An Old Chestnut: Cui Bono

It's getting to be that time of year again, and the questions just never seem to abate, do they?

Today, on PFF, another version of the query appeared. As the blogger indicated, the first question is--must be-- Cui Bono: Who Benefits from a "War on Terrorism"?

Obviously, the Bushies, first, because on Sept 10, 2001, you may remember, the country was slowly awakening to the sick, demented tragi-comedy that was Bushism and the 2nd Bush Administration. It was a shambles, a wreck, a joke-in-waiting. Leno and Letterman BOTH were delivering nightly, sarcastic, satirical broadsides. There were all manner of 'death-watches' on prominent regime figures to be jettisoned if their approval ratings fell much further. It had become obvious that The 'leaders' were a laggard, dullard,vacuous, vapid, but insatiably vicious band of sad-sacks, morons, idiots, wastrels, dolts, and incompetent drooling fools.

All that changed on Sept 11.

Well, no, none of that changed on Sept. 11. They were still--evidently--all those things...BUT they were now all those things, AT WAR, with the support of the terrified, pant-shitting populace.

Big Oil, certainly. The maps that Cheney's band of merry mercenary murderers consulted at their secret, global energy-plan meetings in Feb and March, 2001, indicated their desires, and their plans and their designs. Remember they told the Taliban, they were gonna build the pipeline, and the Talibs could enjoy it from a carpet of gold or one of blood?

But the big, BIG, BEEEG winner was the MIC/National Security State. (Cf: the late, unlamented PNAC). Nothing could better have advanced their interests in corporate, supervisory authoritarianism and reducing popular sovereignty to an antic anachronism more adeptly, more completely and more 'innocently' than a "TERRORIST ATTACK On NYC!!!!!" (Oh MY GAWD!!! The BROWN PEOPLE!!! They're gonna kill us in our BEDS!!!) One need only look at the fate of the Constitution in the aftermath. 1st Amendment? Ruined (Faith-based). 4th Amendment? Gone! (FISA/Spying). 5th Amendment? Gone! (Torture); and the rest aren't far behind.

And none of those institutions which benefited would have scrupled an instant at the death and destruction of 9/11 if they thought it would advance their agendas the way the events unfolding did. Three thousand people dead? They kill that many every month, somewhere in the world.

I'm of the LIHOP ("Let It Happen On Purpose") persuasion. From the PDB that the incredibly, amazingly, unbelievably evil, calculating bint Condi Rice read in August, 2001, at the ranch, which famously announced Bin Laden's plans to strike the US inside the US, they knew something was coming. And they let it. I think the Busheviks knew everything about the plans except the date and flight numbers. They let it go, hoping it wouldn't be too bad. All in all, it wasn't (unless of course you or one of yours was among the victims). It was an incredibly small price to pay for all the benefits that have accrued to the passive perpetrators in war profits and presidential power. The whole idea of a 'Unitary Executive," for example, would have been laughing-stock, pre-9/11. Now it's almost a foregone conclusion.

BTW: I still think McCain'll put Condi on the GOPuke Ticket. And Ahmad Chalabi will be the eventual Iraqi strongman.

(Foto: NYTimes)