Odds and Ends - Big Ones

The president’s approval ratings are up…among his base supporters. It appears, however, that his major PR push over the last several weeks has paid off only with the faithful. Among Democrats and Independents there have been almost no positive changes in the ratings.

The revelation that the president authorized wiretapping of Americans without court orders is blowing up in his face. In today’s Washington Post, even conservative George Will was on his case and the only sign of support was a column written by neoconservatives.

The issue is ridiculous. According to The Boston Globe, the court in question has denied warrants in only four out of more than 5,200 requests over the past four years and, if it’s an emergency, the executive doesn’t even have to ask in advance. The agency simply does it and then asks for an ex post facto warrant; so much for the president’s ridiculous argument that the need for speed led to his order.

It’s very clear that members of this administration look not upon the Reagan Administration for its ideal as they so often indicate; they look to Richard Nixon’s relentless grasp for executive power as their example of how to restore the imperial presidency.

I’ve said it before there were things I liked about Nixon. He was the only president in my tenure that had some clue and inclination for managing the federal bureaucracy. Naturally, that positive led to a thousand negatives and ultimately to his less than happy departure into the setting sun.

As Nixon overreached then so is Bush now. The only thing I’ll say in his favor, he seems not to be exhibiting the obvious psychological strains that Nixon did when events started to spin out of his control in 1974.

Early results in the Iraqi election are going against the U.S. party line. Religious and ethnic parties seem to be the early winners. We were doing all we could for Interim Prime Minister Allawi and his buddies so now I guess Dubya is going to have to explain that electing mullahs was his plan all along.

Why on earth would anyone want to be president? I guess that’s why we get so few that exhibit signs of normalcy.

Blog on!

Wild Bill