The Post-9/11 Question

Right after the unconscionable Al-Qaeda-scripted and directed terrorist attacks on the US in the morning of September 11, 2001, a question started making the rounds in key US-based mass media channels, particularly conservative talk radio: “Why Do They Hate Us?” The ‘They’ in the question refers to ‘the rest of the world’, and the ‘Us’ refers of course to the ‘US’. Up till date, the one answer to that question that floated most on conservative talk radio here in the US was that the rest of the world hates the US because its loves democracy and that the attach is the manifestation of the hatred of the US by the rest of the world. For any objective analyst or observer, it was an answer that begged the question because people in every corner of the world mourned with Americans over those acts: major newspapers in many parts of the world went out of their way to proclaim in extra-ordinary pieces of editorial that “We Are All Americans!” The inherent truth in this proclamation underscored the support and justification expressed by many people all over the world for the invasion of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan by the US to punish Al-Qaeda and its leaders for their terrorist attacks on America.

But beyond Afghanistan, in its reaction to those attacks, the Bush White was completely taken by its sworn conservative credentials. Going by the tenacity that it exhibited as it fished around for excuses and justifications to invade Iraq on the grounds that it was involved in the attacks, there has been little doubt that Mr. George Bush himself, his vice, Mr. Dick Cheney, and the range of their high-ranking aides all subscribe to the answer to the aforementioned question peddled on conservative radio that the rest of the world hates America because it loves democracy. Proof of this was partly revealed in a Washington Post story Monday July 2 on Mr. Bush ineffectual attempts to understand the isolation he is experiencing at a time when his presidency is about to end. In the absence of factual evidence, no one except perhaps Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney, and their supporters, believes any more that Iraq was involved in the terrorist attacks. There is no doubt that many are disappointed in Mr. Bush and his administration as a result.

The story is that Mr. Bush has been spending a lot of time with individual theologians, historians, philosophers, and leading authors or groups of them that he invites to the White House to help him seek answers over light refreshments to an array of questions that include: “Why does the rest of the world seem to hate America? Or is it just me they hate?” He does not yet appreciate that his preference for the answer to the question spawned by conservative radio is largely responsible for all the failing policy initiatives, particularly on Iraq, he has taken so far, and that they are largely responsible for souring turn in his presidency.

Although no one knows at this point what his invitees tell Mr. Bush in response to the many questions that he tables before them, every one of them who has said anything so far is convinced that he is a highly isolated individual, and that he is highly fixated on Iraq. According to a former aide who recently visited with him: “Nothing matters except the war. That’s all that matters. The whole thing rides on that.” That fixation is to the degree of disengagement from serious governance issues. His friends who made excuses for him insist that he is not oblivious of the responsibilities of the presidency. But that incompetence that pervades every aspect of his presidency so far still lingers. Rather than engage New York Congressmen that he invited to accompany him to a school in Harlem to promote his education program on issues of importance he preferred to talk baseball aboard Air Force One. One of them, Democrat Charlie B. Rangle, chair of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, which was involved in a tough negotiations with the White House on trade pacts at the time was so disappointed in Mr. Bush’s preference to talk baseball instead of serious legislative issues. Rangle’s observation that: “He talked a lot about the Rangers. I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about” was to say the least aptly dismissive of one who he felt lacked the capacity for rising up to what the occasion demanded. Can Mr. Bush's reported capacity or "terrific knack of not looking through the rearview (sic) mirror" to absorb the massive wreckage produced by virtually all his policy initiatives indicate anything in his personality with regard to particularly his evident incompetence as president?

Mr. Bush’s inability to come up with the right answer(s) to the post-9/11 question for himself may be the greatest undoing of his presidency so far. The US, indeed, the world is worst off for it.