(10)
George W.'s Epiphany
The President wasn't supposed to hear things like this. There is a reason that certain ideas are called subversive. Opinions like those heard at the Camp David Roundtable had always been carefully "managed." As we saw earlier, influential handlers of the President like Vice President Cheney never failed to paint anyone with ideas close to these as virtual enemies of the state. These were the traitors, "America-haters," friends of the Taliban, and left-wing wackos that Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter, and FoxNews loved to hate. Until this stormy day in December, George W. Bush had lived in complete ignorance of the real substance of any of these views. He had never read a book, never read even part of a single article by any of the people at the Roundtable, nor really of anybody on the more extended list. He had, in fact, been shown several of Molly Ivins's columns throughout the years, both when he was Governor of Texas, and on into his presidency, but he had treated them as humor, even when Ivins was dead serious.
He held the same view of the Left that most average FoxNews viewers and Ditto-heads did: Liberals loved to spend other people's money, they were soft on crime, soft on Defense, they were pro-abortion and pro-gay anything, they wanted the government to be babysitters for the poor, they wanted to take guns out of the hands of honest American citizens, they wanted to socialize medicine, they already had socialized education, they'd rather protect a snail darter than build a dam, their poster people were Ted Kennedy, Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, and Barbara Streisand, and they definitely couldn't protect America after a crisis like 9/11 like the conservatives could. Most of them weren't religious, and those that were often were into wacky Eastern religions or New Age gobbledygook.
Because of his term as Texas governor, he was more attuned to liberal ideas on domestic and economic issues. He knew very little about anyone's foreign policy views, including his own, before the 2000 presidential campaign. That might seem amazing, considering who his father was. But foreign policy never much interested him, and most of the years of his father's interaction with the world at large were spent in self-absorbed business ventures, or worse. The turbulent sixties' college life passed young George W. by without leaving a single dissenting mark.
Neo-conservatives Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle were enlisted as early as 1998 to tutor the prospective presidential candidate on foreign policy, and found him woefully ignorant on some of the most basic concepts; they were starting with essentially a tabla rasa. Henceforth, the Texas governor-cum-president would view the world through the neo-con lens. It must be remembered that this was only four years prior to the Camp David Roundtable.
The two dreams, however, had rendered the President quite vulnerable to unusual new ideas. Believing that they were visions from God, George W. Bush took the messages that the dreams contained very seriously. This was life-changing stuff. He was led by his visions to invite a group of men and women to speak to him in a language that was strange, exotic, and ultimately, believable. He had listened carefully, training his mind not to wander as it often did during Cabinet meetings. The more he listened, the better he understood. By the time Arundhati Roy finished, he was there. George W. Bush was having an epiphany.
And what of Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice? Colin Powell had always had a latent streak of liberalism that didn't need much of a push to come out. Most of the neo-cons, in fact, thought he was a closet liberal. Many of the things that the Secretary heard on that afternoon were, if much harsher in tone, still validations of points he had rather unsuccessfully tried to inject into heretofore one-sided National Security meetings. He found himself in agreement with the speakers more often than not, and couldn't help but wonder somewhat amusingly what in the world Cheney, Rumsfeld, et al would have made of these people.
As for Condoleezza Rice, she was more cautious and confused. She saw the danger in these opinions, and, knowing the President as well as she did, was aware that he was impressionable. She knew that if he took any of this seriously, which it appeared that he did, disaster loomed in the weeks and months ahead. As for her own views, well, she was a tough nut to crack. It was not her ideology that was vulnerable. Her job was to serve the President, to parse incoming information from a variety of sources and present clear alternatives for him to consider. Never did she imagine this day. Never would she have dreamed that she would be in the position of steering her president away from a tantalizing liberal ideology. This was not in the manual. She wanted to tell the President to close his eyes, click his heels together three times, and keep repeating, "There's no place like home, there's no place like home."
