How President Bush's Monomaniacal Leadership Compares to Captain Ahab's in Moby-Dick

The opening decade of the 21st century will stand as one in which Moby-Dick not only seems achingly contemporary, but also eerily prescient. In these times Moby-Dick presents a reply of sorts to Plato's fears about reality being distorted through fictional representation. Ahab and his psychotic pursuit of an object he refuses to understand in any terms but his own vengeful pride and arrogant will to conquest can be seen as a flawless mirror image of the same traits exhibited by the democratically appointed leader of our own country, and is a testament to one of the novel's implicit themes and warnings. Rising above all the conflicting symbolism that permeates the novel, one theme is crystal clear and unadorned with any confusing trappings of duality. Bestowing power upon a man who is maddened by monomania, consumed with revenge, and bereft of the ambition to understand his adversary while content to label that adversary through ignorance as purely evil will always lead to death, destruction, economic devastation and the perpetuation of that indifference to apprehend.