- Once upon a time there was a President named George who
wanted to be Emperor. (Not a bad idea. He was a lousy President. He really
needed a different job.)
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- President George had traveled to Mexico-once. So he figured
the whole world was pretty much like Texas. He thought about it for, oh,
five minutes. What he needed was a country far, far away to invade. Surely
those foreigners would be charmed by his folksy swagger (being more primitive
and all). They'd appreciate him more than those Gosh Darn Americans, who
had awfully high expectations of a President. Why, he imagined these foreigners
would bow and scrape and wow over his every golf shot.
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- So he pulled out a map. And he saw Iraq--- with a "Q."
And he asked one of his ministers what he'd heard about this place. The
minister's eyes got bright: "Ohhh," he said. "Iraq's got
oil and pipelines. We could make some serious profits if we grabbed Baghdad,
and tossed its rulers in the trash can of history."
-
- Well, if there was one thing President George understood,
it was oil profits. That's what paid for those Black Helicopters ferrying
rich folks to private parties in Houston. Absolutely everybody who was
anybody had a helo-pad on their ranch. So when George heard about Iraq's
oil, he saw his destiny. He would be Emperor of the World from Texas to
Baghdad.
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- President George called all his Republican friends to
a Grand Old Party, where he proclaimed his vision. He promised to share
Iraq's oil wealth (so they could ride in helicopters and private jets,
too). And he started handing out military contracts by the fistful.
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- And the Republicans declared, "This is a Democracy.
We vote to make you Emperor."
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- And George answered, "Amen."
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- There was just one pesky Little Female who would not
shut her mouth! He called her "Miss Bossy Boots," and he hated
her like nobody else. She was T-R-O-U-B-L-E!!! See, she'd been a covert
back channel to Iraqi diplomats at the United Nations in New York years
before he ever got to be President. And she shrieked from the rooftops
and banged on every door on Capitol Hill, warning this War with Iraq would
be catastrophic.
-
- Some of his opponents compared her to Cassandra, who
prophesied the defeat of Troy. Miss Bossy Boots kept raving that War in
Iraq "would cost $1.6 Trillion-" not the puny $300 billion that
his allies insisted on. She declared it would "bankrupt the Middle
Class, create upward pressure on taxes, and push Wall Street into a double-dip
recession." This lady had spunk, everybody agreed. But she was determined
to rain on his parade, insisting the wannabe Emperor had no clothes.
-
- Worst of all, her CIA team had negotiated a comprehensive
peace framework that annihilated every possible justification for War.
Through her covert back channel, Iraq had consented to 1) resume weapons
inspections; 2) invite an FBI Task Force into Baghdad, with authorization
to conduct terrorism investigations; and 3) deliver priority contracts
to American corporations in telecommunications; health care, hospital equipment
and pharmaceuticals; and non-dual use factory equipment.
-
- Why, Iraq had agreed to import 1 million American manufactured
automobiles from Detroit and Indiana every year for 10 years!
-
- The CIA's peace option would mean good jobs with good
salaries for American workers, so they could consume endlessly, pumping
up profits on Wall Street. If that wasn't annoying enough, Iraq was ready
to give America all the Oil Contracts it wanted.
-
- Why, Baghdad even proposed a highly innovative plan for
democratic reforms. They offered to repatriate exiles and house them at
expanded Embassy compounds protected by Embassy security. Returning exiles
would be allowed to establish political parties, and compete in national
elections overseen by America's favorite ex-President, Jimmy Carter. So
the Democracy card was out of play, too.
-
- Miss Bossy Boots! That bitch accomplished it all without
the deployment of a single soldier or the death of one Iraqi child.
-
- Damnit! President George wanted to be Emperor. And he
needed this War to do it.
-
- Just about this time, spies from his Intelligence Services
uncovered a rag tag conspiracy hatched over a campfire in a cave in Pakistan.
Kicking over the coals, the wild-eyed young conspirators dreamed of hijacking
airplanes and striking a famous building in New York City. George smirked.
That suited his plans perfectly. If the attack achieved maximum destruction,
George could lay the blame on Iraq--- and he'd have all the excuse for
War that a President- er, an Emperor- could desire.
