Reading the news is no longer a mere informational experience. It has become, rather, a fretful descent into leaderless whiplash and cognitive dissonance, an unnerving peek into romper-room disarray and downright pixilation.
This dispiriting plunge, I suspect, is likely what threw Papa Bush into that contorted fit of teary-eyed gibbering the other day. Contrary to the media's psychoanalysis, he wasn't just thinking of Jeb or George, with pride or pity. He had simply read the papers that morning and shortly thereafter convulsed into a general state of neurotic despair.
It is quite legitimate these days to quite literally ask: What in the world is going on? And that's after reading the news. The papers offer no clues, because our nation's leaders, the dunderheads in charge, happen to be clueless themselves. Cases in point: Just this morning -- this one morning alone -- there were three, flip-flopping front-page stories that left the reader not informed, but utterly, dejectedly, hopelessly adrift. To wit ...
"The White House has resisted the idea of widening its own diplomatic channels with Iran and Syria," so naturally what followed was that "A State Department spokesman ... [says] the United States approve[s] of Mr. Maliki’s proposed conference" with Iran and Syria.
Apparently America's official diplomatic demarche now resembles the adolescent goings on of our junior-high years. Would you tell Tammy I really like her? Then tell me what she said? Titter, titter. Isn't this exciting? Clueless, yes. Hapless, absolutely. But definitely exciting.
Then there was this. Mr. Bush repeatedly insists we're winning in Iraq. After all, what else could daily servings of unbridled carnage and boundless anarchy indicate? So naturally what followed in a related story was that his hand-picked "nominee to be defense secretary won unanimous approval from a Senate panel ... after testifying that the United States was not winning in Iraq."
The victory-denying, president-defying, hand-picked nominee to be defense secretary also "said it was 'too soon to tell' whether the American invasion of 2003 had been a wise decision" -- an invasion course he not only advocated in 2003, but one that even a D- eighth grader could now competently, authoritatively conclude was pure, quixotic stupidity.
But not to worry. Mr. Bush's nominee added, helpfully, that "It's my impression that frankly there are no new ideas on Iraq." Is it not somehow comforting to learn that our new expert man at the Pentagon may not be clinically delusional, but merely every bit as clueless as the rest of us?
Damn good thing Rummy is out and he's in. A touch of fresh bewilderment should make a real difference. FDR used to intentionally pit one sitting adviser against another to achieve a kind of enlightened synthesis, but of course his advisers has something of value to advise. In GWB's case it's simply a revolving-door matter of out with the clueless old and in with the clueless new.
Last, we read that "The United States has offered a detailed package of economic and energy assistance in exchange for North Korea’s giving up nuclear weapons," which in this instance was naturally preceded by, "the administration has resisted making clear to North Korea exactly what kind of aid it would receive if it agreed to begin taking apart [its nuclear] facilities."
Here's a thought. Perhaps administration hawks and administration realists could first get together and agree on what the administration thinks, then, and only then, let North Korea know, not to mention the administration's Decider.
That might help to clarify things -- for everyone, including us poor bastards subjected daily to multiple and oddly tidy news reports of strategic bedlam.