I would never argue that I’m not a moonbat, so why make an issue about whether I have BDS?

I agree with your comment comparing Bush to Carter and Reagan. I’m reading What it Takes about the candidates in ‘88, and recommend it–looks at Iran Contra from the viewpoints of (so far as I’ve read) GWHB and Dole.

And incompetence defines someone like Carter or Reagan, but Bush is severely detached from reality. That is called psychosis.

JJC- only those who still defend Bush’s Presidency suffer from BDS. But you are smacj-on with Acheson and realpolitik.

At the risk of over-simplifying, I disagree with this. I think a majority of Americans would agree with a Dean Acheson approach to foreign policy as it relates to national security concerns if it were explained to them. Not that the disagreement wouldn’t be there, but that it would be much more manageable than it seems to be today.

Bush, Cheney et al were apparently averse to an Acheson-style realism, and that aversion strikes me as a major component in their embrace of the Iraq project. Perhaps they could have sold the American public on their vision, but instead they misrepresented the casus belli and communicated no sense at all of what the risks were of invading Iraq, so much so that it seems they were unaware themselves of the risks or perhaps, even worse, indifferent to them.

I understand (?) that you believe the state of play in Iraq in ‘03 justified the invasion, but I’m pretty sure there isn’t that much support for your view in the general American public. While you’ve said Bush could have done a MUCH better job of communicating his views, I still think that understates the error. To sell his view of national security required extensive, and ultimately damaging, politicizing of the issue, including the trumpeting of WMD, the whispering of connection between Saddam and 9/11, and a sophisticated campaign to marginalize potential opponents of the war.

I think the partisanship you’re saying was always there is almost entirely emotional, the residue of past skirmishes. 9/11, though, changed the emotional atmosphere. It’s all come back, of course, with interest, but I just don’t think people’s ideas are all that different about national security issues, but the political posturing obscures what I think is probably a fairly broad consensus.

And as far as your second point, that if the cause for war was just and real that we’d be united: well, that’s just another way of saying that part of the country didn’t agree with the decision to go to war. It’s a description of the situation rather than an explanation. You assume that your side is correct in it’s opinion that this war was not just. Do you really feel that the only reason that would have made the invasion just would have been the existence of WMD? Was not Saddam a problem either way? Was he not ignoring every UN resolution? Would it have not been justified for him to have been taken out in ‘91 (I’m not saying it would have been a smart thing to do because we’d have had the same consequences in the aftermath as we have today- but I’m strictly speaking of whether or not such a move would have been JUST.) Were the sanctions that were keeping Saddam in check really maintainable, given the corruption of the Oil for Food program? I think that most people who feel that they were somehow tricked into supporting the war at the outset are ignoring those questions. The administration made the legalistic case for going to war based on WMD because that’s the only way to justify it under international law. To me it was always obvious that this was only a legal argument and that Saddam was a problem with or without WMD- because regardless of whether or not he had them in ‘03, he’d have always been seeking them. And containment of his ambitions wasn’t possible because our ‘allies’ weren’t any more likely to do that than they were to support the invasion- France, Germany, and China were all financially vested in their ties with Saddam.

For the most part, we are willing to give up some power to achieve peaceful coexistance. Also, we are divided more evenly than the Shiites , Kurds and Sunnis are – so that its more unlikely that one party will assert absolute power over the other. We don’t have the problem of interference from regional powers in our security- unless you count illegal immigration. The two situations are so dissimilar.

If the cause for war was just and real , I believe we would still be unified. We were unified in the first Gulf War under Bush’s father, and were unified going into Afghanistan, and remain so. The cause was fraudulent and the selling of it was dishonest, major mistakes were made early on which pretty much ensured our defeat. That is why we are split apart on this war.

