Bush and His Self-Fulfilling Prophecies

Bush mentioned the attacks of September 11th five times in his speech last night, and asserted that terrorism is the reason we are fighting the war. Here is a brief history of the “original” motive for going to Iraq: 1. Terrorism 2. WMD 3. Saddam=bad guy 4. “freedom and democracy” and finally…5. Terrorism.

We originally started the war to stop terrorism in Iraq (which did not exist). The instability of war allowed terrorism into Iraq. Now we must fight in Iraq to stop the terrorists. Congratulations, W. You have fulfilled your own prophecy and can now justify your original “original” reason for going. But had you not asserted that Iraqi terrorism was a current problem in 2003, the country would have never supported this war. Hundreds of thousands of people would not have died. And terrorism would never have been a problem in Iraq. But at least you were right. Eventually. Way to Go, George.

Consider this circular policy-making in the context of Social Security. George reports that Social Security is bankrupt (although it is not). This causes Americans to support policy changes. The policy changes, once implemented, bankrupt Social Security. And once again, George has created the exact problem that he intended to fix before it existed. But he can look back and say "see, I told you so." Foresight is apparently 20/20 when you have lots of power.

How do we get our country back on track? Tell our President to stop “fixing” things.