The rest of the Roundtable was uneventful, mainly because the rebuttals that one would have expected from the three members of the administration were lackluster. In Colin Powell's case, his explanations were technical, and lacking in emotional vigor. He simply didn't disagree enough with what he had heard. Condi Rice just wanted the day to be over, and didn't want to stoke the fire any more than it had been, so she was politely non-specific. George W. Bush's head was so spun around from everything he had heard that he was in a sort of daze. He wanted to talk to Laura. He wanted to spend some serious time with Mo. He was reduced to saying unsubstantial things like, "Y'all are gonna be my new advisors", and, "I'm gonna find a Cabinet position for each one of you, except for your position of course, Colin, heh-heh-heh."
After saying his goodbyes to the participants of the Roundtable, he motioned for Mo Levison to stay behind. "Mo, you and I have some serious catchin' up to do."
"That we do, Mr. President."
"Listen, stay here at Camp David the rest of the weekend, and we'll have dinner tonight, and... other than when we're around other people, don't call me Mr. President. Mr. President is my dad."
"Alright, Mr. President."
"Mo!"
"Well... there are people still around."
***
At dinner that night, George W. Bush was his usual, get-to-the-point self. Over prime rib and baked potatoes, the President laid it all out. "Mo, what I'm gonna tell you is...well, you're gonna think I've lost my mind if you didn't think so already. I had a dream, or, a vision, or I don't know what it was, and then a week later I had another one. One of the upshots of the dreams was the roundtable thing we had today, and the other is that you're here."
"You were told to bring me here in a vision? Wow, I'm flattered."
"Well, not exactly, but Mo, man, I...I feel almost like I did when I had my Conversion–I mean, it's that strong."
"What's that strong?"
George W. Bush went on to explain in stunning detail the substance of the two dreams. That he could tell this to a man he hadn't seen in five years was a testament to their friendship. "You see, Mo, I'm questioning the whole meaning of why I have this job, how I got it, and what the heck I'm supposed to do now. Nothin' serious, as you can tell. You know, I'm surrounded by people who are pushin' me into this Iraq thing, and I'm swallowing it, hook, line and sinker. I mean, the whole business doesn't really add up–Iraq and bin Laden, WMDs–I mean, for all we know he could be pullin' all of our legs–but that doesn't seem to be stoppin' anybody. But geez, Mo, we're way down the road on this thing, and if I stop it now...I mean I don't know if I can stop it now without starting a revolt in my own party."
Mo Levison was just listening, buttering bread that he had already buttered, letting his friend talk it all out, not losing sight of the extraordinary position he was in.
"I feel like I ought to be on a psychiatrist's couch or something–am I makin' any sense?"
"First time ever," kidded Mo.
"I knew I could count on you. Anyway, the 'radical wackos' today? That wasn't supposed to hit me the way it did unless something beyond my powers of understanding is goin' on here. I mean, I got it. Me. I think Condi was about to faint, heh-heh-heh. But what am I supposed to do now?!?
"What, now that you've come over from the dark side? We have a little initiation ceremony where we chant the names of FDR and LBJ around a fire dressed in nothing but loincloths."
"As long as the Indian lady is there, too–just kiddin', just kiddin'...but man, what was the number of that bus that hit me this afternoon?"
"Arundhati Roy? I knew you had to be mentally ill when you agreed to be sliced and diced by Arundhati Roy. She gave you the gentle, truncated version, you know. I could fall in love with that woman."
"I know this sounds masochismic, but I liked it. I mean, she was right about a lot of things, and so was, well, everybody really. Except you. Shoot, even you. See, I've been floating along on this, this thin string of political belief because... I dunno, because I was supposed to. I mean, it's just because of the people I've been around, and not been around, I guess. But I never heard this stuff. Never. I guess I wasn't payin' attention or something–don't start!"
"I don't have to. You're doing a good enough job on your own. And the word is masochistic. But I have to admit, this is the strangest thing I have ever heard of, and it's complicated by the fact that you're uh...the uhh...
"Most powerful man on the planet with the ability to blow up the entire world?"
"Yeah, something like that. What do you tell people?"
"Exactly. 'My fellow Americans, you're going to find this hard to believe, but, blah blah blah.'"
"You ever read The Onion? Course you don't. Anyway, it's a parody newsmagazine, and it's hilarious. They did a thing where they had Jesus come back the second time and he announces that he has converted to Islam and the whole Christian thing was a mistake and his new name is ibn al-Shabazz or something. It was really funny but it reminds me of you now."
