May 17, 2000

The Role of the President in the Politics of Disclosure
Part II: The case for and against George W. Bush

Stephen Bassett

(Second in a three-part series.)

Let’s get one thing straight right up front.  The politics of UFOs, how the presence of extraterrestrial beings in our world, now, is going to affect you, your government, and every other person on the planet, is not only bipartisan, it’s transcendent.

Transcendence is about moving from one paradigm to another, one worldview to another.  It is a process so powerful, the very mechanisms involved are altered.  In fact, they are not really up to the task, but being all we have, we make do.

That which is about to happen to the world will affect every political party, nation, race, religion, and point of view.   There will be no paradigm deferments.  Everyone participates whether they want to or not.  At this level, staking out territory, getting the upper hand, building political capital, war chests, arms races and other Machiavellian machinations are made silly.  We will find common ground and work together as we find our way through this or we will make utter asses of ourselves before an audience that may extend to the other side of the galaxy.

And one response to this might well be, “so what.”

The two main political parties don’t happen to have a plank in their platforms on this particular matter.  Worse, for some time they have immersed themselves in the “Politics of Nothing” where the truly difficult issues are ignored completely or locked into permanent stasis.  What is left are the personal and the dregs.  One is reminded of the old aphorism about college life, namely that, “the reason university politics are so vicious is precisely because the stakes are so small.”

The process of electing an American president has now become sufficiently grotesque and expensive, voters no longer expect any deep controversy on a matter of true substance to force itself upon them during this quadrennial circus.

The media focuses 75% of its coverage on who’s up, who’s down, the polling numbers, endorsements, pratfalls, scandals and peccadilloes.   Only 25% is left to cover what a candidate actually believes, assuming they would tell, or how they would govern, assuming they knew.

All of which might suggest, why not make the partisan case.  Pick a party and convince it the UFO/ET intriguees out there number in the tens of millions (they do).    Show ‘em the websites, the mail lists, the demographics (high education, high income), the emotional intensity, and then close with, “Four words, ‘Go Alien, Kick Butt.’”  You got your pro-life vs. pro-choice, your pro-gun vs. anti-gun, and now, your Rare Earth vs. Aliens Coming out the Wazoo.    Finally the politics of UFOs would take flight with everyone taking sides and spending hundreds of millions of dollars making TV commercials intent on showing the other side is comprised of idiots.

We could do that, but it would be wrong.

So let’s examine the coming election and how a victory by George W. Bush might affect the process of disclosure of the extraterrestrial presence.   But in doing so, let’s not misinterpret a tough and candid analysis as a campaign ad for electing Al Gore (and vice versa, next week).

Election 2000 offers up a host of delicious ironies. 

Much has been made of the millennial turnover.  Certainly the politicians have taken advantage of this arithmetic inevitability.  So many bridges to the 21^st Century have been built, no one is at risk of getting their feet wet.    A cynic would say the year 2000 is about as important as that moment, while stuck in another freeway jam up, you happen to note your odometer turnover 100,000 miles.    You smile for a moment, and ten seconds later it’s history.

Call it accident, fate, or a cosmic joke – the next couple of years will live up to the pre-turnover hype.   This election campaign, conducted in the last year of the second millennium and placing a new president in office in the first year of the next, is indeed our political connection between two worlds.  What is at stake is whether the 21^st Century will surpass the horrors of the 20^th or bring the human race freedom at last from the brutality, some say evil, of its pre-sentience animal nature, its lizard brain.

The moment screams for a president with profound new vision, someone poised by special background and circumstance, to lead the most powerful nation on the planet into truly new territory. 

So, naturally, what we have is perhaps the most dramatic instance of “same old, same old” in memory.   After eight painful years of dealing with the consequences of a president who lost, or perhaps never had, his moral compass, the Democrats put forth a candidate who is as close to a seamless extension of that president as has occurred in any election this century.  More on that next week.

And the Republicans?  In 1990 President George H. W. Bush began a campaign with an 80% approval rating.  He was, and is, the quintessential 20^th Century political man:  WWII, cold warrior, diplomat, CIA, VP, secret societies, backroom connections, patriotism, control, plausible denial – the total package.   Perhaps he somehow sensed that cosmic change was in the air because in mid-campaign the sitting president lost his vision, stomach for the process, perhaps even his desire to be president and came unglued

  At the end he could barely deliver a speech without falling into near incomprehensibility.  What followed was an upset, which in the opinion of this author surpassed that of Truman over Dewey in ’48.  William Clinton, the anti-Bush, is elected.  He takes office as stunned Republicans stare in disbelief.

Despised by the military and intelligence careerists to such a degree it becomes a serious matter of protocol noted by the press,  Clinton immediately comes under political and personal attack almost unprecedented in the modern era.    Finally, in a fashion worthy of Shakespeare’s best tragedies, he defies his enemies with a consummate act of self-destruction and hubris, handing them all they need to destroy him completely and take the Democratic Party with him.

He barely escapes by virtue of the incompetence of the Republican leadership in the House and their own personal failures coupled with Clinton’s almost preternatural survivability.  Nevertheless, the country is put through a nightmare.

There is every indication the public wants to put this behind them - the extreme partisanship, special prosecutors, tawdriness, and political gridlock. They want a new start and a rejuvenation of the presidency which has been further weakened and humiliated.  So who do the Republican insiders and deep pockets line up behind early on and in extraordinary financial fashion?

The son of George Bush, George Bush, a man in some respects more like Clinton than Gore.

