"BUSH Keeps Fear Alive-Because It Has Been So Useful"(WaPo Edit)

Using Our Fear

By Eugene Robinson

Friday, January 27, 2006; Page A23

Once upon a time we had a great wartime president who told Americans they had nothing to fear but fear itself. Now we have George W. Bush, who uses fear as a tool of executive power and as a political weapon against his opponents.

Franklin D. Roosevelt tried his best to allay his nation's fears in the midst of an epic struggle against fascism. Bush, as he leads the country in a war whose nature he is constantly redefining, keeps fear alive because it has been so useful. His political grand vizier, Karl Rove, was perfectly transparent the other day when he emerged from wherever he's been hiding the past few months -- consulting omens, reading entrails -- and gave the Republican National Committee its positioning statement for the fall elections: Vote for us or die.


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The thing is, fear works. The administration successfully invoked the fear of "mushroom clouds" to win support, or at least acquiescence, for the invasion of Iraq. By the time it was clear there were no weapons of mass destruction, the fear of losing to terrorists on the "central front" had been given primacy. We stopped hearing the name bin Laden so often -- no need to bring attention to the fact that he remained at large -- until reports emerged of secret CIA prisons, torture and domestic spying.

Bin Laden does remain a threat. He would hit the United States again if he could. We do expect the president to protect us. But a great wartime leader rallies his citizens by informing them and inspiring them. He certainly doesn't use threats to our national security for political gain. He doesn't just point at a map and say "Boo."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/26/AR2006012601478.html

One of the main reasons why I post on DU is to help kill the fear.

WE HAVE NOTHING TO FEAR,BUT FEAR ITSELF"!!!!

Kicked and nominated

this admin need to be revealed, understood, and rejected!

See! We can do it too. :>/

When I think on the results of the recent democratic elections in the Middle East, I can't help but think about the mindset prevalent in America during the 2004 election.

Rove ran a campaign designed to take advantage of what his Fear Machine had wrought. People who had no clue about the issues were constantly hearing (and listening) to a steady diet of "We've been attacked...George Bush is the man who will attack back! John Kerry wants to make DEALS!"

Fear voted in 2004. Unseemly, craven, "I don't care what you do to women, children, or my rights...SAVE ME!!" fear. They wanted the War Machine in power because rightly or wrongly they felt theatened...and wherever the Fear Machine failed, the Diebold Machine stepped in.

Why should anyone be surprised that Middle Eastern voters reacted to the same stimulus in the same way? They elected their own War Machines. It's simple psychology. So simple, in fact, that I'm half inclined to wonder if perhaps the election results in Iran and the Palestinian Authority didn't go down exactly as the neocons expected, providing more fuel for a Fear Machine which had started to sputter.