We Need Context"We need context," said retiring Secretary Rumsfeld on 11/9/06. Sometimes Rumsfeld can sound a note that is almost blindingly wise--without knowing it. What Rumsfeld meant was that we needed a new story: About the Iraq war, about Afghanistan and Guantànamo, and about the GWOT. It's funny that Rumsfeld said "we need context," because up until now he and his colleagues thought they had the story, the story-line, the plot-line. Democrats never did have a story, at least not one that they could agree upon. Did the Bush international policy group create a "context?" Their story was the one that Bush spouted during the '06 campaign: even if there were no WMD's and even if Saddam (rhymes with madam) didn't have connections with "al Qaeda." The real reason we went into I-raq was to topple Saddam and to bring Democracy to those poor benighted (and non-believing) dark-skinned I-raqis, and if they tried to resist it, why we'd…uh, we'd teach them the benefits of American-style democracy. We were going to transform the Middle East. It was a messianic vision, and it appealed to the religious right. When Iraqis didn't greet Americans with open arms--except for a few staged scenes around Saddam's falling statue--Rumsfeld could have said then, "we need context," but instead the story was simply modified, just a little. What is "liberated" I-raq's proudest day? When those millions of I-raqis voted and showed off their purple fingers. Elections. We were going to show them how to really do it. We might even have sent a few elections dirty tricks specialists from Rove's shop. Maybe the Democrats finally won an election because Rove was short-handed--maybe he'd sent his best men to I-raq, so he couldn't steal the election here. (A joke). But the Rumsfeld, Cheney, Perle plot-line was a fantasy. We've known that since before the invasion. That was their context. When Rumsfeld said, "We need context," what he was really saying was: "We need to figure out another story-line." Rumsfeld is right--for the Democrats, too: we need context a story, based on reality (something Rumsfeld might find hard to fathom) but an agreed upon story, one that better explains what has happened, not just in Iraq and Afghanistan, but in those secret prison camps, and in the US Congress. We need context to counter the Republicans' failed story with a more realistic story of our own. For example: Bush and Cheney shouted during the election that Democrats would cut and run, or would only fight terrorists with police powers, or would give in to them, or wouldn’t know how to deal with them; you had to be tough, and you had to fight to win. Bush clearly has had no clue how the US was going to "win," (or even what that meant) which is why Rumsfeld said "…we need context." But Bush was still spouting their line until the election. Rumsfeld said "We need context" two days after. What did happen? What is the context? Was it greed, incompetence and ideological blindness that led Bush, et al to be so determined to take over in Iraq? Was it the oil companies, or were they just co-conspirators, cheering the plotters on? Or were the oil companies in on planning the invasion when they met with Dick Cheney in the secret energy task force in 2001? Maybe we'll finally find out, when John Conyers begins his first investigation in January, 2007. Perhaps the Democrats' context will grow organically, as the truth begins to leak out in those (and many other) hearings. I have a suggestion: look back in history to the failures of other empires, like Rome in 476. What you'll find is that the class holding exclusive power--as the Republicans and their funders did until this election--is a class or cabal driven by greed, and greed for power. These people have no concern for the state, the people, or the country, only for themselves, although they have convinced themselves of just the opposite: through their story. The more isolated they become, by their wealth, by their control of the media, the more incompetent, greedy and blind they become--until the empire collapses. That will give you a beginning context: of why it all happened in Iraq, the Katrina disaster, why Congress voted for the Military Commissions Act, why we even have something we call The Global War On Terror. Maybe a new story will tell us what we need to do about all of this, now that we have a chance to turn things around, to change the ending. Note: kernels of this idea were given to me by Elizabeth Cunningham, whose book tells a new story about Jesus and Mary Magdalen see The Passion of Mary Magdalen
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