Bush Versus Goering

This morning, I read this article in the Toronto Star (login required). What caught me was the quote attributed to George W. Bush in this exchange:

According to this account, when senior Martin government figures tried to explain the difficulties of convincing Canadians it would be worthwhile for Ottawa to join the new defence system, Bush appeared astonished. Bush "waved his hands and remarked: `I don't understand this. Are you saying that if you got up and said this is necessary for the defence of Canada, it wouldn't be accepted?'" the Post quoted the Canadian official as saying.

Fascinating. Bush apparently expected Martin to be able to just get up and say that missile defence was "necessary for the defence of Canada" and everyone would just go along with that. On one level, I find this remark to be profoundly offensive, that Bush assumes that Canadian citizen (such as myself) are such stupid sheep as to be willing to go along with his idiotic and probably useless missile defence system. But then I remembered, this is what has worked for him as President. Attack Iraq, it's for national security; pass the Patriot Act, it's for national security; vote for me, it's for national security and so it has gone with just about every issue. Defence and security have been Bush's magic words for the past four years, and I guess he finds it unbelievable that it doesn't work quite as well here as it evidently does in the US. His remarks remind me of something that was said by Hermann Goering at his trial in Nuremburg,

Naturally, the common people don't want war, but after all, it is the leaders of a country who detemine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.

Really, the similarity of the sentiment is remarkable. There you have it, Bush works on the same cynicism as a defeated Nazi general.