They should have known

They’re shocked, just shocked, they tell you. They’re everywhere. Even in Costa Rica.

I was in Costa Rica recently to assess my house construction and obtain legal residency.

Who are “they”? They’re America’s real enemies: Bush supporters.

“They” were a man and two women at the bed and breakfast where I lodged. Their accents—and attitude—tripped my radar. They wanted to know why I was moving to Costa Rica.

“Politics.”

Silence. Frozen smiles.

Politics went undiscussed over the next week. Minutes before my departure, however, one of the women queried: “Back to work Monday?”

“Yes. Arnold needs me,” this state worker replied sardonically.

“What do Californians think of Arnold?” she drawled.

“Apparently, 70 percent of them think he’s doing fine,” I replied. “Personally, it embarrasses me to be from the state.”

Pause.

“We voted for Bush, twice.”

The kicker: “Who knew?” You’ve got to be kidding.

Who knew, for instance, wooden drones couldn’t fly from Iraq, penetrate American airspace and then deliver two-liter payloads of Roundup?

Who knew the Busheviks would shred the Constitution like it was anathema to their dreams of world corporate domination?

Who knew the White House could treasonously expose a CIA agent and then (gasp!) lie about it?

Who knew Dubya would double Hussein’s body count, keeping mass-grave excavators workin’ big-time on their dig time?

Who knew any of this, or so much more?

Once the administration’s lunacy became obvious to all but the most moronic, it was inevitable that Bush supporters would begin pleading what I heard in Costa Rica: insouciant self-absolution of responsibility in the whole sickening affair, because, after all, who knew?

Not so fast. Just as Hitler wouldn’t have gotten as far as he did without solid support or acquiescence by the citizenry for his domestic and cross-border horrors, so neither would Bush and company have been able to dismantle nearly everything that was good and decent about this nation without the aid, overt or otherwise, of tens of millions of belligerently nationalistic, xenophobic, morally twisted, historically ignorant, scared-of-their-own-shadows Americans.

Now they want a free pass? Please.

Not even in Costa Rica.