“no ambition whatsoever to use 9/11 as a political issue”

According to the New York Times, “Speaking of 9/11 in January 2003, President Bush told the Associated Press that he had ‘no ambition whatsoever to use this as a political issue.’ “

And a year ago, he enforced a ban that prevented photographers from taking pictures of flag-draped military caskets.

Lots of folks are very very angry that he’s turned around and done exactly what he said he wouldn’t do. But then again, that is par for the course with this president. His track record of half-truths, manipulative statements, and outright lies speaks for itself. It frightens me to think of how easily people are swayed, how easily they just accept whatever they are told by those in power. Like sheep. It’s easier that way, I guess. It makes me think quite seriously of 1984 or Brazil.

A smidge of paranoia is healthy, so I almost always assume that anything I’m told by politicians is either mostly or completely not true. They have professional word twisters in their employ who can quite easily craft sentences that appear to say one thing but really mean something entirely different. These statements go unnoticed by those who aren’t sharp enough to really think about what they are being told (in otherwords: the great majority of Americans). Remember the “tax rebate” of a few years ago, which, because of the way the Bush Administration phrased it, everyone thought was a refund of their 2001 taxes, but which actually turned out to be an advance on your anticipated 2002 refund (meaning we had to pay it back)? They deliberately misled the public into thinking that it was something that it was not. Technically, they didn’t lie, but ONLY technically. Case in point.