There is a straightforward way to understand the worldview of the person you are about to elect to the presidency.   Read three books.  The first would be the candidate’s political autobiography; the second would be a neutral, quality biography by a responsible journalist; and the third would be the most critical biography available by a competent journalist/author, however biased.  Combined in the same mind, it’s a potent amalgam.

For the average citizen who does not belong to a think tank or have much discretionary time to do political research, this is as good as it gets.  If the last five presidential elections have proved anything, it is that television ads, talk shows, cream puff interviews, convention show speeches, and scripted debates are meager fare if one seeks to know what a presidential candidate actually believes about anything.

As regards George Bush, the choices are not too difficult.  The following are suggested in the same order:  his political autobiography, A Charge to Keep, George W. Bush with Karen Hughes; a neutral biography, First Son: George W. Bush and the Bush Family Dynasty, Bill Minutaglio; and a highly critical commentary, Shrub: The Short but Happy Political Life of George W. Bush,  Molly Ivins and Lou Dubose.  (Note:  Fortunate Son, J. H. Hatfield, is not recommended as there are serious issues with the author and authenticity of key elements of its content.)

Here’s a summary of what you would learn. 

George W. Bush and William Clinton were born 45 days apart in 1946.   They had very different childhoods, but grew up to be tall, attractive, personable, men of boyish demeanor and playful personalities, with predominant ties to a southern lifestyle.  Both attended Yale University and went on to become chief executive of southern states known to have “weak governor” systems, with Texas being the weaker of the two. 

Bush and Clinton are practicing Protestants, Clinton Baptist, Bush Methodist and born again.  Both men sowed a silos worth of wild oats, committing various “youthful” indiscretions which played a role in their campaigns.  Those by Bush apparently did not extend into his marriage and ended around the age of 40, while Clinton’s persisted with well documented results.

Both men avoided serving in Vietnam, Clinton via student deferments and Bush via alternative service in the Texas Air National Guard.  Both utilized whatever connections they could to effectuate this result.   Bush was accepted immediately into the Guard and pilot program with 100,000 Texans on the waiting list for the Guard and other pilot applicants (150) waiting up to 18 months to get flying clearance.

But enough about similarities.  It’s the differences that get interesting.   William Clinton grew up poor and dysfunctional in a family less connected to power than dirt.  It was this background which gave him the ability to relate to the average person and feel the pain of disadvantaged classes.  It was his greatest strength and his greatest liability, as this same background laid the foundation for the ruination of his place in history and full appreciation of his contributions.

George W. Bush, on the other hand is possibly the luckiest businessman/politician in the galaxy.  He is the Republican Jack Kennedy.  John Kennedy came from a family ruled by a powerful man who viewed his sons’ right to the presidency as a given.  Joseph Kennedy used his money, the money of his friends, pulled every lever, stuffed ballot boxes, moved heaven and earth to give his sons a leg up with the presidency in the cross hairs.

A generation later, George Bush received the same treatment in spades. Through every step of his business and political career money poured in from political and financial connections to the family.   Every time he got in over his head, he was covered. 

This enormous reservoir of connected money was particularly potent in Texas politics where there is no limit on personal contributions - $1,000, $1,000,000 – no difference.  Bush spent over $40 million in his two gubernatorial campaigns.  That money combined with the money raised and being raised for the 2000 presidential bid, will make George W. Bush the most financially backed politician in the history of the nation. George W. Bush’s father, the President, is a man heavy with gravitas whose rèsumè is thicker than the D.C. phone book.  His son is Bush lite, not remotely in the same league.  It is as if the Republican party is determined to rectify that terrible upset outcome of eight years ago, to put the world right.

What does it mean for disclosure?

In one regard it is favorable.  From the standpoint of those managing the UFO/ET issue within the government, one of the most critical disclosure issues is control.  They want absolute control of as many variables as possible.

If you are going to announce to the world the presence of extraterrestrial beings who can pretty much come and go as they please, whatever spin you intend to put on this revelation, you want to have the complete cooperation of the executive and legislative branches, military services, intelligence agencies, enforcement agencies, etc.   You want to make disclosure on your terms, according to your schedule and be able to deal with any and all reactions to that disclosure as you see fit.

The status and power acquired by the military/intelligence complex during the Reagan years and the end of the Cold War symbolized by the dismantling of the Berlin Wall in 1989 set the stage.   The senior Bush was the perfect president to have in office.  It is this author’s belief the process of disclosure was thus set in motion to occur early in Bush’s second term (1993).  The same circumstances set Col. Philip Corso in motion toward his eventual 1997 memoir, The Day After Roswell. 

Clinton’s election suspended the process.  George W. Bush, if elected, would be a surrogate senior Bush.  The military and intel agencies will embrace the son.  The network would be reestablished, the players reassembled, the father’s consultation a given, and control would be sufficient to proceed.  So far so good.

But there is a downside.   Ultimately the politics of UFOs is secondarily concerned with disclosure and primarily concerned with the quality of that disclosure.  The end of the UFO/ET cover-up (or management if you wish) is inevitable.  What is problematic is the veracity and comprehensiveness of the process.  Will it be misrepresented and spun to serve government agendas not known to the public?  Will it be destructive or constructive in its formulation?   Will it build trust in government or further erode trust in the minds of the American public and citizens of other countries?

And the key question, will George W. Bush have the substance, courage and intellect to stand up to the military/intelligence infrastructure should they attempt to pervert the process and he knew it?

The election this November may be the most important in our history.  Whether the voters know a flying saucer from a Boston cream pie, the presidential piece to the disclosure puzzle will be in their hands.