Peaceful Transition of Power

By Robert Fischer | Published: January 20, 2009

As we watch Bush leave the White House, I’d like to take a moment to call out the people who called him a fascist or accused him of plotting to postpone elections or retain power. You disrespected that man, and you were wrong. I hope you take a moment to understand how your misconception formed, and try to avoid jumping to such hasty conclusions in the future. That kind of hyperbole isn’t necessary and isn’t helpful to building our future together.

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  • Josh Reed

    I’d also add that the inauguration, while exciting, is simply one politician leaving office and being replaced by another politician. Excitement and hope is fine, but should be tempered with a healthy dose of skepticism. Up to this point Obama has done nothing more than the last winner of American Idol–won a popularity contest based largely on potential rather than accomplishments. Actions speak louder than words. We can all share a collective sigh of relief when he actually starts delivering on his promises.

  • http://www.vitarara.org/ Mark Menard

    Wow, very strong words. I agree with them all. If the fears of the extremists on the left were to be believed this day would never have come. This transition and the smoothness of it, which the Obama team have spoken of, should accrue to Bush’s credit. (Even if nothing else does, but history will tell that story.)

    Mark

  • Brian

    OK. I’ll bite- because I was one of the people worried that Bush *MIGHT* want to declare himself a dictator.

    What could possibly have made me imagine that he might do that? Was it the illegal spying? Torturing? The detainment of US citizens without due process? Maybe it was the way he lied us into wars of aggression against countries that didn’t, and weren’t going to, attack us. Maybe it was the theory of the unitary executive- that if the President does it, it’s not illegal (thus making the President above the law, and making the correct term for that position “King” not “President”). Maybe it was the “signing statements”, where the President decided to make his own laws, or maybe it was the unprecedented secrecy of the Bush administration even before 9-11 (remember the Energy Policy?) that blossomed into full-blown paranoia afterwards. Maybe it was the “free speech” zones. Maybe it’s the fact that I’m living in a Consitution-free zone.

    Of course, it’s just insane to think that a man who violated law after law, sacred principle after sacred principle, might be willing to violate another law and/or sacred principle. I have no idea how I managed to jump to that conclusion.

    And, simply because he’s voluntarily stepped down from power doesn’t mean he’s not a fascist, it simply means he’s not a fascist dictator.

    And it also doesn’t mean that we’re not well on our way to becoming a fascist dictatorship- it just means that when (if) we do, it won’t be George W. Bush as dictator. All of the crimes Bush & co. committed are being validated, in that we’re not punishing them. And if they’re not punished, are they really crimes? So the next Republican Dicta, er, President, will be able to pick up right where Bush left off, torturing, spying, ignoring the law and the Constitution and basic human decency.

    Who’s to say the next guy won’t make a bid for the whole enchilada? Especially given the near unlimited ability to indefinitely detain and torture anyone who dares oppose him? Remember, all that is necessary for this is to happen is for the President to declare that someone is an Enemy Combatant, and that person’s rights disappear. Now, Bush used that ability sparingly, and only against shady characters with swarthy skin, but that right is now an established prerogative of the Presidency.

    George Bush has committed crimes that sixty years ago we hung people for committing. He has dismantled many of our hard-won and hard-defended Constitutional rights, including many of the most important ones. Just about the only crime he hasn’t committed is elevating himself to Dictator, but he has enshrined the ability of some future President to do precisely that. He has thus imperiled American Democracy. “Disrespect” seems hardly a strong enough word for my opinion of George W. Bush.

  • Josh Reed

    Obama has already shown where he stands on illegal spying and telecom immunity–no better than Bush. Let’s hope he can do better on some of the other issues you’ve raised Brian.

  • Brian

    Obama isn’t a plaster saint. But his administration is going to be less corrupt and powerful than Bush’s, not because of anything Obama does or doesn’t do, but because it won’t be allowed to be. The Clinton rules are back in effect, and any scandal will be flogged unto death. There will be none of the shrugging and “ah well”s and “boys will be boys” sort of responses that greeted each Bush atrocity. Plus, there is a significant minority of both houses that stand ready to impeach Obama for jaywalking. If Obama tried asserting the privileges of the unitary executive, he’d be impeached so fast his head would spin.

