Bush's continued presidency is a crisis without equal

A Crisis Almost Without Equal
Republicans and Democrats alike are starting to face the prospect of what it means to have George W. Bush as their commander in chief for another 33 months -- in a time of war, terrorism, and nuclear intrigue. How can the press contribute to confronting the crisis? First: recognize it exists. Thomas Friedman started to do that today.

By Greg Mitchell

(April 19, 2006) -- No matter which party they generally favor or political stripes they wear, newspapers and other media outlets need to confront the fact that America faces a crisis without equal in recent decades.

Our president, in a time of war, terrorism and nuclear intrigue, will likely remain in office for another 33 months, with crushingly low approval ratings that are still inching lower. Facing a similar problem, voters had a chance to quickly toss Jimmy Carter out of office, and did so. With a similar lengthy period left on his White House lease, Richard Nixon quit, facing impeachment. Neither outcome is at hand this time.

The alarm should be bi-partisan. Many Republicans fear their president's image as a bumbler will hurt their party for years. The rest may fret about the almost certain paralysis within the administration, or a reversal of certain favorite policies. A Gallup poll this week revealed that 44% of Republicans want some or all troops brought home from Iraq. Do they really.

....... “I look at the Bush national security officials much the way I look at drunken drivers. I just want to take away their foreign policy driver's licenses for the next three years. Sorry, boys and girls, you have to stay home now -- or take a taxi. ... You will not be driving alone. Not with my car.”

The problem -- the crisis -- is that Bush and Co. likely WILL be driving the “car” for 33 more months.
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more at:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002383107
VIA:
http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/04/bushs-continued-presidency-is-crisis.html

Democrats MUST win control of congress this fall if there is to be any improvement.

re how to think before voting...

What questions should we be asking ourselves?

Which Party has done the most for the Peoples welfare?

Which Party has done the most damage to our Gross Revenue...known as the GROSS NATIONAL PRODUCT (GNP)?

Which Party is BEST for the FUTURE???

The Dems should not rest on the Parties Past Laurels but strive to develop and forward Solutions other than the Band Aid type...

comes from the business community.
delegates rather than having hand's one knowledge of issues.
can speak in complete sentences.
was only a "c" student.
has achieved nothing that wasn't handed to him by rich suck-ups.
refuses to come clean about his past.

Add more if you can.......

to push the button. I can't even remember. Bush is insane. There is no other conclusion.

the one with itchy fingers.

Kennedy did make one little political mistatement on the nuclear thing, but you won't hear it from my lips.

many examples in our Human History of wrong Leaders at the Wrong time, and at the wrong Nation, Country...

Bush is fitting right in there among the top 3....

investigations. Maybe we need more senators and congressmen?

have time for foreign policy and we can keep him in a little black box with no light. If Rethugs want to know what's good for them they will prosecute the hell out of him.

I'll bet George's dogs don't even like him.

:kick:

machines, gerrymandered districts and other dirty tricks to pull them through in 2006 and 2008.

These guys know Shrub is bad news. They also know there are some seriously dirty players at the top of their party.

The only way the Republican Party could possibly redeem itself at this point:

* Leave Shrub in office for right now. Figure out some way to keep him from nuking Iran (if he does that and they don't impeach him immediately, there is no more Republican Party). Let the worst actors in Congress keep him propped up. Get him a new goat book. Something.

* Don't run real hard in the 2006 election. Maybe even give the Dems some back-channel help. Anyway, get it so a lot of Republicans lose in 2006, and the Democrats take back control of Congress.

* Next, do a little finagling in Palm Beach and get the Pigboy thrown in jail on some of those OxyContin charges. This is especially important--Limbaugh is their main Useful Idiot, and they don't need a Useful Idiot.

* The next step is critical: Let the Democrats impeach Dick Cheney and George Bush and throw both of them in jail. They'll need a fairly tame Republican to step into the role of Caretaker President. For this they'll need someone who's reasonably pure of heart and relatively unknown. Who's governor of Utah? He's probably okay.

* Then they need to throw the 2008 presidential and congressional elections. The intent is to reduce the evil-Republican presence to the bare minimum. The president will then have to be reelected for this to work.

* Let the Democrats fix everything as well as they can in eight years.

* And finally, in 2012 just take credit for everything the Democrats did, and attempt to come back to power.

Considering that the American electorate has an attention span a quarter of an inch long, it's doable.

