by Mark Silva
Gore Vidal, the writer, put his chips on Barack Obama last year.
He wants them back.
In an interview with the Times of London, the 83-year-old lion of literature calls the American "inexperienced'' in military matters and complains that he has "f----d up'' health care.
At least he's honest, though, Vidal says of Obama.
" I was hopeful,'' Vidal tells the Times. "He was the most intelligent person we've had in that position for a long time. But he's inexperienced. He has a total inability to understand military matters. He's acting as if Afghanistan is the magic talisman: solve that and you solve terrorism."
The United States should withdraw from Afghanistan, Vidal says.
""We've failed in every other aspect of our effort of conquering the Middle East or whatever you want to call it,'' he says, calling the war on terror "made up... The whole thing was PR, just like 'weapons of mass destruction'. It has wrecked the airline business, which my father founded in the 1930s. (His father founded TWA). He'd be cutting his wrists. Now when you fly you're both scared to death and bored to death, a most disagreeable combination....
"One thing I have hated all my life are liars, and I live in a nation of them,'' he says, retaining some optimism about Obama "because he doesn't lie.''
As for health-care reform, he says Obama "f----ed it up. I don't know how because the country wanted it. We'll never see it happen."
Vidal now believes, as he did originally, that Hillary Clinton would be the better president. "Hillary knows more about the world and what to do with the generals,'' he says in the interview. "History has proven when the girls get involved, they're good at it.
"The Republicans will win the next election, Vidal believes. "Remember the coup d'etat of 2000 when the Supreme Court fixed the selection, not election, of the stupidest man in the country, Mr Bush."
Vidal, author of two dozen novels, many screenplays and countless essays, also delivers a withering assessment of the American public and the nation's future.
The U.S., he says, is "rotting away at a funereal pace. We'll have a military dictatorship fairly soon, on the basis that nobody else can hold everything together.
"Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people. His problem is being over-educated. He doesn't realize how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is. Benjamin Franklin said that the system would fail because of the corruption of the people and that happened under Bush."
Comments
Obviously Gore Vidal is a racist, or something.
(sarcasm off)
Posted by: Chris | September 30, 2009 12:01 PM
Old soldiers never die, they just fade away. Mr. Vidal's entitled to his opinion, which is half right. Far better than what we can expect from the Republican-Libertarian fringe !! President Obama can't turn the whole ship-of-state around in 7 months. It took the Bush&Cheney fringe, 8 years to put us in this mess. Patience, my fellow citizens and you will see a revitalized America, under the stewardship of President Obama and Vice-President Biden !! That is why all the shouting and provocation from the Republican-Libertarian fringe, they are worried President Obama's administration will succeed !!
SUPPORT OUR TROOPS, BRING THEM HOME, ALIVE AND WHOLE. NOW.
Posted by: Don Fitzgerald, IL | September 30, 2009 12:23 PM
Vidal now believes, as he did originally, that Hillary Clinton would be the better president.
Oh boy, dumb and dumber . . . or lib and super lib, same thing.
Hey Donnie:
SUPPORT STUPID POSTS, POST THEM DAILY, IDIOTIC AND REPETITIVE. NOW.
Posted by: Bobbie Mobbie | September 30, 2009 12:46 PM
I have said many times that it would be better for all concerned if the South secede. The Republicans would lose most of their angry white base, the informationally challenged Confederates, Fundamentalists and Ku Kluxers, Teabaggers and Glenn BeckerHeads.
If they were gone, we'd finally have a really good country for the first time in many years. If only they were gone.
Posted by: moreofthesame | September 30, 2009 12:48 PM
The Republicans have done a great job of pushing themselves to the fringe in the eyes of the broader public. I think we're going to see a rise of a 3rd party which will take a more moderate stance than the Far Right. Eventually the crazies will no longer have a Republican power base to control and they will fade from view. However, putting them all on their own little island somewhere is not a bad idea....
.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9mYCU0mH7w
.
Posted by: K | September 30, 2009 12:54 PM
Leftie Gore Vidal is still alive? Who knew? Who cares what he has to say?
Posted by: Bruce | September 30, 2009 12:55 PM
The Republicans are Nazis in the sense that they appeal to racism, religious and ethnic hatreds, religious nationalism and so called "Family Values" all the time to attract lower class, low IQ white supporters. I can find many similarities between the Republicans and other fascist parties of the far Right, past and present. At the same time, they also have a free market capitalist and Country Club side of people who only back them because they don't want to pay taxes, and want big business (Big Oil etc) left alone to do what it wants.
It's sometimes hard for the Right to hold the Country Club types together in the same party with the Nazi wannabe's and other assorted Right-Wing populists.
Posted by: Nevermind | September 30, 2009 1:01 PM
When he says we're "rotting away at a funereal pace," he couldn't be more accurate.
