Generalissimo

Generalissimo (2001)

If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier...just as long as I am the dictator.
--George W. Bush, 12-18-2000

The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
--Winston Churchill

I'm the commander -- see, I don't need to explain -- I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being President.
--George W. Bush, as quoted in Bush at War by Bob Woodward

It's Greek Theater -- complete with padded flight suit phallus. Our self-described "war president" forgets that in satyr theatre a horse's tail was often tied to the back end. From City Dionysia:

In the satyr play the chorus members (who belonged to a Dionysian society) dressed up as the god's companions to celebrate his vital power. Its subject was related to that of the tragedies, but brought the hero down a peg by its earthy humor.

[...]

There were two or three actors, a reed-flute player, and a chorus of twelve, who were dressed as tipsy silenoi (horse-men), satyrs (goat-men) or various blends of the two. Thus they wore short pants to which a large phallus and a horse's tail were attached; they also wore soft dancing shoes that resembled hooves.

[...]

More common in the satyr play than in tragedy was the dance figure known as "peering" or the "owl dance," in which the chorus looked around as though searching for something -- part of the message of the satyr play.

On the Washington stage, the drama of a horse's ass is playing out. And the public has switched to comedy mode. No one's buying tragedian Cheney's somber rebuttal that claims of doctored intelligence to amplify war drums is "senseless" and "reprehensible." No, the sensible assumption, borne out clearly by the Downing Street Documents, is that the lying liars were cooking intell overtime. Common sense would call into question the coincidence of "failed" intelligence aligning perfectly with NeoCon nation-building hoop dreams of slam-dunk first-strike wars. No, that war president was hibernating inside Bush's compassionate conservative cocoon from the get go. The codpiece could not be contained.

"It is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began..."
[Poster by Ted Rall]

And Americans aren't bamboozled by Dear Leader's comic procession stage exit to the Far East. A call-in poll during Lou Dobb's CNN program tonight suggests how limp the POTUS phallus has become. The question centered on the president's Asian trip. 67% found the trip to be a failure. 31% said it was insubstantial. A mere 2% described the jaunt a success. These phone polls are not "scientific," true, but the meager support for Bush's headline-diverting trek to the Far East underscores that nearly all the blindfolds are off. And once the emperor is revealed to have no clothes, no stuffed crotches or presidential patches on para-military jackets will hide the smoke and mirrors anymore. There is no unseeing what has been so clearly seen:

The truth once seen, man is aware everywhere of the ghastly absurdity of existence...nausea invades him.
--Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
[Cartoon by Ted Rall]

Better late than never. We no longer have to dance and peer like a Greek chorus that is looking around for something. Our war is a fiction that was staged for us -- increasingly tragic. Only the players are comic. They cannot move away from the footlights. They are still searching for something:

I'll take Paul Lynde to block...

They are searching for an exit strategy...