What? - Part Two

Personal

Confronting the Bush administration is confronting the authoritarian personality.

At it best, the authoritarian wants simple top-down hierarchical structure. Sometimes you might need a clear cut leader. Loyalty is a prerequsite for the authoritarian.

The authoritarian doesn't need logic, facts, or rationality because they speak from a position of unequaled self righteousness. They can't be challenged. Think Coulter. She is possessed with an irreproachable divinity. Possessed as in, 'need of an exorcism.'

At its ugliest, the authoritarian becomes the sadist. Its important to make a very clear distinction between adults engaging in consensual activities, sexual or not, and an authoritarian sadist. The authoritarian sadist could care less about your consent.

Recall the smiling face of the 'soldier' in Abu Ghraib standing next to the torture victims like a hunter proudly standing next to a dead elk trophy. These people were chosen for that because they want to do that. They are the authoritarian with major pathological tendencies.

How do you deal with the sadist? Its an age old question. One on one, you have to decide for yourself and know what you are doing. You can ignore, talk around, meet head on and try to overpower, try to outsmart, get your comeuppance later on after the fact like a well placed lawsuit.

Someone like Chomsky overwhelms them with pure intelligence and a massive internal library of knowledge. Someone like Jon Stewart slays them with biting satire.

Personally I believe the way the deal with Bush is impeachment. Recall that in some circles Bush is the closest thing to God. He is well insulated from the disdain that the majority hold for him. He also seeks the unlimited power of the unitary executive. Impeachment is his greatest fear.

There are personal things that you can do that lighten your dependence on the authoritarian corporate structure that controls American politics. This would run from being completely off the grid, to choosing where you purchase your gas (Exxon helps fund the American Enterprise Institute) to being active in your local community, to making a pain out of yourself to your local congressperson and senator, to finding creative ways to express your political needs. Some people can do this with song for example. Everybody tries to find their thing from protesting to writing legislation etc etc.