House of Eratosthenes

Not Going To Hell After All President Bush is hated. I think it’s fair to say President Bush is the most hated persona to occupy that high office, probably since the office has been there. The time has come to ask why this is. In nearly four years following the invasion of Iraq, and six years after he took office, none of the explanations make any sense whatsoever. I have been repeatedly preached and scolded and counseled and upbraided and reproached, that I must do certain things and vote certain ways because this emotion exists. I think deep down, everyone agrees it’s unwise to do things because of emotions even when emotions are understood easily. The more I learn of this emotion, the more convinced I am that I don’t understand it, and I don’t think anyone else does either…even the people who advertise that they have it. A lot of people stand to gain an awful lot if they can get people like me to understand what’s going on here. And after all those years, no explanation has been forthcoming, satisfactory or otherwise.

Oh yeah, why I’m supposed to join the ranks of those who hate him — people tell me that. They have a catalog of reasons. They add to it whenever they think of something, and they seem to think there’s something wrong with reciting just a piece of it. The whole list must be rattled off. And replication must be instantaneous; if one Bush-hater thinks of something new, all the other haters must add it to their own catalogs. So I hear these items fairly often. But the thing I want, continues to be left out. It’s like an itch I can’t scratch. Why George W. Bush is a walking superlative in the history of hated-people…such a rich history that is…no one’s given any justification for this.

I’m going to try to do it here.

He got 3,000 American troops killed, they tell me. The notion that these deaths are really his fault, is subject to reasonable debate. The notion that, if he has some blame for these casualties, he’s going to have to share it with others — is something that can only be subject to unreasonable debate. A lot of people could have done a lot of different things, and those dead troops would be smiling and eating and laughing and joking and burping and farting like you and me. But allowing for all this anyway — we’ve had other Presidents who got many more troops killed. Many, many more troops. This is according to the same logic. They weren’t nearly as hated. So that’s not it.

He “waged an illegal and unjust war.” That’s a matter of opinion…but allowing for that, again, going by the same logic, we’ve had other Presidents wage illegal and unjust wars. In the minds of some, anyway. They weren’t so hated.

He’s pro-life. We’ve had other Presidents who were pro-life.

He’s from Texas. We’ve had other Presidents from Texas.

He is thought by some to have shirked his military duty. We’ve had other Presidents thought, by some, to have shirked their military duty.

He swaggers. We’ve had other Presidents who have swaggered. One of them was in a wheelchair.

He spies on people, in the process, alienating them from the rights to which they are guaranteed by the Constitution. That’s what I’m told. Is anybody going to advance the assertion that this is unprecedented? When President Bush is said to “wipe his ass with the Constitution,” this is a figure of speech…invariably, it is pronounced without a citation from the U.S. Constitution in mind that is being violated. Other Presidents BLATANTLY violated specific amendments and/or articles/sections. Unapologetically, and without precedent. That includes the wheelchair-guy by the way. They weren’t so hated.

The economy is lackluster. In America, the economy has been quite a few measurable notches below lackluster, and we’ve had sitting Presidents who were decidedly at fault for some terrible economies. We’ve had Presidents who actually wrecked the economy with their bad policies — economies that would certainly have done better if something different were done. We’ve had Presidents who were still in office when the chickens came home to roost and there was broad agreement about the link between the poor policies and the sputtering economies. President Bush is hated more than those Presidents were…so…we continue looking for the underlying reason. It’s clear we have not yet found it.

A lot of people say he’s a dimwit. That seems, at first blush, to be the answer; I rarely hear anyone confess their hatred of President Bush, without throwing in the apparently-essential scolding that he’s anti-intellectual and stupid. But there are problems with this. Throughout recorded history, if the human equation has shown one consistent sentiment toward simpletons wielding real power, that sentiment would be tolerance. Tolerance to a fault, actually. We can adapt to dimwit bosses, and as a species we have done so many times before America came along. Based on the information I’ve reviewed, if President Bush has managed to arouse bumptious demands for his removal from office based on his addle-mindedness, with all other motivations for the acrimony being decidedly subordinate, he’s made history. Human history. It’s really hard to make that kind of history. I don’t think that’s it.

He’s inarticulate. So was Lincoln, according to some contemporaries. Benjamin Harrison was characterized as speaking in an annoying, high-pitched squeaky voice. Grant was shy. Coolidge didn’t say much.

None of these Presidents were quite so hated.

