http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/06/15/1912/United, Not Divided — Against Bush
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This is what it’s come down to for
President Bush, a duck so lame he’s nearly quadriplegic. Six and a half years into his interminable presidency, the whole world is sick of him.
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The GOP’s Republican primary candidates are competing to distance themselves from Bush, and more and more conservatives are in open revolt. Some, like economist Bruce Bartlett, fume at the explosion of government spending under Bush. Others, like Sen. Chuck Hagel and a growing cadre of Republican foreign policy experts, are appalled by Bush’s mishandling of the Iraq war and other national security issues.
Others, such as Richard Viguerie (conservative direct-mail pioneer) and former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr (the House’s lead prosecutor during the Clinton impeachment), are so angry at what they see as Bush’s constitutional abuses that they’ve started channeling (and in Barr’s case, joining) the ACLU. “Since 9/11,” they assert, “the executive branch has chronically usurped legislative or judicial power and has repeatedly claimed that the president is the law. The constitutional grievances against the White House are chilling.” Even the three harpies of far-right punditry — Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin and Laura Ingraham — have denounced Bush’s favored immigration bill as soft on illegal immigrants.
Oh yes, then there are the courts. Last week, judges in two of the administration’s military commissions announced that the commissions lacked jurisdiction to try Guantanamo detainees. This week, the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals — one of the nation’s most conservative courts — gave Bush another slap in the face, declaring that “the president lacks power to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain” terror suspects in the United States.
Then there are the military and defense establishments, which are increasingly taking positions opposite those of the president. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates thinks Guantanamo should be closed. So does former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. Uniformed officers complain openly that Bush has broken the back of the military. And no one, including the generals charged with overseeing military operations in Iraq, seems to think that Bush’s “surge” is succeeding.
I could cite more examples of people fed up with Bush, but … why bother? These days, when you announce that the Bush presidency has been an epic flop, you face a sea of nodding heads.
Come to think of it, there is one thing for which we should all give the president credit. Bush famously promised to be a uniter, not a divider — and at long last, he may have managed to keep that promise. Though there’s still much that divides us, the nation and the world are increasingly united on at least one issue: We’re sick and tired of the presidency of George W. Bush.