Democracy, Shamocracy

11:43 pm EST September 20th, 2006 | News | 3 Comments

Someone ought to educate Bush and his cronies about deeds, not words.

At the United Nations lectern this week, President Bush hailed the spread of democracy. "From Beirut to Baghdad," he said, "people are making the choice for freedom." Yet even as he spoke, tanks were rolling through the streets of Bangkok as a military coup toppled the elected leader of Thailand, who at that moment was in New York for the U.N. session.

Bush made no mention of the dramatic events on Tuesday and left New York yesterday without ever seeing the deposed prime minister, much less offering any public support for a onetime strong ally of the United States. The president’s spokesman later provided a strikingly mild response only after being asked by a reporter, pronouncing the White House "disappointed" by the coup.

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3 Responses to “Democracy, Shamocracy”

  1. Dr. Anatole Gavage-Huskanoy says:
    September 21, 2006 at 12:15 am

    Billmon had a nice post this week referencing Orwell, pointing out how, for the Bush Administration, ‘democracy’ and ‘fascism’ have lost all meaning apart from ‘good’ and ‘bad’.

  2. nihilistic_disintegration says:
    September 21, 2006 at 1:33 pm

    It seems that for Bush, the spread of Democracy requires that a foreign military occupy the country. Maybe that’s why he didn’t mention Thailand.

  3. Dana says:
    September 21, 2006 at 6:55 pm

    Surely, Mr Willis, you haven’t forgotten that the deposed Prime Minister of Thailand, though democratically elected, had suspended democracy in his country?

    No one knows if the military junta will keep its promises for democratic elections in the reasonable future, but even if it doesn’t, at worst you have one autocracy being deposed by another autocracy.

    Even The Liberal Avenger was not disappointed in the coup d’etat, although he’s concerned that the junta might not keep its promises.