Meltdown Indeed

As President Bush prepares to "govern" for the duration of his term, legacy concerns seemingly abound. The president is rushing around sucking air out of all kinds of venues; today, he is offering his economic thoughts at The Manhattan Institute. Never one to waste an opportunity, Bush is currently pushing his latest trade agreement, insisting the only way out of our present financial debacle is dependent on forging yet another questionable trade agreement, a measure completely unrelated to the housing and credit crisis. Meltdown indeed.

The meltdown consists of a logical leap we all see takes us off a cliff.... Bush is a master at the Republican tactic of staying on message, delivering said message in a way which confuses the listener into agreement, leaving one without knowing why one lends support. Bush began his speech detailing the economic woes we currently face, seizing particularly on the housing crisis, expressing his shock and dismay over the situation we find ourselves in. He deftly transitioned into why this crisis wasn't due to deregulation, and, further, why government intervention was NOT necessarily the answer! Considering he and his appointed Treasury Secretary authored the largest government bail-out in American history, this rings a bit hollow.

Government has turned a blind eye to corporate greed and excess; this fact, nobody can deny. Yet Bush is trying to run around, shore up his "legacy", and convince the American people that his administration's policy of coddling corporate interests, with the typical neo-con disdain for regulation of any sort, is GOOD for the country, good for the economy in general. I'm not sure about you, but this makes me mad as Hell. After the American people soundly rejected this top heavy style of governance, Bush has the audacity to rub it in our faces that regardless of what conditions on the ground tell us, regardless of what we see in our gas bills, our mortgages, our grocery bills, our friend's faces as they lose their jobs, our grandparent's despair as they choose between groceries and prescription medicine, our sadness as we see our neighbors face foreclosure..... he has the temerity to run around and tell us that despite all this evidence to the contrary, we aren't seeing things correctly. He, obviously, is STILL RIGHT! Can't we see that?

No, actually, Mr.President, we can't. We don't see things your way.... at all. We demonstrated this a week and a half ago at the polls..... we demonstrated this two years ago during the Mid-term elections. The "thumpin" you alluded to? The woodshed Mr. McCain has spoken about since the 2008 election? Those are the new reality for the G.O.P. if the party refuses to change course. The president does his party no favors by adamantly defending policies which clearly have this country in ruin.

I like gracious W. much better. W. on the defense, telling us to suspend our disbelief and buy into his version of the miserable new reality, is more of a pill than most of us can swallow. We spit it right back at him a week and a half ago; please, in service to your country Mr. President, quit trying to force-feed this bitter, deceitful pill most of us are unwilling to stomach.