Read This Article.

[athelind]

Ron Suskind examines the current occupant of the Oval Office and his attitude toward Fact and Faith.

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In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn't like about Bush's former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House's displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn't fully comprehend -- but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency.

The aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

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Ultimately, that's what this election comes down to: the "Reality-Based Community", with its roots in the Reformation and the Enlightenment, against an Administration rooted in Divine Right and Revelation. These people aren't "neo-conservative"; they're Neo-Feudalist.

(Yes, registration is required, and the New York Times seems to have one person dedicated to cancelling the accounts generated at BugMeNot. I HATE having to register for news sites -- but I did for this article.)

Comments

[cargoweasel.livejournal.com]

It is reason vs. irrationality this election cycle. Bill Clinton said something interesting on his Daily Show appearance:

"Democrats win when people think."

Over all of the noise and spin of this election cycle, all the smear tactics and all the lies, somehow, above it all, the people are thinking, about where their country is headed, and they're coming together and demanding a change. It's heartwarming to see, it's the American spirit at its finest. It gives me hope.

"Democrats win when people think."

[athelind.livejournal.com]

Damn. That is the Best Quote Evar.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

I'm going to get Pyat to show me how to link your journal to mine, so I can point out this article to my brother-in-law. Practically the only thing I don't like about him is that he's an ardent republican.

[llyander.livejournal.com]

I haven't read the article yet, but I have to say I think that quote scares the hell outta me.

[taral.livejournal.com]

http://www.majcher.com/nytview.html (or use one of the copies)

[paka.livejournal.com]

Reality-based community has to be the dumbest euphamism I've ever heard. What, is there a Surreality-based community for Dadists, or something?

[r-caton.livejournal.com]

Dear Christ that is scary. Explains why he and Tony Blair work so well together....
Check out when Blair is explaining how he came to get Parliament with him on invading Iraq. (notably the WMDs that could be deployed in 45 minutes). He's very sorry that the info he was given was dud. He's very sorry that the naughty naughty intelligence services mislead him so that he innocently misled Parliament. But he's still not sorry for the war, since regime change is a Good Thing so he must have done something good.
Blair will never apologise because he genuinely beleives he can do no wrong and therefore will never have anything to apologise for. Sounds like Bush is a kindred spirit.
God help us all if this man succeeds through fair means or foul.

[araquan.livejournal.com]

Neo-feudalists. I like that. One of my favorite passages from the article:

And for those who don't get it? That was explained to me in late 2002 by Mark McKinnon, a longtime senior media adviser to Bush, who now runs his own consulting firm and helps the president. He started by challenging me. ''You think he's an idiot, don't you?'' I said, no, I didn't. ''No, you do, all of you do, up and down the West Coast, the East Coast, a few blocks in southern Manhattan called Wall Street. Let me clue you in. We don't care. You see, you're outnumbered 2 to 1 by folks in the big, wide middle of America, busy working people who don't read The New York Times or Washington Post or The L.A. Times. And you know what they like? They like the way he walks and the way he points, the way he exudes confidence. They have faith in him. And when you attack him for his malaprops, his jumbled syntax, it's good for us. Because you know what those folks don't like? They don't like you!'' In this instance, the final ''you,'' of course, meant the entire reality-based community.