"That's funny?"
"Well, I guess you had to be there. But I don't know–you're going to have to take baby steps. You can't just come out with the whole thing at once. Ann Coulter will personally assassinate you."
"I can't take baby steps, Mo. We gotta war comin' in ninety days! I got equipment already moving, we're setting up command in Qatar, not to mention Cheney, and Rumsfeld, and Tommy Franks–what the heck am I gonna say?"
"Maybe you need to put it in the hands of the UN, only this time let 'em do their worst. That'll buy you some time. Become an advocate of more inspections. That'll get Tony Blair off the hook too, won't it?"
"Geez, he's way out on a limb. I suppose the UN is one way to buy a little more time, but I'm gonna look like an idiot–"
"I got news for you, with all due respect, you guys already look like the Keystone Cops with this Iraq thing. To anybody who doesn't watch Fox or listen to Rush, that is. Whatever credibility you lose with your base, you're gonna gain a ton with everybody else around the world."
"Well the base is what elected me and the base listens to Rush and watches Fox and the base is what would keep me from being a one-termer."
"You can't have it both ways. Maybe, just maybe, it's more important to get this right than it is to keep being President. I know that sounds like heresy to a politician, but there it is. I'll be leaving now."
"No, actually, the thought crossed my mind today. I mean if I do a one-eighty on this, I'm probably writing my political obituary, but I guess the question is: can I live with that, or can I live with myself if I don't?"
This last idea was a very serious one to ponder. The two ate for awhile, first in silence, then talking about trivial things, as if each brain had to take some time to reflect and reload. Nothing else needed to be said about their five year break.
***
"Bushie, I need to talk to you." The President finally had found the right moment to bring his First Lady in on his thinking. The President was sitting on the bed taking off his shoes. Laura Bush was in front of a vanity mirror applying face lotion.
"What is it? Is it something bad?"
"On the one hand, it might be, but no, I don't think it's bad. Remember the dream I told you about? With Lincoln?"
"Yes–how could I forget that? You were so... excited about it."
"Yeah, anyway, I had another one, about a week later."
"With Lincoln? Honey, how come you didn't tell me?" Laura Bush was looking at her husband through the mirror.
"It wasn't about Lincoln, and I was just freaked out about it, and I didn't want to wake you up, and...I dunno, I just...I feel like God is tellin' me something really important. He certainly has my attention. No, this dream, and you're not gonna believe this, but this dream featured Bill Clinton of all people, and–"
"Bill Clinton?!? Bushie, you are going nutty, sweetie."
George W. Bush stood up and started pacing around the room. "See–I knew you'd say that–now listen, and be serious. The real star of the show was Martin Luther King. He was in the kitchen as sure as you and I are sitting here. I mean, I could touch him. There were others–uhh, Gore was there, and Bono, and Bono had this parrot, good God, the thing kept sayin' Iraq! And those guys left but Clinton and Martin Luther King stayed and Dr. King ate everything in the whole stinkin' fridge and talked to me, and Bushie, I can remember every single word. It was like a vision, or a prophecy or something. And...this might be the craziest thing of all...I think I'm in the middle of a modern-day Christmas Carol."
Laura Bush spun around and faced her husband. "What? What are you talking about? Bushie, you need some rest. I'm gonna tell Doctor–"
"No, honey, I've never been better... I think. No–I'm dead serious honey, you gotta believe me. The Dickens story–Christmas Carol–that's what's happening to me with, with Lincoln, and then Clinton, don't you see? It's just like it. And, if I'm right, I'm gonna have another dream soon about the future that's gonna be really scary. See, I've been reading the book, and–"
"You've been reading A Christmas Carol? When have you had time... look, Bushie, I'm trying my best to understand, honey, but what does this all mean?"
"I'm gettin' to that, Bushie. I had to fill you in on the dream part. That's why these people were here this weekend. It was something that I was told to do in the dream–in both dreams, actually. And Mo, too, that was in the dream."
"Abraham Lincoln told you to bring all those people to Camp David? He knows Bill Moyers? And Jesse Jackson?"
