That means he could be. And I do grant that LBJ and Nixon had domestic accomplishments. But saying Reagan was the reason the Commie sfell is flat out wrong. I saw Al Haig on C-Span a night or two ago, and he even laughed at the assertion. Reagan was a total cipher. His domestic policies led to the 87-92 Depression. Unlike Nixon and LBJ, however, his bodycount was low. Bush’s is low in comparison to Nixon & LBJ, so while he’s like Reagan domestically, he’s not in a league w LBJ and Nixon….yet.

I dislike W as a Prez, but do we really want him to sink to the worst in another 2 years? He may get there, but at what cost?
As for us not being attacked since 9/11- so what? We were not attacked domestically like that for 225 years. His blunder- and Condo’s, Cheney’s, and Rumsfeld, was incompetence at its worst. Last night I saw Frontline’s doc on Cheney. My God! Now, he’s definitely the worst VP!

Nixon was a disaster domestically, and like Bush was secretive and had an imperial presidency. But he did make diplomatic strides with Brezhnev and opened the door to relations with China.

Reaganomics reminds me of Bush’s economic program, and he did cut social services while cutting taxes. Like Bush, he pandered to his base of wealthy Republicans. But his talks with Gorbachev and his military build-up did help lead to the fall of Communism. Many in Eastern Europe owe him a debt of gratitude (though the policies of many presidents as well as their own poor decisions actually led to the breakup of the Soviet empire)
What achievements does W have to point to? The vast enrichment of investors holding stock in KBR or Halibritton? The numerous medals of freedom handed out to those whose mistakes have cost this country dearly? Major milestones in nuclear development met by Iran and N.K.? The only real accomplishment I can see is that we have not been attacked domestically since 9/11. Not much of a legacy.

Shaun: ‘There are no parallels in U.S. history to the havoc wrecked by the Bush administration. The misdeeds of the (Andrew) Johnson, Van Buren, Polk and Coolidge administrations are small beer by comparison.’

Sorry, but the dismantling of Reconstruction’s gains, the blind eye toward the KKK’s ride, the return to spoils politics, and the greenlighting of political machines all make Andrew Johnson a worse Prez than Bush. Yes, W has 2 more years to go farther down, and- by God- he may just pull it out, but he’s not the worst yet. Hell, with LBJ, Nixon, and Reagan, he’s not even definitively the worst Prez of my Lifetime!
LBJ’s bodycount was much higher- both in troops and civilians, Nixon upped the ante and brought us Watergate and the subversion of the Constitution. Reagan flat out lied to Congress and ran a Shadow Gov’t that even believers in Area 51 wd be shocked at, he decimated a generation of inner city youth with his social sevrices cuts, he showed open disdain for the working class with the PACO disaster, resulting in the most dangerous decade in aviation in fifty years, he balloned the deficit, % wise even worse than Bush has, so I say- GET A GRIP!
W is BAD, but when has there been even a GOOD Prez? Look at the sheep for answers:

http://www.cosmoetica.com/B142-DES91.htm
B142-DES91
Home Of The Meek: The Cowardly American Electorate
Copyright © by Dan Schneider, 4/10/04

My bad. I was so busy pulling wings off of flies that a typo crept into my comment.

What I meant to say is that “the worst may be YET to come.”

I would paraphrase you and say that Bush is bad and, as my post notes, the worst may be get to come.

While demonizing the concept of paying for government services “tax and spend” we have been deceived into betraying our own children. Certainly both parties are responsible to some extent, but the Republicans have been truly reprehensible. Bush said “we believe Americans can spend their money better than the government,” Then he proceeded to give away our children’s future to the already rich. The $350 million in direct costs for the Iraq war is almost literally rounding error compared to the $8.7 trillion debt (and still counting) that we are passing on to our children. If you think both parties are responsible for this, think again. Take a look at this graph, compiled from White House figures, yes George W. Bush White House figures.

