President Machiavelli Bush
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President Machiavelli Bush
George W. Bush, our current President, must keep a copy of Machiavelli’s most celebrated work, “The Prince “(1513), on his desk in the Oval Office. In my opinion, Bush and his administration’s actions mimic Machiavelli’s advice to the Prince on the tactics that he should use to stay in power. I am going to discuss how President Bush uses Machiavellian principles.
My first example is of Bush’s “War on Terror”. In 2001, the President stated that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and Saddam was going to use them against the U.S. and other nations even though he did not have concrete proof . He also said Iraq had ties to Al Quaida and this was a threat to our security and the security of other nations. In justification of his war plans, Bush sold the idea of Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction to the American public to gain it’s support. After a few years of war, in 2005, the White House confirmed that the search for weapons of mass destruction was officially over. NOTHING was found and Americans had been duped. In all reality, George Bush had intended on invading Iraq from the moment he walked into the White House. He wanted to remove Saddam and his regime through military action. This self- proclaimed “War President’s” administration had manipulated the facts and made falsehoods to build a case for his war. Many innocent American and Middle Eastern lives were taken.
Machiavelli would have been proud and would have felt Bush used the cunning of the fox. He said that it was necessary to know how to disguise the nature of the beast and to be a great hypocrite and a liar and men are so simpleminded and so controlled by their present necessities that one who deceives will always find another who will allow himself to be deceived (Machiavelli, page 46). Bush was a very deceiptful fox.
Next, Machiavelli suggests that of all the virtues that a prince should appear to have, the one that is most of political expedience is the virtue of religious faith. The APPEARANCE of piety inspires the greatest devotion in his populace(Urban, #130). Yet, it is only the appearance of religion that is helpful . George Bush claims that not only is he saved, but is called upon by God to political office. He also uses extensive references to scripture during his public speeches and he promises to bring freedom “as a gift from the Almighty” to benighted regions of the world like the Middle East. His so called strong morality and grounding in faith was one of the major reasons for his widespread public appeal, and according to some estimates, they are among the most important factors in the 2004 election(Urban, #130). This “good ole boy” painted a virtuous image of himself that the people loved and he has quickly fallen from grace after being in office for two terms. His positive popularity diminished, not only in the United States, but all over the world as well. I found the following fact interesting: a poll conducted in Britain named Bush the second biggest “threat to world peace” after Bin Laden, beating North Korean president Kim Jong—il (Wikipedia, #203). I guess appearance isn’t everything.
The last comparison I will make is the Patriot Act and the fear that it created in the American public.