"1,001 uses for Bush" - A Brazilian major newspaper columnist's view of *

Original in Portuguese at http://oglobo.globo.com/jornal/colunas/jabor.asp - this link will have a different column from June 1, 2004.
Translated by Yours Truly

1,001 uses for Bush
By Arnaldo Jabor

There's a good side to Bush: he has 1,001 uses. Bush is good because he shows us the hypocrisy that was hiding under the "democratic globalization" marketing.

Bush teaches us that political systems are slower than changes in social and economic life. Bush shows us the need to reform civil society; it has become clear that democracy is abstract in the face of the invincible brutality of things. Bush reminds us things have desires of their own. Bombs want to go off, cannons yearn to fire. A 500bil budget craves being used.

Bush, by means of so many mistakes and authoritarianism, may reawaken the hunger for democracy in America. Bush reminds us that the Right is very alive and that multilateralism only existed for America while she needed Europe, during the Cold War. With the end of bipolarity, the USSR finished, they stood absolute, arrogant, and unilateral.

Bush reminds us stupidity is way stronger than reason. Bush shows us the hole is deeper.

With Bush we are realizing it is the Iraqis dying, and the crazy soldiers performing pornographic torture, who are defending the return of an international democratic multilateralism.

Bush teaches us the Truth of America, with no veils — teaches that democracy has to react inside there, because half the population wants hamburger, root beer and authoritarian war.

Bush makes us hate the Republicans' stupidity. Bush has taught us the West is much more fragile than we thought. Bush learned everything with Osama, his Lord and Master, whom he obeys blindly. By the way, Osama would vote for Bush, who just profits him with his (Bush's) mistakes. Bush shows us the lunatic fringe of America may become the majority. Bush wants it. Bush teaches that the politics of reason no longer moves the wheel of society. Through him, we learn that Fascism is stupidity in power. With Bush we understand that, before ideologies, there is the mental disease that begets them. Be it the Communist omnipotence of "paradise", be it the neoliberal idiocy of "end of History", be it the Fascist lust for death to ravage cultural and political differences.

Bush teaches us there will never be a harmonic, Platonic world — something Machiavelli had already foreseen — and our dreams of eternal peace are unachievable. Bush wants to convince us that Kant was a dumbass. That Hobbes is the one who had the feel of things. Kant was quite naive in his dreams of universal government, and Hobbes was certainly closer to today's world.

Bush shows us the Iraq War is just the reflex of a broader war against the West, waged by him and his cohorts.

Bush shows us that Americans envy Europe and believe their conciliatory, political maturity to be a flaw of weak people, with no will to fight. He tells us Europe wants to tame the "Leviathan" with words and ideas.

But, on the other hand, Bush is living proof of the impossibility to impose democracy and freedom through the force of arms. You can't win the hearts and minds of a country with explosions and gunfire.

Bush showed that sexual issues are stronger than war in America. That neurosis and religious repression are stronger than the Enlightenment. Nobody thinks of impeaching him, he who is destroying his country's prestige and threatening the West, not to speak of creating millions of man-bombs. On the flip side, Clinton happened to bang the girl and almost got kicked out.

Bush showed that politics today is ruled by the financial bourgeois. No trace of the former "greatness" of liberal ideology.

Bush is not a person. He's an end product. Centuries of Puritanism, and years of the neocon gang, made him their speaker. Bush is a businessman. No, wait: he's a middleman for the oil industry.

Bush wants to create a new "American way of life" — the wrong way. He wants to revert everything that was won in the 60s and 70s, civil rights, liberties for minorities.

Bush teaches us the main enemy is no longer the old cigar smoking "bourgeois"; the enemy today is a business method, it's the capitalism of speculation and financial flows.

Bush teaches the new Lefts that they have to change their goals and methods. Before, the Left thought of unity. Today, it's the fundamentalist Right and turbo-capitalism who want "unity", dreaming of a world ruled by one single megabusiness, World Inc. Before, the Left searched for the "absolute"; today, they wish for the relative. Bush teaches us we can no longer fight with just the weapons of the old nation-state. Bush is helping to awaken civil society from its dream of dependence; it has to organize more and more to jump-start the jammed machine of States and governments. However, the terrible evidence of Bush's errors may make the West better. Bush, along with Osama, teaches that religion is not the opium of the people — it's the bomb of the people. Bush is the red alert that says: if America becomes populist and authoritarian, adopting the "politics of fear", anything may happen. Including the end of the world.

Edit: I just felt this had to be seen by larger audiences. Whenever I ask for authorization, my requests fall into black holes. If the newspaper or the columnist get their pants in a knot over copyright, I'll be more than happy to request the admins take it off.

thanks.

This guy hasn't pulled any punches.

I've never seen anything so damning.

Thanks for the post and the translation.

...of a rhino that has just been stung in the nuts by a bee.

That's why I like him. :evilgrin:

Hey, maybe some liberal outlet there could pick him up? Anyone has media contacts?

Thanks for posting it!

"Bush wants to create a new "American way of life" — the wrong way. He wants to revert everything that was won in the 60s and 70s, civil rights, liberties for minorities."

How about FDR's 30s

How about Jefferson's 1790s


Then there is Jeb Bush who realizes that blacks won the right to vote but no one ever said they won the right to have their vote counted.

This clever loophole contributed to the 1,200,000 uncounted votes in 2000.

I read O Globo, Jornal do Brasil and A Folha de SP daily. Gotta get my fix of reality. LOL

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
news source.

Thank you.

DU Moderator

What do I do? I suppose I could host it elsewhere and post a link.

I would love to see Arnaldo Jabor publish at www.zmag.org

Asked if they could use a new columnist.