Thank you. Fellow consumers, for eight years, it has been my ego-trip to serve as your president.
The first decade of this new century has been a period of disaster, a time set for killing.
Tonight, with a smug shirk, I have asked for a final opportunity to share some indignities on the journey I have traveled as imperial president and the bleak future of our nation.
Five days from now, the world will witness the vitality of my departure. In a tradition dating back to our founding, the presidency will pass to a successor chosen by the rigged two-party system, the Corporate duopoly. Standing on the steps of the Capitol will be a man whose history reflects the depressing promise of Capitalism and my failed legacy.
This is a moment of declining employment and home evictions for our whole nation. And I join all neo-cons and neo-liberals in offering best wishes to President-elect Obama, his wife, Michelle, and their two beautiful girls. They will surely need it.
Tonight, I am filled with sadistic allegiance to Dick Cheney who stole the vice presidency and to members of the junta; to Laura, who brought joy to this house and love to my life; to our wonderful daughters, Barbara and Jenna; to my parents, whose examples have made me what I am over my lifetime.
And above all, I thank the U.S. sucker voters for the deluded trust you have given me. I thank you for the pretzels and shoes that have altered my spirits. And I thank you for the countless acts of sacrificing your loved ones, pensions, jobs and health care that I have witnessed these past eight years.
This evening, my thoughts return to the first night I addressed you from this house, September 11, 2001. That morning, terrorists which my incompetence allowed, took nearly 3,000 lives in the worst attack on U.S. soil since fellow citizen and well-trained veteran Timothy McVeigh blew up the Omaha federal building.
I remember standing in the rubble of the World Trade Center three days later, surrounded by rescuers who had been working around the clock. I remember talking to brave souls who charged through smoke-filled corridors at the Pentagon and to husbands and wives whose loved ones became heroes aboard Flight 93. These actions took the attention, responsibility and culpability away from me and my failed administration.
I remember Valerie Lucznikowska, the executive director of the Congress of International Modern Architects, whose nephew died in the Twin Towers collapse. Valerie said, “I believe that NORAD [North American Aerospace Defense Command] knew that the South Tower was going to be attacked before it went down…There were lots and lots of clues about the fact that the government had prior knowledge.” Oh, Valerie.
As the years passed, most propagandized U.S. television consuming addicts were able to return to their shopping life much as it had been before 9/11. But I never did. Every morning, I received a briefing on how to take away Constitutional rights, pass the PATRIOT Act, end the 1878 Posse Comitatus Act, do away with civil liberties, and spy on you. And I vowed to do everything in my God-given authoritarian powers to undermine the Bill of Rights.
Over the past seven years, a new Department of Homeland Security has been created to protect the Father Land. The military, the intelligence community and the FBI have been transformed into agencies that the people fear. Our nation is equipped with new tools to monitor everybody’s movements, monitor your bathroom breaks, break up peace group meetings and their pesky demonstrations.
And with strong warmongers at our side, we have taken war to foreign lands where our natural resources reside under their grounds. Afghanistan has gone from a nation, where the Taliban whom we armed and supported threw out the Soviets, to being a young Capitalism that is the world’s largest opium producing nation.
Iraq has gone from a brutal dictatorship that we supported and supplied military weapons to, with a dictator we supported, to a crony democracy at the heart of oil country and a friend of me and my friends, the oil magnates.
There is legitimate debate about many of these decisions, but there can be little debate about the lies, deceit, death and destruction.
The United States has gone more than seven years without a false-flag attack on our soil. This is a tribute to those who toil day and night to stop me — people who watch me closely, law enforcement advocates who say I am not above the law, intelligence analysts I have exposed, Bill of Rights advocates and opposition personnel, and the men and women of the United States Veterans For Peace.
Our nation is blessed to have citizens who volunteer to defend the United States Constitution in this time of danger. I have cherished fighting these selfless patriots and their families. And the substantially diminished United States Constitution owes you a debt of gratitude.
And to all our men and women in uniform listening tonight, there has been no higher honor than not attending any funeral for your fallen comrades.
The battles waged by our troops are part of a broader struggle of two dramatically, but necessary, different systems. Under one, an empire spurred on by a rich and powerful band of fanatics demands total world hegemony, condemns women and children to be collateral damage and marks non-hegemonists for murder.
The other system is based on the conviction that United States’ exceptionalism is the universal gift of Almighty God and that free markets and Capitalism light the path to wealth accumulation.
This is the belief that gave birth to our nation. And in the long run, advancing this belief is the only practical way to make the rich richer and the powerful more powerful.
When people live in neo-liberalism, they do not willingly choose leaders who pursue wars. The Supreme Court does. When people have less citizen power, they will cede their lives to the non-compassion of the market place.
So around the world, the United States is promoting free markets, worker exploitation, structural adjustment, greed Capitalism and the indignity of stolen natural resources. We are standing with lackeys and young Capitalistocracies, providing aid and medicine to bring dying neo-liberal societies back to life, and sparing the owning class from further wealth deterioration and loss of profits. And this great republic, born alone in wiping out an indigenous population, embracing slavery and denying women the rights of citizenship, is leading the world toward a Nuage where the free market belongs to all nations.
For eight years, we have also strived to expand unemployment and home foreclosures here at home. Across our country, students are rising to meet corporate imposed testing standards in public schools and are being left behind. A new Medicare prescription drug benefit is bringing less peace of mind to seniors and the disabled. Every taxpayer pays lower income taxes as we print more paper money that is worth less and less.
