The days dwindle down to a precious few

As the remaining time of the second Bush administration trickles down to a not very precious few. Not precious even for Bush because surely, unless we really did elect a complete delusional to the presidency –TWICE – he must be most painfully aware of what a failure and disaster his reign was. I say reign because he would never have gotten closer to the White House than you and would by purchasing a ticket for a tour, had his father George Walker Bush not been president first. So humanity never really gets monarchy out of its system. Aristotle --who knew the genius of Philip and Alexander— declared it the best form of government, IF one could guarantee that the son would be as good as the father. But alas, that is not possible. He must have appreciated how lucky the Macedonian royal family was in the 4th century B.C. The Bush family was not so lucky. And neither were we.

I keep bringing up Bush senior, who even I now acknowledge was a better president than we thought (the Eisenhower of our era—he seemed dumb because the wasn’t the most articulate tool in the shed) He bears some responsibility for his son. History is filled with kings (and non- monarchical leaders) preventing their sons from cashing in the family’s political chips.

Among modern greeks even George Papandreou allegedly declared “God help Greece if my son ever becomes Prime Minister.” He did. The extent of God’s help is still unclear. And now the grandson waits his turn at bat.

The irony in Bush Junior’s case is that the job he really wanted was to be the commissioner of baseball. As bad as that likely would have been for the national past-time, it probably wouldn’t have been much worse than the tenure of certain “Bud” Selig proved to be—lets call him the godfather of the steroid era. But “Bud”, a team owner himself (the commissioner is supposed to keep an eye on the owners) never let go of his “temporary” appointment. So,there being no opening in the world of baseball, George turned to the “real” world and became governor of Texas. Since he did not screw up Texas they way he did all his earlier endeavors, and being blessed with some kind of charm, he was “elected” president of Florida, I mean of the U.S. The boy is nothing if not lucky—his brother Jeb was governor of the U.S., I mean Florida at the time of the “election.”

Some would say those nasty “ “ “ “ are out of place and that we should look forward, not backwards. Yes of course, our country has serious work and repairs to do, but calls for investigations are legitimate. And if sober examinations of the facts of the Bush administration’s wars and regulation of the economy are called for, they must proceed. The charge I invented for Bush himself is “criminal incompetence”, because if one’s stupidity leads to disasters for the nation it is criminal if not treasonous. As for the rest of his administration, especially Dick Cheney, stupidity had nothing to do with it. It’s not automatic that those men and women should be prosecuted because there are always many reasons, promoted by different legitimate interested groups, for going to war, or for adopting one regulatory stance or another. But lets take a look. Not for revenge, but for deterrence. All government officials, democrats as well as republicans, must know that they will be called into account for their actions.

Which brings us back, momentarily, to “Bud” Selig. Thanks a lot you selfish fool. And more substantially to George H.W. Bush (Bush Senior). You should have told the republican party to resist the temptation of nominating your son. I just learned that the term Bimbo, derived from the Italian word for child “Bambino”, originally referred to charming male fools, “Bimbo being a masculine word. There you have it: The Bimbo President. I never thought Al Gore would make a really good president, but his election was not to be prevented at all cost—and risks. Thanks a lot George senior.

But the minutes keep dwindling, and Junior will be tucked into bed soon for his last night at the White House. Good night George, and God forgive you.