I think, what it is, is he took a bad guy down. We’ve had Presidents do that before, too…but President Bush did it in the modern age, when good & evil are supposed to be matters open to individual interpretation. In an age where evil is supposed to be a subjective viewpoint…he targeted someone. He’s an unwelcome paradigm shift, and the shift is in an direction that makes a lot of people uncomfortable. Once you go down the road of insisting there is no such thing as “absolute” evil, you can stay there as long as you choose to…until someone else comes along, defines evil as being really evil, and does something about it. This makes the nihilist/anarchist crowd look bad.

It hurts their P.R. You stand there “helplessly” watching a house burn, you look okay. Someone else grabs a hose while you sit there on your ass watching…now, you’re embarrassed. If the other guy didn’t happen along, the house would have burned to the ground. But you’d look good. Nothing else really counts, right?

It’s like the guy watching a woman being mugged and raped, making a calculated, brazen decision to allow the attack to commence uninterrupted because it’s “not my concern.” Inaction resulting from purely pacifist interests. He looks all right…until someone else gets involved. And then the pacifist looks bad. And silly. And cowardly. And impotent. And then the pacifist begins to harbor some decidedly un-pacifist feelings, toward the other fellow who made a decision to help out.

Come to think of it, the anger these leftists have toward President Bush, is not at all unlike the anger felt toward a masculine, self-assertive, virile interloper, from a cuckold, whose lonely and bored wife has finally been reminded what a real man can do. It’s not unlike that kind of anger at all.

One exception, though. In our society, we do not value the idea of strong, effective men stealing women from weaker men. We do not raise our sons to sleep with other mens’ wives. We do raise our boys to stand up for what’s right; to get involved, to lend assistance if evil is sure to triumph for lack of that assistance. That is what President Bush did. I’m glad it was done, and history will be glad for it too.

To those who insist on hating him and continuing to build that reasons-for-hate catalog, I say, go ahead. Hate him if you want; hate him all you want. I think it would be good for your own mental well-being to identify, in your own mind, WHY it is you hate him. If you come up with the reason, and are too ashamed to admit to anybody else what it really is, you’re still better off than the guy who hates President Bush but won’t put the effort in to figuring out why.

[…] House of Eratosthenes It’s like the guy watching a woman being mugged and raped, making a calculated, brazen decision to allow the attack to commence uninterrupted because it’s “not my concern.” Inaction resulting from purely pacifist interests. He looks all right…until someone else gets involved. And then the pacifist looks bad. And silly. And cowardly. And impotent. And then the pacifist begins to harbor some decidedly un-pacifist feelings, toward the other fellow who made a decision to help out. Come to think of it, the anger these leftists have toward President Bush, is not at all unlike the anger felt toward a masculine, self-assertive, virile interloper, from a cuckold, whose lonely and bored wife has finally been reminded what a real man can do. It’s not unlike that kind of anger at all. […]
- 186k Per Second - » Whimps - We Shall be Called Progressives | 01/07/2007 @ 19:13
[…] Source: House of Eratosthenes […]
- Bush - Why the Hatred?-- Scott’s Morning Brew | 01/08/2007 @ 12:59
Coolidge’s nickname “Silent” Cal proves your point.
It’d be interesting to do a survey on how many newbies know which beloved, revered prexy occupied a wheelchair and broke Constitutional rules right-and-left.
- cfreeberg | 01/08/2007 @ 14:05
Lessee, (A) people have a disproportionate hatred of Bush (no evidence offered), therefore (B) it must be because they can’t stand that he stood up to “evil” (no evidence offered; no test conducted). Morgan has a new take on the tired right-wing saw that people who oppose Bush love terrorism and evil. But it will seem like Morgan is actually a deep-thinking, original, truth-seeker if it’s posed as a clever question.

Nice try, shill.
- Zossima | 01/09/2007 @ 12:19
Zossima, you need to adjust your browser settings, I think. There’s a picture with the article above that offers the evidence you claim isn’t there.
- mkfreeberg | 01/10/2007 @ 11:10
[…] The B.U.F. And Would You Like Fries With That? The Boortz Santa Drive Saddam Hussein’s Last NegotiationWar of Endurance Lynx Whatever Happened To Dungeons? III Why The Hatred I Don’t Want To Be Them On Groups II On What We Call “Science” On Generous People […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 01/11/2007 @ 09:51
[…] Quite a time has passed since I last mentioned a new-found weblog. Lately I have not had much opportunity to explore the blogosphere. But yesterday via Just Muttering, I encountered an intelligent essay on Bush Derangement Syndrome. It was my first visit to House of Erasthenes. I would remember if I had been there before. The author keeps an awesome link list. I could write a lot more posts in the ‘weblog’ category, if I explored it. Posted at 8:22 AM | | […]
- Fresh Bilge » HoE | 01/14/2007 @ 08:22

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