Right turn in France?

By Ellen Ratner
There's a social tragedy unfolding in France as ghetto rioting passes its 10th day. All of it – the kids throwing stones, the cars set afire, the random, foolish, self-destructive violence – ought to ring some very familiar bells on this side of the pond. It's what happens when a majority population tries to sweep out of sight a minority that it once held mastery over.



In France, it was French colonies in North Africa, populated by Muslims, ruled by Paris – when their descendents came to France, it was clean the toilet, shovel the snow, shut your mouth and recite the Marseilles. In the United States, it was enslaving African-Americans. But in both cases the centuries of oppression simply added up to the same thing: Watts in the '60s, South Central Los Angeles in the '90s, and for the French in 2005, a bad start in a Parisian suburb called Clichy-sous-Bois that has now spread to the City of Light itself.

It's an old story – as old as human injustice. But the thing that really gives me heartburn, as well as our country a black eye is the Schadenfreude – defined by Dictonary.com as "the malicious delight in the sufferings of others" – that has gripped so much of the American right-wing press and blogs.

"If President Chirac thought he was going to gain peace with the Muslim community in France by taking an appeasement line in the Iraq war," sneers the New York Sun's editorialists, "it certainly looks like he miscalculated." The Sun goes on to note (sneeringly) that back in the early '90s, an assortment of blowhard French intellectuals "sneered at America for the Los Angeles riots." Big newsflash – both sides of the Atlantic are lined with blowhards.

What I find so interesting among America's right wing is the depressingly familiar assignment of blame here. Those of us of a certain generation remember all too well what Presidents Lyndon Baines Johnson and Richard M. Nixon, often joined by FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, had to say about the race riots of the '60s – they were caused by the communists. It's the same answer this trio often gave to the anti-war protestors of the same era – they were controlled by the communists.

Well, the communists are gone and the Reds are no longer under beds, so who is left to blame for the French riots? Here's what the right-wing blog Captain's Quarters has to say: "It's probably too late for those answers to combat the Islamist momentum that has built itself in the streets of Paris now" the blogger notes. The answers that CQ thinks are too late are "job opportunities, decent housing and good education for these new citizens."

Today radical Islam serves as the same boogeyman that the Reds served in our parents' generation. And that's really too bad, because as long as we're focused on boogeymen, the real problems – a lack of jobs, housing and education – will go unsolved. Just like Hoover wiretapped Martin Luther King to see which Russian was controlling him, the French will be tempted to deport the arrestees, crack down on crazy mosques and halt legitimate immigration.

All of this could provide the perfect segue for an older French tradition, one just as ugly as violent jihad and one that's never far from the surface in France – French fascism. In the old days, it was Col. Alfred Dreyfus and the Jews. But they're largely gone now, courtesy of the Nazis, Vichyites and assorted collaborators. So what – or rather who – is left?

The Muslims are left, that's who. And who will play the role of scapegoater? The French have a candidate here as well – John-Marie Le Pen, a leader of the National Front, which, as the name implies, is fascism-French-style and anti-immigrant to the rotten core. Think he's some crank on the margin? Think again. Le Pen picked up almost 20 percent of the national vote in 2002. My guess is this could be his year.

The American right won't have much to sneer about if Le Pen and his ilk participate in a future French government. Putting aside the extreme human-rights concerns, his ultra-nationalist economic proposals would position France and no doubt Europe to take a hard line against importing U.S. goods – with disastrous consequences for us. Moreover, if some Americans find Gaullist internationalism a bit irksome at times, they have yet to reckon with the type of French hyper-nationalism that a Le Pen would introduce – Chirac may see us as a rival, but Le Pen believes America is an enemy.

So even putting aside the old adage that people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones – and with our history on race relations, no American should even consider picking up a pebble – although the right in American loves the way our country has turned, they also need to consider the consequences of a sharp right turn in France, and what it could mean to us. Not a pretty picture.

Red meat for red-meat eaters

By Ellen Ratner
Before offering my predictions about what Friday's indictment of "Scooter" Libby means ("Scooter" is an Andover Academy graduate ... where do preppies come up with these nicknames?) let me first declare – as a liberal who, unlike some in the White House, passionately believes in the rule of law – that Scooter is innocent until proven guilty, and that he'll get his day in court (unless he cops a plea first, but more on that later).



But while Scooter's actions may not amount to guilt, they clearly add up to stupid, as in politically stupid. And as Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald made clear, the legal Sword of Damocles still dangles over Karl Rove's bald pate. In sum, the White House is risking the possibility that Libby might become a redux of John Dean (of Watergate fame) who drops a dime on his ex-compatriots in exchange for a little prosecutorial love, and that Rove may soon be devoting his enormous talents to developing brilliant "strategy" for winning the hearts and minds of grand jurors, rather than Red State voters.