"politics."

23760 hours.


damn.

I don't know the math...but its gonna be a lot more than it has to be...

...if you have a web page, you can link to it.

<http://bushclock.lose.com/>

I am hoping that with indictments in the Plame and Abramoff cases this administration will be few in numbers.

Operating exactly as it should. I wonder when these people are going to wake up to that reality.

Friedman, who still supports the Iraq war, opens by declaring that given a choice between a nuclear Iran and an attack on that country engineered by the White House, he would choose the former. That’s how little he trusts the diplomatic and military chops of Bush, Rumsfeld, Condi and Co. He cites “the level of incompetence that the Bush team has displayed in Iraq, and its refusal to acknowledge any mistakes or remove those who made them.”

But then he goes on: “I look at the Bush national security officials much the way I look at drunken drivers. I just want to take away their foreign policy driver's licenses for the next three years. Sorry, boys and girls, you have to stay home now -- or take a taxi. ... You will not be driving alone. Not with my car.”

The man's hitting percentage is like an American league pitcher batting in an inter league game. He can see the pitches he even knows how to throw them he just seldom makes contact.

That is what I see about Friedman, he can gather tons of facts but can seldom make an intelligent analysis out of what they mean. In the cases he gets it right, I always suspect it is because he was straighted out by his wife. He has admitted to this before.

Since we agree here, I will just chalk it up to the influence of others or maybe the broken clock being right twice a day.

Is his wife well known or anything?

My wife straightens my out all the time, too.

I appreciate you going out of your way to make sure everyone is given their due and also to your passing along some of the best information on the DU, you've got your finger on the pulse and it's noticed by many here.

If the American people will do that in November, at least that will be a check on the dangerous regime we're stuck with for 33 more months.

What a way to start the Hitler's Birthday celebration.
Our President is a nut. Get the tranquilizer darts and duct tape. Bull goose loony, crazier than a shit house rat and sounds more and more like Tourett's patient on crack. :toast:

illegal acts. Tweety brushed this aside and said something like, "Well, not really guilty, that hasn't been confirmed." Ron answered VERY strongly, "Do you really think there is any doubt that this pResident manipulated the intelligence to go to war in Iraq?"

A criminally insane mass murderer is more like it.

the bumbling is what bothers them.

Check out this song, John Lennon would be proud http://decider.cf.huffingtonpost.com

:hi:

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

I posted it to the Clark 08 Yahoo Group, and it inspired several other parodies!

Finally they get around to noticing the Bush crisis and too late to look at the hopeless situation the GOP is in. had they greater moral stature, more than a McCain or Lieberman they might see that both sides of the coin are a loss and opt for the right thing to do to save their country- at least.

But their souls, their minds, their conscience have long been mortgaged to loan sharks. You may decry the Old King Log Dems and their Quixotic quest for lost bi-partisanship and Third Way republicanism, but stop and consider the "dominant" party.

Bush's diehard, last remaining supporters are the only solid core left in the whole GOP base. The traditional GOP and the Dem and Liberal haters, the ideological Conservatives have lost heart and the collapse of the Bush presidency capped by impeachment signing the death knell of the entire agenda that rational core still clings to would not exactly rally their base. But they have no faith in anyone or anything anymore anyway. All the investment in fantasy rendered null and void and indictable, not to mention their own collaboration and corruption and failures, there is noting left and all the thrill and confidence of floating lies will be gone. Then the REAL problem that the GOP does not in any way represent more than a selfish fraction of the rich population- plus a jar of mixed hate nuts- will treat them as all the weak have been treated by the GOP.

They have no where to go to win. No one, if Bush and his crony machine falls, will cheat the margins for them, no one will dispense the barrels of money. Business money- without the craven surrender of the Dems must flow back to the new majority. The media is in a shambles for having been sunk so low. They too will follow a Bush impeachment into electoral inadequacy. The Great Wurlitzer will wheeze discords and then silence.

As I said. Facing this oblivion, a man of strong integrity would feel free at least to do the right thing, even if too late and bungled as better men have done during this national nightmare. But there are virtually none left among high elected or selected GOP officials. If some pipsqueak tried to imagine a moral awakening he would be destroyed before even arousing a faint sympathy among the masses and the just. Most have not the capability of imagining a moral choice here and pragmatically there are no pluses for the fearful and the guilty. For all the talk of qualms or necessity, in public speech and in backing Bush, not much has fundamentally changed, much less any nhint of accountability or legislative spine.