"Noooo Bushie! Abraham Lincoln didn't tell me specifically about anybody–he just said I needed to hear viewpoints from the other side...that I was getting' all of my information from one angle, and he was right. And Martin Luther King told me almost the same thing."
"What did Clinton say?"
"Oh...he was just kind of riffin' with Dr. King, but he had a few good things to say. Now that I think about it awhile. I wasn't happy at first that he was in the dream, and neither was he."
"He said that?"
"Well, yeah, it was like he was put there, and neither of us had anything to do with it. But the real upshot of this whole thing is, and I talked a bit to Mo about this, is I think I'm changing in a major way, and fast."
"What kind of way? Is this the bad part?"
"Depends on how you look at it, Bushie. Let's just say I don't think it's gonna help my chances for a second term. But the weird thing is, I think I'm okay with that."
"Now you're really losing me, Bushie," said Laura Bush as she looked back into the mirror to wipe the cream off her face. "Back up a minute. How are you changing, and why might it cost you another four years? I was just beginning to like the place."
"I dunno, it seems like a couple of weeks ago I had one set of convictions, and now I'm developing a whole 'nother set of convictions, and–"
"Honey, don't tell me you're buying into what those people told you today? I mean, they're nice enough, I suppose, and make swell dinner guests, but this was all for show wasn't it?" Laura Bush turned to face her husband. "Wasn't it?"
"You don't understand. The dreams led me to invite the people here today, and to be open to listen to what they had to say–and I liked it."
"But Bushie, you're a Republican! You can't like what they say! It's simply not possible! These are the people you, and your father, and his father have fought against your whole lives. It's not in your DNA. Tell me what has gotten into your head? First Christmas Carol, and now this?"
"Look, this is hard enough to deal with, but you have to just...just try and understand that I'm dealin' with something that I don't completely understand yet, but I am definitely gonna need your support, Bushie, because if you're not with me..."
"Oh, Bushie, you know I'm with you. I just think you're acting a little...funny, that's all. But please, promise me you won't do anything...rash. Christmas vacation is here, so you have some time to process all of this."
The President had decided to cancel plans to spend Christmas at his ranch in Crawford, Texas, and instead stay at Camp David. Laura Bush would remain until two days after Christmas, when she would travel to Texas to visit her family. Mo Levison would also linger at Camp David with the President. Visitors during the vacation would include his father and mother, his brother Jeb, and his twin daughters Jenna and Barbara, along with a skeleton crew of staff, which included the ever-faithful Blake Gottesman. Interestingly enough, the only Cabinet member to visit Camp David over the Christmas holidays was Colin Powell.
Unfortunately for George W. Bush, he did not have a lot of processing time. The right-wing media, which came down hard on the President for initiating a meeting with the crème de la crème of the liberal elite, went into a full-court bezerk-a-thon as word leaked out about the actual roundtable. Even the abrupt changing of his vacation schedule was not immune from speculation. George Will, the Washington Post columnist, gently chided the President: "Over the weekend, it appears that George W. Bush took leave of his senses. For the sake of the nation, if anyone knows where they are, please return them at once." Others were not nearly so kind. Rush Limbaugh had this to say: "If I didn't have it by credible sources that this 'roundtable' actually took place, I would have thought it was some kind of a bad joke. Can you imagine Ronald Reagan doing something like this? What could the President have possibly been thinking?!? All that was missing from that group was a bong and Mao's Little Red Book. I gotta tell ya, folks, there's something odd going on down there in Washington..." Bill O'Reilly groused that it was "shameful and Carteresque," and wondered "where the hell Jane Fonda and Abbie Hoffman were." Robert Novak speculated aloud whether Dick Cheney had lost control of the White House. Even AIPAC, the powerful Jewish lobbying group, got into the act when it said in a statement that "it was unconscionable for an American president to meet with such overtly anti-Jewish agitators such as Edward Said and Robert Fisk, not to mention the seriously misguided Rabbi Michael Lerner. To what good could this possibly come?"
