For 8 Years, George Bush Turned America Into an Episode of Beverly Hills, 90210

Remember high school? I sure do. For most, well-adjusted, average teens, high school was an emotional Gitmo. Four years of waterboarding, without the board, or the water. Instead we were doused with peer pressure and slammed against the false walls of equally false "popularity."

Of course there were those handful who loved high school. For them high school represented a high-water market in their lives. And for a handful of them it represented  THE high water mark of their lives. Never again would they be as popular, successful or powerful than they were as members of a high school "in-crowd."

For most of the rest of us it would take some 20 or 25 years, and a high school reunion, to discover how few of these former in-crowders had gone on to accomplish dittally-sh*t as adults. High school really was their high water mark. Sad. (Okay, not so sad.)

But, from time to time some of these high school hot shots rattles his or her way into positions of power and authority. Just how this happens remains one of life's enduring mysteries. But it happens, and that's exactly what happened with George W. Bush and his fellow in-crowders.

They ran America like it was America High for 8 years. And if you remember, Rule 1 of all high school in-crowds was to refuse to acknowledge the existence of those not "in," and that meant not talking to them.

And so it came to pass that in George W. Bush's America High it was decided that the best way to deal with countries around the world they decided were decidedly NOT cool, was to not talk to them. After all, it worked  for them in high school.

So it was decided that America High would be the head in-crowd nation and would talk only to nations the GWBers decided were cool. Likewise, as the head in-crowder, America High would be the one to decide who in the world was "in" and who in the world was "out." The slogan on America High's letterhead was changed to read, "You're either with us, or you're against us."

Among those the GWB crowd would not talk to were  Cuba and Venezuela. As for the rest of Latin America, the word went out, "hang around with those two lefty-loser countries and we won't talk to you either."

After all, we didn't want all of Latin America to become losers, geeks, nerds (aka, "socialists.") Toe the simplistic in-crowd line  –  "capitalism good... socialism bad" – or the phone line goes dead. ("No habla, no mas.")

Well, how did that work?

By 2006 the numbers of Latin American countries that had joined Cuba and Venezuela had mushroomed:

Latin America's Leftist Shift

"Within the last six years in Latin America numerous social movements have gained momentum in the fight for human rights, better living and working conditions and an end to corporate exploitation and military violence. Recently, left of center leaders have been elected in Bolivia, Uruguay, Chile and Venezuela. (Full)

Nice going, Bushie in-crowders. You hauty, holier than thou non-talkers managed to turn half of Latin America into Cuba.

"We had this debate throughout the campaign, and the whole notion was that somehow if we showed courtesy or opened up dialogue with governments that had previously been hostile to us, that that somehow would be a sign of weakness — and the American people didn’t buy it," Obama said at a news conference following a weekend gathering of leaders from the Organization of American States here. "And there’s good reason they didn’t buy it, because it doesn’t make sense." (Full)

The GWB crowd's silent treatment wasn't restricted to Latin American. Nor was the damage.  They also decided that Iran, Syria and Hezbolla were also not speak-worthy nations.