Caesar

Via Melanie at Just a Bump in the Beltway. Gary Hart writes an article at Salon here. Worth jumping through hoops for.

The new Caesars

The Bush administration's empire building is trampling on who we are and
were always meant to be -- a republic.

Aug. 18, 2004 The
cause of imperialism, weakened for a time by the fall of the European and Soviet
empires, has found new advocates. The fact that the 21st century imperial power
happens to be the United States of America, whose independence from colonialism
was declared 228 years ago, seems not to matter. The neoconservatives'
project to position the United States as the world's dominant power -- and to
use that power to govern in venues chosen seemingly by them alone, and
collectively where reasonably easy but unilaterally where necessary -- has been
advanced and saluted.

A careful review of the statements of President Bush and his
administration up to the declaration of victory in Iraq yields little evidence
of the true purpose of America's invasion. The world is now familiar with the
arguments: Iraq possesses weapons of mass destruction; Iraq has or will soon
have a "nuclear capability"; Iraq harbors and supports terrorists planning
attacks on the United States; Iraq itself is a threat to U.S. national security.
All have proved untrue and are no longer offered as justification for America's
"preventive" war on Iraq, an action with precedent in U.S. history possibly only
in the Philippines more than a century ago.