Additionally, though I too am angered by the Democrats going along with the war resolutions, and any of them who supported the erosion of our civil rights, I say this in their defense: I watched Colin Powell march out satellite photos alleged by the intelligence community (or so we were told) to be sophisticated mobile weapons labs, a startlingly precise accounting of the numbers of liters of anthrax and nerve gas in the Iraqi arsenal. If this was the same manipulated and devious “evidence” handed to Democratic legislators, I can’t blame them for voting the way they did.

James Buchanan, who dithered around and failed to act during the successional crisis that lead this country into the civil war that REALLY nearly destroyed this nation, and whereby nearly 1 million soldiers died DIRECTLY as a result of the war, and many, many more civilians died indirectly from starvation and property destruction, especially in the south, (nobody has even a clue as to that number) is ‘small potatoes’, and ranks higher than Bush?

Nixon, who used the FBI and IRS as his playtoy, was caught burgling and was the only president in the history of this nation to resign scores higher than Bush? Come now, my friend, really. Bush may be bad, but the worst he has yet to capture.

In fact, according to most surveys of Presidential Scholars, he is pretty well in the middle of the pack, just below Bill Clinton, strangely enough. This nation has survived much larger crisis and it will survive this one.

Agreed.

I fear that the congressional hearings that you cite will be neither a corrective to the imbalances of the previous six years nor a genuine accounting of the Legislative branch’s oversight failures.

Those failures necessarily include another flock of sheep — the Democratic minority — and I do not expect that the Democratic congressional “leaders” from that sad era will be called to testify about their own failures.

To some, the sky is always falling when they’re not in charge. And sometimes even when they are.

And yes, I admit that a lot of the dysfunction is due to civil servants. But FEMA functioned under James Lee Witt and Clinton. Bush reorganized FEMA into the Dept of Homeland Security- decreasing its power and funding.

During Katrina he was on vacation and remained for several more days- seemingly detached and disengaged during the worst natural disaster in our history. Strangely enough, he managed to fly back to DC during the Terry Schiavo “emergency”.

Whoever heads the government takes credit when it works well and the blame when it doesn’t. When it doesn’t work,usually there is a seismic shift, as we saw in 2006.

An amplification or three . . .

There are no parallels in U.S. history to the havoc wrecked by the Bush administration. The misdeeds of the (Andrew) Johnson, Van Buren, Polk and Coolidge administrations are small beer by comparison.

I did not suggest that the system of checks and balance cannot work, but please recall that the Bush administration has fought ferociously to neuter the constitutionally manadated responsibilities of the Judicial and Legislative branches through a power grab that is unprecedented in American history.

As to whether Americans have had more or less confidence in the survival of the republic, I dunno. I would imagine that many Northerners feared that it might not survive in the darkest days of the Civil War. Was the body politic more engaged then than now? That question is unanswerable since women and blacks were denied the vote, among other factors.

I asked for examples, not because I’m doubtful that they exist, but because I would like to see a side by side comparison of situations then and now. My argument is that our Constitutional checks and balances can and will work, while you seem to think otherwise. I think if you would actually go through the exercise of examining the historical record, you might have more confidence of the survival of our republic.

I think you overestimate the effect that an administration can have on the outcome of any particular government program. 99% of the governmental individuals working on the Katrina response were civil servants. They will be around no matter what the adminsitration is. Claiming that Democrats will always be efficent is getting dangerously close to “water carrying.”

Are you claiming that the DC public schools are efficent, inexpensive, and turning out a great product? Are you claiming that Detroit is a well run city, are you claiming that the “Big Dig” was a governmental success?

Nothing in my post hinted at, let alone said outright, that there is lock-step agreement about the degree to which the nation is in peril.

Your glass would seem to be half full. That’s fine. Have a big sip for those of us whose glass is nearly empty.

The historic record is rich with examples of national leaders who were peacefully deposed through no-confidence votes, as well as those who were ousted through putsches and coupes d’etat. The U.S. Constitution does not allow for the former; the latter is unthinkable.

As the record of the past six years abundantly shows, George Bush is a dangerous man. Ask the families of the 3,000-plus soldiers killed in Iraq (more than died in the 9/11 terror attacks) how full their glasses are?

If you believe that the new Democratic majority can make substantive course corrections, then you’re drinking Kool Aid.