Joe Klein: An Administration’s Epic Collapse

The Time column by Joe Klein that I commented on earlier is now available on line. The earlier post gives some highlights, but the final paragraph sounds even stronger when read in its entirety:

When Bush came to office–installed by the Supreme Court after receiving fewer votes than Al Gore–I speculated that the new President would have to govern in a bipartisan manner to be successful. He chose the opposite path, and his hyper-partisanship has proved to be a travesty of governance and a comprehensive failure. I’ve tried to be respectful of the man and the office, but the three defining sins of the Bush Administration–arrogance, incompetence, cynicism–are congenital: they’re part of his personality. They’re not likely to change. And it is increasingly difficult to imagine yet another two years of slow bleed with a leader so clearly unfit to lead.

Joe Klein has really come a long way. Just last month he was attacking the left wing extremists who have been saying this all along. It is amazing that it took Klein this long to figure it out, and even more amazing that there are still many Bush-worshippers who do not realize what a disaster George Bush has been for this country.

This isn’t so much a collapse but an administration which never really got off the ground. On September 10, 2001 Bush was seen as an inept new President in his first year who already looked like a single-termer. The next day Bush got his big break and figured out how to play politics with the attack to look like a hero to a narrow majority who did not see through the Orwellian propaganda campaign from the right.

Despite all the propaganda, George Bush remained the same incompetent man who lacked the intellectual curiosity to do anything successful since his cheerleader days in college. There is only so much damage that can be done to the country before even the most closed minded figure out what is happening. If Joe Klein really wants to open his eyes, he will find material to fill all the columns he needs on the damage done by George Bush.

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