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Drowning in the Shallow End of the Pool
Author: BobR    Date: 12/18/2008 13:34:27

With just over a month left in the Bush Regime, the retrospectives on his Administration will be flying fast and furious over the next few weeks. Once Obama takes over, the last eight years will fade like a nightmare upon wakening, as the country and the pundits continue their tradition of second guessing and arm chair quarterbacking the current resident of the White House.

So how will History treat Bush? Kindly is certainly not likely.... But what will be the overall theme? Arrogance?... Policy over reality?.... Incompetence?...

That last one certainly seems most likely. The Bush Administration has succeeded in being able to stoke fresh outrage to a level one wouldn't think possible after the previous outrage. Every few months it seems there's yet another incident or revelation, leaving the country asking: "Okay - can we impeach him NOW?"....

The crown jewel in the Tiara of Incompetence will likely be the stunning mismanagement of FEMA during the NoLa Katrina disaster. Michael "heckuva job" Browning did his best impression of Marie Antoinette, fussing over ties, while a city - not to belabor the metaphor - drowned. Meanwhile, Bush - half a country away - fiddled with a guitar and ate birthday cake.

Others have already voiced their opinion of Bush competency. While discussing the recent shoe-throwing incident (an embarrassment that eclipses his father's vomiting on the Japanese Prime Minister), Mark Morford lists 12 other things that we can throw at Bush. SourceWatch has a page dedicated to the Bush Administration's incompetence.

If one were to view the Administration incompetence as a song, the introduction would be 9/11. It was a spectacular splashy monument to Bush's inability to listen to the intelligence provided him. Paradoxically, it actually made him more popular, but one can excuse that as a Shock Doctrine reaction. So taking this to the logical conclusion, one has to wonder if the coda has been written yet.

The most recent incredulity is the SEC's failure to notice a $50B ponzi scheme happening right under their noses. Like every watchdog group in this Administration, they either limp along with their hands tied, or they simply don't pay attention:
The SEC chairman said he was "gravely concerned by the apparent multiple failures" of SEC staff to look into claims about Mr Madoff.

Mr Cox said: "Credible and specific allegations regarding Mr Madoff's financial wrongdoing, going back to at least 1999, were repeatedly brought to the attention of SEC staff, but were never recommended to the commission for action."

This meant staff had to rely on data voluntarily produced by Mr Madoff's firm, rather than use a subpoena to obtain information, he said.

Mr Madoff, who was arrested on Thursday, ran a fund that paid annual interest of about 10% but prosecutors say it was, in effect, similar to a pyramid scheme, with money from new investors paying off old ones.

There's also the military looking to arm local Afghan militias in an attempt to improve security. I am SURE nothing can go wrong with THAT.

So perhaps we will get yet another surprise ending, not unlike a Haydn symphony.

Grover Norquist famously said of government that he'd like to "reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub." Instead, the Bush Administration finds itself drowning in the shallow end of the pool, weighed down by its own incompetence.

With just over a month left, here's hoping the passing will be swift.

 

101 comments (Latest Comment: 12/19/2008 04:22:25 by Scoopster)
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