Bush: Sorry about that whole free market thing.

US President George W. Bush said in an interview Tuesday he was forced to sacrifice free market principles to save the economy from "collapse."
"I've abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system," Bush told CNN television, saying he had made the decision "to make sure the economy doesn't collapse."

Of course, this makes no sense.

President-elect Barack Obama said Monday a review by his own lawyer shows he had no direct contact with Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich about the appointment of a Senate replacement, and transition aides did nothing inappropriate.

(emphasis ours)... because this required a "review" by a "lawyer"?

Perhaps in some lawyerific parallel universe, this makes sense, but in terms of plain-speak it illustrates perfectly why there is such a disconnect between modern politicians and their constituents: They are either making zero sense or we don’t know what the hell they are talking about.

We now break from this woolly populist rant to return you to your normal BwD programming.

A Bailout? Perhaps. Just not this Bailout.

A few random thoughts on this bailout business

- We continue to have a very hard time putting all that power in the hands of one virtually unaccountable person. Henry Paulson, the Treasury Secretary, may be a very capable man but how is he as the single-point-of-contact for the entire financial sector of this nation’s economy a good thing?

- We were talking with B-Daddy on the phone and were commenting on how the latest polling shows the American public trusting Suit to better handle the economy but also not in favor of government intervention into the free market. We remarked this as being demonstrable of the George Will quote, “Americans talk like Jefferson but govern like…” and before we could get “Hamilton” out of our mouth, B-Daddy yelled, “Mussolini…! I wish ‘we’ governed like ‘Hamilton’”. But I think he got the point.

- And we’re pretty tired of all this talk of “executive compensation” and “punishing the evil-doers in the board room” and blah, blah, blah… Give it a rest. Do we want the responsible parties punished? Yes. But the incessant populist-driven yammering to string up the suits is pretty far down on our list of priorities when it comes to getting this whole mess straightened out. Besides, it just provides cover for those who should’ve been minding the hen house in the first place and who are currently the very same people crafting the legislation that will make everything all nice and pretty again. Foxes!

- “We have to do something”. Do we? Its been nearly a week since this meltdown occurred and Congress has not passed any legislation and there have been no runs on the banks. If we can wait this long to “do something” that must be done “urgently” or “immediately” can we wait a little longer, keeping the wolves at bay, to “do something that makes sense?”

- This is a fantastic opportunity for McCain to drive the final stake between he and President Bush. By rejecting this bailout he distances himself from Bush, he burnishes his Maverick credentials and makes Suit look more and more like the Bush III he really is.

Its a crowded market, kid. Give us something we can work with, will ya?

It appears that there was a previous draft of McClellan’s book that publishers did not find all that appealing back in 2007.

Bush endorses Obama

McCain would be wise to run a campaign that portrays an Obama presidency as Bush's 3rd term... it will remain to be seen if Obama can successfully distance himself enough from Bush to win in November. Click here for more.

Bush is in Africa?

Irish rock’n’roller and Band Aid/Live Aid organizer Bob “Rip Van Winkle” Geldof has apparently been unaware that President Bush doesn’t get a fair shake from time to time from the press.

While speaking to reporters who were waiting for a press conference with Bush and Rwandan President Paul Kagame, Geldof praised Bush for spending billions of U.S. dollars on Africa to fight disease and poverty while slamming the press corps for largely ignoring it.

Here’s Bob, who like us, doesn’t like Mondays:

"This is the triumph of American policy really," he said. "It was probably unexpected of the man. It was expected of the nation, but not of the man, but both rose to the occasion."
"What's in it for [Mr. Bush]? Absolutely nothing," Mr. Geldof said.
Mr. Geldof said that the president has failed "to articulate this to Americans" but said he is also "pissed off" at the press for their failure to report on this good news story.
"You guys didn't pay attention," Geldof said to a group of reporters from all the major newspapers. Story here.

