Dictator In Chief

Jill over at Brilliant at Breakfast posted, and quite well too, about
Glenn Greenwald's post concerning Bush's now complete power grab of this country.

The next secular holiday after that is Flag Day -- June 14. If you have children, they will be drawing flags in school that day. When they bring home their flag drawings and flag stickers, think for a moment about what that flag means -- and then think about the aforementioned president deciding that our entire system of government as set forth by the Founding Fathers who originated that flag is no longer applicable -- because he says so.

Is that the America we now live in? And are we going to put up with it?

I began to comment and decided instead to post my thoughts here.

Perhaps two things are operational.

First is the fact people haven't felt any pain yet. Our concerns, Jill's and mine, still seem "possible", but where's the problem? Bush isn't hurting me. Although some have felt the pain, most people just don't notice anything wrong.

Second is, although our concerns are "possible", Bush would never do anything to hurt America and Americans. He just needs such powers to fight the evildoers. That term, by the way, made me want to vomit when I heard it come out of the mouth of the President of the United States.

In both cases the people would be wrong.

In the first case. If allowed to keep such powers and set precedent, America no longer exists. Sure the land's here, but what America stands for is blown all to hell. We now have a full-blown dictator in the White House. There is nothing to stop Bush from doing anything he damn well pleases.

Congress appears to have abrogated its responsibility to check Bush's power. Maybe our only hope will come from the November elections.

I have always feared concentration of power in the hands of one political party, but found some comfort in my belief the wisdom of the governing party would keep us out of trouble. There would be no chance Congress and the SCOTUS would blindly follow their president. I used to hold Republicans in much higher esteem than I do now.

However, I never feared concentration of power in the hands of one person. That I thought impossible. How silly of me.

The second thing is wrong because it's putting blind faith in a "benevolent" dictator. I for one don't trust Bush to be benevolent any more than I would trust a pit bull to watch my baby. Well, if I had a baby, but you get the idea.