And a lame duck will lead them.

So they will cling to what they did in 2002 etc. They will wait for Bush to do his worst, scramble the national mood and rig the vote tabulation, take his money and hold on, blinders on, parrot talk spewing almost unconsciously out of their pale mouths until 2008.
If you thought the Dems were bad or weak or incapable of fighting consider the GOP, party of lost bought souls, consoled by money, hiding behind abused power, forever deprived of the popular vote and legal legitimacy, of the very meaning of what it means to be an American or the duties of their foresworn oaths of office. The party of the Damned.

That's not at all a given. Consider Bush's allies: Aznar was only voted out at an election; the same with Berlusconi (and his fingernails are making gouge marks in the floor as they drag him out by his feet from his former office). Their right wing parties never made a move to depose their failed leader. They just went for elections - and lost. Howard in Australia won. Why think the Republicans would behave differently?

And then consider Blair: he won his election, although most Brits think he screwed up over Iraq, and his left wing party, even though many have always been against the invasion of Iraq, still haven't kicked him out - even when he's said he won't stand at the next election. That's because the main opposition is further to the right of them, and they don't fear losing many more votes on the left than they already have (most of those were to the Lib Dems, which is, when all's said and done, a centrist party - just an anti-imperialist one, that's all). And this may be what's driving Hillary Clinton and some other Democrats - if Blair can survive while being pro-war, in a country with a small vaguely left wing alternative party, then surely they can in a country with no othe left wing choice at all. So they occupy the centre ground, courting voters who still think the USA has a right to throw around its military weight.

Why is this guy assuming that BushCo WILL be at the wheel for another 33 months? At least he acknowledges the problem, but with approval ratings like they are, how can one assume that * will ride it out?

* tons of experience at bailing when the going gets tough, why would it be any different this time? Of course it will be in the guise of the voters and congress "picking" on poor monkey boy.

End of story. What do they plan on doing for the next two years ? The 'vision thing' is looking pretty "Mr Magoo" long abouts now.

5 Losing Seasons and yet he still has his Believers....

We need a new coach, a new owner, and a new GOAL....

scurry away in the middle of the night.

Anything.

Just get them all to GO already!

But rather than push impeachment for partisan reasons, the Democrats will actually put it off -- for partisan reasons. An unpopular president helps their drive for votes in November, and everything else is secondary.

What in hell does he expect the Democrats to do? There isn't the slightest, teeniest indication that the Republicans would do anything to allow an impeachment, so what's the point of trying? The only hope for impeachment is to win the House in November. That isn't "partisan." It's the only hope to stop Bush for the last two years of his reign of terror.

The congress and the senate know Bush WILL cause a Nuclear war. There is no doubt there, or in this discussion. We are powerless to stop him. The people we have elected won't stop him. I am just sick about what has happened to our country. I trust none of them.

The recent rearrangement of personnel at the WH, IMO, is a sign of an impending crisis.
They began the inevitable distancing of Rove yesterday, with McClennan thankfully gone (I think this guy was about to crack), and a new office sheriff in town - all point to some heel digging at the top. And then there was the particularly entertaining "The Decider" campaign in ordered support for one of the other de facto Presidents - Rumsfeld.
I believe the avalanche has begun to slide and they know it. Unfortunately for all of us, this gang will not go quietly into the good night. Expect some unprecendented fireworks as the waters continue to rise at Pennsylvania Ave.

See with Scotty gone, the press can't follow up some of the questions he didn't answer but said he'd look into it. They were through with Scotty. Thanks for the welcome :hi:

"...the reality of Bush continuing to serve as Master and Commander of the Iraq war and all other foreign policy into 2009.

Now that IS scary. :hide:

That's an dvantage of the parliamentary system: if things aren't going right, you get a new government. No waiting three years. Why? Because we can't take a foreign policy time out and what the current government is doing isn't working.

There is no way around it. Bush and Cheney are crooked and incompetent. They must be removed from power as soon as possible.

Since we can't vote no confidence in them just because things aren't going right, we have to impeach them for bona fide wrongdoing: Treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors. That could mean anything from a violation of statutory law to abuse of power. There are plenty of reasons that will stick.

We must remember that in the end it is up to us to get the ball rolling.