Getting Right with the World: Advice for Karen Hughes
© 2005 By David Lytel
Perhaps during his recent European tour President Bush caught wind of the fact — despite all the barriers preventing the truth from reaching him — that he and his government are thoroughly reviled in Europe and throughout the world. Nine out of ten French and German citizens disapprove of Bush’s handling of foreign policy and half those surveyed expect U.S./European relations to get still worse. So Bush has called spinmistress Karen Hughes out of retirement and given her the task of turning it all around. If she can convince the American people that Bush is qualified to be president maybe she can convince the world that the U.S. is not a greater threat to stability and world peace than a loose band of cave-dwelling crazies.
Her best shot, public relations professional would tell you, is to come clean and admit the truth of the worst of the criticisms of American foreign policy so we can all start fresh. As a public service, here are some of the damaging and uncomfortable truths the rest of the world knows that Hughes can help us get on the right side of.
1. Yes, we overthrow democracies: In the past 50 years we’ve overthrown democratically elected governments in Iran, Guatemala, Greneda, Panama, Congo and Chile and in fact not one U.S. military action has led to the establishment of a democratic government. We’re sorry. We’re going to do a lot better in the future picking countries to invade and picking the words we use to justify our actions.
2. No, we won’t support your demand for popular sovereignty: We oppose popular democratic movements wherever they arise because if they came to power they might seize power from the wealthy local elites, renounce the heavy debts we force them to take on, demand fair trading terms and embark on the development path that made the developing countries wealthy — limiting foreign access to their markets. We apologize for this and the next time a democratic movement arises in a nation whose economy we’ve ruined with foreign “aid,” such as Ecuador or Peru we won’t send in the Marines, we promise.
3. Yes, we finance fascism: We paid for and directed right wing terrorist death squads in Indonesia in the 1960s, helping to kill 800,000 people and effectively wiping out the nation’s political opposition so a brutal dictator could retain power. We secretly supplied the racist Aparteid regime in South Africa right up until its collapse, and we provided arms and intelligence to the death squads in El Salvador. We’re really sorry and it won’t happen again, trust us.
4. No, we are not honest about our true foreign policy goals: Our invasion of Iraq had nothing to do with popular sovereignty, the mistreatment of dissidents, the rule of law, or the treatment of women. If they were vital U.S. interests we could achieve them by simply stopping the massive outpouring of expenditures to prop up the governments of Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, all dictatorships with deplorable records on human rights. We regret that we’d temporarily run out of justifications for the seizure of Iraq’s oil fields, but this is fixed now and we promise to come up with a better cover story for the invasion and occupation of Iran.
5. Yes, we are at war with Islam: We don’t really care about what happens in North Korea. We put them on the “axis of evil” list to make it appear that we are not in fact at war only with nations with Islamic majorities. And we have nothing against Islam, it is just that there are a bunch of Muslim countries with oil and not very many countries left to Christianize. Sorry.
6. No, we are not going to withdraw our troops from Iraq: We may someday leave Iraq like we may some day shut down our bases in Korea, Japan, Germany and elsewhere but don’t count on that happening anytime soon. We are building permanent bases to occupy Central Asia because we’re addicted to oil and cannot allow these resources to be diverted to Europe, Russia or Asia. But once we get Iraqi oil production up to its pre-war levels and have invaded and occupied Iran we’ll stop with the invasions for a while. Scout’s honor.
7. No, we didn’t tell the truth about Iraq before the war: OK, we admit it now, Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction were entirely eradicated long before the war began and Iraq had nothing to do with the attack on the U.S. We just saw a chance to seize control of a country with substantial oil reserves so we took it. Sorry.
8. No, we cannot see or hear the pain of people who live in developing countries: We don’t doubt the figures that show from 10 to 20 times as many people die from starvation and related diseases every day as died in the attacks on the U.S. of 9/11/01. But those are foreigners who die from systematic injustice and indifference rather than Americans who are killed in firey explosions, so it may well be tragic but we just don’t care.
9. Yes, we rig elections: The exit polls in Florida in 2000, in Georgia in 2002 and in Ohio in 2004 were accurate, of course. We removed the names of American citizens from the voter rolls, destroyed the registries people use to sign in to vote, manipulated the number and the distribution of voting machines, spread disinformation about the time and place voting was to take place, used the state police to intimidate and threaten voters, modified the recorded results and used deception to make it appear that the recounts were legitimate. Sorry, but the American people were about to make a terrible mistake and we had to help.
10. Yes, God really is on our side: We know this bothers many people, but God favors our worldwide crusade to secure undefended markets for our products and the natural resources we need to manufacture them. We didn’t ask to be chosen, but God is a wise, Christian white man who chose us to subjugate the world. We can’t change God’s will, but we promise not to brag about it so often, which we know is unseemly.
