Train wreck

Avedon Carol takes on the ridiculous but maddening Either/Or argument supporters of Bush and his private little war have been imposing upon all debates about the debacle in Iraq.

For her post, Onward Bushian Soldiers, in which she also deals with the absolutely relgious faith in the man many of Bush's supporters hang their arguments on and makes the case that the real target of the war on terror has since the beginning been not foreign terrorists but American Liberals, Avedon's found the perfect quote exemplifying that Either/Or-ishness.

Each of us has a Hobbesian choice concerning Iraq; either we hope for the vindication of Bush's risky, very possibly reckless policy, or we are in de facto alliance with the killers of American soldiers and Iraqi civilians.

Avedon analyzes this according to its own internal logic:

Note that the alternative possibility that Bush will somehow think better of his reckless policy and do something that might work (or even that Divine Providence will intervene), isn't in this equation - you must either believe in the impossible or you support the enemy.

Most interestingly, your "good" option isn't defined as peace or even as just "the good guys win", it's defined as Bush's vindication.  It's all about him, as usual.

For the sophisticated Machiavellians among them, there's genius in this agrument because it is all about George Bush; it keeps Bush's image tied to the war, which is better for him even if it is a losing war, because whenever his image gets tied to domestic policies his poll numbers nosedive.  (I should say there was genius in it, as lately Bush's tanking in the polls is due as much to his screwing up the war as to his screwing up the ecomomy.)   It is also genius because it forces people who disagree into having to trumpet their patriotism and hatred of terrorists first, and it's never very persuasive to start a fight from a defensive crouch.

But for the run of the mill supporters of Bush and his war, they mean the argument.  They think they think this.  Avedon explains the fundamental blockheadness here---"they can't seem to absorb the possibility that people just plain think the policy itself is not workable"---and then she delivers the perfect metaphor. I've been working on my own metaphor and looking for an opportunity to use it.  Something about us all trapped inside a burning house and supporters of the war accusing anybody who points out that the house is about to collapse around our ears of wanting the fire to win.  But I like Avedon's metaphor much better.  She says:

...they evade the serious debate over the efficacy of the policy by dragging us all into the path of a speeding train and claiming that those who warn that we need to get off the tracks are actually cheering for the train to crush us. Bush says we will defeat the train, and the only reason we might think otherwise is that we have a pathological hatred of Bush, which means we must actually hope that the train will prove him wrong - even if it kills us.

Accurate, urgent, and eloquent.

Comments

[Avedon]

I like yours, too, but i'd like it even better if you hadn't misspelled my name twice. ;)

[Lance]

Not twice, AC. Three times! Actually, four, since I caught the first one myself and fixed it before I posted. Sorry about that. I don't know what was wrong with my fingers and eyes this afternoon, but I fixed the misspellings.

[blue girl]

The right-wingers are experts at the either/or arguments. And it's a real advantage to them when communicating to the millions in this country who don't pay close attention. It a bully tactic and it works for them.

I had this comment on my blog a few days ago: "If you do not trust our government then who in the hell do you trust?? Do you trust the Al-Quida and other muslum extremists??"

Um. Huh?

The metaphor I've been pondering for the last several months is more obscure -- it's this:

I compare our situation in Iraq to a city -- where all the traffic lights are broken. So, we send our children into the streets to direct traffic. But just the children who volunteer for this community service. It's so much cheaper than replacing all the lights.

Our kids keep getting killed, one by one, every day or so by impatient and bad drivers. And when some of the people become enraged about this and just want the damn traffic lights replaced, they are accused of -- not wanting people to be able to drive to work, to shop, etc. And they also remind us that our kids volunteered for this service and they believed in what they were doing for their community! And of course, they accuse us of not supporting our kids.

[Exiled in NJ]

Metaphor? Heller summed it up in two words forty-plus years ago: Catch 22. The Bushian faithful do not read their Bible, they read Milo Minderbender, and Bushie bears a certain resemblance to Milo also.

[mamayaga]

I think driftglass put it perfectly when the idiot Tom Friedman invoked the either/or canard a while back.

[blue girl]

mamayaga-- that was a great post. Thanks for the link.

[Hardy]

Lance, Hobbesian choice? I think she means Hobson's choice, which is not either/or, but no choice at all.