  • Josh Reed

    On the Bush front, I agree with you completely–he’s a bad man and he’s done a lot to damage to all aspects of this country. I’m not defending the guy, I didn’t vote for him either election, but as you alluded to in your first comment (paraphrasing)–if he gets away with it, is it really a crime. We let him get away with it, both by not seeing through his lies and (re-)electing him and by not electing or properly motivating our elected officials to call him on his crimes. You may not be personally to blame for this, obviously there’s a limit to what each individual can do, but ultimately the blame for Bush’s crimes rests on all of our shoulders. In my opinion, your vitriol for him is wasted (except for maybe your own personal gratification) as it accomplishes nothing and the effort is better spent trying to improve the system so that similar things can’t happen in the future.

    I also think your assessment of the current situation is right; Obama won’t be able to get away with the things Bush did. I see this ‘hostile’ environment as a good thing. Judging from the media coverage and conversations with friends and family, Obama appears to have a reality distortion field to rival Steve Jobs. I will sleep better at night knowing there’s a significant minority of Congress just waiting for any scandal to impeach him. Hopefully it will keep his administration honest and will counteract any ‘blinds eye’ the public is willing to turn. As a person who voted for Obama, I was deeply saddened by his stance on the illegal spying Bush chartered and really by not calling Bush out on many of the crimes he commits. This only serves to prove that Obama, like Bush, is a politician first and a defender of our rights second.

  • Brian

    The problem is that the Republicans are not suddenly discovering their inner-law-and-order-ness and becoming vigilant in the enforcement of the law. It’s that the Republicans are simply looking for an excuse. With a decade of distance, can you really say that Monica was all about enforcing the law? And keep a straight face while doing so? Please. And you can’t tell me that Clinton had a reality distortion field about him. It was about kneecapping a popular and effective Democratic president. It was about, to use a phrase, criminalizing politics.

    The crime Obama is really guilty of, in the eyes of those leading the Republican party, is being a Democrat.

  • Josh Reed

    You act as if the Republicans have a monopoly on the ‘us vs them’ mentality. Wasn’t one of Obama’s big campaigning points that he was going to end the partisanship? That tells me that the problem is endemic on both sides of the aisles.

    Clinton? Who cares? it’s done and over with. I don’t think it was a matter of enforcing the law, but I think it was embarrassing and highly disrespectful to the people of this country and sends the wrong sort of image to the world. I don’t care what a person does on their own time, but getting elected President comes with certain responsibilities, one of which is not to be caught doing questionable things. He knew the rules when he went entered office. He also should have known the political climate enough to realize he wasn’t going to get away with it. I think he was a great President, but I have no sympathy for the guy and don’t place blame on anyone but him. Least of all the Republicans.

    I get it, you’re a hardcore Democrat. That’s cool. I’ve avoided the koolaid from either of the parties long enough to realize that they’re both equally as flawed and full of bullshit. We may disagree on a lot of things, but you can’t honestly sit there and tell me the the current two party system is not completely and utterly broken, and that a lot of the problems you’re bitching about are not a consequence of only having the choice of two slimy politicians.

    In the end, while I admire the strength of your beliefs in a particular political party, I think you personify the very “not one of us” mentality that you were vilifying above. Ultimately it damages political progress in this country to not be skeptical of people on both sides of the aisles, and to be actively fighting for more choice in the people we elect to office.

    Just my $0.02. I’m sure you disagree with things along the way. I’ve said my piece, so I’ll let you follow up with the final word.

    Cheers,
    Josh

  • Brian

    So let’s take this one step at a time. As for me being a “die hard Democrat” who “drank the koolaid”, not too long ago I damned near quit the Democrat party out of disgust. Trust me, I am well aware of the limitations and problems of the Democratic party. But if this somehow makes me more reputable, more intelligent, in your eyes, then you’re missing the point. Ask instead why I came back.

    The two-party system isn’t broken, it’s inevitable. Every representative republic on this planet has developed large center-left and center-right parties, which represent the bulk of the political power. Why? Because to get anything done, you’ve got to be part of a majority. Which means you have to compromise.

    The only thing different about the US system is the compromises happens earlier in the process. Notice that both parties are, in fact, coalitions of a number of different factions- the neocons, libertarians, corporatists, religious right, and nativists in the Republican party, the ecologists, femminists, unions, blacks, immigrants, liberals, etc., in the Democratic party. But make no mistake, the compromise happens everywhere. That’s democracy. That how democracy works. No one gets everything their way- a political system where there is someone who always gets their way isn’t a democracy, it’s some form of autocracy.

