So Thomas Friedman declares. Friedman then goes on to explain,

It is the fact that his vice president has made clear that he is not running for president after Mr. Bush's term expires in 2008. So Mr. Bush has no heir apparent. And that explains, in part, why his second term is drifting aimlessly, disconnected from the problems facing the country.

Yeah, that's the problem. Never mind that it was Dick Cheney who pushed all those crazy policies in Bush's first term. Never mind that it was Cheney who pounded the table in order to get us into Iraq. Never mind that all of the trouble we're having in Iraq can be traced back to decisions made in Bush's first term. Never mind that the energy policy (or lack of one) Friedman criticizes is the very policy that Bush pushed in his first term and is the same policy Cheney put together in all those secret meetings.

I'm having trouble buying into the idea that George Bush & Co. aren't so beholden to special interests that they'd pursue policies that actually made sense for the long term. I'm also tired of people making excuses for George Bush. In the early days of his first term the excuse was that he had gotten a late start because of all those Democratic court challenges. After 9/11 there was the line that the economy was in doldrums because of 9/11. Then it was the obstructionist Democrats who were to blame. And now it is a VP who doesn't plan on running for President. I can't wait to see the next excuse they run out for George Bush's incompetence.
posted by Idle Crank at 6/22/2005 09:27:00 AM