Bush's Simulated Version of Reality

As the governor of Texas, George W. Bush visited a juvenile prison in order to reinforce his image as tough but compassionate conservative dedicated to reforming the juvenile justice system. After Bush’s photo-op tour, a young African-American inmate, a petty thief named Johnny Demon Baulkmon, asked the governor a simple but affecting question: What do you think of us now? Bush seized the moment to demonstrate his tough-love brand of conservatism. He grew misty eyed as he explained to the young man, “The state of Texas loves you all. We haven’t given up on you. But we love you enough to punish you when you break the law.”

The governor’s aides and supporters high-fived one another following the encounter; indeed, Bush frequently recounted the incident to friends and made it the centerpiece of his acceptance speech at the Republican convention in 2000. Bush would run as a different kind of Republican, a compassionate conservative and a reformer with results.

Things would not turn out so well for Johnny Demon Baulkmon, however. He was raped by another juvenile shortly thereafter. And in 2006, Baulkmon, now serving time in an adult prison for petty theft, would say of Bush, “He doesn’t care about anything but himself. He’s complete trash, a horrible evil person.” A harsh verdict, perhaps, but the full story does not reflect well on Bush’s claim to be a reformer with results (or the effectiveness of his Responsibility Era reforms).

One cannot blame Bush personally, of course for all that has gone wrong on Johnny Baulkom’s life. But the incident seems symptomatic of Bush’s penchant for staging phony photo-ops – think “Mission Accomplished” – that allow him to project a grandiose and overly idealized image, but one that is completely divorced from reality. Bush is hardly the only politician to try and make superficial incidents appear substantive. But with Bush, the Baulkmon encounter seems the norm rather than the exception. No doubt, Bush’s aides and supporters were high-fiving themselves after his “Mission Accomplished” speech, but it wasn’t long thereafter when the evidence of sodomy and torture abuses at Abu Ghraib began to surface.

The Bush administration is attempting to present modest tactical successes associated with the surge as a significant strategic advance. However, much of the so-called progress the administration cites is either misleading or likely to be ephemeral. For instance, sectarian violence may have declined, but much of this is accounted for by the fact that four million Iraqis are now in exile, and most neighborhoods have already been ethnically cleansed. Further, the much ballyhooed American alliance with Sunni insurgents against al-Qaeda is a largely tactical alliance of convenience by the Sunnis aimed at offsetting Shiite military superiority. We are very likely arming and empowering warlords and militias preparing for civil war.

The situation in Iraq is grim and it is likely to remain so when Bush leaves office in about fifteen months. The prospect of national reconciliation in Iraq is much lower than the prospect of a larger civil war. Nevertheless, the Bush administration will continue to sell its version of simulated reality. Bush has used Iraq as political prop, but it hasn’t fared much better than Johnny Demon Baulkman.

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