Thank you, I don't want to be President of the United States
by Abe Frankel

I can't wait until we get a really evil president. Not devious and cunning like Nixon and Johnson. But really, really evil. God, it would be so refreshing! George Carlin, 1997.

In September, 2000, two months before Bush first stole the presidency from Gore, I went around the towns in rural Tennessee where I lived and put up Avery 4"x4" stickers which read "George Bush is the anti-christ. Pass it on." They were having an Appalachian Traditional Music Festival that weekend, so I knew a lot of down-home religious folks were in town and would see it. It didn't help much and Tennessee soon became a red state. But that was OK. Two days after the election, I wrote an article called "Welcome to the United States of Twomerica!" in which I coined the terms "red state" and "blue state," which eventually everyone else picked-up on. Geographically and referentially, it wasn't a total loss.

Of course I knew that George W. wasn't the anti-christ. Dick Cheney was. But Bush was the one running for the big office with the not-so--round shape. So he got the blame. The fact is George W. never wanted to be President. Nor did he want to be all the other things his daddy wanted him to be. He didn't want to go to Yale. Or prep school. He didn't want to be Governor of Texas. He probably didn't even want to be a slick oil dealer in the Permian Basin even though he did stop feeling like the failure his young life was turning out to be. No, George W., the unurtured child within, never knew what he wanted to be when he grew up! And now that he's President, he still doesn't know. Maybe, he thinks, when this terrible ordeal is over and he's retired, he'll finally figure out what he wants to be when he grows up! But, then, it will be too late. I feel sort of sorry for him–even if he has screwed this country a lot more than Clinton did by screwing Monica Lewinski.

But Bush isn't the anti-christ. He isn't the one in charge although he may even think that he is. "Cheney" is the anti-christ. "Cheney" represents the "large corporate interests" of this country. And they're the ones who control things. And, at least for the last two centuries, with the exception of a few unfortunate interludes, always have. Since the end of the Civil War, the Republicans–do I have to spell out who they're for–have elected the president 21 times to 14 times for the Democrats. And F.D.R. had 4 of those waltzes. The only time that the Republicans lose is when some crisis hits that involves them. A big crisis, like the Great Depression or Teddy Roosevelt's splitting the Republican party–or, hey, maybe right now. Then the Democrats can take over for a while until the big corporations can re-group and figure out how to regain the yardage that has been lost. For example, when they got kicked out because of the ‘29 Crash, they figured out McCarthy-ism. But that wasn't enough to overcome the mindset that F.D.R. had created in the country. He was still the "political father." So, in the 1980s when Reagan won--ushering in the Age of Media-star Rulers--they fashioned him into the new "political father" by making "liberal" a dirty word.

So here we are, wouldn't you say? At a time that is as threatening to our society as the Great Depression: A war that we were lied into entering, where we never should have been, where we have totally failed in accomplishing anything and which seems to have disastrous consequences if we leave.

(Personally, here's what I wanted to do: resurrect Saddam, dress him up in his classy, regal uniform with all of his chest-medals and put him back in charge of things. Then apologize to Iraq and give them 70 billion dollars (half the cost of the war this year). But now, alas and alack, Saddam's dead and it's too late for that! What, may I ask, was the matter with Saddam that isn't the matter with all of the other petty, sick tyrants we've propped up or ignored around the world?)

If you saw the Bush segment on "60 Minutes" a few weeks ago, you may have observed that he was either seriously depressed–maybe when he's the newest ex-president, he can do TV spots for one of the anti-depressants–or perhaps he was faking it. Which is possible because he's a good ham-imitatin' actor. At any rate, I now believe that the anti-christs in charge have decided that their best hope for the election of 2008 is make Bush the scapegoat, the pigeon. A lame duck with his wings clipped, not running for office, the whole now totally acknowledged Iraq disaster can be attached to him. Republicans in Congress, and everywhere, are cutting him loose to sink like the proverbial dollar that did not make its way across the Potomac. And while they'll make it out to be a moral or political decision, it's party strategy.

On the Democratic side, there is perhaps at the moment the opportunity to create a new F.D.R. figure–a revolutionary "deal" that matches the seriousness of the disintegration. An entirely new, vibrant, radical shift in our collective societal consciousness that will bring the majority of Americans back to the Democratic party for decades to come. Ha, ha, ha, ha. I laugh out loud. Do you see any F.D.R .s running around out there? I don't.

If there are any original, visionary vocalizers around, they're like me. They are "outside the system." They live on the web, not the tube. They're bloggers, artists, fact-diggers, fantasy-spewers, nutballs.

When the last revolters were heard in this country, in the ‘60s and ‘70s, when the good guys took over for a while, the big corporations were once again knocked on their butts. Partly, not totally, the reason we were able to take over the country in those years was two-fold: we had the backing of students and faculty on most of the campuses around the country and we used that backing in demonstrations, strikes and protests to get on the 6 o'clock news, on all the networks, every night. We controlled the tube.

After that ran out of steam for various reasons, the anti-christs reassessed and came back once again. And they did two things: they ended the military draft and they bought up control of all the major television networks. "Draft protest" was not only an issue of the ‘60s, it was also a strong motivation for many, many college students, who did not want to go to Vietnam, to join the larger protest. Ending the draft has allowed the administration to wage a war for which college students, and the population in general, are almost totally disconnected. When there are protests in this country–Greenpeace, global ecomony, logging, coal digging–they are going to get little to zero exposure on the tube. If there are any new, radical, original thinkers in this country, they are not going to be pictured on the evening news–or the population doesn't care about them. Which is probably the same thing: as long as good busy citizens don't have to think personally about having a third tour of duty in a wilderness land and they can watch "American Idol. "

Despite what bloggers and geeks may think, our collective societal consciousness is THE BIG TV SCREEN, not the world-wide web. And the big corporations know that. Although it's wonderful to have so much available "information," and free expression, it's too chaotic and loose. It exists in a place called cyberspace, wherever that is. No one can pin it down and organize it into something with a unified social direction. And any opinion, in the feast of opinions, can easily be spun into something else.

But walk into any bar, motel, waiting room, business office or lobby and there is the tube, waiting for you. As if it were always there, always on. And you had just left for a few moments, but now you were back. Some folks, when they're at home, leave the screen on all the time. They don't want to be alone. And the content, and intent, is pretty much universal, from the hallowed halls of PBS to reruns of "Raymond": to dumbifie and/or frighten America, to supply some mind-numbing, befuddling or angst-driving anesthetic to fill in between the pleas for more consumption. And who is behind this? I don't know. I call them "the anti-christ," "big corporations." But I do know this. The day after 911, when all the networks and news channels stopped their regular programming to cover events, all of them, for some reason, adopted the same bottom-of-the-screen slogan: "America under attack." Now who co-ordinated that? I don't know. But is it possible, and, again, I am just guessing here, that part of our cultural focus on the newer technologies of the computer and communications is a smoke screen to distract us from where the real power lies? There is a system, I would say. And it doesn't matter who is President, red, purple or blue.

So, join the enthusiastic mass of politico-monied, media-star searching, self-absorbed grabbers sitting on the tube townhall wooden stage of some rehearsed mini-non-debate? Thanks, but again, no thanks. I think I'll just stay here on my ranch in Tennessee. Maybe I can exchange ranch stories through the miracle of the web with former leader George W.