Did Bush Just Kick McCain In the Teeth?

[Demeter]

http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2008/01/did-bush-just-k.html



Not even Herbert Hoover was as openly pessimistic about the economy as George Bush was yesterday, who conceded to a group of fellow plutocrats that "jobs are growing at a slower pace," that he just noticed we face "economic challenges," that "recent economic indicators have become increasingly mixed," and that "many Americans are anxious about" the snowballing mess...The assembled plutocrats already knew this, of course, as did those many angst-ridden Americans, but for a sitting president to publicly cast doom in a transitional election year on an economy he helped create is, in my memory, unprecedented. Hence the cynicism: The little creep must be up to something of skulduggery dimensions. Simple honesty and transparency are beyond his grasp.


Which directs our attention to possible scenario #1 -- that Bush is playing favorites, and that his favorite is Mitt Romney...But talk of a tanking economy provides a more pragmatic and politically oriented basis for Pop's son to suddenly play favorites, however subtly. And lo and behold, the talk just happened to arrive virtually on the eve of the New Hampshire primary, in which Mitt is widely forecast to bomb out.


Any redirection of Republicans and independents' attention away from national security and terrorism -- McCain's twin towers of public acclaim -- and toward the nation's troubled economic machinery can only benefit Mitt, that grizzled business executive without any foreign policy portfolio. Any pol who can turn a city's Olympics around! -- well, now there's a cool-headed man for a bumbling economy of trillions...That, anyway, is my theory #1 behind yesterday's bizarre confession of a dangerous mind.


The other is one I've suggested before: that the very last person George W. Bush wants to see in the White House come 2009 is one with an "R" before his name...Such a partisan ascension would provide ideological and policy continuity, and that is scarcely in Bush's legacy interests when the walls of Baghdad start tumbling down, as, in time, they surely will. A reasonable argument can be made that the president would much prefer that a Democrat ride into office and start antagonistically tampering with the Middle East paradise that Bush will later claim he left intact. Oh, if only those irresponsible Dems had left well enough alone.

[PATRICK]

1. I doubt that plan A

...and they are totally unprepared and inflexible and at risk without it... involves letting in any Dem for a free ride. If THAT was true you can bet the farm that will be repossessed soon there will be calamities beyond belief necklaced immediately around the hamstrung Dem. However, people long accustomed to getting their own way will prefer an incredibly simpler and to the uninitiated "bolder" scenario of simply maintaining power and turning the screws to keep it.

That would be a Romney/Thompson victory with Thompson soon to pass on the guttering torch to Jeb. All the installed cronies in the courts and the by then discredited weakling Dem leadership could continue this circus until some future disaster- also manipulated by the Bush die-nasty imperial family. There has been NO rebellion among the party factions. Bush merely has to tweak the allowable choices his way.

They will show their hand only when necessary by destroying all rivals to Romney. In any democracy he would be a risky, terrible choice. But not in Bush upper hand system, and un-impeached, his hand has not moved much. Meanwhile we simply wait while the deluded, rigged GOP primary system might fail the Bush plan. This is fighting by crossing one's fingers.

Oh yeah, when will the press finally notice Bush has an extremely tight control over this "open election"? Notice, but of course not say much.

[Demeter]

2. I Fear You Have the Right of It

If only because Bush represents the tip of that vast crime syndicate that's been destroying the country since 2000, and planning to destroy the country since Nixon, if not earlier.

[Enthusiast]

3. Bush Die-nasty, I like it........nt

[Demeter]

4. If Suppressing McCain Was Bush's Intent, He Can Rack Up Another Miserable Failure

Sweet.