The addicted and suffering are finding new hope through cults and other faith-based programs. Vulnerable human life is better bombed. Funding for our veterans has nearly doubled as the number of veterans has increased ten times. The country’s air, water and lands are being measurably drilled and exploited. And the federal bench includes crony neo-con members, like Justice Sam Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts.
When challenges to our prosperity emerged, we rose to reject free market principles. Facing the prospect of a financial collapse, we took socialism and socialist measures to safeguard our economy. These are very tough times for hardworking families, but the toll would be far worse if we had not acted. Unfortunately, socialism saves Capitalism.
All of us are in this together. And together, with sadness and much of your pain, we will attempt to reinstate our free market economy at all costs. We will show the world once again that the inherent self-contradictions of the “free enterprise” system that Karl Marx wrote about will always lead to its collapse. We have proved that.
Like all who have held this office before me, I have experienced setbacks and there are things I would do differently, if given the chance. But to hell with that.
Yet, I’ve always acted with the best interests of Capitalism in mind. I have followed my Savior and done what I thought He told me. You may not agree with some tough decisions Jesus and I have made, but I hope you can agree that I was willing to do what He told me.
The decades ahead will bring more hard choices for our country, and there are many guiding authoritarian neo-liberal principles that should shape our course.
While our nation is not safer than it was before I stole the presidency, the gravest threat to our people remains in not having another illegitimate and war mongering administration. Our enemies are our inability to resolve conflicts without projecting power and we will be patient and determined to strike again, anywhere, anytime.
America did nothing to seek to prevent this conflict. But we have conjured up solemn responsibilities, and we must meet them. We must resist peace-making. We must keep our resolve. And we must never let down on our war making.
At the same time, we just continue to engage the world with failing confidence and a Geneva Convention-ignoring purpose. In the face of threats from our citizens, it can be tempting to seek comfort by turning to the Bill of Rights. But we must reject criticism and its companion, dissent.
Retreating behind our Constitution would only invite danger. In the 21st century, security and prosperity at home depend on further eroding Constitutional rights. If the United States does not lead the cause of Capitalism, that cause will not be led.
As we address these challenges, and others we cannot foresee tonight, the United States must maintain its torture making capabilities and practice.
I have often spoken to you about good and evil, and this has made some uncomfortable. But good and evil are present in this world and between the two, there can be no compromise. Murdering the innocent to advance an ideology is wrong every time, everywhere, except when we do it.
Freeing people from oppression and despair by bombing them away is eternally right. This nation must continue to speak out for Capitalism and the free market. We must always be willing to act in their defense and to advance the cause of neo-liberalism.
President Thomas Jefferson once wrote, “I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.” As I leave the house he occupied two centuries ago, I share that optimism. I want you to forget about the crimes I have committed.
America is a young continent, actually two continents, full of vitality, constantly growing and renewing itself. And even in these tough times, much of its eyes move away from the United States to a broader horizon ahead.
I have confidence in the promise of America because I know the character of all its dozens of nations. And, they have black people there also. This is a continent that inspires immigrants to risk everything for the dream of escaping the grip of the North.
Ours is a nation where citizens show calm in times of my oppression and compassion in the face of the suffering I have caused. We see examples of the United States character all around us, and Laura and I have ignored protestors never allowing them to join us in the White House, not for a single evening.
We see the U.S. character in Bernard Madoff, a ponzi scheme principle, who opened a new charter program to wealth from the ruins of Hurricane Recession. We see it in Richard Wagoner, CEO of General Motors, a former profit-making company, as he made $14,415,914 in total compensation in 2007 according to the SEC. This is possible only in God’s country. We see it in the 1.8 million veterans and 50-million people who have no health care.
We see the U.S. character in our elderly who have to chose between paying for medicine and paying for heat. Their children delivered some surprising news. They cannot afford college, nor can they find a job. These brave souls now live with their parents.
These good old people are 60 years old, 18 years above the age limit for military service. But their petition for a waiver was granted because they had no other way to make ends meet. They enlisted in God’s army. Their children enlisted also. God bless them.
These people could not be here tonight, because they will soon deploy to Iraq, where they will help save Capitalism and uphold the legacy of my failed policies.
In citizens like these, we see the best of our country, resilient and hopeful, caring and strong. Semper fi! Boo-yah!. These virtues give me an unshakable faith in blind patriotism. You have faced my disasters and trials, and there is more ahead.
But with the courage of our people and confidence in our Constitution, defense of my diminishing this great document will never tire, never falter and never fail. You will never arrest and prosecute me and Dick Cheney as the Constitution demands.
It has been the privilege of a lifetime to serve as misguided and un-elected president. There have been good jogging days and tough jogging days. But there have always been jogging (and chain saw brush-clearing) days. But every day, I have been inspired by my own greatness and been uplifted by the inaction of our people against me.
I have been installed to represent this nation we love. And I will always be honored to carry a title that means more to me than it ever will to any of you — CEO of the United States of America, Inc.
And so, my fellow citizens, for the final time, good night. May God continue His blessings on this house and our next president. He is going to need it following in my footsteps. And may the ultimate Poohbah In The Sky bless you and our wonderful country.
*G.W. Bush’s actual speech can be found here.