And add this to the mix: Before the Libby indictment, Bush's poll numbers were already low from the lingering smell of Hurricane Katrina, the continuing saga of Iraq, the nomination of the now-withdrawn hack Harriet Miers, and gas prices so high that the SUV-driving base of the Republican Party would even consider nominating Noam Chomsky for president in '08 if he campaigned on one-buck-a-gallon gasoline.

So what's a beleaguered president to do? There are three things he must do immediately. First, he should consolidate his right-wing base. Second, he must consolidate his right-wing base. Third, he will consolidate his right-wing base. Given this, here are my predictions:

1. Red-state red meat for the Supreme Court. I don't know who Bush will nominate to fill the Court's open slot, but I know this – it won't be some mumbly-bumbly hackette or a tactful smooth talker whose IQ exceeds the combined brains of the Senate Judiciary Committee. No, Bush needs to rally his base, and that means picking a fight with Democrats. So expect a real right-wing brawler for nominee, some Bible-toting guy or gal who says-it-like-it-is, who writes an opinion on speeding tickets and includes dicta opposing abortion and gay rights. In short, somebody to rally the base.

2. Expect to hear the F-word. No, I don't mean anything profane. I mean, "f" as in "fence," as in "fence along the border between Mexico and the United States." You see, the Republican Party is like a guy who doesn't fear the coming economic depression because he's got a ton of gold buried in his backyard. And what is this Republican gold? Exploiting the immigration issue!

As average Americans suffer from rising interest rates, unrestrained globalization, Bush-beloved-but-greedy Arab-oil sheiks, exported jobs and weak unions, they, like most folks, tend to offload their frustrations on the lowest man on the totem pole. In our day, that low man is the illegal immigrant – who can't vote, is often forced to work under table, who looks different, sounds different, eats different food ... you know, the quintessential Other.

In fairness to Bush, this isn't something he'll want to do – inspired by Rove, he's been nurturing the dream of The Great Hispanic Republican Majority – but faced with survival, he'll do what politicians in sinking ships have always done: throw overboard excess weight in order to keep the boat afloat. At the moment, illegal immigrants are definitely Bush's excess weight.

3. Declare victory in Iraq and then withdraw. Shedding more precious American blood on behalf of Muslims who delight in shedding it ain't smart politics, as proven by Bush's declining poll numbers in support of the Iraq War. Here's the twist – in the old days, a president might swashbuckle when his numbers were down and the country was at peace, e.g., when Bill Clinton bombed the aspirin factory around the time of his impeachment. But now, we're already at war and it's an unpopular war, so it's likely that Bush will shake the olive branch rather than rattle the saber.

My prediction is that after the Iraqis elect a permanent government in December, President Bush will make a dramatic announcement of rapid troop draw-downs. (And faced with vengeful Shia and Kurds, once the United States is gone, the minority Sunnis should make sure their life insurance policies are paid up).

One thing about Bush: Somebody else always gets the bill for his mistakes – and you can bet that history is about to repeat itself.

America's decadence

By Ellen Ratner
"The American Republic will endure, until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money."

– Alexis de Tocqueville

Recently, I thought of America's favorite Frenchman when I read about the latest congressional scam du jour, buried in something called the "Digital Transition and Public Safety Act of 2005," a reconciliation submission by the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Sounds important, eh? Anybody who is not afraid of the Big Bad Wolf couldn't possibly oppose something called "Public Safety," could they? Of course not!



So without further adieu (as Mr. de Tocqueville might say), let me quote the first point from the august Senate committee's own press release: "$3 billion for a converter box subsidy program."

Now, at a time of soaring federal deficits, of deafening middle-class whines about not being able to buy that flat-screen television because taxes are too high, about Bush's what-me-worry attitude about potholes on Main Street while he finances sparkling new Iraqi highways and the displaced population of New Orleans is many times larger than that of Fallujah, the Senate Committee wouldn't be – no, no, couldn't be – thinking of actually spending $3 billion to subsidize stupid black boxes on top of television sets so the American public can watch reruns of "Leave it Beaver" or this week's "World Series of Poker" in a clearer, sharper image?

I was pretty sure that "converter box subsidy" was some new wondrous technology – like a satellite that could peer into the mysteries of the human heart and identify terrorists before they were born. Or maybe it was a subsidy for something that poor people need – like housing, health care, or decent public schools. Fortunately, the New York Times set me straight.

