Dear Friend and Reader,<\/p>\n
ITS\u0412\u00a0ALMOST OVER. President George W. Bush said goodbye to the nation tonight on national television. In\u0412\u00a0five days, Barack Obama will take the oath of office as the nation’s first African American\u0412\u00a0President of the US.\u0412\u00a0Its\u0412\u00a0a dream come true.\u0412\u00a0 Finally a President who is a\u0412\u00a0real\u0412\u00a0and bright person\u0412\u00a0who adores and treasures his\u0412\u00a0beautiful family, who listens and wants to help, who asks questions and actually speaks to us as people.<\/p>\n
After eight years of\u0412\u00a0 our country married to Bush,\u0412\u00a0I feel like a new bride hours before the wedding ceremony, ready to start again, dressed beautifully in my\u0412\u00a0white gown and gloves. But\u0412\u00a0I’m also\u0412\u00a0holding the veil and retching in the bathroom. After that last bad marriage, I’m having a panic attack.<\/p>\n
A submerged rage\u0412\u00a0now resides in me after two Bush terms, a rage\u0412\u00a0similar to that\u0412\u00a0of a wife who has survived\u0412\u00a0serious physical and psychological abuse at the hands of her husband. Under Bush, our government dismantled laws guaranteeing civil rights and the Bill of Rights. The Constitution? Just another piece of paper. We tortured people\u0412\u00a0\u0412\u00a0from Abu Ghraib to Guantanamo. We engaged in a non-provoked, pre-emptive war in Iraq.\u0412\u00a0Our treasury was\u0412\u00a0looted by Administration cronies. War profiteers and weapons consultants held reign in the nation’s capital. It’s going to take a long time to fix the mess we’re in. \u0412\u00a0If you believed\u0412\u00a0America turned into a Banana Republic under Bush’s watch, you were right.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Even as we joyously end\u0412\u00a0Bush’s era, we are still as conflicted as\u0412\u00a0our leaders in Congress, especially our Democratic ones.\u0412\u00a0They seem to have finally\u0412\u00a0found their voices but are now scrutinizing every move, every decision the new guy Obama makes even before he is President.\u0412\u00a0Congress is\u0412\u00a0experiencing\u0412\u00a0its own form of panic attack before they put on the wedding veil. But where was this same level of\u0412\u00a0scrutiny from these leaders during the last eight years? How could we elect someone like this—twice? How was\u0412\u00a0Bush able to get away, abetted,\u0412\u00a0with ruining our country and its standing in the world?<\/p>\n
In “It’s the Language, stupid!” – The Frightening Secret to Bush’s Success ‘ – Renana Brooks explains:\u0412\u00a0<\/p>\n
Bush’s language structure is similar to the communication structure of an abusive personality.The goal of any abusive personality is domination, to make their targets do things that they otherwise would not do. Abusers typically use language to create a black and white world where catastrophe is the only perceived alternative to following their demands.<\/p>\n
The abusive personality uses controlling language to gain hold over others and uses a variety of negative techniques to destroy their will to resist. If the target buys into the negative framework then they quickly lose touch with their goals, dreams, and vision of the future. In this hopeless state they will tend to develop a powerful need that can only be satisfied by giving all power to the abuser.<\/p>\n
The hallmark of the abusive personality is the need to cast itself as the savior though personalization, creating a dependency dynamic. In order to present himself as the only man for the job, Bush uses personalization to contrast his positive “optimistic” personality with the difficult times at hand. Bush openly identifies himself as the only person capable of producing positive outcomes, even when the actions required are vaguely understood.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Tonight\u0412\u00a0Bush characterized his eight years\u0412\u00a0as a\u0412\u00a0success in keeping our country free from further attack. He did so with certitude. He pronounced again\u0412\u00a0that history will vindicate him in the end. He\u0412\u00a0will\u0412\u00a0cling to that belief for a\u0412\u00a0long, long time. There will be no looking back. He will be certain. He will be sure.<\/p>\n
In order to bring this\u0412\u00a0waltz with the dictator –\u0412\u00a0our abusive relationship with Bush to closure,\u0412\u00a0we need to look to see the monster for who he truly is: a small, frightened, man who was willingly led by a cabal of munitions, oil and banking profiteers who nearly succeeded in\u0412\u00a0ruining not only our country,\u0412\u00a0but killing\u0412\u00a0countless others across the planet. This monster believed he was right, and counted on us\u0412\u00a0to lose ourselves in order for him\u0412\u00a0to succeed in what he wanted.\u0412\u00a0We just needed\u0412\u00a0faith. In him.<\/p>\n
Tonight, after watching him, let’s\u0412\u00a0look at ourselves. We allowed our country and the world to be\u0412\u00a0under the thrall of this man. And we know why. And now that’s done, there is\u0412\u00a0much to do to repair the damage. In November 2008, we\u0412\u00a0did do the right thing, electing someone to lead us out of the mess we’re in.\u0412\u00a0He knows and we know its going to take a while. In the long run, it will be worth it.\u0412\u00a0<\/p>\n
Take one last peek at George\u0412\u00a0before splashing some cool water on our faces, and re-touching the lipgloss. It’s over. Its time for us\u0412\u00a0to put on the veil again. We’ve traded up.\u0412\u00a0<\/p>\n
Just say goodbye, George. The show must go on.\u0412\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yours & truly,<\/p>\n
Fe Bongolan
\n<\/strong>San Francisco<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dear Friend and Reader, ITS\u0412\u00a0ALMOST OVER. President George W. Bush said goodbye to the nation tonight on national television. In\u0412\u00a0five days, Barack Obama will take the oath of office as the nation’s first African American\u0412\u00a0President of the US.\u0412\u00a0Its\u0412\u00a0a dream come true.\u0412\u00a0 Finally a President who is a\u0412\u00a0real\u0412\u00a0and bright person\u0412\u00a0who adores and treasures his\u0412\u00a0beautiful family, who … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[36,1788,52,906,546],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9360"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9360\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}