Motive, Opportunity, ...

The thought has occurred to me that maybe God wants me to kill George Bush. After all, why else would he have given me two good opportunities to do it?

(I'm kidding, of course. Sure, it's in poor taste, but so is the Bush presidency itself. Geez, you Homeland Security folks have no sense of humor!)

The first one was back in 1992, when George Herbert Walker Bush visited a small liberal arts college in West Michigan, just days before losing the election to Clinton. At the time I was an employee at the college, with my office in a building just yards from where the president would be standing for his speech. We were advised that the Secret Service would be checking the building ahead of time, but I could have found any number of places to stash a small firearm. I also had access to any number of dorm rooms with a view of the podium. Just one shot and the will to take it....

Instead, I went to Washington, to (among other things) participate in a protest in which we encircled the White House several times with red ribbon (like the ribbons then being worn as a symbol of AIDS activism). I was probably one of a small number of people involved who not only knew that the president wasn't at home, but where he was: back at my place. That knowledge took a little of the satisfaction out of it, but I consoled myself that I was in Washington, taking action, while Herbert took refuge in one of the "safest" urban Republican counties in America.

I got another chance at killing George Bush yesterday. The scenario was similar: in the wake of the Democratic primary, George the Lesser came to a safe city to address a crowd he could count on to love him. The venue was the fieldhouse of the college where (until a couple months ago) I was an employee with full access to the facilities. With some advance planning, I might have pulled it off.

Instead, I happened to quit that job, taking a similar job nearby. So I was in the neighborhood when the president showed up yesterday. There were protestors in the street nearby, but I was working and didn't feel that simply adding my body and voice to them was worth the trouble of getting the time off from work. I feel a little bad about that. But I like to think of it as discretion... maybe even self-preservation.

Back in 1992, I was torn at first when I discovered that my plans to go to Washington would prevent me from being on hand to protest Herbert's appearance. His contempt for people with AIDS, his contrived invasion of Iraq, and a hundred other reasons have led me to hate the man. This was Republican territory, and I was in a special position to get attention; I would have had to do something. In all seriousness, I wouldn't have tried to kill him; that's quite frankly something I don't think I'm capable of doing. Probably not even in circumstances of war, and certainly not with premeditation.

But I'm sure I would have done something that would have - at the least - gotten me fired, and perhaps arrested. Earlier that year, I managed to get permission from the college to be present at a live televised "town hall" meeting with Herbert (on closed-circuit video from another location with an in-person audience), and wore a t-shirt under my button-down shirt that had a photo of two male soldiers kissing, with the line "read my lips". I was going to expose it to the cameras, but they never pointed at me. I carried a "Wars Don't Make Us Great" sign at the Grand Rapids 4th of July parade that Herbert (and a tank and troop carriers) appeared in that summer. So I meant business. Being unable to safely protest at that speech, but being able to instead do something productive in Washington made me feel better.

I feel the same kind of hatred for Junior as for his father. I want that man out of the White House, and I'm willing to do many things to accomplish that. Even compromise my high ideals and accept John "Good Enough" Kerry as the alternative. But, again, not to actually kill him.

(For one thing, that'd make Dick Cheney president, and the American people would promptly bend over backwards to ensure that he stayed there for another four years, out of a combination of sympathy for the Republican party, and a fear of "changing horses in mid-stream" during time of war. Kerry would have to either withdraw from the election or be tarred and feathered for "taking advantage of" the assassination.)

So joining the protesters down the street, and merely waving a sign and shouting at passing cars, probably would have just frustrated me. A rationalization, I suppose, but that's what gets me through the day sometimes.