http://www.consortiumnews.com/2006/082206.htmlIs Bush a Clear & Present Danger?
By Robert Parry
August 23, 2006
Faced with George W. Bush’s disastrous policies in the Middle East and his adamant refusal to change course, the question now arises whether the President has become a “clear and present danger” to the security of the United States and, indirectly, to Israel.
For more than five years – even predating the 9/11 attacks – Bush has insisted on a “unilateralist” approach toward the world, asserting U.S. global hegemony under a strategy laid out by the neoconservative Project for the New American Century.
At the center of this grandiose scheme was the belief that the oil-rich Middle East could be remade through violent “regime change” in hostile countries like Iraq. After 9/11, Bush broadened his target to the “axis of evil,” adding in Iran and North Korea and making clear that other lesser enemies included Syria, Cuba and Venezuela.
While this neoconservative plan wrapped itself in the language of “democracy,” the concept was always less about respecting the will of indigenous populations than in restructuring their economies along “free market” lines and ensuring compliant leaders.