In fact, we were vaguely aware that Bush was over there or was scheduled to be over there in the very near future. We let our minds wander, though, to fantasize about the spectacle this would’ve been had it been Himself, America’s first black President, descending upon Africa to “make it rain” U.S. dollar bills on the dark continent. Pure rapture and unbridled adulation, we believe.

But he didn’t and you gotta think Geldof saying Bush has done more for Africa than any other U.S. President has to chap Himself’s hide. First, Bush stole his 9/11 moment and now he has the audacity to be given credit by some long-haired, F.M. radio type for doing more for Clinton’s own people than Clinton, himself! Another revisionist legacy-building opportunity shot to hell.

With his own chances of performing some Lincoln Bedroom fundraising looking slimmer and slimmer every day, these can’t be good times for ol’ boy.

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(The picture above captures the dramatically hideous moment when the man to Bush's left snapped his own neck as a result of a violent whiplash that was an involuntary response to witnessing Bush perform his tribe's dance. Perhaps to avoid further tragedies such as this, the Bush Africa policy should also provide Africa with tapes of American caucasian wedding receptions to better socialize the people of Africa so they aren't caught off-guard in their initial face-to-face encounter with these unfortunate situations).

A "Victory" perhaps.... but for whom?

We’ve been scratching our heads the past couple of days trying to square the reaction to the latest National Intelligence Estimate report on Iran’s nuclear weapons program against our own perceptions of the same.

Perhaps best summing up how this is being spun is the front page of the Drudge Report today which has the caption of “Victory!” underneath a photo of the Iranian loon, Mahmoud Ahmedinejad. As in, hooray for the madman for his geo-political PR coup over the dunder-headed American, President Bush.

Attached article here out of Reuters starts off by claiming the latest NIE estimates contradict the Bush administration’s assertion that Tehran was developing the bomb. “Contradict” is the money word that is used in about every article we’ve read regarding this subject but is it entirely correct or applicable?

The NIE contends that Iran halted their nuclear weapons program back in ’03 but also adds "We do not know whether (Iran) currently intends to develop nuclear weapons." This is important because the NIE doesn’t know…. there is no conclusive way to determine this given NIE’s means.

But here’s what we do know: it was indeed Mahmoud that was over here just a couple months back asserting his country's own right to develop and acquire nuclear technology. And applying the reasonable man theory, why wouldn’t a kook like Mahmoud intend on developing nuclear weapons? Guys like this remind us of the story of the Scorpion and the Frog. American standards of justice for determining guilt, innocence and intent don’t apply and shouldn’t apply here. We know who this guy is and we know what he would like to do regardless of the existence of any concrete material evidence.

Here’s some more from the article: “But the new assessment found Iran was continuing to develop technical means that could be used to build a bomb and it would likely be capable of producing enough enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon "sometime during the 2010-2015 time-frame."

And remember: The same NIE of whose report the President’s critics are agush, is the very same agency that botched pre-war estimates on Sadaam’s WMD program.

After taking this all in, are you left with the impression that Iran’s nuke program is as cold-iron as many are portraying it to be or would like it to be in order to score political points?

As far as the NIE claim that Iran halted its weapons program back in ’03, there has been considerable debate over what it was that caused this to happen. Again, applying the reasonable man theory, what significant action in the Gulf Region kicked-off in ’03 and how might that have possibly influenced this decision?

You see, sometimes the most effective “diplomacy” is that which is represented in the stock scene from mob flicks where the wise guy tells the shop owner, “Today is Tuesday and its just me who stopped by to pay you a friendly visit… I’ll be back here on Friday but I won’t be flying solo…. so please have the money you owe us.” Contrary to the beliefs of the well-intended but hopelessly naïve’ “diplomacy” crowd, this is just how things often work in the big bad world of geo-politics.

Please don’t misunderstand us - we really do hope that the NIE’s most optimistic contentions are 100% correct. Iran not having nukes and not having any intention of developing/obtaining nukes is a good thing. So if it is as the NIE says it is, we can’t help but think that Drudge, perhaps, just perhaps, had the wrong mug shot above his headline.