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When I finally got through to my favorite inside source,
Ananias Ziegler, the media relations director for the
Committee That Really Runs America, he did not exchange the
usual pleasantries. Instead, he said Listen to this,
then tell me what you think.
A bouncy guitar riff extended across a couple of bars, then the plaintive voice:
Everybody's talkin' 'bout surges and urges, purges
and dirges.
Several voices joined in. All we are
saying, is give war a chance.
Ziegler came back on. Catchy, isn't it?
Like a cold,
I agreed. I gather you'll be
using it in a public relations campaign to promote the
president's plan to increase troop levels in Iraq?
Ziegler agreed. It's time we started using American
popular culture to advance American military goals,
he
said.
But isn't somebody going to ask questions?
I
wondered aloud. For instance, there were about 160,000
American military personnel in Iraq in February of 2005.
Now it's about 132,000. So the surge of 21,500 would bring
us back to where we were two years ago, and if that wasn't
enough to quell the insurgency then, why would it be enough
now?
No, people won't ask questions,
Ziegler said.
At least not in the U.S. Senate, where we've managed to
prevent debate.
Didn't that come from the same people who wanted
debates and up-or-down votes on judicial nominees?
I
asked.
Consistency is the virtue of a clock,
Ziegler
said. But there are other good reasons to avoid a full
Senate discussion.
I should think so,
I agreed. But trying to
follow a discussion about a debate concerning a non-binding
resolution -- that's one reason so many Americans hate
politics. All this procedural stuff is so
complicated.
I'll grant you that,
Ziegler conceded. But it
serves two vital purposes.
And those would be?
I wondered.
I thought you'd never ask. For one thing, if the
Senate's reputation is diminished by this, then it's in
control of the wrong people anyway, and their standing will
fall. That certainly helps us at the Committee. And the
focus on Iraq means that people will miss the clues about
taking on Iran.
Iran?
I spluttered. Aren't Iraq and
Afghanistan enough?
Ziegler sounded calm. But Iran could be supplying the
training that have been bringing down our helicopters in
Iraq. Iran has a nuclear program. It's part of the Axis of
Evil.
I mused a moment. So it should be possible for the
Committee to contrive an event that will justify movement
against Iran from our bases in the stable, independent,
democratic republic of Iraq?
I asked.
Ziegler chuckled. Something like that. And meanwhile,
the Senate will keep the focus elsewhere. You know, the
stage magician's old trick of misdirection.
I knew that trick, so I moved on. Meanwhile we're
spending something like $7 billion a month in Iraq, and the
federal debt keeps growing.
Have faith,
Ziegler said. The President says
we'll have a balanced budget by 2012.
But we were running at a surplus when he came into
office. In two years, he'll be leaving this mess for
another administration. Meanwhile, he wants to cut programs
that help Americans, like Medicare and Medicaid, Head
Start, LEAP.
Ziegler interrupted me. Quillen, I have to question
your patriotism. Where did you ever get the silly idea that
American tax money should be used for Americans?
Before I could explain that it just sounded like common
sense, he excused himself, as he had a meeting scheduled to
go over the other verses to Give War a Chance.
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