Because You Never Asked

PCM INTERVIEWS W.

(12/06)

     After 6 years of the agglomeration we call the George W. Bush administration, and almost 4 years of the horrifying cesspool we call the war in Iraq, this essay cannot be called an exercise in entirely new material. Our mainstream media’s lack of sincerity in pursuing the hard core reality of this war’s instigation, has been touched upon before in these pages (see all the “Propaganda” essays, and more). With the war now going so obviously down the toilet, the W. government has had to endure a withering media assault on its policies that could make the previous media insincerity seem irrelevant. I’m here to remind you it is just the opposite.

     As the burlesque of the war and the media’s coverage of it stretches on into eternity, the ludicrous performance of our “free press” has become even more insincere. One must remember that America’s “Big Media” establishment had no trouble leading us gleefully into the fray. Now that the war has become the arthritic old nag it is, Big Media’s disengagement and criticism of it still lacks the courage to ask the fundamental questions; still refuses to go for the jugular; still refuses to be sincere with its constituents. It is now more relevant than ever to further delve into these matters.

     In order to illustrate this, I will now give America the interview it will never see or hear on Big Media, the one we should all hear, the only one that counts (and that is why it will only appear here).

     PCM - First off, Mr. President, I’d like to not thank you for this interview. We all know it only exists on these pages and nowhere else, thus emaciating its impact to an almost negligible extent. We all know you’d never ever agree to this interview in reality, so no thanks for nothing.

     W. - (with that manure-shoveling grin we’ve all grown to know) Your not welcome. I may be stupid as bottled barbecue sauce, but I’m not nuts.

     PCM - And what you’ve done in Iraq is not nuts?

     W. - No, no, that was just an error. With all the Nintendo game weapons we have, who’d a thunk it? Now those Ayrabs --- they are really nuts! They’re almost as crazy as me giving you a real interview, but we know that will never happen. That nuts I’m not.

     PCM - I suppose not.

     W. - (leaning forward and touching PCM on the knee) By the way, you are --- ?

     PCM - Post Consumer Man.

     W. - Oh, right. Look, Mr. Man, can I call you Post? You know how I like to have a good natured, friendly rapport with the Press Corp.

     PCM - Sure. In truth, you’re very good with a quip and a joke. Just think how much better you’d have been for America as a comedian than as president.

     W. - I’ll take that as a compliment, Post.

     PCM - (arranging notes, clearing throat, getting serious) OK, let’s get to the meat of it all.

     W. - Fire away.

     PCM - Mr. President, one of the most consistent ideas you’ve held forth through this whole war is that we will not leave until the mission is completed. Could you please explain what the mission is?

     W. - Of course. The mission is to provide a stable, democratic government in Iraq, one where the Iraqi people can live in freedom.

     (Author’s note - In the real world, this is the point where Big Media and its news and information shows with the most hegemony over public opinion, purposely drop the ball. In spite of all their resources, technology, reporters and pundits debating and analyzing the war in all its minutia, it leaves the most basic, fundamental question of “why?” at this ridiculously superficial level, leaving it to voiceless people like PCM to ask the real questions in hypothetical interviews like this. With regard to the W. Bush presidency and its war in Iraq, Big Media has failed the American people in every way, contributing immensely to the tragedy we now all own).

     PCM - I don’t remember an outpouring of grief from within Iraq asking us to “free” them. I mean, who asked us to do this?

     W. - (smiling radiantly) Ahh, the yearning to be free is a universal feeling in the spirit of mankind. Nobody had to ask us, Post, we could feel its heartbeat, even from 6,000 miles away.

     PCM - But Mr. President, we are approaching the half trillion dollar mark in expenditures here, with no end in sight. If the mission is to simply free and democratize a country, do you consider that cost effective?

     W. - You can’t put a price on freedom, Post.

     PCM - OK, well --- if that’s the case, there must be 100 countries all over the world ruled by despotic tyrants who brutalize their people, crush all opposition, many times leading to genocidal butchery or horrendous civil wars. Why did you choose to democratize Iraq instead of --- let’s say, Sudan, where our intervention may have truly done some good?

     W. - Hey, first off, we’re doing plenty good in Iraq ---

     PCM - --- Mr. President, what I see from Iraq would humble my worst nightmares ---

     W. - --- and we’re aware of the situation in Dar --- Dar ---

     PCM - Darfur.

     W. - Right --- and we’ll do all we can, but we are tied up a bit right now.

     PCM - Let’s get back to this democracy thing.