Posted by: Doug | September 30, 2009 1:21 PM
Nevermind,
You make a compelling argument. Were you and Obumbles on the same team at Harvard Law for moot court?
Posted by: Chris | September 30, 2009 1:33 PM
Teabaggers, birthers, deathers, skinheads, neo-cons, immigration paranoids, the rich who want another tax cut, the corporate elite that want tax money to pay their bonuses, generals with mideast Napoleonic complexes, and a collection of "rebranded" Klansmen, Neo-Nazis, Birchers, and Minuteman nuts etc etc etc.
They're certainly no electoral threat but a mob that needs to be watched carefully like the mobs of 1938 should have been. When the "watchers" are the far right-wingers of the intelligence community, however, who will watch the watchers?
Mr. Vidal seems to have missed out on the eight years of the Bush Administration completely.
Posted by: I'mAnemicRoyalty | September 30, 2009 3:43 PM
Nevermind, K and moreofthesame = John E, Dumb Dumb Janet, perhaps Mark Silva's son?
Anyway, moreofthesame, I think the better way to solve this country's problems is to round of the Lunatic Left from our major cities and ship you folks to Venezuela where you'd be happy. See, you take Chicago out of Illinois and Illinois would be a Republican state. We would have less crime, less corruption, better government, lower taxes and businesses coming to this state rather than fleeing it.
Take New York City out of New York and that state turns Republican. Take San Francisco and LA out of California and it's Republican. Take Seattle out of Washington and it's Republican. Take all of the government workers and Leftists kooks out of Northern Virginia and it is fully Republican once again. See a trend here?
Leftists: Scram, shoe, scat, go away!
Problems solved!
Posted by: John D | September 30, 2009 3:45 PM
"Obama would have been better off focusing on educating the American people...He doesn't realize how dim-witted and ignorant his audience is."
Particularly white Republicans. No other group of Americans--whether it's Asians, Latinos or Blacks--have consistently revealed themselves to be as pliable and illiterate as the white racists and fringe lunatics who make up the GOP.
Posted by: Diane | September 30, 2009 3:52 PM
He outlived Wm. F. Buckley.
Who did a much better job of slamming Gore than Bruce.
My guess: he'll make 100.
Buckley's death was peculiar.
According to his son's account, he was heavily into uppers and downers.
Maybe he got his bottles mixed up.
Anyway, Bruce, yes, it's true--rumors of Gore's death have been exaggerated.
He's got some more books in him.
Posted by: ornery | September 30, 2009 4:21 PM
A common occurance in America today - Buyer's Remorse
Posted by: Terry | September 30, 2009 4:52 PM
But John D, then all the little inbred repug children would be getting their educations and health care from their own peers. You know, a bunch of anti-intellectual, anti science inbred half-wits like yourself.
Posted by: Blubber Snorter | September 30, 2009 5:09 PM
Oh Blubber, I think the school system would be much, much stronger if conservatives ran it. You see, kids today increasingly cannot do math, geography (even adults like BC), science, English, reading comprehension, history and more. Schools are failing our kids even though we keep spending more and more dollars on education (double digit spending increases most every year). The problem is most education systems are run by liberals. Now as far as in-breeding goes, I think that is still something soley in the land of the left. Also, it seems the left is in favor of child molestation and rape, especially when you consider the uproar from the Left over the arrest of its darling and hero Roman Polanski. So, yes, the facts are that if we get the Leftists out of this country, the U.S. will be a much better and greater place for it.
Posted by: John D | September 30, 2009 7:48 PM
The legacy of 20 years of republicanism under Reagan and the Bushes. Massive debt and preemptive invasions. Was all Borrow and Spend for 20 years
Posted by: Tom A. | October 1, 2009 6:10 AM
LOL, more of the same!
RT
www.complete-privacy.net.tc
Posted by: Xavier Steen | October 1, 2009 8:52 AM
Without a doubt, Gore Vidal has been a student of the American political landscape and has the perspective of knowing what he is talking about. Your measured and precise language is lost on most people.
The negative commenters on this article are obviously "educated" from soundbites of clueless numbskulls like Beck and O'Reilly.
Gore Vidal please keep calling out the bull****.
I think it is likely that Obama has a lot on his plate and is still learning the job. I too personally like the man but I am under no illusions that he is a politician and lawyer. To say he he is honest I think will be demonstrated in time. Quite a rare combination.
Any chance of you writing a book about Reagan or one of the Bush's?
Posted by: Brad | October 2, 2009 9:48 AM
Posted by: John D | September 30, 2009 7:48 PM
Geographically Stupid Little Johnnie D - YOU are the person who stated that the island of Cuba is totally within the Gulf of Mexico. After I PROVED YOU WRONG, you then twisted your own words to say that Cuba borders the gulf.
And you have never been man enough to admit that you were wrong.
Posted by: BC | October 2, 2009 9:49 PM