If Hughes will take these steps toward truth and reconciliation, there is every reason to believe the world will forgive the belligerence, disrespect and hypocrisy we’re shown them. Good luck Karen!
What Reagan Taught Bush
The top 10 lessons for counterrevolutionaries.
David Lytel — June 9, 2004
Anyone old enough to remember the Reagan presidency is in shock. The right, because their hero has died; the left, because the eulogizing is so gloriously twisted and exaggerated it brings to mind Reagan himself, who never let the facts get in the way of a good story. If you missed the Reagan administration and need a crash course, here are the lessons that the Republicans learned from the Reagan presidency and have passed on to George W. Bush and America’s current rulers.
10. Even if tax cuts build a weaker America they build a stronger Republican party.
As economist Lester Thurow has written, “the epitaph of the Reagan presidency will be: When Ronald Reagan became President, the United States was the largest creditor nation. When he left the presidency, we were the world’s largest debtor nation.” Under cover of his “supply-side” theory, he massively expanded the federal budget deficit and our trade deficit, both of which were harmful in the long run but allowed the Republicans to juice the economy with debt-financed stimulus and win re-election for Reagan.
The Republican fable that Reagan returned America to economic strength after the failure of the Carter administration is not borne out by fact. Reagan continued Carter’s regulatory reform policies, and only in the final year of his presidency (1988) did employment return to what it had been in 1979. There is no evidence that Reagan’s “tax cuts” had any significant economic impact, since they were really a shift in the tax burden from the wealthy to the middle class.
The long-term effect of the Republican drive to reduce the tax burden on the wealthy is profound. If U.S. taxes were equivalent to those of our European allies, the Social Security Trust Fund would be solvent and sufficient funds would exist to virtually eliminate poverty and provide significant investment in public education. So when you see substandard housing and underfunded public schools, think of Ronald Reagan.
9. A President must take full responsibility for everything except mistakes and illegal activities.
Reagan’s campaign manager, William Casey, negotiated the sale of weapons to Iran to secure the release of America’s hostages held there, a direct violation of U.S. law and policy. Once in office as Reagan’s CIA director, he illegally oversaw the transfer of funds to right-wing counter-revolutionaries in Nicaragua.
The official response to the torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib is eerily similar to the story created to defend the Reagan administration’s cover-up of Iran-Contra: that it was the work of a few rogue employees operating at the highest levels of the U.S. government. The Reagan administration’s official cover story was that Oliver North brokered illegal arms deals and redirected funds to paramilitary groups.
In reality, such operations required the tacit cooperation of major intelligence and military institutions. Yet the thin veneer of plausibility enabled leaders to escape accountability. The debate often ignores the deeper issue — why the U.S. supported forces widely cited for human rights abuses. Then as now, strategic alliances justified moral compromise.
8. While overt racism is unseemly, signal alignment subtly.
Reagan pioneered insulting the poor and powerless and demonstrated how politically effective it could be. Launching his campaign in the Deep South, he invoked “states’ rights,” language that replaced overt racism with coded messaging.
His portrayal of Black women as “welfare queens” legitimized public hostility that had become socially unacceptable during the civil rights movement. Meanwhile, corporate crimes that drained billions from the economy received little attention. The disparity reflected priorities — and the demographic of those benefiting from such systems.
7. Nations that support U.S. policy can act without restraint.
Reagan’s foreign policy supported regimes and groups accused of severe human rights abuses. In El Salvador, political factions linked to death squads received support under the banner of anti-communism. Similarly, apartheid in South Africa was treated as an internal matter.
Strategic alignment often outweighed ethical considerations, a pattern that persists in modern geopolitical relationships.
6. Bust unions whenever possible.
One of Reagan’s first major acts was crushing the air traffic controllers’ union. He refused negotiation and replaced workers with more compliant personnel.
This move signaled a broader shift — weakening labor power to consolidate economic control. When crises arose, such as airline security failures, attention was redirected rather than addressed directly.
5. Undermine regulation from within.
Reagan appointed leaders who opposed the missions of their own agencies, such as James Watt and Anne Gorsuch. This approach weakened environmental protections, delayed cleanup efforts, and reduced enforcement.
It created a model for dismantling regulation not through legislation, but through leadership.
4. Defense spending can serve political goals.
Reagan’s “Star Wars” missile defense system consumed billions despite lacking effectiveness. It strengthened ties between corporations and political power while fostering dependency on continued global conflict.
Companies benefiting from defense spending became core political allies.
