August 30, 2002
"Lucky Me, I Hit the Trifecta"
While the World Trade Center burned, Carlyle and other insider Bush war contractors plotted their greatly enhanced financial prospects. Bush equated the catastrophe with a big win for himself in his tasteless joke about having won the trifecta, which he repeated over and over again. And who can blame him for gloating over the massive tragedy that had fallen upon the nation? He was only telling the truth.For him it was the world's greatest excuse, justification for everything he wanted to do anyway, beginning with a robbery of the national treasury for his rich friends which was already well underway. Paul Krugman in the New York Times ("Just Trust Us") describes in detail the Bush administration's piece-by-piece dismantling of the nation's fiscal integrity over a period of two years.
Though there was a leveling off of economic growth near the end of the Clinton years, there was a noticeable downturn that coincided with November of 2000, the month that the country's democratic institutions were subject to a frontal attack by the Bush team, with Carlyle heavy James Baker leading the attack. The negative psychological impact of that travesty cannot be measured, but economic indicators reflected a negative effect of the lawless Bush mob from that time. Bush started talking recession almost immediately in order to set it up has having been Clinton's fault.
When he took office, the dismantling of all things Clinton and all things that reflected the good of the commonwealth over the good of the corporate elite got underway in earnest. Talk of attacking Iraq had begun immediately after Bush seized control, even before he took the oath of office. In December 2000, CNN was broadcasting a new logo for "The Unfinished War" accompanied by slices of footage of a sinister Saddam Hussein and his henchmen. Along with an immediately darkening psychological climate, the country was plunged into a recession that continues to deepen.
After Bush achieved his policy centerpiece, the taxcut that bankrupted the country and funneled all the money to his rich corporate buddies, the defenses of the country lapsed to such a degree that the enemies created, armed and trained by the CIA succeeded in carrying out the most devastating attack ever on the American mainland. That is, Osama bin Laden (whose family also made big money through Carlyle war investments) allegedly carried out the attack. The American people were never shown evidence. We were considered national security risks.
So here we are in the deepening darkness of the Bush-corporate fascism, with no signs of improvement on any front, even with an election approaching. And Bush is happy as a clam. Everything is going his way. Lucky him.
-- By David Cogswell