Had a thought on 9/11.

[JKane]

Last Saturday I wandered through a "tribute to 9/11 memorial classic car show" in my hick right-wing town, there was live music, and the guy on stage went into a teabagger-like rant (while trying to be coy about it) and then played a 60's protest song--with no hint of irony.

And it struck me (about as hard as I'd have liked to strike him) that last Saturday marked exactly as long into Obama's presidency as we were into Bush's on 9/11.

Think about that.

How does Obama get all the blame for the shit he inherited, especially the economy, while to this day Bush gets no blame whatsoever for 9/11?

It's now absolutely clear that the Bush administration specialized in putting unqualified cronies into bureaucratic offices all over the government with disastrous effect, often people who didn't believe the bureacrasy they were appointed to head had any right to exist at all. We can mostly agree this happened at the EPA, the FDA, and certainly at FEMA. Clearly regulators of the banking and oil industry too.

But Richard Clark's book made it clear this is also what happened in the early days within the national security apparatus. Fucking Condolezza Rice was more interested in consolidating her power and dipshit at justice department more interested in covering Justice's breast than perusing the clear and present danger the outgoing administration tried many times to express to them.

Yet Bush gets a pass for the greatest terrorist attack on American soil in the nation's history, turning a surplus into the worst deficit in history, and cratering the economy *twice* in 8 years! Nobody even really calls him on fucking over the Afghanistan war in order to put all the resources into the senseless war in Iraq.

But every single thing that's wrong now, INCLUDING THE AFGAN WAR is somehow Obama's fault according to the Republicans and especially the teabaggers!

What the fuck? Of course the Republicans who had 110% control at the time would say that, but how THE HELL are they allowed to get away with it?

[TampaYankee]

I think history will hold Bush accountable although there is some blame to apportion to Bill Clinton too, and the U.S. Congress.

Personally, I believe Bush is one of the very worst presidents in U.S. history and I belive history will show that. It will take some time for the topic to recede from the political horizon as party politics on either side precludes the clearest view and discussion of his tenure. He will go down as a poor domestic president, a poor Commander-in-Chief and as a war criminal IMO.