12.21.07 5:00 AM CST
• Politics
• Rocky Rakovic
Time magazine named Putin their Person of the Year, but I think Bush was robbed. Take a look-- the two sometimes-comrades are very similar, but I think G-dub is a bit better:Bush’s Re-electile dysfunction: The democratic process was a mess in our 2000 election with flawed ballots leading to overvoting in Florida. While many media outlets claim that a recount would make Al Gore president, the Supreme Court 9 cast the deciding vote by stopping the investigation.
Putin’s big rig: After a lengthy and bold investigation the Moscow Times uncovered egregious vote-tampering on behalf of Putin for his second term election. They estimate that 2.2 million votes were stuffed, bribed, pressured or adjusted in the final tally.
Bush fiddling while Rome burns: After Hurricane Katrina rocked the Gulf, Bush took two days to return from his month-long vacation at his Texas ranch. Also, it took him over seven minutes to put down The Pet Goat when he was told “America is under attack” on 9/11.
Putin’s Nero impersonation: When the Kursk nuclear submarine sank on August 12, 2000 leaving troops trapped alive inside, Putin remained on holiday on the Black Sea for five days before returning to respond to the tragedy, by which time the entire crew of 118 had died.
But when Bush acts he overreacts: The quagmire in Iraq is too vast to explain here. Let’s focus on the fact that under the Third Geneva Convention, you can’t execute any P.O.W. (Saddam Hussein) and his shadow government is shaky and not in cohesion with the Arabic way of life.
Putin’s war on terror: A month after Putin became PM, the Second Chechen War ignited. Chechnya has oil, talked to the Taliban, and was in the process of establishing an Islamic government. Russia violated many tenants of the Geneva Conventions and installed a puppet government.
Captain America: Bush’s speechwriters sound as if they have been plucked from writing comic book dialogue. “It is not enough to serve our enemies with legal papers.” “Everywhere that freedom stirs, let tyrants fear.” And to insurgents, “Bring them on.”
Tough talk: In Jonathan Becker’s The Ties That Bind, he notes that Putin uses a similar “bravado” in his words: “when diplomats were murdered in Iraq he said he would ‘find and kill’ those responsible.” Of Chechen terrorists, Putin said he would “rub them out in the outhouse.”
King Bush: Bush has violated hundreds of laws while in office. His Patriot Act made surveillance of citizens, a violation once deemed unconstitutional by the 4th Amendment, possible. Dare he buck law and try for a third term? He has said, “A dictatorship would be a heck of a lot easier.”
Czar Putin: He has pushed Russian democracy back to the days of Stalin- from reviving the Communist flag to seizing the oil and gas industries. His critics have been stifled, and at least 21 journalists who spoke up against him have been mysteriously killed.
RSS 2.0
http://www.playboy.com/mt-tb.cgi/8641