Editor's note: a flurry of recent news reports indicates that the George W. Bush Presidential Library selection committee, headed by Don Evans, is nearing a final decision on a site for the library. As a contribution to the process, we reprint Robert Kuttner's October 21 column proposing a detailed plan for the site.
In two weeks, Election Day will render George W. Bush a lame-duck president, and he can begin thinking about his presidential library. Imagine what an honest rendition of that library might look like.
Such libraries typically begin with the early career -- in this case The Foggy Years, the heroic service in the Air National Guard, and the falling upward economically. A gallery could commemorate all the Texas businessmen who helped young George turn business blunders into windfalls.
This would lead into an exhibit on Governor Bush, the Uniter not the Divider, his collaboration with Texas Democrats, and the unity theme in the 2000 presidential campaign. From there, you'd go directly into the Hammer Room, and observe Tom DeLay excluding Democrats from the legislative process in Congress.
The next salon would be the Rogues Gallery, featuring each of the several congressional scoundrels of the Bush era -- DeLay being forced to step down as Republican House leader, the hapless Representative Bob Ney pleading guilty but refusing to give up his seat, Representative Randy Cunningham devising convoluted scams that led to prison time, as well as an elaborate interactive diagram on the multiple connections with corrupt lobbyist Jack Abramoff. A nearby exhibit would commemorate corporate felons close to Bush, beginning with Enron officers.
One of the most surprising exhibits would be the Gay Closet, depicting the several senior Republican congressional staffers, congressmen, and leaders of the national Republican Party who turned out to be closeted gays. The exhibit would be paired with examples of Republican anti-gay ballot initiatives. The Museum of the Iraq War would open with the Mission Accomplished Room, a wax diorama of President Bush costumed in his flight jacket, emerging from a fighter jet on the USS Lincoln flight deck. The Mission Accomplished banner used in the original May 2003 stunt would adorn the wall. On a facing wall would be discrete portraits of each of the thousands of soldiers killed in Iraq after the mission was declared accomplished.
The stout-hearted could take in a lifelike simulation of the torture chambers of Abu Ghraib. Viewers would exit via the blinking color-coded lights of the Hall of Fear, showing the innumerable efforts to keep the American electorate in a permanent state of anxiety. An educational exhibit would trace the falsification of intelligence linking Saddam Hussein to al-Qaeda and to nuclear weapons, and the helpful role of credulous reporters.
The nearby Spin Gallery would feature journalists who temporarily thrived by serving as Bush's enablers. Judith Miller and Bob Woodward would each get a room. In the nearby Chamber of Echoes, viewers could trace administration talking points from press handouts to Fox News commentaries, editorials in the Wall Street Journal, and talk-radio scripts.
The Hall of Faith would depict the gift of tax-supported services to mega-church empires, and include videos of speeches by Bush's favorite televangelists, such as the Rev. Jerry Falwell calling the 9/11 attacks God's punishment for America's sinful ways. The parallel Hall of Science would display the handing over of science policy to deniers of global warming, religious opponents of stem-cell research and contraception, and sponsors of theological reinterpretations of Darwin.
Nearby would be rotating exhibits featuring Great Moments in Public Management. This month: "Heck of a Job, Brownie: FEMA and Hurricane Katrina."
A cozy lobby would display how lobbyists for major industries took over government -- energy industries running energy policy, drug companies running the FDA, and so on. Museum-goers needing refreshment could enjoy complimentary doughnuts offered by the HMO industry, to commemorate the doughnut hole of non-coverage in Bush's Medicare drug bill crafted by the insurance companies.
A special exhibition, American Democracy in the Bush Years, would feature material on Ken Blackwell and Katherine Harris, with displays of flawed or manipulated voting machines, purged voter lists, excessive ID checks, rubber-stamp courts, and suspensions of civil liberties.
Visiting schoolchildren who did not live through the Bush era, jaded by special effects in horror movies, would anxiously ask parents and teachers if this all really happened. And at the back of the museum, tourists would be startled to notice a larger, ominously darkened building, dwarfing the sunny George W. Bush Presidential Library. This is, of course, the Dick Cheney Vice-Presidential Library.
Robert Kuttner is co-editor of The American Prospect. This column originally appeared in The Boston Globe.
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