A President is not allowed to criticize his successor?

[BlueStater]

Is this actually a rule? I could have sworn that Bush Sr. was very critical of Clinton while he was in office but I could be wrong of course.

If so, President Carter has broken that rule 100 times over, even though I agree with everything he says.

[buddysmellgood]

1. It's just a polite agreement, unless the constitution is in danger.

[0rganism]

2. Rules? Protocol? Fuck 'em. The bushies can't even follow the LAW.

When bush leaves office, we'll start talking protocol again.

[yorkiemommie1]

5. agreed

our very survival as a country is in danger.

[WI_DEM]

3. There is no rule, many presidents followed it--up to a point

actually ex-president Ford after a grace period of one-year was very critical of President Carter. Carter was tough on Reagan and as we know has been extremely tough on Bush II.

[Wilms]

4. That's apparently custom. And these are uncustomary times. n/t

[Inland]

6. That's the right wing media's job.

After all, it was the media and republican congresscreatures who spread the shit about Clinton's team doing hundreds of thousands of dollars of vandalism to the exec office buildings. All Bush's team did was occupy those same offices, know full well that nothign of the sort had happened, and keep quiet while others lied.

The very first act of the Bush admin was based on a petty, petty political lie. Then things got bad.

[The Backlash Cometh]

7. That was pre-2000.

Bush had 1001 ways to criticize Clinton and Clinton first tried to take it, but eventually dished it back. I think he started around the 9/11 hearings. He only started to get cozy with the Bushes lately.

I think we've dispensed with tradition from the moment that the Republicans used the courts to get a ruling that a sitting president could face a civil trial and when a sitting president's private life became grist for the media. Neither things had been done before Clinton.