The most extreme example of the negative aspect of this stubbornness during my own lifetime came a little more than a dozen years ago, during the dark days of the administration of George W. Bush. The lead-up to the invasion saw an absurd stubborn denial of common sense, as many Americans chose (the emphasis is on choosing) to believe Bush and the other chickenhawks who pined for war in Iraq. There was an angry response to any voices critical of the invasion, whether these came from within American borders, or outside of them. There was the whole French-bashing thing, and the emphasis on censoring the word "French" to describe fries and toast, and replacing it, irony of ironies, with the word "freedom."
And as it turned out, the detractors were right. No weapons of mass destruction (WMD's) were found, and the whole basis of the war that we were now stuck in proved to have been a false premise. Still, Americans celebrated the successful outcome of the war, as Saddam Hussein's regime collapsed within a couple of weeks, and iconic images of statues of the dictator being torn down won the day. Iraq was viewed as a success story. George W. Bush famously (or more accurately, infamously) gave his famous speech declaring victory in Iraq, with a gigantic "Mission Accomplished" banner in the background. Everyone was happy that the war had been fought, and won.
Until it became clear that it was not actually won. As the casualties mounted, and more American soldiers died after Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech than before, more and more Americans began to realize that maybe this war had been a mistake after all. The war began to drag on, and then there were stories and pictures that were leaked of torture inside of the Abu Ghraib prison by American soldiers, which portrayed Americans in Iraq in a negative light. So did the no bid contracts, and the profits from certain American corporations that obviously benefited from the Iraq invasion, most famously Halliburton and Black Water.
You might think that after such a fiasco, people would have been itching for Bush to go. Indeed, many really wanted him gone, and viewed him and his years in the White House, with some measure of justification, as a miserable failure.
Indeed, Bush's poll ratings plummeted, but they only sank so far before the 2004 election. Despite all of the failings and the arrogance that the entire administration had showed the country, and indeed, the world, he stayed more or less on top of Democratic nominee John Kerry in the polls. True, many wanted him to lose. Yet, Americans re-elected Bush in 2004. In fact, Bush received more votes than any other candidate had gotten in history.
Less than a year after getting elected for a second term (and really winning the election for a first time), Bush's approval ratings fell even lower, going to the lower 30's and even into the 20's. That came after his failed handling of the Hurricane Katrina disaster, and more bad headlines with Iraq. There were other disastrous stories as well, such as Vice-President Cheney shooting a man in the face. But by the time that the economy nearly collapsed in 2008, and massive corporate scandals had become so routine as to be the norm during these Bush years, most people agreed that Bush was indeed a bad president.
Yet, the collective memory seems to be very short, because despite knowing that the next president, whoever it would end up being, would be inheriting a huge mess, the blame fell squarely on Bush's successor very quickly. President Obama was blamed for the sorry state of the economy, even though the conditions that had created that poor economy clearly had actually occurred during the Bush years.
Unbelievably, roughly a year after Bush left office, there began to be images of him on billboards and online posts, with the questioning (and questionable) caption, "Miss Me Yet?"
Not only do I personally not miss George W. Bush and his administration, I wonder why they have not been brought to trial as war criminals.
There were actually a lot of things that the Bush administration indeed proved guilty of. Almost to a man, they were arrogant and corrupt. The national debt rose dramatically, while the gap between rich and poor widened to a staggering degree. I do not remember corporate corruption scandals on such a scale, and with such a degree of frequency, as during those dark Bush years.
But far and away, the worst thing that the Bush administration did was pursue the Iraq war under false pretenses. Thousands of American soldiers died, and tens of thousands of Americans came back with serious injuries, and dealing with the taxing emotional stress of the war. Add to that over 100,000 Iraqis dead, and countless seriously injured, plus much of the infrastructure of Iraq destroyed, and you indeed have grounds for serious charges of war crimes.
Many Americans, particularly neocon supporters of the Bush regime, consider any American being charged with war crimes as an unthinkable thing. This is an aspect of the stubbornness in the American characters that has painted the United States in a negative light around the world. Too many Americans truly want to believe that they should be viewed as exceptional, and thus exempt from the rules that govern over literally everyone else in the world, simply because of their nationality. Being American entitles you to being immune from what everyone else in the world is subject to, according to the neocon mentality.
One thing that I do not understand, and will probably never understand, is how Americans cannot recognize just how poorly this kind of thinking reflects on them throughout the rest of the world. Other empires have come and gone, and pretty much come to feel the same way about themselves, just at that precise moment when they began to decline.
The signs of decline are everywhere, and they began to be and feel obvious during the Bush years.
That is testament enough to speak volumes of just how detrimental George W. Bush and his administration, and the policies that have been pushed by them, have been to the United States.
The Lies We Believed (And Still Believe) About Iraq by Charles Lewis, June 27, 2014:
Off The Grid: PBS' Frontline Uncovers New Photos of Bush & Cheney After 9/11 Attacks By Off The Gridon July 24, 2015:
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