Still a C- Student
George W. Bush has botched the job in Iraq as badly as he botched the job at Harkin Oil.
But, at least at Harkin, it was cash he wasted, not lives.
Simply put, Iraq is a mess.
Of U.S. making.
With no improvement in sight.
Where is all the strategic planning and personnel? Where are all the trucks rolling in to create the economic windfall that was just waiting for us? Where is this new, better life we were supposedly giving to the Iraqi populace? Just how is all of this supposed to happen, exactly?
At the White House, they haven't quite thought things out that far yet. Give them time, they're working on some plans. Possibly. That is, if there's not a photo op this afternoon, or a fund raiser this evening.
Remember when they sold 43 to us on the basis of his having been a CEO? They always steered us away from the unpleasant fact of his having been a horror at the job at Harkin. That he was a lousy CEO, as CEOs go. That he bled cash when everyone else in his industry was doing fine. Remember hearing that it took a sweetheart, insider-trading deal with his Dad's friends to finally take it off his hands and let him walk away? I know, don't worry, most of us have forgotten that.
He hasn't improved any. He's still that C student he's boasted about being at Yale.
The height, breadth and depth of the incompetence of this boy-CEO is stunning. Forgetting for a moment that the idealogues in this administration had already been pushing for Saddam's removal at all costs since 1991; that Deputy Defense Secretary Wolfowitz called Gen. Clark moments after the World Trade Center collapsed, telling him to say that it was Saddam who did it, even without any evidence; that this administration then created a pattern of lies, deceptions and falsehoods to take the American people's eyes off its real dangers and focus them tightly on their own personal enemy; that this administration has allowed the economy to unravel beneath its very feet as it persued its goal of toppling Saddam at any cost.
Forget all that.
Going forward, what's important here is that this Bush group has no clue about how to fix any of the mess they've made. All they can think of to do is blame Bill Clinton for everything short of the sun going down in the west, instead of offering proposals to fix what's broken, without also dismantling the federal government. Beyond the inevitable weary cry of "Tax Cuts!" for their supporters, there is precious little talent in this administration for economic theory. Literally, no one at the White House has any inkling as to how to fix this swamp they've created.
In Iraq, now that they've gotten us to give them the trophy they wanted, they have clearly shown no aptitude whatsoever for knowing how to proceed without making matters horribly worse.
For the Iraqi people, and for the soon-to-be-scores of murdered American soldiers.
If they were so fixated on taking out their favorite bogeyman, you would have thought that some of that high-powered prep school, Ivy League, Neo-con think tank brainpower would have been pointed towards what to do after they've achieved their goal.
Life after winning seems to have escaped them.
When Karl Rove is your Guru, winning is all that is important. Governing can be left for someone else to worry about.
But, that doesn't work when people's lives are at stake.
But, then, they would have had to have had at least a C+ average to understand that.
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posted by Gotham 9:20 AM
