, immediately upon hanging up, thought: “Dang! I forgot to leave my number so the president, whoever he is, can call me back.”

I accessed the link but held out little hope I’d learn anything. I snooped around and espied a U.S. Army study entitled “CJTF-7 ALLOCATION OF THE JOINT LAND ATTACK CRUISE MISSILE ELEVATED NETTED SENSOR.” (Don’t all those capital letters just make you want to go out and kick some TERRORIST ASS??)

I found the report’s synopsis most interesting:

“This study determines which of thirteen enduring bases in Iraq should receive the JLENS.” (JLENS. Sounds, by design, more like designer eyewear from Jennifer Lopez than what it’s undoubtedly designed to do: kill more people more efficiently.) Naturally, I couldn’t access the study itself, and, instead of fourteen bases, DoD has pegged the number at a baker’s dozen (perhaps we’re being charged for fourteen but “only” thirteen are actually being built; love that KBR), but it’s close enough for government dirty work.

So there it is: confirmation from none other than the Pentagon itself that the U.S. intends to stay in Iraq for a mighty long time, no matter how nicely (or not) we’re asked to leave; no matter the myriad phony reasons given for attacking that benighted land; no matter how many times Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeld and Rice and the rest of the murderous fascists who destroy and kill everything they touch cynically swear that our benevolent, peace-loving country’s sole desire is to instill democracy there while it is simultaneously and systematically being eviscerated here; no matter the hell what, actually. Here is proof positive of PNAC’s pinheaded plan, yet it’s too much for the whoreporate media to bother asking about, let alone investigate.

This would normally be where I would conclude the column as neatly and cleverly as possible and then suggest some sort of measure to counter the latest insanity emanating from the White House. However, I’ve a confession: It’s tough shaking the feeling these days that the highest purpose served by any commentary is simply to (hope to) add to the historical record. This seems to be the routine: I get pissed, I report, you read, you get pissed, and then … we do it again. In the meantime, the administration’s utter dismantling of anything truly American continues unabated. (How ‘bout them national ID cards, huh?) My reservoir of trusty helpful hints for fixing our besieged country is pretty dry.

I do have one suggestion, though: Take full advantage now of the Second Amendment (the only one, oddly, that America’s controlling fascists favor), and arm yourself -- heavily -- if you haven’t done so already. Learn all you can about firearms to prepare for the real possibility of a future firestorm in this country. I am not alone in thinking it will get very ugly here fairly soon; after all, for starters, one can’t prop up an insanely unsustainable lifestyle by borrowing over $1 billion a day without adverse consequences, ‘cause, when I was doing it, it wasn’t long before my dealers -- er, creditors -- were at the door.

If the country does indeed blow up, I assume it will look more like a civil war than a revolution given the millions of already well-armed Americans squarely behind the squareheads in charge, but labels matter not when someone is trying to kill you. We should all be prepared. Stock up on essentials, like ammunition, water, and Chee-tos.

For those who have a knee-jerk bias toward possessing weapons, for heaven’s sake, get over it. How can you say you support the Constitution if you cherry-pick your amendments? On a far more practical level, how do you expect to defend yourself against someone who has you in their sights: throw scads of really well-formulated arguments against them?

Because that sure has worked great so far.

Just what, exactly, do these concluding paragraphs have to do with permanent U.S. military bases in Iraq? Nothing -- and everything.