    And whine all you want about the tyranny of the majority, but consider this: the tyranny of the majority has that no other tyranny has: the best odds of you being part of the tyranny.

    But this is also the fundamental problem with democracy- to get into the majority, you’re going to have to compromise. Which means you’re guaranteed not to be totally happy with the result. In fact, most of the time the result will be barely acceptable to you. And the id is not on board with this concept at all- it keeps asking why you should keep having to compromise all the time. Why can’t, just once, everyone just do what you want?

    Unfortunately, everyone else’s id is asking the exact same question. Which means that- baring you becoming a dictator- that’s not going to happen. The choice isn’t between “barely acceptable” and something better, it’s between “barely acceptable” and nothing at all. Because if you demand everything, and give up nothing, then everyone else has absolutely no reason to compromise with you, to give you anything.

    This is why I came back to the Democrats- the choice isn’t between the Democrats or some better party being in charge, it’s the choice between the Democrats or some worse party being in charge. Yes, I compromised to be part of the Democratic party. But this way, I at least have a hope of getting to “barely acceptable”.

    This is a lesson the Republicans are going to have to learn. I comment- Obama negotiated with the Republicans on the stimulus bill. He compromised with them- adding tax cuts and removing some things from the bill. You think we liberals like this bill? He didn’t have to do either of those. And what did he get for his willingness to compromise? Nothing. Not a single Republican voted for the bill. Of course, this was the fault of Obama, because to our national media, “compromise” means giving the Republicans everything.

    Unfortunately for the Republicans, sooner or later Obama is going to realize three things: 1) that compromising with the Republicans will not help, will not bring any Republicans on board, 2) that the media’s going to paint any failure of bipartisanship as Obama’s fault, no matter what, and 3) Obama doesn’t need Republican help to get things passed, he has large majorities in both houses.

    Secondly, cynicism is neither hip nor smart. It’s intellectual laziness masquerading as hip and smart. Someone who doesn’t believe in anything is just as intellectually lazy as the person who believes in everything. Look, see, Clinton lied about his sex life, Bush lied about the reasons we were going to war. See! Both are liars, both are exactly the same! And I’m sure Obama lied about something, some where, some when! And worst of all, they’re all politicians! The simple fact that someone ran for elected office is all the proof we need that they’re the scum of the earth. We don’t have to think about things at all, no ugly complicated gray areas to consider, no circumstances to understand, no significance to judge, no compromises to be made. Thinking is hard, let’s go shopping!

    The id likes this- no compromises, and you get to be as selfish as you like. And on top of that, you get to be right, things are going to hell in a hand basket (“for evil to triumph, all that is necessary is for good men to do nothing”). And no intellectual effort is required beyond that of coming up with good comebacks. And whatever happens is not your fault- no one is listening to you. You get a trifecta of immediate emotional rewards.

    I hope I’ve caused you to think about some things. But, unfortunately, I’m willing to bet that I haven’t. Please prove me wrong.

  • Josh Reed

    I said I wouldn’t respond, but I feel the need to. If nothing else to prove that I have thought about things.

    Where you’ve missed the point is that in all of my comments I’ve done nothing but advocate skepticism and critical examination of all politicians, on both sides of the aisle, regardless of where you may stand. I may have been a touch cynical, but not because it was hip or smart, but because one simply has to look at the current state of this country as a whole and try not to be cynical. No where along the lines did I make generalizing remarks or encourage people not to examine the issues for themselves. Political activism seems to be all the rage these days, which by and large is a good thing, as long as it is done responsibly. Aligning myself with a particular party doesn’t mean I give the members of that party a free pass while I’m out lambasting the “other party”. This is simply intellectual laziness masquerading as political activism.

    As for the two party system being broken, I’ve thought it over and I still don’t think it’s inevitable. At the most fundamental level, everything decomposes to two groups–the yays and nays–for a particular issue. I’ll also concede that if you take a sample of votes from a group of politicians, then you may see strong correlation. However, trying to put politicians into two bins, Democrats and Republicans is a gross oversimplification and in my opinion is very dangerous. Democrat and Republican are worthless terms because they’re arbitrary and amorphous, and they obscure what’s really important–the issues. You said it yourself, they’re is a whole rainbow of factions within each party. Furthermore, the definition of Democrat and Republican has changed over time. A Democrat today is not the same as a Democrat 50 years ago.

