Spreading democracy...or something...

We live in a world of contradictions we aren't supposed to notice or remember.
Our provincial premier promised us not to raise our taxes, then prompty whacked us with the largest tax increase in decades. He still won't call his 'premium' a tax, even though it is; he won't even acknowledge he broke a promise.
He repeatedly insists that any privatization of our sacred public health care system is a sin, even as he's effectively privatized chiropractic and optometry. He likewise promised to hire thousands of nurses, and now is giving hospitals a $200 million grant, over half of which is to be spent on...severance pay for nurses.
Our Prime Minister promised a bold new style of government, but has proven himsself to be every bit the bully and ditherer his predecessor was. Sixteen days to deploy our D.A.R.T team to the tsunami zone (it took Italy two). Whenever the heat gets to be too much, Martin, like Chretien, leaves the country. And your chance of making a difference in Ottawa, despite all Martin's assurances to the contrary, is still "who you know in the P.M.O."

George Bush is now firmly installed in the White House for another four years. And with him come more promises. He intends to 'spend his political capital' by spreading democracy throughout the world.
Or so he says.
Remember back when the Americans went to war? The rationale given then had everything to do with weapons of mass destruction. Liberating the Iraqis from a brutal tyranny was secondary. Now that those weapons of mass destruction have turned out to be mythical, Bush would have you believe liberation was his sole intention all along.
Even with an expected exponential increase in terrorism, the elections in Iraq are poised to go ahead at the end of the month. Unless you have a deathwish, this is one contest you'd rather lose...or better still, not enter in the first place. I give the winning candidate three months. If he's lucky. He might even survive an assassination attempt or two before they get him.
It is really no surprise that George W. Bush is an evangelical Christian. He insists that the Arab world exercise its "free will", while threatening all manner of mayhem if that "free will" doesn't match his own. You can't blame him, though. His God does the same thing.
Yes, the world is full of contradiction. George Orwell would nod knowingly to himself, I'm sure.