Separated at birth?

There's a remarkable diary today on DKos that describes an encounter with a cabbie who emigrated from Idi Amin's Uganda. Twenty-four years ago he fled dictatorship and oppression to find freedom in Canada. Bale, the cabbie, has the wisdom of someone who's seen it all (all emphasis mine):

"How did he [Amin] get so powerful?"

"Well he was already powerful. But he rose to power by dividing people. You know he been with Kings African Rifles, and old British regiment. He learned military stuff really well and so when he was living somewhere and he was angry with someone, he would get ten guys from a competing tribe to go get him. You understand?"

"What do you mean competing?"

"I mean they hate each other since before time. The Zulus and the Hutus...you know these?"

"In Rwanda? Yes. [...] They hate each other since before a single white man put a foot in Africa. Amin recruited armies of Lugbaras to kill Acholis. He was good at that. And he was a big man. Very strong. Very intimidating. He had an army of thugs. Very soon, he used them."

"I could not understand how my friends who I grew up with, even my brother, would start agreeing with his thugs and his policies. I could not believe my brother who said one evening to me "What do you care about the Acholies?"

" `Your mother is Acholie', I told my brother."

"So? That means I should want more Acholies in my neighborhood? They stink. Mom is different."

"I was so upset. How could my brother act like this? Because he was afraid and [d]id not want to be on the side of the weak."

[...]

"What do you think about Bush?"

"Bush is a dictator. Did I offend you?"

"No. What makes him a dictator?"

"You cannot joke about killing him. Hell even under Amin we danced and sang death songs at him. He had a hotel complex that he tortured people in. The difference between Bush and Amin as far as that goes is that I knew where my relatives were being tortured, and no one knows exactly where the Americans are torturing their victims."

"Do you believe we are doing horrible torture to thousands or to a few?"

He thought about it and said "Is there any difference? My experience is that once torturers begin torturing, the torturers have a hard time stopping."

That really upset me. I persisted. "Seriously, do you think we are torturing thousands?"

He took his time. "They won't let you see one dead soldier. Even under a flag they won't let you see it. They don't tell you the truth about anything. They lie lie lie. My experience tells me this. I don't really know. But if I had to guess, I would guess that your government is doing the worst things you can possibly imagine. Liars are lying because they cannot tell the truth. When I see Bush speak, I don't see a stupid man as you do and many others. I see a man who is too shamed to tell the truth. He has caused so much pain and knows it, but if he admitted one little bit of it, it would come crashing out like a dam. You understand? Bush is in a lot of pain."

We pulled up to the hotel, I asked him to park and waved off the bellhop.

"What do you think will happen to America, Bale?"

"What do you mean WILL happen? What hasn't happened yet? You torture in secret. You invade for what? The government reads your e-mail and listens to your telephone and makes you take off your shoes and pull out your computer. For what? Who do you need to protect yourself against? Is your computer going to attack you? Who should you be afraid of? Your government is more scary to most people than any terrorist. I feel for you really. Because I don't think you have any idea how far down the road you already are."

"So you think we are already at a dictatorship," I asked.

"I think you are far worse than a dictatorship. You are in a dictatorship but most of the population is still living in another time. Once America was the cat's meow. The problem isn't so much your government. It is your population. Here you are have lost so much in freedom, so much in prosperity and so much in reputation, and you have to ask me if you are living under a dictatorship," He answered a call for a pick- up. "I will have to leave. There is a passenger across the street. But I will leave you with this. Dictatorship looks different to everyone. Some of them are disguised and people can't see past the disguise. In China, it was years before anyone questioned why they all wore the same close [sic]. In America, if you are rich or conservative, dictatorship can be very pleasant. You understand?"

"I understand," I paid him, and thanked him.

"Do you think I should flee America?" I asked him.

"I fled mine," he answered.

We can't all flee. We've got to stay and see this through. We've got to start the rollback away from dictatorship and begin our redemption from national shame. But first we've got to see and understand exactly where we are and what we've become.

Bale put his finger directly on the dynamic that draws voters to the Republicans:

"Because he was afraid and did not want to be on the side of the weak."

Republican success for the past thirty-eight years has been achieved by both sowing fear and appearing strong.

But we all know that they're not really strong. Republicans are as weak and frightened as the people who vote for them.

This is what we've been trying to tell Democrats like the Torture Twelve: Go along, you lose. Stand up to the brutes, you win.

Rove is famous for attacking his opponents precisely where they seem strongest. It gives his guy the appearance of strength.

I say attack Republicans precisely where they appear strongest: Their perceived strength itself.

Every Republican running for reelection is weak, a cowering pussy who can't and won't stand up to Bush and Cheney.

Bush and Cheney are weak. If they were strong, they wouldn't need to make everyone else afraid. They wouldn't need to lie and bluster. They wouldn't need to torture.

They have power because they have divided Americans. But power isn't strength. Republicans are weak, frightened bullies who can't stand the light of day. They don't want us to know what they're doing in our name, because they know we'll kick their sorry asses to hell and back.

It's our job to repeat that every day, to ourselves and to everybody who crosses our path.