1. Historical Tapestry: The Unweaving
In historical capsule form, let us sketch out the "thought movements" that are no doubt imbricated in the understanding of Bush Jr.'s thought, the resilient heritage or traditions he either espoused or rejected due to his formulation and maturation as a unilateral cowboyist thinker. It is perhaps by no accident that Bush Jr. himself became an exemplar of what he professed, a creature impinged upon by larger concentric social forces in the history of thought which thereby marked his contributions.
If this were a stage production—a very faithful analogy owing to the time frame in which we are discussing, an all too pithy and apt reconstruction of the period as evidenced by its constituent members—The first act would concern the emergence of Reagan as the acme of the Neo-conservative ideal of tits, war, and Jesus; the reactive methods that felt both the fear and trembling of the ramifications of a mass will that caused such eruptions as the French Revolution. Reaganism, as a prelude, privileged the faculties of capitalist super-oppression over the will-to-decency, a regulative function of thought that could produce systematic control over the rumbling desires that threatened to undermine the moral solidarity of the thinking subject—Just say No to drugs, but say Yes to Rambo. Reagan introduced the sagging post-Carter world to a critical division between Reason and the progressive banking edict uber alles, which, now a classical philosophical division as a reconstitution of the Platonic Form (albeit in highly modified expression), we may never know through the vagaries of the Rambo banking system. The money-in-itself stands apart from the Understanding as an impassable gulf. And though Bush Jr. attempted to bring this gulf into a more articulate and practical form, attempting to correct what he saw as crucial mistakes in the master's work, it was not until the arrival of Saddam alarmism that the money-in-itself is brought into closer contact with the thinking subject as the expression and form of the Idea.
But of all the critics of the Reaganetic astrological oppression and the Neo-conservative ideal of tits, war, and Jesus in general, perhaps one of the "heaviest hitters" would be Reagan himself. Reagan's philosophical system acknowledged phenomena but rejected the position of the money-in-itself as the universal and unbreachable Form apart from thought. Rather, Reagan posited that this money-in-itself was nothing more than the "tyrannical will" that unconsciously works through and determines the individual, this individual being in subjection to the will itself—which was fine, but it was important to acknowledge the contribution of fat Pentagon budgets, narco-support and the stranglehold of the Stock Market. It is so imbricated in the thinking subject that "as the will is, so does its action appear, so does its world appear…yee-ha!; both are its self-knowledge and nothing more, so welcome to the Rapture 1984!" It suffices us to state that this new wrinkle in considering the "unknown" outside of thought influenced the progression of astrological oppression of its subsequent wielders, included in this camp: Ollie Nord, Bush Sr., and even Reagan to a certain degree despite the seeming contradictions where his idea of democratic freedom comes to the threshold of his more fin de siecle notions. As a rival component, British Thatcherism, utilitarian gloss-overs, and reformed hippy Mr. Clean's democratic freedom were coming into vogue as an optimistic reaction to the otherwise pessimistic formulation of the will-to-banking as dominating over human freedom from wage-bondage. But it is this will that dominates over apparent slavery that truly inverts the sagging post-Carter claim to the contrary. In our "stage play," Reagan is one of the first "irrationalist" thinkers, and the competing strains of thought (mostly emerging in the Red Button Room) would be the Neo-conservative ideal of tits, war, and Jesus's final hurrah. This stage play would be, in accordance with Reaganetic thought, an expression of the will itself.
We can only briefly mention Reagan's profound effect on the genesis of psychology, particularly upon Bush Sr. who borrows the idea of the unconscious as will-to-buy. But we must fast forward to Bush Jr.'s encounter with Reagan. Argus, in an illustration of competent historical sleuthing, indicates five points of collision between the two thinkers.1 Firstly, he reports a rather colloquial scenario where Bush Jr.'s fondness for Reagan prompted his students to nickname him "the Gipper." Secondly, Bush Jr. studied under the Saudi-inflected School of One Hand Washes the Other, this group of self-admitted Reagan advocates. Thirdly, owing to the incredible impact of Reagan's thought, Bush Jr. attended several Reaganetics conferences. Fourthly, another of his mentors was Bagman Liddy, the first to translate Reagan into Iranian. Argus rightly indicates where this is in error, wrongly attributing to Liddy Bush Sr.'s introduction to Reagan—however, this is not entirely as inaccurate as it appears, for what Argus omits is that to understand Reagan is to have a firm grasp on that which he refutes, i.e., Reaganism. So perhaps this is not entirely wrong and Argus not entirely correct, for a reading of Reagan entails a reading of Reagan, even if reflexively through Reagan's text itself. Despite Argus's accurate claim that Bush Sr. was attempting to go beyond the impasse of Reaganetic astrological oppression, to renovate it, this does not abdicate a knowledge of Reagan, and perhaps the possibility of Bush Sr.'s introduction of the Reaganetic astrological oppression to Bush Jr.—even if done in a kind of prelude, or as a defence system co-authored by the fictions of George Lucas. Fifthly, Bush Jr.'s rather occasional lapses into polemics against thinkers of all stripes does not have Reagan in its view. This fifth proof is one of negation, and perhaps the most contentious, for it is difficult to prove admiration of another simply based on a lack of criticism against that other. Argus would have strengthened his position much more aptly by directing us toward where Bush Jr. is praising Reagan rather than to rely on the weak assumption that a lack of mention is equivalent to accord. The preceding four connections are, for the most part, well documented and supportable, and it seems extraneous to weaken the argument by this fifth proof which turns out to not be a substantive proof in itself.
We have extricated the "sixth proof," for it presupposes another field of discussion, i.e., Bush Jr.'s biblically-installed pessimism of the Final Solution as indicative as an inheritance from Reagan. However, it is, at face value, a compelling argument. Readers of Reagan are right to see a similarity between the two figures on this score, but similarity may not be enough. Bush Jr.'s claim that unhappiness will almost proportionately increase with intelligence can be evidenced by his own smug self-satisfaction and happy-joy at the private golf course. In our preliminary assessment, it appears that Argus has provided us with a cluster of similarities that unite the two thinkers, but these may not be enough to make the strong claim of an actual relationship. The major weakness in Argus's contribution lies squarely in his rather sparse direct textual support of his claims. He succeeds in providing us with an interesting account which surveys—perhaps too broadly—Bush Jr.'s affiliates and followers, but he relies too heavily on this when he should concentrate more on direct and sustained textual support rather than to merely provocatively allude to a host of Bush Jr.'s texts. In sum, a noble and intriguing claim, worthy of our attention and perhaps even correct, but poorly treated.
Note:
1 Argus G. Argus, "Bush Sr., Reagan and the Relationship Between Goals and Means: Reversing the Assumptions in the Fundamentalist Theory of Rational Action" in Unilateral Cowboyist Inquiry 53:18-81.