George W. Bush was taking the criticism fairly well in stride, but couldn't help complaining one morning as he and Mo Levison were on Stairmasters watching FoxNews. "Can you believe all the crap I'm gettin' over one lousy meeting?"
"Yep."
"Yep? I'm being skewered like a pig at a luau and all you can say is 'yep'?"
"Yep. What did you think would happen? Your side has the most vicious attack dogs, which is fine unless they're unleashed on you."
"Did I invite you here?" The Stairmaster ramped up into serious hill mode.
"Yep. Hey do you remember Marcus Aurelius?"
"Uhh, wasn't he the Ivy League's first black running back? Just kiddin'!" replied the President, to Mo Levison's incredulous look. "I know who he was–a Roman emperor, right? I remember that much. Don't remember what he did–must've slept through the rest of that class."
"As I recall you did," replied Mo, sweat dropping from his eyelids. "He was maybe the greatest Roman emperor, at the height of the Empire. But the guy was amazing, and he left a record of his thoughts, called Meditations. You were supposed to read that at Yale."
"Well, you read it, and look where you are, and I didn't, and look where I am," countered the President. "But now that I think of it, it does sound familiar. I think somebody, a staffer, gave me a copy of that when I was in Austin. I didn't read it then, either."
"He wrote some things almost two thousand years ago that you ought to hear right now. It's a thin little book, and I always carry it with me in my computer bag. I'll be right back." And just like that, Mo Levison jumped off of the Stairmaster and ran up to his cabin to retrieve the book. In a minute he was back, and out of breath. "Yeah, this is great," said Mo, panting. "Right here...umm... here–'Does the news bother you? Do you worry about things out of your control? Then take the time to concentrate your mind in the acquisition of some new and useful knowledge and stop it from flitting about'."
"Sounds like a fortune cookie, Mo," said the perspiring President, accelerating up another imaginary hill.
"This is the emperor of Rome, not some Chinese Restaurant. Here–here's another one: 'Do not hesitate to change course if someone is able to show where you are mistaken or point out a better way, but be persuaded only by arguments based on justice and the common good.' This was written two thousand years ago. Oh–and here is my favorite, written just for you: 'So you don't dazzle them with your blazing intellect. Get over it! Still you have plenty going for you. Let the virtues you posses shine forth: your honesty, dignity and stamina; your indifference to pleasure and loathing of self-pity. Do you not recognize these as qualities you possess or as virtues you are fully capable of owning?' I mean, he saw you coming."
"You carry that book around?"
"I'm just trying to point out that a great Roman emperor two thousand years ago was having some of the very same issues that you are having today. Don't you find that fascinating?"
"I guess misery loves company," sighed the President as he cooled down, and finished his exercise.
***
While the President was holed up at Camp David, United Nations weapons inspectors, led by Hans Blix, were scouring Iraq for any sign of weapons of mass destruction. It was presumed that it was just a matter of time before they would be found. The military buildup in the Gulf continued unabated, while the war plans of CENTCOM Commander Tommy Franks were being honed to finer and finer detail. One would have been hard-pressed to find anyone, with the ironic exception of Sadaam Hussein himself, who didn't think that the United States was going to invade Iraq no matter what Hans Blix found or didn't find. But there was one man, the most important man, who was beginning to have real doubts about the whole operation.
George W. Bush intentionally invited his father and his brother Jeb to Camp David during the Christmas-New Year's holiday because, even more than the liberal thinkers he heard from, these were two people whose counsel he had sorely neglected and whose honest opinions he needed right now.
On the night of December 26th, the President convened an after-dinner meeting which included his father, the former President George H. W. Bush, his brother Jeb, the current Governor of Florida, former National Security Advisor to Bush Senior General Brent Scowcroft, who had written an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal critical of the current Bush administration's direction towards war, and Mo Levison. Had the content of this meeting not remained a secret, it would have no doubt been even more controversial than the Camp David Roundtable. Luckily for the President, what was said in front of the fire in the main room in the Aspen Lodge was never revealed until now.
