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There's a first time for everything, but that doesn't explain why Ananias Ziegler called me last week. As you may recall, he's the media relations director for the Committee That Really Runs America. After the usual pleasantries, he explained that he was on a public-relations offensive to dampen any elation over the departure of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
You have some connections with the Biased Liberal
Media,
Ziegler said. So can you put the word
out?
What word?
I wondered.
The word that we have an inexhaustible supply of
partisan hacks who can find legal justifications for the
denial of habeas corpus, the use of torture in
interrogation, the indefinite detention of people without
filing charges, the deployment of federal prosecutors for
political purposes, the establishment of religion and the
gathering of information without getting warrants. I don't
want to see you guys getting egg on your face by
celebrating the departure of Gonzales and acting as though
some era has ended. There are a lot of other people who can
do the same important job just as well, and we have every
confidence that President Bush will find one of
them.
I assured him that I would do so, then asked about the president's recent speeches to the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the American Legion.
What about those speeches?
Ziegler asked.
It seemed to me he was drumming up war with Iran,
I said, then quoted Bush: Shia extremists, backed by
Iran, are training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our
forces ... Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards are
supplying extremist groups with funding and weapons ... The
attacks on our bases and troops by Iranian-supplied
munitions have increased ...
Ziegler cut me off. I see your point,
he said.
It's what we call a pre-pre-emptive strike.
A what?
I wondered.
Consider the President's situation. He's so unpopular
that Republican candidates for office won't be seen with
him, unless it's at a fund-raiser where only the
beneficiaries of his tax cuts are allowed in. His closest
associates are leaving his administration. His power is
shrinking by the moment, but he has one hope of turning
that around. He can start another war and then the country
will rally for a while -- preferably until November of
2008.
So Bush is laying the groundwork now, and then he can
pull Iran out of his hat when the time is right?
You got it,
Ziegler said. Lots of talk about
how Iran is exporting explosives, seeking nuclear weapons
and aiding the Taliban in Afghanistan -- you know the
drill.
But the President said that 'We always enter wars
reluctantly,'
I pointed out.
That's just the usual appeal to American
mythology,
Ziegler said. We like to think of
ourselves as a peace-loving nation that does not respond
unless severely provoked.
Indeed,
I agreed. But we had to generate some
provocation for the Mexican War in 1846 by marching an army
into disputed territory so that our flag would be fired
upon. And we had to park a battleship in the Havana harbor
in 1898 to inspire the Spanish-American War. Seems to me
sometimes we go looking for trouble.
Exactly,
Ziegler interrupted. It proves once
again that our glorious leader is a true conservative and
an enthusiastic practitioner of the traditional American
way.
I suppose,
I agreed. So the President is
laying the groundwork for war with Iran. And if his ratings
continue to slip, he will give us even more warnings about
the dangers we face from Iranian extremists.
More than just warnings,
Ziegler said. You
don't have the security clearance you'd need for me to tell
you any more. But if we keep pushing the Iranians,
eventually they'll push back, and then the President can go
on TV to explain how America has been attacked, and we had
to strike back to preserve stability in the Middle East and
our nation's credibility. Bingo, he's a great leader
again.
But suppose nobody believes him,
I said. After
all, we never found any WMDs in Iraq, and that's one reason
he said we had to invade. Despite that banner on the
aircraft carrier in 1993, the mission hasn't been
accomplished. He's got some credibility problems. How are
you going to handle that?
Simple, Quillen,
Ziegler concluded. With or
without the Patriot Act and with or without Alberto
Gonzales, we can just round up people like you who bring up
such topics, and put them away.
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