No virtue in being pigheaded and great vice in being 'busholute'

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=18697

First Published 2006-12-11, Last Updated 2006-12-11 10:00:08

No virtue in being pigheaded and great vice in being 'busholute'


Now it appears that much of what has been discussed for years in the non-corporate media is coming to light in Baker’s report, with all key recommendations made in the report expressed by many of us long before the commissioning of the august panel over six months ago, says Ben Tanosborn.


Probably most of us had a favorite teacher, or two, at different learning periods of our formative years. I had one during my first teen year that left quite a mark. Still a novice, a year short of his final vows, “Father Superlative” appeared brilliant to us in several academic subjects, but how he dispensed philosophy through grammar was really his masterstroke. And it was during a basic course in “Logic, Psychology and Ethics” when his star really shined.

No adjective or adverb made its presence in our class without this almost-priest giving an eloquent dissertation on the positive, comparative and superlative forms it might have, and the implications of their use. And that’s where I had my first confrontation with the difference between being firm, becoming obstinate and making an ass of oneself as a pigheaded fool. For years I’ve been able to make use of the differentiation. Until now, that is; after the ascendance to the presidency of George W. Bush. Now a fourth state, one past superlative has entered the mix with this blasphemer of the language giving an unprecedented and overly inflated meaning to the term firm.

It all happened during that 2002 through 2006 trajectory in the implementation of US foreign policy in the Middle East; not just in Afghanistan and Iraq, but also the forgotten Palestine, and the caldron simmering in Lebanon. Bush stood firm in his desire for war, becoming obstinate in his unattainable victory endeavors, turning pigheaded to a no-win situation that should have been obvious for at least two years to his cabal..........