The $3 billion was there to allow owners of analog boxes – essentially, the 70 to 80 million Americans who don't pay up monthly for cable or satellite television – to convert to digital systems, and thereby become more likely – if not required – to pay the monthly vig for a subscription service. Move over monthly expenses for blood pressure or diabetes pills, and make way for "Animal Planet"!

Obviously, this provision of the bill is designed to subsidize both the public as well as the cable and satellite subscription companies, currently ranked in national esteem just ahead of Abu Musab al Zarqawi. This foolish, unnecessary, absolutely decadent provision was voted in 19 to 3 by the committee. Co-sponsors were Republican Ted Stevens of Alaska (the guy who de Tocqueville was thinking about when he coined the epigram above, and if you don't believe me, check out what overpopulated Alaska picked up in the recent highway bill) and Democrat Daniel K. Inouye. Voting against the bill were three rich people who somehow haven't forgotten what they were elected to do – Sens. John Kerry, John D. Rockefeller IV and Barbara Boxer.

Is there any better evidence of American decadence? Our national mood drifts; Congress and the White House are engaged in a race to the bottom in popularity; the median price for a house on Nantucket is $1.2 million; we're in a supposed war on terror, but the only ones sacrificing anything are a relatively tiny handful of Americans who voluntarily lay their lives on the line, while the rest of America's youth skate by without sacrificing a thing; people die or are rendered homeless because government wanted to save a few bucks on substandard levies in New Orleans; meanwhile, people who can't afford the payment on their first mortgage take out a second mortgage to pay the first and run up some more credit-card debt.

I don't know when this will all end. But it will not end well.

Bush: A truly small man

By Ellen Ratner
This month's story has been that George W. Bush's nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supremes has pitted him against his own conservative base. Yet for liberals, this episode also reveals some major insights about this president.



Bush's four years in office has sometimes looked like a painting that claims to be art, although one in which viewers could make little sense of the zig-zags, splatters and lines on its canvas. But with the appointment of Miers, the whole thing is suddenly explicable – it is the portrait of a small man pretending to be a great one, a little thinker claiming big ideas, a James Buchanan dressed as Abe Lincoln, a hack believing he was a statesman.

Before 9-11 geometrically expanded his shoe size, Bush was widely seen as a little man. In 2000, he had the good fortune of running against Al Gore, who, while I liked his policies and principles, was in many ways also a little man. Bush's first year in office was chiefly distinguished by a payoff to his loyalists (i.e., the tax cut), Karl Rove-inspired lip service to his evangelical base and the mishandling of an incident where a U.S. military plane may (or may not) have strayed into Chinese airspace. The little man with little principles failed to fill his first nine months in office with much to keep the public thinking; most people had former Rep. Gary Condit's troubles on their minds.

September 11 "made" Bush, although the United States military – a part of our government that is really the creation of the Republicans, Democrats and most of all, the American people – picked up the tab. The little man was suddenly elevated on the ruins of the World Trade Center. But his string of failures, temporarily buried under our military's successes, seems all too obvious in retrospect. Add them up and ask yourself, "What do they mean?"

The CIA failed to warn of 9-11 and badly advised the president on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Did heads roll? No. CIA chief George Tenet was retained and given a presidential medal. Bush's sainted loyalty, it was whispered.

Rumsfeld incompetently managed the Iraq invasion. Unsealed borders, rampant public disorder, Saddam's army slipped away, victory was declared, and then everybody was surprised as Baathists mysteriously resurfaced in an insurgency. Did heads roll? Nope. Bush's loyalty, aides whispered.

After 9-11, next to the military, the most important part of the federal government is FEMA. Life is what happens while you're planning something else – while everyone thought the next disaster would come from terrorists, Hurricane Katrina showed up. And what did we learn? That FEMA was staffed by Bush Hack-o-Rama loyalist Michael Brown, a man unfit for the position by virtue of no experience. Bush made a barely audible Rove-crafted mea culpa, Brown fell on his sword, and the people of the Gulf picked up the tab. You see, Bush is a loyal guy.

Now, we come to Harriet Miers. There are plenty of right-wing women judges who'll forget more about the Constitution than Miers will ever know. But Bush, little fella' that he his, threw over his conservative base, the same folks who have followed him blindly down many a dead end, in return for – what? Loyalty – to Harriet Hack Miers.

