MSNBC Host Chris Matthews let one slip tonight, or it was an extremely poor choice of words. Following President Barack Obama's Dec. 1 speech, which he announced his intentions for increasing troop levels in Afghanistan, MSNBC followed with wrap-up coverage of his speech with arguably three of their most prominent on-air personalities - "Countdown" host Keith Olbermann, "The Rachel Maddow Show" host Rachel Maddow and Matthews. Matthews referred to a scene from "Gone with the Wind" about the American Civil War as an example of "excitement" going into a war. He said that was lacking in the room during Obama's speech. Dishonesty in Washington at high levels has become like poverty in India. Just when you think you've seen the very bottom, you discover yet a lower level of degradation. After the Bush years of outright lies and systematic deception, we now have Obama plumbing new depths as he tortures the very language itself. 1984 here we are. Escalation is withdrawal; establishing a protectorate wherein the United States runs the government behind a nominal Afghan façade is "not nation-building;" a facsimile of a British style native state under the Raj is transmuted into self-determination.
Then there is the troubling choice of the West Point Military Academy as venue for this historic address. There is only one place for the President of the United States to speak to the citizenry on a matter of war and peace -- it is the White House. It is -- along with the Congress -- the cynosure of our collective political identity, the repository of our democratic compact. We, as citizens, are all there -- equal members of the republic. Choosing a military venue adds nothing in terms of legitimacy, of dedication to the country, of the supposed conviction of the words being spoken. The trappings of physical might, as opposed to the symbols of authority, are more suitable to tin pot tyrants and megalomaniac emperors.