Basically my point is that we are united in our goals but very, very divided in our ideas of how to acheive the goals- and the period after 9/11 (really starting in late 2002- 2003) unmasked that. If you look back (I read a good piece about this but can’t remember where or who the author was) to the Cold War period, our major strategy of containment of USSR and alignment of countries in our sphere of influence was accepted by BOTH parties. There were differences on the edges but the central premise wasn’t argued. Now in the power vaccuum after the demise of the USSR, there are major differences of opinion about the role that the US should take and how we can prevent enmity. I think that the less hawkish believe that we can earn trust of all other nations; that’s a great goal and I agree with it to some degree, but personally I believe that there’s going to be a period of time while we are earning trust (and possibly, forever) that there will be enemies who will hold everything against us. Even our attempts to aid other countries are often seen as unwanted meddling, so we have to have the resolve to fight against those who choose to fight against us. Of course, you might agree with that but we might still differ on how to determine who those people are, or you might disagree with my whole premise.

Kim: In hindsight I’d say I was wrong to think that at this point in history the Shia, Kurds and Sunnis could work out a power sharing govt, but your comment actually makes my point for me: here in our country, we do have serious differences of political philosophy but our govt structure allows us to function even with those differences. So what I’m saying is that the unity that we all felt after 9/11 was real but it felt deeper than it really was because it preceded the actual discussion of policy which brought out our differences. Just because I think that the partisanship is inevitable doesn’t mean that I fear that we’ll have one party’s members trying to gain dominance through violence.

And jjc, I do agree that Bush could have done a MUCH better job on the communication aspect, and in fact I think that is the crux of our bitter partisanship now. The fact that we all have serious differences of opinion is one thing, but the fact that the discussions never really took place led to a lot of division. I do put most of the blame for that on Bush but it also didn’t help that the Dems didn’t effectively force a conversation either. Instead, they first went along with Iraq (I think because they were more afraid of the consequences if they were wrong than they were of the risk of failure of the policy- and I find that incredibly disdainful because basically they were betting on being able to blame Bush if things didn’t go well). So yeah, I do see fault on both sides (not to mention that even during the debate over Homeland Security in 2002, people like Byrd were comparing Bush to al Qaeda so it’s not like the Dems were innocent of throwing rhetorical bombs either.)

If you want to stipulate that the opportunity fo the world community to unite never existed, I don’t expect I can talk you out of that, any more than I can talk you out of holding that the partisan divisions were there all along.

But remember, everyone pretty much agreed that the Taliban had to be taken out and that bin Laden should be captured. And everyone, even if for a short time, was flying the flag. For a while there, it was everyone’s security, and everyone’s nation.

That, to me, is the real lesson of 9/11. I didn’t, and don’t, understand how you could live in that moment and not get that lesson. But we all know that when GWB refers, as he so often does, to the lessons of 9/11, that he has something else in mind.

CS-Yes 9/11 was exploited, but most of all by Bush, the man with the opportunity to bring Americans together and get the rest of the world behind us. I do believe its possible for people to put their differences aside to reach for a more important goal, but they have to believe in their leader and his cause. Bush has always cared more about a National Unity government in Iraq, than a national unity government here at home. Others have done so in time of war- Roosevelt and Truman were successful. So I doubt your premise. Bush has appealed to his hard right base since day one.

IMO, Many of the Democrats who voted with him for Iraq did so out of misguided loyalty and patriotism, and yes fear that Karl Rove would ferret them out as cowards. But once the GOP obtained the majority in both houses, Bush realized that reaching out to them was no longer necessary . Then it became about governing for the base- and nothing but the base. And those around him see the ‘winner take all’ mentality as a valid one- recently John Bolton openly defended this type of governance.

In the wake of 9/11, Bush had an opportunity no American POTUS is likely to for several decades to forge an international and a domestic alignment (two separate but related things) that would have had the overwhelming majority of sensible people on one side and a small albeit alarming concentration of fanatics on the other. He appears to have missed this opportunity thoroughly and profoundly. Why?

