Novels, war and psychopaths.

As I look at the havoc George W. Bush has let loose on the world it seems like a cross between The Mouse That Roared, Dr. Strangelove and for the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan Catch 22. A man I wouldn't have read a few short years ago, Charley Reese puts it all into perspective.
No-Win War
Reese has been opposed to Bush's mis-adventure in Iraq from the beginning but in this commentary he sounds more like a Quaker than a conservative as he condemns war in general and those who start them.

I heard a lecture by an Army psychologist who contended that after 90 days of combat, the casualty rate was 98 percent. Those not wounded physically were wounded psychologically. The other 2 percent were psychopaths.

His passing remark about the psychopaths was interesting. A psychopath is a defective human being, almost a bionic robot. Psychopaths can be intelligent and manipulative, but they lack totally the capability of feeling any emotion for or attachment to other human beings. They are without conscience, without remorse, without regret, without compassion. They can feel rage when frustrated. They commit a lot of the crime and in prisons usually run the inmates.

Let's look at that last paragraph again: "Psychopaths can be intelligent and manipulative, but they lack totally the capability of feeling any emotion for or attachment to other human beings. They are without conscience, without remorse, without regret, without compassion. They can feel rage when frustrated." and now let's look at this from the Leiter Report:
The "Moral Vacancy" of George W. Bush

This is a quite brilliant diagnosis, written last fall by E.L. Doctorow, and confirmed, of course, by everything that has happened since:

I fault this president for not knowing what death is. He does not suffer the death of our 21-year-olds who wanted to be what they could be. On the eve of D-Day in 1944 General Eisenhower prayed to God for the lives of the young soldiers he knew were going to die. He knew what death was. Even in a justifiable war, a war not of choice but of necessity, a war of survival, the cost was almost more than Eisenhower could bear.

But this president does not know what death is. He hasn't the mind for it. You see him joking with the press, peering under the table for the weapons of mass destruction he can't seem to find, you see him at rallies strutting up to the stage in shirt sleeves to the roar of the carefully screened crowd, smiling and waving, triumphal, a he-man.

He does not mourn. He doesn't understand why he should mourn. He is satisfied during the course of a speech written for him to look solemn for a moment and speak of the brave young Americans who made the ultimate sacrifice for their country.

Are you beginning to understand why we are where we are today? Yes that's right, the American people put a psychopath, who is surrounded by other psychopaths in the White House. And if there was any doubt we have this:

In Washington it is hardly a secret that the same people in and around the administration who brought you Iraq are preparing to do the same for Iran. The Pentagon, acting under instructions from Vice President Dick Cheney's office, has tasked the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with drawing up a contingency plan to be employed in response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States. The plan includes a large-scale air assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. Within Iran there are more than 450 major strategic targets, including numerous suspected nuclear-weapons-program development sites. Many of the targets are hardened or are deep underground and could not be taken out by conventional weapons, hence the nuclear option. As in the case of Iraq, the response is not conditional on Iran actually being involved in the act of terrorism directed against the United States. Several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are reportedly appalled at the implications of what they are doing--that Iran is being set up for an unprovoked nuclear attack--but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections.

It would appear that Dr. Strangelove is not only alive and well but firmly in charge.