“MR. PRESIDENT, ADDICTION IS AS ADDICTION DOES”

Or, Only 11 More Steps out of 12 to Go

Thank you Mr. President for finally admitting on May 25, 2006 you were a juvenile jerk, a strutting bully, an arrogant poser ignorant of history and customs, a cowardly paranoid fearful of honest debate, and in general a pathetic judge of men, words, deeds and their consequences. Those are perhaps not quite your own choice of how to characterize your comments on past misjudgements, but the general intent is the same.

Good for you to recognize that at long last. It has only cost thousands of lives, trillions of dollars, almost all the good will that had been laboriously built up over decades, not to mention tearing apart our national family. Still, at least you deserve a pat on the back for beginning to recognize the monumental error of your ways. That is, assuming your comments are not just another political ploy to work the polls.

Pardon us for a lack of confidence you mean what you say, but families of addicts like you have long and bitter cause to doubt. And, we will continue to doubt for a long time to come. You must re-earn that trust once so freely granted to you. Keep in mind words are not enough, especially when nothing else suggests you have genuinely moderated your addictions to military adventurism and oil.

As you should have discovered in your previous addition to alcohol (and possibly other recreational pharmaceuticals), that admission of yours is just the first step in your recovery. Now take the other 11 steps from the tyranny of your addictions, addictions which you have attempted to impose on us against our will.

Granted, the rest of the steps to recovery are far more difficult. They are painful and maybe even expensive. Nevertheless, nothing less will allow us to forgive you in light of what you have wilfully destroyed so far. You must show you are taking those extra steps as well.