I would argue that if you want to locate the point in recent history where partisanship spiraled out of control, that was it.

Well, jjc, I’d say to some extent you are actually making the same point that I made and Austin seconded: that GWB has been tested in an extraordinary way and then was found to be lacking (or as I’d put it, his fatal flaws were magnified by the magnitude of the situation).

You see 9/11 as a turning point in partisanship, but I’d say that nothing changed that much except that we all became more aware of our partisan differences. For a brief period we all thought we’d come together and we certainly wanted to (and want to now too, for the most part), but when the rubber met the road everyone realized that a) half the country sees the solution to our national security in one way and half of it sees it another way and b) the leaders in each party can and will exploit those different viewpoints as much as they possibly can because it benefits them personally to do so (and in many cases I don’t think they do it consciously- though in some cases I think they do).

To you, the disastrous results of the Iraq War repudiate Bush’s entire strategy but to a lot of us, the situation repudiates his implementation of the strategy. To you, it seems obvious that he took a wrong turn right from the start and that is why you see it as though he wasted this incredible opportunity. To many of us, that opportunity for the world community to unite never really existed. I’m not interested in rehashing our differences on that point, but I think you can see how you and I would come to different conclusions about Bush based on our different readings of the events and what Bush’s options really were. Your argument reminds me a lot of a remark that my husband and I make to one another when we disagree, in order to break tension with levity: “Why can’t you be reasonable and see it my way?”

I will add only these observations:

“Pathos” is the root of pathology. Pathos translating to “suffering.” In this context, what we see at times in Bush can ideed be interpreted as pathos. Let’s face it, the man is suffering (viz. Martin Amis).

Politicians are largely clever, but rarely intelligent. Intelligence tends to include, cleverness to exclude. Cleverness also tends to lead, at some point, to disillusionment and ruin. Clinton, a very clever politician is not so unlike Bush in this way. Both are clever and have gathered their enemies for their cleverness. This unfolding for Bush is both archetypal and meaningful, but, really, only for him, if he chooses do examine it.

It is good and right that Bush suffers. Beyond what we deal with and see in the world, he is playing out his own private drama and it may ruin him and it may enlighten him.

Everything else is artifice.

Maybe the people who rag on Bush for partisan reasons say what they say because of BDS, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t something wrong with the man and his situation beyond some guy getting in over his head.

Similarly, the fact that you are mostly non-partisan (I think you’ve said as much, and I’m taking you at your word.) doesn’t mean that you aren’t led astray by partisanship.

In the wake of 9/11, Bush had an opportunity no American POTUS is likely to for several decades to forge an international and a domestic alignment (two separate but related things) that would have had the overwhelming majority of sensible people on one side and a small albeit alarming concentration of fanatics on the other. He appears to have missed this opportunity thoroughly and profoundly. Why?

I would argue that if you want to locate the point in recent history where partisanship spiraled out of control, that was it. And yet you seem fixated on the lefties on this board who are spoiling the moderate and non-partisan atmosphere with their uber-partisanship.

I guess I’m out of contrarian mode now, but I would bet you that many who appear harshly partisan to you now were at one time relatively moderate even by your standards. But the Katrina bungling and the Terry Schiavo posturing and the Alberto Gonazlez business and the relentless sloganeering and of course the entire sorry Iraq saga are a sufficent cause to the partisan effect you see even for those who weren’t partisan to begin with.

As for Bush, well, anyone can make mistakes, maybe even a lot of them, but almost any halfway sensible person starts seeing that things have gone wrong and that a fair reckoning must be made to start turning it around. George W Bush won’t or can’t do this.

You have to wonder why.

If I had to come up with something in a nutshell, I think he Peter-principled himself; surrounded himself with too many people with the same mindset rather than a more diverse set of views; and learned some wrong lessons from the end of his father’s Presidency, and so applied the wrong corrective actions to the Washington scene.

