I was trying to understand why the Bush administration would nominate a veterinarian to head the women’s health section of the Food and Drug Administration. I understand that humans share 98 per cent of our genetic makeup with certain ape species, but still. The difference in required bedside manner alone should have dissuaded anybody from thinking that this was a good idea.
Then, it hit me: George W. Bush is channeling the spirit of Tristan Tzara! His administration is entirely surreal!
I imagined Bush, Dick “Andre Breton” Cheney and Donald “Dali” Rumsfeld sitting in the Oval Office, pondering how to lift Americans out of their political lethargy. “We need to do something outrageous,” Bush says. “Something that will really grab people’s attention and wake them up.”
“Did you have anything in mind?” Rumsfeld asks.
“Let’s give Michael Brown the top job at FEMA,” Bush tells him.
“What are his qualifications?” Cheney asks, a twinkle in his eye.
“He was head of the International Arabian Horse Association,” Bush responds. The laughter is uproarious. “But, wait,” Bush cries, wiping a tear from the corner of one eye. “It gets better.”
Trying to control his laughter, Cheney says, “It…it does?”
“He was fired for incompetence!”
“Brilliance!” Rumsfeld shouts, and falls out of his seat.
“That should shake the bourgeois out of their complacency!” Cheney concurs.
How disappointed they must have been that, instead of realizing the appointment for the gag it was, people actually took it seriously!
Have you wondered how the government committed $223 million for a bridge in Alaska that goes to an island where practically nobody lives? Seriously: there are only 50 people living on the island. That works out to over $4 million per person. It would have been cheaper to build a helipad and give everybody on the island their own helicopter! Haven’t you wondered how a responsible politician could vote for such a measure?
Isn’t it obvious? The Bush budget process is an exquisite corpse! Here’s how it works: one legislator works on the first page of a budget bill. When he is finished, he folds the piece of paper he is working on so that only the last line item is visible. Then, he gives it to the next legislator, who works on the second page of the budget bill, and so on.
The problem with the Bush government is not that the leaders are all insane. (Oh, don’t even pretend the thought hadn’t crossed your mind.) The problem is that the public doesn’t understand what they’re doing. Bush and his cabinet carefully orchestrate public provocations, throwing together disparate things that don’t ordinarily go together and justifying everything with a dream-like logic, in order to make the American people more aware of the soul-deadening conformity of their existence. The American public, on the other hand, thinks it’s actually getting a functioning government.
“Okay,” I imagine President Bush saying. (Yes, my imagination is pretty active.) “Let’s invade Iraq.”
“But, they haven’t done anything to us,” Cheney points out.
“Exactly.”
“But, North Korea is a more immediate threat,” Rumsfeld states.
“Even better.”
After a moment, the three men double over, laughing hysterically. When he is finally able, Cheney puts a hand on Bush’s shoulder and says, “Tzara would have been proud of you.”
While the artistic surrealists worked with paint and canvas; the political surrealists deal directly with reality. Rene Magritte may have painted a rock hanging suspended in mid-air over a seashore. The Bush administration has cars in trees and boats floating down the main thoroughfares of cities! In addition, just by doing nothing, Bush created the indelible image of people living on their rooftops, an inversion which would have made Luis Bunuel envious.
Dali has melting watches? Bush has completely destroyed time as a concept! One minute, he’s John F. Kennedy. The next, Teddy Roosevelt. Sometimes the war in Iraq is World War II, sometimes it’s Vietnam (can’t let those Communis – sorry, I mean Islamo-fascist dominoes fall!). Past and present meld into one incomprehensible reality.
The jig is up, Mister President. I know what the game is. There’s no use continuing to pretend that your legislative initiatives arise out of carefully thought through policies when they are, in fact, guerrilla theatre. Really, Mister President, fun is fun, but it’s time that the United States got the government it really needs.
Mister President? Hello? Mister President…?