So here's the lesson: A truly big person has a real sense of the national interest. You may not always agree with it, but the big person will execute it at all costs. Think Abe Lincoln preserving the Union, FDR ending the Great Depression, or Harry Truman's dropping the bomb, Woodrow Wilson's gambling on the League of Nations, LBJ's devotion to the War on Poverty, Ronald Reagan's defeating the Soviets, or JFK's desire for a test ban treaty. I'd be the first to argue about some of these men and their policies, but never about their sincerity.

But Bush is different. In his world, small loyalties trump the national interest. The nomination of Harriet Hack Miers ties everything together. Miers' nomination isn't an aberration – it's business as usual. And what a damn bloody business it's been. Americans die in the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, New Orleans and Biloxi, and Fallujah and Ramadi (so the Iraqis can have a "constitution" with a Bill of Rights photocopied from the Quran), so that Bush can have a legacy of . . . Paul Bremer?

Give me Tammany Hall or the old Daley Machine out of Chicago. Those times might have been just as small-minded – but they were fun to watch and nobody died.

No more excuses

By Ellen Ratner
"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves ..."

– "Julius Caesar," by William Shakespeare

Here's my paraphrase of an old ethnic joke that is strictly verboten in our age of political correctness:



Question: What do you call a basement full of Republicans?

Answer: A whine cellar!

Yes, with apologies to the Great Bard, the party that used to strut and fight is now "strutting and fretting its (last) hour upon the stage (until the congressional election of '06 and the presidential election of '08) when it shall be heard no more." If, dear reader, by the end of Bush's second term, you have come to believe that it was a "tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing" well, don't blame me. By then I will have been warning my readers for many long years.

Consider recent events. The winds of Hurricane Katrina blew away the last shreds of Bush's credibility. Mike Brown, the disgraced and fired head of FEMA, fell on his sword for the president, but the people of the Gulf paid the bill. And did those he-men Republicans, the Conquerors of Baghdad, the Blood Heirs to the Throne of Kabul and Pretenders to the Twin Kingdoms of Syria and Iran, step up to the plate and say, "Sorry"? Sure, Bush winced and whispered sorry – while Karl Rove's minions blamed the mayor, the governor, the levee commission, the weather, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Congress, New Orleans' impoverished population and Judge Crater, missing since the 1930s.

Meanwhile, 50 or more people a day are blown up in Iraq. Remember all those "whiny liberals," those "traitors" like Ted Kennedy who were "unpatriotic" by speaking truth to liars in calling our occupation of Iraq a quagmire? Well, if the pools of blood and heaps of body parts in Baghdad, Ramadi, Fallujah and Samara don't qualify as a quagmire, then I've got some WMDs in Iraq to sell you.

Has anyone from the Bush White House stood up and said so much as an "Oops!" – as in oops, we should have put in more troops; or oops, we should have sealed the borders; or oops, we never trained our soldiers for this kind of urban combat? How about: Oops, we shouldn't have invaded to begin with? No, but all of the administration whining sounds like alley cats in heat. Blame the jihadis, blame the Sunnis, blame the porous borders, blame the "disloyal" Democrats, blame Syria, blame Iran, blame al-Qaida, blame Judge Crater. I guess taking responsibility is the Achilles heel for the pseudo-tough.

The latest Bush self-pity-party has been over the nomination of his crony Harriet Miers to the U.S. Supreme Court. Now does the Bush dynasty begin to resemble the last days of the Roman Empire when emperors who were hereditary idiots began appointing their horses to public office. Even as a liberal I'm shocked that with all of the highly qualified conservative candidates out there – real judges with real track records and real judicial reputations – our president rips out a page from Tammany Hall and appoints some hack to sit on the highest bench of the third branch of our government. I would have fought the nomination of somebody like Janice Rogers Brown with everything I had, but hey, at least we knew where she was coming from. But Harriet Miers?

She is so weak – and Bush believed his base was so stupid they'd just roll over once again (as they have again and again and again.) But it turns out that they won't – not this time. They've drunk the Kool Aid on Iraq, and Social Security reform, and the war on terror and everything else. But now, they actually remember reading his lips when he promised them a conservative Supreme Court.

So Bush holds a whiney press conference to defend his nomination of Miers, not from predatory Democrats, but from ... Republicans! And what is her strongest credential? That she's a Christian. I have nothing but respect for Christians and Christianity, but somebody better tell Bush that the vacant office is that of Supreme Court justice and not pope, and that he's the president of the United States and not a member of the College of Cardinals.

Whining is what people do when they have run out of solutions; when they are overwhelmed by events; when they feel that they're "misunderstood." It's what people do who can't accept reality, can no longer roll with the punches, when the wit has run dry and the excuses run out.

But it's not what presidents do. Not good ones, anyway.