-
- Here came Miss Bossy Boots again! She'd got wind of that
terrorist conspiracy, too, and she wasn't playing the game. That stupid
woman kept trying to get law enforcement to cooperate with her Intelligence
team to block the attack!
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- FEMALES! He snorted and sulked and pouted!
-
- Now George might have been a lousy President, but a life-time
of mediocrity had taught him how to attack anybody who threatened to expose
his weaknesses. Getting rid of her would require a degree of ruthlessness.
But an Emperor had to be ready to sacrifice his country and his people
for his own ambition.
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- George knew what to do. He declared that anybody who
opposed his War against Iraq would be guilty of Treason. His friends in
Congress rushed through a law called the "Patriot Act." It declared
that troublemakers and truth tellers could be detained without a trial
or hearing, facing secret charges, secret evidence and secret grand jury
testimony. They could be locked in prison "indefinitely," until
they got wise to who was boss! And it wasn't "the power of the people-"
like those demonstrators kept shouting outside his bedroom window at the
White House.
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- Emperor George gave the order for Miss Bossy Boots to
be thrown in a dungeon --- on a military base in Texas far away from the
Talking Heads in Washington. He strutted around the Oval Office, celebrating
his triumph, while his advisers giggled hysterically. She'd be helpless
in Texas. Not one of those prison guards would listen to her stories about
the dangers of invading Iraq, because they'd never traveled beyond Mexico,
either. And those military generals running the base would do their part.
They wouldn't want their soldiers to hear her rants, while they were packing
up to become cannon fodder in Baghdad.
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- Just for good measure, Emperor George declared her "incompetent."
-
- Oh he would teach that female a lesson alright! Miss
Bossy Boots would make a good scapegoat. If the War got tough, Emperor
George would insist it was all her fault! He would blame her for "poor
intelligence before the War." The more outrageous the lie the better
its chance of success, after all. As the coup de gras, she would be denied
the right to a Trial. That way she could never call witnesses to dispute
the government's phony stories about Pre-War Intelligence. And she could
never expose the government's advance knowledge of that hijacking conspiracy.
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- Who said Emperor George wasn't a genius? Hey, didn't
Troy make out okay in the end? He couldn't remember. Miss Bossy Boots would
know. Given five minutes, she'd probably try to tell him. Well, by golly,
he wasn't going to listen!
-
- With a shit-eater's grin, he shipped her off to prison
on Carswell Air Force Base.
-
- Except the War didn't go as planned. The Iraqi people
were not so primitive as Emperor George anticipated. They fought hard for
freedom and the right not to live under a violent Foreign Occupation. American
soldiers were hated. None of the other world leaders trusted Emperor George,
and America's pre-eminence and moral authority collapsed on the world stage.
-
- Blaming Miss Bossy Boots didn't work, either. The Middle
Class was too smart for that game. They knew Emperor George and his friends
in Congress were to blame for pushing the country into this stupid and
unnecessary War. The Middle Class survived every day confronting the damage
and losses to the domestic economy, caused by the massive deficit spending
and national debt to pay for this failed Empire. They watched money dry
up for schools and parks. Roads and bridges got bad and started to break
apart. There was no money for police or teachers. Little boys and girls
couldn't grow up to become firefighters-which looked like the best job
in the world for 10 year olds, who dreamed of becoming heroes. Ordinary
people couldn't afford medicine.
-
- Emperor George packed his bags and tried to sneak out
of town to live out his days on his ranch back home in Texas.
-
- As he was driving away, the crowds lined the streets
and he could hear them shout:
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- "Ain't no power, like the power of the people, 'cause
the power of the people don't stop. No way."
-
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- ____________
-
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- Susan Lindauer is the author of "Extreme Prejudice:
The Terrifying Story of the Patriot Act and the Cover Ups of 9/11 and Iraq--"
This humble tale mirrors her work in Pre-War Intelligence, right down to
the peace option and advance knowledge of 9/11. It describes the unbelievable
brutality she suffered when Republican leaders decided to crush her opposition
to the War, including the year she spent in prison on Carswell Air Force
Base.
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