    The danger comes in when people, both the voters and the politicians, start thinking in terms of parties instead of the issues. By placing the emphasis on classifying politicians into one or the other party, it encourages them to vote along party lines. It also makes it easier for bad politicians to stay in office because all they have to do is vote with their party to keep they classification of Democrat or Republican. This leads me to the other danger of emphasizing Democrat or Republican–it encourages political apathy and ignorance by taking the spotlight off first the issues and second the person running for office. What’s the difference between someone choosing (or so apathetic) not to vote and someone going to the polls and voting ‘R’ down the ticket with no consideration to the politician or platform? Absolutely nothing! No thought went into either.

    Sadly a lot of people in this country choose not to vote. What’s even more sad (IMO) is that a large group of people who take the time to vote do so ill-prepared to make an informed decision. “My parents were Democrats, so I’m a Democrat”, “Those liberals just want to raise taxes and increase the size of the government”, “I’ll never vote for a black president”, “I’m voting for Obama because he’s black”. All examples of ignorance I’ve personally seen on the television and in person. By dumbing things down to Democrat or Republican, we only encourage this ignorance and also the pandering to party politics among politicians. This is not to say that everyone that says “I’m a Democrat” or “I’m a Republican” is ignorant. I’m sure if you were put on the spot you could name of several issues you feel strongly about and that the majority of Democrats feel the same way. So just to be clear, I’m not lumping you in the ignorant category, I’m simply pointing out that it exists and is a product of the emphasis placed on two party politics.

    So what’s the solution? I may be naive, but I honestly think this country would be better off if the no one talked about Democrat-this or Republican-that and if politicians were encouraged to vote their conscience. It would force the voters to take a harder look at a particular politicians voting record and make an informed decision on the issues that matter the most to the voter. Bad politicians will inevitably find their way into office, but focusing on their voting records would help us weed out the bad apples and replace them with politicians that better represent their constituents. You may worry about progress, but I think the progress you mention in your previous comment comes from the perspective of someone firmly entrenched in party politics. In my mind, every issue voted on is progress, regardless of whether I agree with the result of the vote or not.

    I know would feel far more confidence in the direction of this country if it was being decided by politicians, voted into office by informed voters, and guided by their conscience rather than what they need to do to keep some arbitrary moniker placed on them. Will it ever happened? I doubt it. Voters are either too firmly entrenched in the arbitrary classifications being used or too lazy to actually inform themselves about the issues at hand.

    You’re right, cynicism is not hip and smart, but neither is ignoring what really matters–the issues–and not political parties. There’s no more progress or damage done by a vote not cast in cynicism than a vote cast along party lines in ignorance. One could argue that there’s actually more damage done by the ignorant vote. At least the person not voting has left the decision up to the (hopefully) better informed voters rather than introducing noise into the system. I think we can both agree that encouraging people to educate themselves, regardless of how they end up voting is a good thing.

    Hopefully in the last 8 or so paragraphs, I’ve convinced you that I have indeed ‘thought about some things’. If you truly meant what you said, then you’ve lost your bet as I’ve intelligently addressed your points and debated my point of view. In which case, having lost the bet I think you owe me a 6 pack of beer. :) However, if by ‘think about things’ you meant give up and come over to your way of thinking, then I guess you’ve ‘won’–you’ve done nothing to convince me that encouraging people to think beyond simply the monikers of Democrat or Republican is not a worthwhile endeavor.

    I’ll leave you with two of my favorite quotes:
    “Just imagine politics with its dumbbell element subtracted. There would be no Republican candidates. There would be no Democratic voters. The whole system would collapse.”
    and
    “The price of apathy towards public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”

    Cheers,
    Josh

  • Brian

    I had hoped to convince you that it was at least theoretically possible that my lifelong support of the Democratic party didn’t arise simply because I was so stupid and brainwashed that I’d willingly drink poison, and that it could, just possibly, have arisen from careful, skeptical thought over many years. Because if I haven’t even managed to pass that low bar, nothing else I say has any hope of making any impact at all.

    I’ll see your six pack, and raise you double or nothing that you can not convince me that you haven’t drunk the koolaid. Literally, in this case- that you haven’t been convinced to give people committing the worst crimes a pass, simply because their opponents aren’t plaster saints. Make mine Coca cola, however- I don’t drink beer.