With the soft glow of the fire lighting the faces of the four men as they sat sipping various after-dinner drinks, the President sat with his back to the fire facing them. "I, uh, want to level with you all–Dad, Jeb, General Scowcroft–I'm having some, uh, real reservations about what we're thinking about doing in Iraq. I think we may have gotten a little too overzealous–Mo, is that the word? Anyway, I'm reexamining a lot of what we're doing right now, and one of the things I need is some opinions other than the ones I usually get. First of all, I need to say with all candor that we have a real split in my administration–General Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and...me, believe it or not, on one side, and Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and all the guys under them on the other. It's gettin' pretty rough between General Powell and the Vice President, and I'm afraid it's not gonna last. Did you all read the Vice President's speech he gave in Nashville? That speech was not vetted by anyone. He all but declared war on Iraq by himself."
"Son, I did read that, and I had no idea Saddam Hussein started the crack problem," said the elder Bush.
"I'm not privy to all the intelligence you see, but I could've sworn it was the Columbians we were dealing with down in Miami," added Jeb Bush.
"See, that's just it. Nobody knows where he's gettin' his intelligence. He and Don have just started their own pipeline, bypassing the CIA whenever it's convenient. I'm starting to believe some of the intelligence is faulty. Dad, what's your opinion of where we're at?"
"Well, I would defer first to General Scowcroft–Brent?"
"First of all, I think your people are conflating Iraq, terrorism, and WMDs."
"And that's not good?"
"No, Mr. President. Saddam Hussein is obviously a terrible guy, but he's not suicidal. He's a power-hungry dictator whose main goal is to survive. Giving WMDs to religious fanatics is something he would be very unlikely to do. If they could be traced back to him, then he is toast. If he has them, then he's going to brandish them as a warning to anyone who threatens his survival. More importantly, while current administration policy and rhetoric seems to make Iraq the number one problem in the Middle East, the rest of the world thinks it's the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and I agree." Scowcroft leaned forward towards the President. "And make no mistake, world opinion is vital because you need all the help you can get fighting the War on Terrorism. Invading Iraq like this is going to create more terrorists, and get you less help fighting them."
"Well, that's uh, that's uh, what I've been thinking, General," said the President. "I'm particularly concerned about what happens to Iraq after we beat 'em. That's General Powell's biggest concern, as well, but Don and Dick just brush it aside like it's nothing to worry about."
"Of course it's something to worry about," said Bush Senior, eyes flashing, looking suddenly vital. "That's what we were worried about in '91–hell, Cheney was worried about it, too. We could've marched right into Baghdad then, too, but what do we have when we get there? A nightmare, is what. General Powell is right, son. I've tried to keep my nose out of it—don't want to seem like I'm over your shoulder–gotta find your own way–but this is loony tunes. Bad stuff. There–I said it."
"Well, I'm glad you did, Dad, glad you did. Jeb, any thoughts?"
The President's younger brother, unlike the President, had an easy time with the English language. There were more than a few top Republican honchos who thought the wrong Bush brother was in the White House.
"From where I sit, there doesn't seem like there's a whole lot of logic in the administration's foreign policy. I mean, the goal can't be to piss off the whole world, but that's where it looks like we're headed. I hesitate to say too much because I don't know the whole picture, but I gotta tell you–nobody outside of the base is buying what your team is selling. I think you're taking your eye off the ball, and you guys are trying to convince me that the ball is Iraq, but I just don't see it."
"It's interesting that you have Mo here, son. That tells me a lot right there. Whadda you think of all of this, Mo?"
"I only got here a couple of days ago, sir, and before that, I was about as out of the loop as one can get. My specialty is the law, and I've had some serious questions about the treatment of these 'detainees'. It comes back to who we are as Americans. If we treat the alleged terrorists like the terrorists treat their enemies, then we've lost a big part of what makes us special as Americans. But I'm certainly happy that the President is taking a good, hard look at the whole picture, and that gives me real hope for the future."
"You oughta run for something, Mo. Spoken like a true politician." Mo winced, as the elder Bush chewed on an ice cube, a family trait.
"Well, the horse is way out of the barn...it's gonna be hard to call her back," said the President wistfully.
"Anything we can do to help you–Mr. President, I'm sure we all will do," said his father, and the other three men gamely agreed as they stood and clinked glasses and toasted George W. Bush's lonely courage.
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