by sixtimeseven » Fri Aug 12, 2005 7:13 pm
As I progress into my fifth decade on Earth, the wisdom of those that have gone before becomes not only more profound, but acutely topical. It dawned upon me while watching a live broadcast of Presidential Press Secretary, Scott McClellan field questions from the White House press corps on July 13, 2005, pertaining to Karl Rove’s 2003 attempt to emulate W. Mark Felt, and become the Linda Lovelace of the Bush Administration.<br><br>First, however, it seemed prudent to research the origin of my opening statement, in that it is said that: "history repeats itself." In truth it is "they" who said that history repeats itself, as I was unable to find a specific reference in Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations to that exact phrase. I sought similar expressions to find the earliest recorded version. <br><br>The earliest reference I found was by the Greek, Thucydides, in the 5th Century B.C.E., but it does not actually speak to the topic at hand. I dug deeper and found four that are relevant to the subtle, yet thought provoking concept I wish to convey here. Each speaks for itself.<br><br>"<!--EZCODE UNDERLINE START--><span style="text-decoration:underline">History is no more than the portrayal of crimes and misfortune</span><!--EZCODE UNDERLINE END-->," by the intrepid Francois Marie Arouet Voltaire, 1694-1778. Sans Voltaire, there may never have been a French, or for that matter American, revolution.<br><br>"<!--EZCODE UNDERLINE START--><span style="text-decoration:underline">What experience and history teach is this - that people and governments have never learned anything from history, or acted on principles deduced from it</span><!--EZCODE UNDERLINE END-->," by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, 1770-1831, whom I knew nothing about until I googled him. A German theologian whose idealism and volumes of philosophical publications and essays contributed to the birth of analytic philosophy.<br><br>"<!--EZCODE UNDERLINE START--><span style="text-decoration:underline">Upon this point a page of history is worth a volume of logic</span><!--EZCODE UNDERLINE END-->," by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., 1841-1935, Civil War veteran and Harvard Law Professor appointed Associate Supreme Court Justice by Theodore Roosevelt. He was known on the Court as "The Great Dissenter" because of the brilliant legal reasoning found in his written opinions. He retired from the Court on January 12, 1932 and was the oldest man to have ever served on the court.<br><br>"<!--EZCODE UNDERLINE START--><span style="text-decoration:underline">The vengeance of history is more terrible than the vengeance of the most powerful General Secretary</span><!--EZCODE UNDERLINE END-->," by Leon Trotsky, 1879-1940, a leader of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia. Until Lenin's death, Trotsky was the second most powerful man in Russia. Trotsky lost the leadership to Joseph Stalin, who later exiled him. Trotsky waged a bitter fight against Stalin from abroad until his assassination in Mexico City, in 1940.<br><br>That foundation laid, let us proceed to some specific examples of how history repeats. Wherever possible, I have provided literal quotation within double quotes. Other statements have been paraphrased to the best of my recollection and are enclosed between single quotes. I confidently provide paraphrased recollections having been a young adult during and having witnessed the events--in some form--whether it be in person or, live or rebroadcast television, newspapers, magazine articles, and/or books particular to the greater issue(s) that contain specifics relevant to the incidents at hand. Should there be any factual discrepancies, they are unintentional and purely accidental, and editorial comment or correction are welcomed.<br><br>1974 - Ron Ziegler, Press Secretary to President Richard Nixon, during a White House press briefing, said, ‘I am not going to comment on issues pertaining to the Watergate break-in, as there is an ongoing investigation being conducted by the Justice Department Special Prosecutor and at the highest levels of the White House.‘ When asked about known facts surrounding the break-in that contradicted Ziegler’s earlier statements to the press in 1972 he replied, "Statements from two years ago are inoperative."<br><br>2005 - Scott McClellan, Press Secretary to President George W. Bush, during a White House press briefing said, "I am not going to comment on that since there is an ongoing criminal investigation." McClellan refused to discuss his denials two years ago of wrongdoing by Karl Rove. <br><br>1997 - President Bill Clinton during a White House press briefing said, "I did not have sex with that woman." The unspoken remark we have all made inferentially being, ‘Of course, that depends upon your definition of the word sex.’<br><br>2004 - Karl Rove, Deputy Assistant to President George W. Bush, during a press photo op, said, "I did know and did not leak the name (of CIA officer Valerie Plame) to anyone." The unspoken inferential statement being, ‘I merely told Matthew Cooper and Bob Novak that Ambassador Wilson’s wife worked for the CIA. How they figured out her name I do not know. Maybe they looked in the phone book.’<br><br>1973 - Former Attorney General, Nixon Presidential campaign advisor, and extended stay guest of the Federal prison system, John Mitchell, during a telephone conversation with Washington Post reporter Carl Bernstein, threatened physical assault upon owner and publisher of the Washington Post, Kathryn (Katy) Graham - to wit - "Katy Graham is going to get her tit caught in a ringer if you print that!"<br><br>2005 - A U.S. District Court Grand Jury, in an unprecedented action, imprisons New York Times reporter, Judith Miller, for refusing to disclose her source to investigators. This is the first time in U.S. history that a journalist has been jailed for refusing to disclose a source, contrary to common law corollary inferred from freedom of speech and freedom of the press rights defined within the First Amendment to the Constitution. Robert D. Novak, an outspoken journalist who also published CIA officer Valerie Plame's name and occupation, has not yet revealed his source and remains at large.<br><br>These three coincidences:<br><br><!--EZCODE FONT START--><span style="font-size:xx-small;">doubletalk by Presidential press secretaries from two different eras demonstrating that both either lied, or were left out of the loop in the early stages of a probe of questionable illegal activities on the part of a high ranking member(s) of the White House staff,<br><br>omission by intent, commonly called, "jailhouse law" (or as Washington Post Editor-in-Chief, Benjamin Bradley put it, "a non-denial denial"), utilized by the former president and Mr. Rove, in hopes that the problems would just, "go away,"<br><br>overstepping the line of traditional and respected conduct, and infringement of liberty by the Justice Department by intimidating and/or incarcerating members of the fourth estate,</span><!