Wednesday, July 25, 2007

What could be so bad?

I've avoided big-politics-in-the-sky* items, as the vantage point of an expat is always a weak one and within the new music community I'd mostly be singing to a choir of like voices, but I've had a question lately of which I can't simply let go:

The Bush administration has claimed an unprecedented level of executive privilege and freedom to operate without oversight. In this, the Republicans in Congress have bent over backwards to enable the administration by either not conducting oversight when in power themselves, or now supporting the White House in blocking effective oversight under the Democratic majority. The administration itself has been so committed to these efforts that they are willing to let major figures (like the Attorney General) appear in public as either liars or incompetents. Given the real possibility, even likelihood, that a Democrat will be occupying the White House in 2009, what could it possibly be which they have hidden which is so potentially damaging to the Republicans if exposed that the Administration and the Republicans in Congress are now willing to cede the same level of privilege to the next Democrat in office?

Keep in mind Pynchon's Proverb for Paranoids, number three: "If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers."

As long as we're acknowledging our justifiable paranoia, check out this Executive Order.
_____
*Terry Riley's term, not mine.

1 comment:

Civic Center said...

It's getting weirder and worse in the United States with each passing day. It all feels like a bad Robert Ludlum novel where the Nazis have somehow come back and taken over the White House, the Vatican, the European Union, the, oh crap, it's real.

And in answer to your original question, what are they NOT hiding might be a better Pynchon Paranoid question.