    Returning to the us-vrs-them mentality for a moment, I’d like to leave you with this quote:

    “Mark my word,” he said, “if and when these preachers get control of the party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. The government won’t work without it. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.” He had absolutely no doubt that these people had made Washington more divisive than it had ever been, and he was concerned that their divisiveness was spreading throughout the country.

    I’ll let you figure out who the “he” is in this paragraph, and who the author is. Although I recommend reading the whole book. It is very relevant to this discussion.

  • Josh Reed

    You haven’t addressed any of my points, Brian; I’m not even sure you read my comment.

    No where along the lines did I say you were stupid or brainwashed for being a Democrat. I even specifically said:

    This is not to say that everyone that says “I’m a Democrat” or “I’m a Republican” is ignorant. I’m sure if you were put on the spot you could name of several issues you feel strongly about and that the majority of Democrats feel the same way.

    My point was (and it was clearly stated throughout my previous comment): putting emphasis on classifying politicians as ‘Republicans’ or ‘Democrats’ obscures what is really important: the issues and where the politician stands on those issues. Furthermore, grossly oversimplifying things only perpetuates political ignorance among the voters as they no longer have to think about the issues at hand but simply decide if they’re red or blue based on some arbitrary definition of what makes a Republican or a Democrat. In short, people should strive to educate themselves about the issues and the politician’s voting record rather than worrying about whether the politician is a Democrat or a Republican.

    As for me being “convinced to give people committing the worst crimes a pass”, I never said what Bush did wasn’t wrong and that he shouldn’t be punished. If Obama’s administration decided to prosecute Bush and the people that enabled him for their crimes, I (as well as most of the country) would firmly support it. Obama had a chance with the telecom immunity and chose not to. I personally wish he had gone after the people spying on us citizens and sent a strong message. I have no doubt that there will be far less abuse of it under Obama, but who knows about the person elected into office after him. It would have sent a strong message and affirmed that what was done was wrong and unacceptable. However, with limited time and resources to make progress I’d much rather the administration focus on moving this country forward than tracking down every person that conspired with Bush and punishing them. This is the precedent that Obama has set. It doesn’t mean that Bush was right or shouldn’t be punished; it simply means there’s a better use of our time, money, and effort. It all boils down to the necessary evil of politics: compromise. You espouse it but are unwilling to accept it in this case.

    Your quote is interesting and relevant; it’s true of the preachers as well as any close-minded group, liberal, conservative, right wing, left wing, or otherwise. A man is what he does and not what he says (or what he calls himself). Calling myself a Democrat doesn’t make me any more open-minded or ‘right’ than my neighbor down the street who calls himself a Republican or my neighbor up the street who says she’s undecided. It certainly doesn’t mean I should egg my Republican neighbor’s house because of what Bush did or how Clinton was treated. If my neighbors and I sat down and debated the issues, we’d learn at least two things: 1) we don’t fit neatly into one party or the other and 2) we aren’t as different as the terms Republican and Democrat would have us believe. So given how arbitrary the terms ‘Democrat’ and ‘Republican’ really are, why continue to put such emphasis on them?

  • silk

    Well the original point was quite valid anyway. The “omg the president will use x y or z to stay in power” comes up from the wing nuts on every presidential transition, left or right. Bush may have pushed the lines on this or that law, but that’s hardly reason to expect him to declare himself dictator, especially when he’s been giving speeches and comments for at least a year that he would soon be gone. On top of that it was pretty obvious that he had senioritis and his general attitude was so “I’m so over this crap”.

  • Brian

    So, just out of curiosity, what’s the color of the sky on your planet? I live on earth, where the sky is blue, and Bush didn’t “push the lines” on a few laws. He broke them. And not the little ones, like jay walking or speed limits either.

    The ones that, not too long ago, we hung people by the next for until dead for committing.

    But hey, lying about your sex life, torturing innocent human beings, it’s all the same, right? It’s just politics. And actually bringing these facts up makes me “shrill” and “partisan” and probably “unhinged”. Fine.

    A question, though: what, short of the government coming around and throwing your ass into a concentration camp (which, I comment, we’ve already started constructing), would make you rethink your position? What possible crime could the Republicans commit to make you think “wait, this is not just those whiny liberal jerks with their Bush Derangement Syndrome, these are actually bad people”?