--EZCODE FONT END--><br><br>coupled with the previously mentioned cerebral quotations, lend themselves to prognostication. Therefore, I offer a chronology of speculative predictions consistent with the irony of these coincidences.<br><br>1) Within the next 30 days, a missing persons report will be filed with the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department by commentator, Tucker Carlson, for columnist and political commentator Robert D. Novak. It will be discovered that Novak had already been missing for ten days prior, but no one noticed until Carlson visited Novak’s home to collect on an unpaid bet over whether or not Howard Dean wears thong underwear. Within days it will be determined that Novak was spirited out of his home late one night by Homeland Security Police on a vague charge of obstruction for refusing to reveal a source. Novak’s whereabouts will remain unknown until February 2009, when he will be discharged from the military prison at the U.S. Naval Station, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a better man for the experience.<br><br>2) Shortly after Karl Rove is indicted for leaking information critical to National Security and lying to the grand jury, President Bush will be recorded on video--by six major networks--pushing Presidential Press Secretary Scott McClellan backwards down a granite staircase leading to a federal building, causing McClellan to collide clumsily into several members of the surrounding White House press corp. Bush will then turn indifferently and quickly rejoin other staff members climbing the stairs, while McClellan, the reporters and other onlookers stare agape. Fortunately, no injuries are reported, however Helen Thomas of UPI will file a civil suit against McClellan for scuffing her Nikes when he steps on her toe. McClellan will subsequently settle out of court in lieu of him agreeing to replace her footwear, and an evening of drinks, dinner and dancing--Dutch--with the senior White House correspondent.<br><br>3) Karl Rove, upon learning of his indictment, will publicly announce that he is "born again," and will devote the rest of his life to Jesus (a la Charles Colson of the Nixon White House). As witness to his conviction, Rove will confess during a live interview with Pat Robertson on CBN that, as a child he did pull the wings off of flies, set fire to cats, and push colored classmates off of the monkey bars during recess. Robertson will declare him forgiven chortling, "Boys will be boys."<br><br>4) Within three months of his imprisonment in 2007, Rove will grant an exclusive interview to <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>Playboy Magazine</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END-->, in which he discusses intimacies of his past. He will admit that although he has never been the recipient of fellatio, he did perform it three times in his life.<br><br>One was a memorable Christmas day as a bespectacled, towheaded nine year old. He received from Santa Claus his only wish, a Genuine Red Ryder 200-Shot Carbine, Range Model Action Air Rifle, despite his mother’s adamant objection that he would "put his eye out." While trying out the air rifle in the snowy and icicle encrusted back yard that morning, one shot ricocheted off the garage and house back into his face and cracked the left lens of his eyeglasses, putting him into a state of panic. To prevent having the precious air rifle from being taken away by his mother for obvious reason, he sat down in the snow and began to cry. His mother dashed out of the house to his rescue; whereupon he fibbed that a great, big icicle had fallen from the garage and hit him, damaged his eyeglasses, and nearly "put his eye out." Mother was, of course, sympathetic and later Karl was allowed to continue his target practice.<br><br>Unfortunately, Scut Farkus, the class bully with red hair, freckles, and a Davy Crockett coonskin cap, witnessed the entire episode and threatened to squeal to his mother if Karl did not "lick his sicle" behind the garage.<br><br>Another was during a Boy Scout Jamboree. Karl had forged documentation demonstrating his qualifications to earn of three of the four merit badges he was awarded that Summer. Fellow Scout Ron Reagan, Jr., knew of the forgeries as Rove had talked aloud in his sleep in the pup tent the night before. Reagan demanded Rove meet him in the Sani-Can after lights out to "raise his totem pole," in return for his silence.<br><br>The last occasion, Rove was discovered stuffing the ballot box during a wet T-shirt contest at a Colorado ski resort. Unfortunately, the event was held the night after Los Angeles Lakers basketball star, Kobi Bryant, was squelched from his sexual advances upon an unnamed female resort employee. It was Bryant who witnessed Rove feeding quarters into a photocopier in the lobby--duplicating his own ballot. Bryant, frustrated from the night before, insisted Rove join him in his hotel room so he could "score a slam dunk."<br><br>5) During the Republican Convention in late Summer 2008, just six months after George W. Bush’s resignation and subsequent suicide, his daughter, Jenna Bush, will release a scathing, tell-all bestseller book entitled, "My Bush is Bigger than Your Bush," about the traumas of competition within a family of twins, and life as a political prop. Among the revelations will be that she and her sister, Barbara, were born hermaphrodites. They underwent surgical penectomies three months after birth. Her father kept the removed tissue in two hermetically sealed, individually labeled jars of formaldehyde, and willed them to the Smithsonian Institute Museum of Medicine to be displayed alongside 1930's bank robber John Dillinger’s ‘significant contribution’.<br><br>Jenna’s book will also describe documents found in her father’s Yale footlocker. One, a daily calendar keeping track of appointments with his public speaking tutor, Warner Brothers voice characterizationist, Mel Blanc.<br><br>In conclusion, and in afterthought, I include one other quotation relevant to repetition of history, which may be the only one Mr. Rove is acquainted with:<br><br>"History is more or less bunk," by the well-known and sometimes out--or over--spoken Henry Ford, 1863-1947.<br><br>Only time will tell.<br> <p>"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." -- Theodore Roosevelt</p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p097.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=sixtimeseven>sixtimeseven</A> at: 8/20/05 6:20 am<br></i>
