Deer in the Headlights

Now that almost everyone’s agreed that George W. Bush is a failed president maybe the worst ever, I’m beginning to feel sorry for him. When in a small minority appalled by our invasion of Iraq, I went at him with a passion that I can no longer muster. At that time I thought that Iraq was going to be Dubya’s Achilles heel and had no clue that everything he touched would reek almost as badly of bovine excrement.

Katrina’s so sad that I can’t even begin to mount anger. The federal, state and local governments were completely unprepared for a storm so big and powerful, and when it came ashore with its category three winds and huge tidal surge there was no chance that anything good would come of it. It wasn’t Bush’s fault, but he implied that he could hold back the sea and went on to appoint Brownie (of heck of a job fame) to head up his response. It’s ironic that Bill Clinton appointed the most competent person he could find to run FEMA and every disaster on his watch turned out as well as could be expected, but be assured that no matter who was president when Katrina landed no president in history would have been up to the task – although many of them would have looked better in failing.

Social Security – holy mackerel; how could anyone have been so insensitive as to think he could take on the sacred cow of the tennis shoe crowd, propose a solution that didn’t even pretend to fix the long term fiscal imbalance, and walk away unscathed? This is the issue that assured that Letterman, Leno, Colbert, O’Brien, and Jon Stewart would have material at least through January 20, 2009.

The Dubai ports sale – Trust me on this? How dumb can one man be?

And so on. Sadly for me, the president’s missteps and gaffs are working to the advantage of the Republican Party. At the moment Dubya reached for the Social Security live third rail the GOP members of Congress began their race away from his embrace. The way the electorate is spread across the country and the nature of the districting in the states assures an uphill struggle for Democrats for at least the next generation so winning even the House of Representatives is going to be a major uphill climb. While the polls show Bush, the Congress, and Republicans in a race to the bottom, the Democrats are going to have to work like crazy to pull off even this mini triumph.

Bush has done everything he can think of to stanch the bleeding. He laughed at his shortcomings at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner; he let Andy card fall on his sword; he pushed Porter Goss over the side; he manfully assured that his successor would have to deal with the problems associated with his tax and budget profligacy; he stopped talking about spreading freedom and democracy outside the Green Zone. What’s left? He’s talking about vetoing a pork laden bill that funds the war and Katrina recovery, but the operative words here are `talking about.’

I’ll get over feeling bad for the poor schnook, but his ineptitude makes it difficult.

Blog on!

Wild Bill