    And for the record, I’m getting more than a little pissed at Obama for continuing these self same policies. We haven’t shut down gitmo, we haven’t pulled out Iraq, we haven’t even started either. The slim hope I’m holding on to for the Obama administration is that a successful health care reform will a) give him a big boost in political capital, and b) teach him that he doesn’t need to give either the Republicans or the Media the time of day, and allow him to stop the crimes of the Bush administration, and maybe even prosecute them.

    If he doesn’t, then I’m done with Obama. Obama will be no better than Bush.

  • Brian

    Josh: sorry, I somehow missed your comment. You did say I had “drunk the koolaid”. Here’s a hint: follow the link I supplied, and learn the origin of that phrase. Simply because somebody consistently votes for one party doesn’t mean they are ignorant or uninformed- because the party labels are not completely irrelevant to a politicians positions on the issues- there is, in fact, a very high correlation on a politicians positions and their political party. Not an identity, not 100%, but still high.

  • Brian

    Oh, and third comment: if your response includes an admission that Bush committed serious crimes (like torturing innocent people, invading countries that hadn’t attacked us on false pretenses, warrantless spying on the American people, etc), please include an explanation as to why it was so beyond the pale to believe that maybe, just maybe, he might have been willing to commit yet more crimes (like overthrowing democracy).

    Robert, this goes for you too.

  • silk

    Brian> “But hey, lying about your sex life, torturing innocent human beings, it’s all the same, right? It’s just politics. And actually bringing these facts up makes me “shrill” and “partisan” and probably “unhinged”. Fine.”

    Eh… who said you were shrill or unhinged? You were the only one that said that, ironically kind of making it seem true.

    Brian> “A question, though: what, short of the government coming around and throwing your ass into a concentration camp (which, I comment, we’ve already started constructing), would make you rethink your position? What possible crime could the Republicans commit to make you think “wait, this is not just those whiny liberal jerks with their Bush Derangement Syndrome, these are actually bad people”?”"

    I would rethink my position, which was agreeing with the original post regarding “but that’s hardly reason to expect him to declare himself dictator” (and postponing the election/staying in office) if Bush had, in fact, declared himself a dictator and was still in office. I made no comment regarding whether these are good or bad people, please respond to actual posts, not your inner demons.

  • http://www.smokejumperit.com Robert Fischer

    Let me put it this way: a set of information lead to conclusion A. Experience has shown ~A to be true. Therefore, something is wrong with the set of information leading to conclusion A. At the point when ~A is shown to be true, it’s time to analyze what lead to conclusion A. That’s all my post said.

  • http://www.smokejumperit.com Robert Fischer

    A few more clarifications on my position.

    If you were concerned or threatened about the powers being isolated in the executive during the Bush administration and the secrecy involved in wielding those powers, then I am right there with you. (I’m still there, having seen little out of Obama’s administration and the newly-dominant Democrats to ease my mind. This EFF press release pretty well illustrates the continuity of the civil liberties crisis under Obama, and the Obama DoJ’s tight relationship with the RIAA and about-face on military commissions for Gitmo detainees isn’t helping my confidence any.)

    If your statements or thinking about politics were probabilistic, then your beliefs aren’t subject to being disproved (although the one experimental data point is against your statements/thinking), and so discussing whether or not they’re “reasonable” is rather pointless1. Since this is reality and not some random dice game, it’d be nice if probabilistic statements that turned out to be false could account for their failures, and anyone who made a probabilistic statement that turned out to be false and then accounts for that failure substantially raises their credit in my books. However, I realize that in this world of Realpolitik the key point of probabilistic statements is the ability for people to throw them around without being held accountable for their wrongness later, and so I don’t expect much.

    The important part in all of this is that we give credit where credit is due: to those who foresaw what actually occurred. Similarly, we should treat with increased cynicism those sources of information and hype which predicted things that turned out to be false. And if we became wrapped up in a paradigm which brought us to expect a future that never came to pass, we should be particularly concerned — after all, these people were capable of taking us for a ride and alienating our expectations from the impending reality.

    1 Given conversations about a known past event, it is reasonable to believe the known past event happened and unreasonable to believe the known past event didn’t. Bush left the most office in the world with civility and peace, despite Bush’s successor having run a campaign based largely on capitalizing on Bush’s failures. That’s a known past event.

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