The 21st century a flop so far
A child in the '60s, when the world was turning fast, I loved the upbeat '90s' carbonated peace and prosperity. But the 2020s are a bitter brew of COVID-19 and poison politics choking us.
In fact, the 21st century lost the plot early on.
George W. Bush was a tragic tiebreaker choice of president by the Supreme Court. Bush v. Gore, a 5-4 ruling in 2000, gave new meaning to "one person, one vote." The supremely political court ruled against the people's popular vote. One event led to another in a cascade that has made all the difference. Once, even globalization sounded good.
If you believe in harbingers, things haven't been the same since. If you recall Bush's rookie reaction to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, it was wide-eyed fear: "Oh dang, that's the plane plot the CIA briefer told me about in August when I was clearing brush in Crawford." (A paraphrase.)
Bush was utterly unprepared for a simple plan he should have seen coming. Somehow, he got away with it. Outgoing President Bill Clinton told him that al-Qaida was his biggest national security problem, words he ignored. So did Condoleezza Rice, his national security adviser.
We were shattered after Sept. 11. Bush preyed on this dark moment and changed our way of life with domestic surveillance, torture of suspected terrorists and a behemoth agency called "Homeland Security." This made airports and other public spaces ugly and forbidding.
The White House now looks like a fortress and Congress built a bunker.
Seeking revenge, Bush started two wars of aggression, in Afghanistan and Iraq. Thousands of lives were lost and trillions were spent on lost wars. The United States left these nations in shambles, Afghanistan back to the benighted Taliban
The war in Iraq was waged on Bush's false claims of "weapons of mass destruction." There were no ties between Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and the Sept. 11 hijackers, mostly Saudi nationals. By then, we had crossed the Tigris and the Euphrates.
To make matters worse, Bush won a close contest in 2004 against Sen. John Kerry, a Vietnam War hero who led veterans opposing the war. Bush had no such proud record and allowed Kerry to be painted poorly by "Swift Boat" veterans. That was when truth became a casualty in presidential politics.
Al Gore and Kerry were leading environmentalists who would have plowed ahead on climate change. Just sayin'.
In 2008, a dazzling young Black president was elected amid a financial crisis that rocked the housing industry: the Great Recession. The new president did not punish Wall Street wrongdoers who caused the debacle. We saw the wordsmith avoid confrontation, a missing element in his chemistry.
For a while, Barack Obama's oratory pleased the people.
But the 44th president prolonged Bush's wars. He passed Obamacare, but fell short on the environment, immigration and gun control. Racial police violence went unchecked.
Finally, Obama let a Supreme Court seat get away, never calling out Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, for blocking his nominee. A president can't let a senator humiliate him. That is just what Obama did.
Obama prided himself on being bipartisan and named Republican James Comey his FBI director. Comey foiled Hillary Clinton's presidential quest not once, but twice, for investigations that came to nothing.
Clinton's loss was also Obama's. He failed to protect his legacy. The solo artist in politics - a rare bird - did not campaign enough to get his chosen one elected in 2016.
The crowning blow to the century so far was Donald Trump - the angry anti-Obama who took power after losing the popular vote. He was impeached twice, very nice. Trump's vile tweets, vulgar boasts and virulent lies he told as part of his job description sullied - and sickened - the American square almost beyond repair.
And then the rabble came for us - peaceful democracy - on Jan. 6, 2021.
I shall be telling this with a sigh, counting losses but believing in the dream that is America, still.
© 2021, Creators