The current economic meltdown and our government's seeming inability to agree on what to do about it has been dominating the news ever since the Paulson "plan" was released (along with the apparently incorrect dire warnings that we were just days away from slipping into the abyss). Close on its heels are the random bits demonstrating the McCain campaign's political hari-kari, and Palin's ignorant arrogance. Obama is hardly in the news anymore at all.

Also missing in action is pResident Bush.

Oh, he makes the occasional appearance, like the groundhog emerging from its burrow to let us all know we have 6 more weeks of winter. But the strutting cocky rancher is gone. In his place is a defeated deflated miserable man with a reverse Midas touch that has seen everything he's touched turn to shit. Even the pundits that once supported him have noticed:



At this point in his career, he's not just a lame duck - he's an impotent aging mandarin, no longer respected or even relevant. On numerous occasions recently it's been Obama that's stepped up to act presidential. Congress seems to have finally limped away from Bush's death grip on them (although they still have moments of Stockholm Syndrome). It seems that Bush has finally realized that his legacy is going to be a broken America, and there's nothing he can do about it.

Of course - it's not like he's actually tried to do anything. He swallowed the Friedman economic model hook line and sinker. He sat in the driver's seat while the economy plowed toward the cliff, and took his hands off the steering wheel saying "it will correct itself". Imagine his surprise as it went hurtling over the edge... we can only hope it lands on its wheels rather than exploding in a ball of fire.

Normally these sorts of retrospectives are done closer to the man leaving office, but it appears his spirit has already left, and only the hunched muttering shell is left behind to muddle through these next 16 weeks. So what will his legacy leave behind?

• Iraq: He didn't just break America, he also broke Iraq, and in spectacular fashion. Our illustrious TriSec reports the latest stats every Tues, but the once thriving modern non-theocratic nation has literally been bombed back to the "stone age", with tribal fighting, few modern conveniences, and a long brutal road ahead of them. All this for only $500 billion dollars and over 4000 American lives.


• Torture: They opened this Pandora's Box, putting American soldiers at risk for retributional torture. Way to support the troops...


• Hurricane Katrina: The response to the hurricane was illustrative of the Bush Administration's approach to governing: do as little as possible and do it incompetently. The criminal negligence experienced by the citizens of NoLa was a microcosm of the entire Bush administration. Heckuva job there Brownie...


• Habeas Corpus: Bush didn't just shred the Constitution, he shredded hundreds of years of legal precedence. Was it necessary? Of course not - he just wanted to feel the power.


• Spying on Americans: Nixon could've learned a thing or two about paranoia from this administration. They wanted to know what everyone was doing all the time. The only thing more disgusting than this was all of the "Americans" that said "hey - no problem... I've got nothing to hide".


• Acting the Buffoon: The seemingly never-ending embarrassment coming from his antics are far too numerous to mention, but some of the more memorable include dancing, trying to open fake doors, giving Angela Merkel a quick back rub, mispronouncing words (including world leaders' names), being unable to define what a sovereign country is, and boasting that a 51% edge in the 2004 election was a "mandate".

Only time will tell how history eulogizes this period of American history, but there's very little positive that can be culled from the heaping stinking pile. Besides Bush's blundering through his presidency like the drunken redneck he is, there was congress rubber-stamping every noxious request from Bush, the Democrats' seeming unwillingness to stand up to him, and the American citizens (and the press) too cowed in fear to raise much of a protest.

It's not just an ugly legacy for Bush - it's an ugly legacy for ALL of America. We can make amends on Nov 4th. It's no longer Bush's job to fix this; now it's ours.