When White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan says that 9/11 “changed the equation” (and he says it a lot), the emphasis is more on the change than the equation. This is by now an entirely familiar maneuver, of course — a cornerstone of the Administration’s rhetorical transformation of 9/11 as an actual event that took place into a providential revelation of our national character and calling.
The “changed the equation” formulation is especially frustrating because the “changed” part short-circuits an effort to get at the rationale promised by the mythical equation. There’s the promise of the self-criticism that the Bush administration seems so often to lack, assuring us that decisions are made after running possibilities through the equation and taking the one that turned out best.
The equation takes responsibility here, which answers one mode of critique of the administration’s policies – namely that they’re driven by irrational belief (abstinence education) or hatred (“After all, this is the guy who tried to kill my dad.”). It’s not about what we want to do, it’s about what’s prudent and rational... we have an equation!
There’s a lot to say about the existence and non-existence of that equation. But for now, let’s just say they’ve got one, but rather than posting it on the White House website, they’re keeping it secret, forcing the rest of us to deduce its terms. One of the first things I’d like to figure out is what’s on the other side of the equation from things like invading Iraq, hiring Gonzalez as Attorney General and the terms of the most recent Bush budget. To ask an economic question, what are we, as a nation, trying to maximize or minimize? What’s the target?
I may turn back to this subject at a later date to work this out more, but based on the evidence so far, here’s my best guess: The primary goal of the current American government is to minimize the number of non-military, non-journalist American citizens killed by Middle Eastern terrorists.
$5 billion a month for Iraq while cutting $58 million from a Public Health Service program for “chronic disease prevention and health promotion”? $4,942,000,000 wouldn’t get the job done next month to make room for a war on chronic disease? No, because that doesn’t help protect people from Middle Eastern terrorists one whit. In fact, people who died because of inadequate health care would then be un-killable by Middle Eastern terrorists, further reducing the key metric! Funding for the EPA or the CDC AIDS program? Please.
So, as long as the invasion and occupation of Iraq doesn’t actually increase the likelihood of terrorism against American civilians, “Freedom [from being killed by Middle Eastern terrorists while living in the United States but not freedom from dying of anything else or freedom from factors that affect the quality of your life] is on the march.” If not, well, we’ll need a new equation.
by Noah Wardrip-Fruin, Pat Harrigan
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