Bush the Incompetent

[kurth]

Bush the Incompetent
By Harold Meyerson

Incompetence is not one of the seven deadly sins, and it's hardly the worst attribute that can be ascribed to George W. Bush. But it is this president's defining attribute. Historians, looking back at the hash that his administration has made of his war in Iraq, his response to Hurricane Katrina and his Medicare drug plan, will have to grapple with how one president could so cosmically botch so many big things -- particularly when most of them were the president's own initiatives.

In numbing profusion, the newspapers are filled with litanies of screw-ups. Yesterday's New York Times brought news of the first official assessment of our reconstruction efforts in Iraq, in which the government's special inspector general depicted a policy beset, as Times reporter James Glanz put it, "by gross understaffing, a lack of technical expertise, bureaucratic infighting secrecy." At one point, rebuilding efforts were divided, bewilderingly and counterproductively, between the Army Corps of Engineers and, for projects involving water, the Navy. That's when you'd think a president would make clear in no uncertain terms that bureaucratic turf battles would not be allowed to impede Iraq's reconstruction. But then, the president had no guiding vision for how to rebuild Iraq -- indeed, he went to war believing that such an undertaking really wouldn't require much in the way of American treasure and American lives.

It's the president's prescription drug plan (Medicare Part D), though, that is his most mind-boggling failure. As was not the case in Iraq or with Katrina, it hasn't had to overcome the opposition of man or nature. Pharmacists are not resisting the program; seniors are not planting car bombs to impede it (not yet, anyway). But in what must be an unforeseen development, people are trying to get their medications covered under the program. Apparently, this is a contingency for which the administration was not prepared, as it has been singularly unable to get its own program up and running. This is, remember, the president's signature domestic initiative, just as the Iraq war is his signature foreign initiative.

< snip >

How could a president get these things so wrong? Incompetence may describe this presidency, but it doesn't explain it. For that, historians may need to turn to the seven deadly sins: to greed, in understanding why Bush entrusted his new drug entitlement to a financial mainstay of modern Republicanism. To sloth, in understanding why Incurious George has repeatedly ignored the work of experts whose advice runs counter to his desires. More and more, the key question for this administration is that of the great American sage, Casey Stengel: Can't anybody here play this game?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/24/AR2006012401163.html

[SpiralHawk]

1. K and r

Youd might want to consider cross-posting this in GD - good article thanks

[BillZBubb]

2. He left out Bush's biggest blunder--the US debt.

Their is no excuse but gross incompetence for the sea of red ink Bush and his cronies have run up.

[struggle4progress]

3. It's deliberate. Grover sketched the scheme back during the Reagan era:

bankrupt the Federal government to destroy it. They made a good stab at it during the reign of Bush I, which is why the Wall Street folk had Clinton by the throat from day one. Clinton's serious effort to repair that damage has forced Bush II into double-time on the project ...

[enid602]

4. logic

Bankrupt the government, and when our foreign creditors demand we tighten our belts, our government creates some terror incidents, enabling them to forsake all social spending in favor of much needed defense outlays. When citizens are in need, they will have to go to churches for help. In short, transfer government's social responsibilities to churches. Welcome to Iran.

[rodeodance]

5. kand r

[Demeter]

6. Bush: The Criminally Incompetent

With emphasis on the criminality--Incompetence can be fired; criminality must be rooted out, captured, prosecuted and punished.

[Aviation Pro]

7. Just goes to show....

...like selecting the president of a high school student body, the office of the presidency goes to the most well-liked and connected, not to someone who could actually get something done, and done right (the first time).

America, land of boob tube, home of the morons.

[underpants]

8. The real "I word"

K&R

[AuntiBush]

9. He is Incompetent

Worst President, ever imaginable!!

Everything he touches destroys us.

PNAC. NEO-CON agenda. http://www.newamericanempire.org/

And then read this: http://oldamericancentury.org/

[BlueEyedSon]

10. What if every "screw-up" was intentional?

See who benefits
Follow the money
etc

[bemildred]

11. Yep, the premise is wrong, Bush cares not a fig for being "competent". nt

[BlueEyedSon]

12. He is competent to do what he was elected to do. Reward large corporations

and the ruling elete (the have-mores). Using OUR money and lives.

[Julius Civitatus]

13. Wow! People at the WaPo are eating their cereal this week

They seem to be quite ballsy today. I'm impressed, given the suck-up job they've done for the last 5 years.

[ArmchairMeme]

14. Incompetence???

If we are to believe this vast incompetence on the part of Bush then this would be reason to remove him from office as he is unable to lead the country due to this vast incompetence.

I think it, the incompetence, is a red herring. I think all that has been done in this administration has been done to the U.S. intentionally. This then also becomes reason to remove him from office. (Isn't it treason to undermine the U.S.?)

[Martin Eden]

15. Deliberate

Those whose ideology dictates that government is the problem rather than the solution have no interest in making government programs operate efficiently. Instead, the problems created by their DELIBERATE incompetence are used as further evidence that government can't do anything right.

[nofoil]

16. Wowiee!

This made it in the Post? My day has officially been made!