Old World Order: Bush's News Conference

At Mr. Bush's news conference today, no one asked the simple question on my mind: "Mr. President, are your friends making money off the Iraq war? And if so, who and how much?"

The press pass tiger wannabes seemed to be pressing the president as best they could, but the lambs lie down inside the beltway. Mr. Bush makes up for his incompetence with sheer doggedness. He's of a mind to stay the course.

Overall, the news conference was a show of stubbornness and not much else. It seems that when it comes to facing his questioners/critics (or any journalists for that matter), the president will be a deer in the headlights all the way back to Crawford in January of '09. This is a man who would not be up to the task of being a good high school principal, and here he has to actually act like he might actually have to answer a tough question. A press badge is like a radioactive bullseye in the White House war room. The president is propped up behind the presidential seal while the man behind the curtain running the country is, as always, sealed off, clearly out of sight.

Mr. Bush is no longer saying that Iraq is the lynch pin in the Middle East. It's in such tatters that now Iran looms larger than at any time since the waning days of Jimmy Carter's ill-fated term. Pre-Reagan, and this time, there is no Reagan waiting in the wings, no great prognosticator on either side of the aisle.

Mr. Bush's idea of reform is the oldest world order there is: tribes fighting to the death over patches of sand from behind palm trees. Condi Rice and Robert Gates seem to be rather civilized people, but they are just pawns to the bigger game being played by the captains and kings of industry, mercenaries every one and nary a public servant in the bunch. State and Defense Department trips to the Gulf, even by the secretaries themselves, may be nothing more than smoke and mirrors, shuffling the deck while the high tech hounds of war lock onto their targets.

War that is prolonged, if not 'permanent,' is profitable and has deep pockets (to the tune of trillions). It is clear that Mr. Bush, above all else since getting out of the business of baseball, intends to keep it that way. And he says he is a president of peace. Isn't that enough right there to suggest he seek treatment?

Mr. Bush kindly put things in perspective when he said that "if you're interested in avoiding World War III," you'd better make sure to disarm every enemy nation (but our own, of course). The president is a cross between Don Quixote and Mr. Magoo, taking windmills for battle stations, turning stockpiles of weapons into motives for war, with no end in sight.

In other words, start worrying and learn to love the bombs.