- AUSTIN, Texas -- Looking at the wreckage of the Bush administration
leaves one with the depressed query, "Now what?" The only help
to the country that can come from this ugly and spectacular crack-up is,
in theory, things can't get worse. This administration is so discredited
it cannot talk the country into an unnecessary war with Iran as it did
with Iraq. In theory, spending is so out of control it cannot cut taxes
for the rich again; the fiscal irresponsibility of the Bushies is already
among its lasting legacies.
-
- As we all know, things can always get
worse, and often do. I rather think it's going to be up to the Democrats
to hold the metaphoric hands of this crippled administration until it limps
off stage. The Republican National Committee has a new scare tactic for
the faithful: You must give to the party, or else the Democrats will spend
the next two years investigating the administration (horror of horrors).
Those who recall the insanely trivial investigations of the Clinton years
may indeed regard this as the ultimate waste of time and money (as even
Ken Starr concluded, there never was anything to Whitewater), but in fact
it could be a therapeutic use of the next biennium. In fact, the offenses
are not comparable.
-
- Suppose we really did stop to investigate
why and how and who is responsible for the lies, the deformed policies
and the inability to govern of this administration. There is a wealth of
lessons to be learned about the dangers of ideological delusion and of
contempt for governance.
-
- Trouble is, the world is not apt to
hold still for two years. It seems to me pointless to impeach Bush. In
the first place, the Republicans so trivialized impeachment into partisan
piffle, it would look like little more than payback. In the second place,
I believe Dick Cheney is seriously off the rails, apparently deeply paranoid
-- let's not put him in charge. The minimum we should expect of Bush in
return for dropping impeachment (or not) is that he cease breaking the
law. Despite the opinions of Dick Cheney, Alberto Gonzales, David Addington,
etc., the president of the United States does not have the authority to
set aside the law.
-
- (If Bush were impeached, I would use
as evidence his astounding statement in March that the matter of getting
American troops out of Iraq "will be decided by future presidents
and future governments of Iraq." What a contemptible statement.)
-
- It would be easier to contemplate a
two-year holding period if Bush hadn't already wasted so much time. Of
particular note in this department is "the inconvenient truth"
-- global warming. Wasting eight years in the face of what we already knew
when Bush came in is not only insane, but also unforgivable. A recent poll
showed the majority of Americans feel the war in Iraq will be the overriding
issue of Bush's presidency. I suspect future historians will fixate on
his global warming record -- not only doing nothing to stop it, but letting
the hole get dug deeper, as well.
-
- Barring emergency, I suspect the wisest
thing Democrats can do in the next two years is to begin steadily undoing
what Bush hath wrought -- on tax and spending, on global warming, and on
surveillance and other illegal lunges for power. George W. Bush ran in
2000 as a moderate. He did not bother to inform us at the time that he
felt the government of this country needed a much stronger executive above
the law. Congress has sat by passively while this administration accrued
more and more power. If members of Congress think the legislative branch
should be equal, it's time for them to stir their stumps.
-
- Am I jumping to conclusions? Can Karl
Rove yet steer his party away from electoral disaster in the fall? I learned
long ago never to call elections closer than six weeks out, and normally
I stick to that rule. But I do not think George W. can be put together
again, so Rove's only option is go negative against the Democrats -- no
surprise there. At this point, they could attack Democrats on almost anything,
but that would leave the large question, "Compared to what?"
And, we must watch out for those voting machines.
-
- It would be interesting to see an election
in which Bush is not a factor and the whole fight is over what Tom DeLay
and the K Street Project have made of the Congress. If ever a gang of corrupt
jerks deserved to be held accountable, this one does.
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