A Musing Bush

I'm a free market kinda guy. Just like the President. President Bush wants elected officials to remember that "markets and free enterprise is what made the country great". He also wants everybody to know that the proper role of government is "not getting deeply involved in the mortgage business or managing car companies".

Pretty funny stuff coming out of the mouth of the guy who just announced that he's going to appoint a "car czar" to keep the automakers in line and oversee the 17.4 billion dollar bailout of the auto industry.

Car czar. There's a free market term for you. Following in the glorious footsteps of the Energy czar, the Drug czar, and the Russian Tsars. And we all know how well those concepts worked, don't we?

So, here's a question for you 54 per cent of Republicans who think President Bush is doing a swell job what with Iraq, Afghanistan, North Korea, the recession, the free market, the Constitution, and all those other little messy details:

When Hugo "Lefty" Chavez nationalized the oil industry in Venezuela, that was a bad thing. You all said so. I said so. So how come President Bush nationalizes the banking industry, the insurance industry, the airline industry, and now the auto industry, and 54 per cent of you still think he's doing a bang-up job? Could it be that your core beliefs are just convenient little textbook theories that can be tossed aside when the real world comes crashing down around you?

See, President Bush still believes that the free market is the way to go. In normal times. It's just that he believes these are abnormal times brought about by market excesses. Sounds reasonable, doesn't it? And in such abnormal times, the government needs to step in to calm things down and bring us all back to a straight path of prosperity. After all, there's a danger to the national economy that must be addressed by the swift, sure, competent hand of the government.

Hmmmmmm. Danger to the national economy. Weren't those the words used by Hugo "Lefty" Chavez just before nationalizing the Venezuelan oil industry? Aren't those the words used by Robert "Nut Job" Mugabe before nationalizing Zimbabwe's farms? Aren't those the words used by Vladimir "I looked into his eyes" Putin just before he "re-allocated" various industrial corporations to his favored cronies? Swift, sure, competent hand of the government my......

Okay. These are abnormal times brought about by market excesses. Well, Mr. President, I don't have a Harvard MBA, but my understanding of the free market is that disruptions brought about by market excesses are NORMAL! Market excesses are what make the market work. They weed out the weak and inefficient, and reward the efficient and innovative. Reward and punishment are what make the free market system work. Take the profit and loss incentive/disincentive out of the equation and you destroy everything that makes the free market work. The President's plan is not going to reward the Smart car innovator or the ingenious creation of the Nissan Pivo. The plan will reward the colossal mistake of focusing manufacturing resources on gas hogs like the Hummer. The plan will give OUR MONEY to people who keep making BAD CALLS in the FREE MARKET! All in the name of protecting the national economy. Kinda like taking away individual rights to protect the national security of the LAND OF THE FREE!

Tell me again, you 54 per cent of Republicans who think President Bush is doing such a dandy job running the store, exactly what your criteria for excellent job performance are. You've certainly set the bar very, very low. Really, really low.

Of course, the story being spun on all fronts is that when all is said and done fifty years from now, President Bush will be remembered alongside the greatest of residents of the Oval Office on Pennsylvania Ave.

Dream on. There's a man sitting in an Iraqi jail because he insulted the prime minister of Iraq and a foreign dignitary. The foreign dignitary was President Bush, and the insult was the hurling of shoes at said dignitary. He's not being charged with attempted battery. He's being charged with insulting leaders and foreign dignitaries. Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez have laws that can put a citizen in jail for insulting them. Vladimir Putin and Robert Mugabe have laws that can put a citizen in jail for insulting them. Joe Stalin and Adolph Hitler had firing squads for subjects/citizens who insulted them. Two years in jail for an insult? In a democracy championed by George "Democracy is on the march" Bush? In a Democracy and a Republic, the leaders work for the citizens, Mr. President. In London and Tel Aviv, two of our closest allies (usually), insulting leaders at press conferences is a sport and a national pastime.

Well, here's what the arrest of the journalist who tossed his shoes at President Bush has done for President Bush: each day he remains in jail is another day that the shoe-throwing gets plastered across the internet and television stations throughout a good part of the world. Each day his fate remains anything other than a small fine and release from confinement is a day of lower prestige for President Bush. Each day that this journalist spends awaiting word of his fate is another day that President Bush's legacy will be fixed in acrylic for all eternity.

Face it, Mr. President, spin your legacy all you want. You, like Nikita Kruschev, will forever be fixed in video images and minds around the world with shoes at the podium. Size 10.

And one last ahh....musing. The guy got off two shoe throws from short range before being tackled by Iraqi--Iraqi, not American--security personnel. Does anybody else wonder whether even the Secret Service has had enough of President Bush? Oh, they won't let any real harm come to him. They are too good and too dedicated to their profession to let that happen. That doesn't mean, however, that they don't know how an image can shape a legacy. And it doesn't mean they don't enjoy a good chuckle every now and then.