3. Ignore global problems.
The Reagan administration failed to respond effectively to the AIDS crisis, contributing to thousands of preventable deaths. Social stigmas were reinforced rather than challenged.
Similarly, environmental concerns like climate change were dismissed, delaying meaningful action.
2. Image outweighs performance.
Reagan demonstrated that likability can shield leaders from scrutiny. Media coverage often focused on tone rather than substance.
This model continued under Bush, where public perception frequently overshadowed policy evaluation.
1. Claim credit for historical change.
The fall of communism was driven by internal economic and political factors, yet Reagan and the Republican Party claimed credit. In reality, liberalization and systemic instability played the decisive roles.
Despite this, narratives were shaped to reinforce political advantage — even when inconsistent with facts.
The sanitized version of history presented in Reagan’s obituaries portrays him as a heroic figure who saved America. In reality, he functioned largely as a spokesperson for decisions made by others, expanding corporate influence and weakening public institutions.
By undermining public authority and emphasizing image over substance, Reagan established a political model that continues today. Bush represents a continuation of that approach.
David Lytel served in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Clinton Administration. He holds a PhD in government from Cornell and later founded a political action committee focused on voter registration.
Silencing the Vote," The Baltimore Sun"
People from all over Ukraine have gone to Kiev to protest dishonest vote counting in their presidential election. Exit polls, so trustworthy that they are used worldwide to uncover election fraud, showed the opposition candidate had won, and the people didn’t believe the news when it reported the government’s surprise victory.
To those of us who doubt President Bush won the election in the United States, the key differences between here and Ukraine are the methods of fraud and the passivity of the news media.
Here the party in power used unverifiable computerized voting to boost its totals and intimidation and misinformation to suppress the vote totals of its opponents, but the news media haven’t investigated it.
The recounts by the Libertarian and Green parties in Ohio and by the Ralph Nader campaign in New Hampshire are not being covered by the commercial news media, despite being under way for more than two weeks. And that’s not even the most consequential story the national press has not yet seen fit to print.
In Franklin County, Ohio, Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, a Bush campaign official, distributed voting machines so that Republicans could vote efficiently while ensuring that Democrats had to give up hours of their time waiting in line because of a shortage of voting machines in their districts, thus reintroducing a poll tax that the Constitution forbids. Mr. Blackwell did the same elsewhere.
One polling place in Howard County, Ohio, that was under court order to permit everyone in line to cast their vote sent them all home at midnight because the order applied only to Election Day itself.
Warren County, Ohio, closed the vote count to outside observers on the advice of the Department of Homeland Security. This county in suburban Cincinnati is of no interest to al-Qaida but it is the single most important county in the nation to Mr. Bush’s re-election, having produced nearly one-third of his statewide margin.
Democratic registration improved by one-third from four years ago, while Republican registration dropped by 10 percent. Mr. Bush’s performance statewide dropped, too, but despite all the arrows in the other direction, Mr. Bush’s vote totals mysteriously increased.
Mr. Bush’s total increased dramatically over four years ago in the 26 Florida counties using optical scan equipment manufactured by Diebold Election Systems Inc. Democratic performance apparently plummeted everywhere Diebold equipment counted votes.
Multiple counties in these states recorded more votes than there are registered voters.
Exit polls nationwide showed more voters casting ballots for Sen. John Kerry than for Mr. Bush. But instead of explaining the accuracy of exit polling and the dubious trustworthiness of the voting machinery, the news media have refused to investigate.
About 70 percent of Ohio’s voters cast punch card ballots. The recount may undermine Mr. Bush’s very narrow victory in Ohio. In New Hampshire, we’ll learn if voting equipment manufactured by corporations openly in Mr. Bush’s camp gave him a bonus.
All of these “glitches” and “irregularities” nationwide and not one improperly credited vote to Mr. Kerry? What are the chances of that being random?
Finally, we deserve an investigation because there are so many of us. According to a post-election Harris Poll, 38 percent of Democrats and 37 percent of people who are not enrolled in either of the two major parties believe there were either “some” or “many” attempts at unlawful vote suppression.
The most conservative estimate would be 37 percent of the millions of Democrats who voted, or 18 million Americans. When the independents are added, the total is 30.3 million Americans who do not trust the legitimacy of our own presidential election.
We oppose faith-based voting and demand complete transparency in the vote casting and counting. Like Charlie Brown trusting Lucy to hold the football steady enough to kick, the leaders of our party seem determined to ignore both reason and experience.
Unless we act, the nation will get the same result as in 2000 — no investigations, no indictments, no convictions and more fraud. We suspect that if the votes had been tallied honestly, we would be preparing for the inauguration of the candidate who authorities with a huge stake in the outcome tell us lost the election.