Perhaps. But very recently, Andrew Card (Bush’s former chief of staff) was on the Daily Show, and he said just the opposite. He argued that Bush actually surrounds himself with people holding a very diverse set of opinions and that he makes his decisions based upon this.

So the question is, does Bush surround himself with a diverse set of opinions and simply ignore those who have the better ideas? Or was Andrew Card inaccurate in his assertion, and the truth is closely to what many of us suspect–that Bush indeed surrounds himself with advisors with a very narrow set of views that reflect his own?

“If I had to come up with something in a nutshell, I think he Peter-principled himself; surrounded himself with too many people with the same mindset rather than a more diverse set of views; and learned some wrong lessons from the end of his father’s Presidency, and so applied the wrong corrective actions to the Washington scene.”

I could not agree more.

Otherwise, why did you try and throw the ‘beyond the pale’ comment back at me, unless you feel those were constructive and rational talking points?

What do I think is wrong with him? Probably nothing, at least in the sense that it was being presented in Tim’s post you linked to, or in your lead-in (at least by inference).

Just because he is failing as a President, and the occupation of Iraq has been an utter failure, doesn’t mean there is anything ‘wrong’ with him.

Incompetency does not have to equate mental illness or deficiencies, or lack of intellectual capabilities, or evil intent. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses, and as CS said, being in a position of great power multiplies the effects of both you strengths and weaknesses, but it doesn’t make then actually stronger within the person. It just makes them an easy target.

Carter is a great example, in my mind. No one doubts his intelligence, nor, at least when he was President, did anyone doubt his humanitarianism. But he bungles the US economy, much of the current Mid-East situations trace significant roots back to policy decisions in his administration, and he was, as a whole, an ineffective President as well.

But I never heard ‘what is wrong with Carter? Does he have deep-seated mental issues that prevent him from succeeding?’. I did hear criticism of his micro-management style, his unwillingness to let his subordinates make their own decisions, etc. But not that those were due to anything other his style.

So that is why I said it seemed like ‘demonizing’ again to me.

It is not enough that Bush is not a competent President – it has to be related to physiological issues, like his past drinking, or his religious devotion, or some kind of Oedipus complex, or a lack of intelligence (never mind that he is a Harvard MBA, and got better undergraduate grades than both Kerry and Gore, his supposed intellectual superiors).

If I had to come up with something in a nutshell, I think he Peter-principled himself; surrounded himself with too many people with the same mindset rather than a more diverse set of views; and learned some wrong lessons from the end of his father’s Presidency, and so applied the wrong corrective actions to the Washington scene.

Forget about Georgie, what about the 28% who voted for him and continue to support ANYTHING he does. The US became enablers for his mistakes, the voters are just as complicit in his mistakes.

This is what scares me. George W. Bush will be gone in 21 months, but the 10-20% of the electorate who support him no matter what he does will continue to vote in election after election. These are the Republicans who pride themselves on being “fiscal conservatives” and yet continue to support a president who has presiding over the highest rate of spending since the Lyndon Johnson adminsitration. These are the Republicans who lambasted Clinton for nation-building and yet defend Bush, who has engaged in biggest nation-building exercise since WWII.

Bush isn’t the problem. It’s the partisan mindset of certain Americans–Americans who hold one set of principles when their party is out of power and a completely different set of principles when their party is in power. This really applies to both parties, as I don’t remember the Democrats being as critical of Clinton for his nation-building policies as they are of Bush. But the ease with which Republicans accuse their opponents of being flip-floppers–despite Bush’s 180 degree shifts on nation-building and deficit spending–never ceases to amaze me.

Demonizing him would be making things up just to make him look even worse. BTW, he himself has demonized politcal opponents and those who disagreed with his policies. His administration or election campaigns have tried to destroy the reputations of people like Richard Clarke, Eric Shinseki and even John McCain. He’s kept Karl Rove at his right hand, as an attack dog.