     W. - Yes, I love democracy.

     PCM - When it comes to the Middle East, all of our client states, like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia ---

     W. - (breaking in) Hold it, hold it. They are not “client” states, they are “allies”.

     PCM - Suit yourself. In any event, Kuwait, the Saudis, the Gulf States, etc. --- none of them are even remotely democratic, while the country you’ve demonized and threatened over and over again, Iran, just held a legitimate election and seems to have a somewhat rooted democracy.

     W. - Yeah, but the religious freaks in the turbans run everything.

     PCM - Maybe. I don’t claim to be an expert on Iranian affairs, but it certainly looks as if they have some form of a democratic tradition far more robust than our “allies” in the region.

     W. - Yes, but their government’s policies are contrary to our interests.

     PCM - Ah hah! So it’s not democracy, it’s more a question of who is playing ball with us or not, right?

     W. - Now hold on, I didn’t say that ---

     PCM - I’ll give you another example of this from our own hemisphere. Have you heard the name Hugo Chavez?

     W. - C’mon Post, I’m the president, I’m up on these things.

     PCM - Well, you’ve demonized Chavez as much as anyone in the world and he’s been democratically elected more times than you with far greater margins.

     W - Yeah, but he stood up in front of the world and called me a devil and acted like I smell bad!

     PCM - Not before you engineered a coup in a very undemocratic effort to remove him from office ---

     W. - (angry) Now hold it ---

     PCM - --- and bungled that too!

     W. - --- You have no proof of that!

     PCM - (shouting) And can you prove you are not the devil?

     W. - (shouting back) I can prove I don’t smell bad!

     PCM - ---

     W. - ---

     PCM - ---

     W. - (arranging his cuff links, smoothing his hair, composing self) You see Post, this is why you’ll never have a real interview with me, why you have to fake it here in one of your essays, why I only talk to guys like Wolf Blitzer.

     PCM - That may be true, but there is one advantage I have; you can’t escape, you are going to have to fess up, something Wolf and the boys and girls never make you do.

     W. - (shrugging) Big deal. Go ahead.

     PCM - Now, if Chavez has been democratically elected and you value democracy so much, why do you demonize him so?

     W. - Are you kidding? He hangs around with Fidel Castro, he’s a friggin’ commie.

     PCM - Ah hah! Once again, you show you are more interested in who is playing ball with us, and not in democracy.

     W. - Well, it’s not that simple. It’s a combination of things. You have to think of our national interest too.

     PCM - I’m glad you brought that up.

     W. - Uh oh.

     PCM - What exactly is our national interest in Iraq? The security threat was either a complete lie or a complete mistake, and yet you persist in this mission to stabilize and democratize. Let me put it to you like this ---

     W. - Do you have to?

     PCM - Somebody’s gotta do it.

     W. - Well, it might as well be you --- much better than Wolf Blitzer.

     PCM - Right. This is what all the Wolf Blitzers scattered all over the Big Media television dial will not ask you. Mr. President, if the most rentable product in Iraq was --- asparagus, would you be interested in democratizing and “freeing” the country?

     W. - (in a weak voice) Maybe. I like asparagus.

     PCM - Is it worth a half a trillion dollars and more to keep the price of asparagus down?

     W. - Well --- I’d have to run it by my advisors.

     PCM - I’ll take that as a “no”. Let’s face it, a half trillion and more is a pretty steep price, even for oil.

     W. - Yeah, more than we expected, and it makes it so damn hard to leave.

     PCM - You mean it’s hard to just leave all that oil there after all this?

     W. - I’m not going there, and not even you can make me do it.

     PCM - Perhaps it’s not necessary at this point. Once again, no thanks for nothing, and may you and your whole team rot in Hell.

     W. - You don’t really believe in that, do you?

     Relevant Material: Two days before the mid term elections of 2006, President Bush, campaigning before friendly fire and in an obvious rut of desperation, talked about Iraq and the danger of not succeeding, mentioning the national interest of the area’s oil deposits. He even talked about the price of oil and what could happen if --- etc., etc. I saw news footage of these comments shortly after he’d said them. It seemed so out of character for him to mention the “o“ word, I expected the media to jump all over it. With the exception of Keith Olbermann, who did make a big deal of it on his nightly news show, the rest of the press corp must have been out playing golf, for there was nary a word about it from anywhere else in Big Media’s realm. In fact, Olbermann’s rant was rife with questions as to why this was so.

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Email: JerryG@postcman.info