Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Where has this George W. Bush been for the last six years?

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The George W. Bush currently holding a press conference is at least talking like the president that a lot of people who voted for him in 2000 thought they were getting: the guy who’s “a uniter not a divider”; the guy who believes in the good faith of all political leaders from whichever party; the guy who believes in bipartisan cooperation to get things done; the guy who thinks that Democrats and Republicans are equally committed to defeating the terrorist threat, want to support American troops that are in harm’s way, and have the best interests of the United States at heart, and just may differ as to how best to carry out those goals; the guy who has some humility about his own limitations and who accepts the possibility that he, and members of his administration, are not perfect and may have made mistakes.

That guy has been completely absent for the last six years, and it’s a damn shame.  I’m glad he has re-emerged.  Here’s hoping — really hoping — that it’s not just for show.

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  1. I seem to recall him talking like this just after the 2004 election, too.  If he didn’t mean it six years ago and he didn’t mean it two years ago, why should anyone believe he means it now?

    • I seem to recall him talking like this just after the 2004
      election, too.  If he didn’t mean it six years ago and he
      didn’t mean it two years ago, why should anyone believe he
      means it now?

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      Cause he doesn’t have any choice now?

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      Here’s hoping…

    • I seem to recall Bush’s 2004 victory was called a mandate.  So, I agree with David that this speech sounded like earlier Bush, although not quite back to 2000, when he claimed he would not use the military for nation-building and without an exit plan. 

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      Tone is different, but the policy is going to stay the same. The Dem control of the House is narrow.  The senate is tied (does that count Lieberman as an (I))?  And we still need policy.  The Dems should accept Rumsfield resignation as an invitation to the table and get to work on a bipartisan plan.

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      • The Dem control of the House is narrow.

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        Not that narrow. We’re looking at about 30 votes. That’s what the R’s held for the last 2 years, and I don’t remember anyone calling their lead ‘narrow’.

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        The senate is tied (does that count Lieberman as an (I))?

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        Yes, and Bernie Sanders.

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        The Senate is worst case tied (which would still mean R control). If Webb takes Va (current margin +~6500 votes), then its 51-49, counting Bernie and Lieberman, who have both said they’ll caucus with the Dems.

  2. But if you think there’s any chance whatsoever that this isn’t completely for show, I’ve got some great oceanside property in Worcester I’d like to sell you.

    • But it would be so nice if, faced for the first time with a Congress controlled by the other party, he actually had to follow through on his words – on wanting to get something done.  Time will tell.

      • told George this morning to use the “uniter” meme before  the subpoenas start arriving. 

      • One way or the other, because if he’s not, he’s a total LAME DUCK. I suspect it’s all a horse-and-pony though. Or else, the subtext is “I’m begging you Dems…let me in! Let me keep some of the power I had!”

  3. And Rumsfeld is gone.

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    Let’s just take a moment to let the import of that little nugget sink in.

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    As they say in Texas…

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    YEE-HAH!

  4. this is the way that bush handled things when he was a governor having to deal with a (yellow dog) democratic legislature. the dogmatic right-winger has really been a washington incarnation that surprised a lot of texans. even many who knew him well.
    if anything, there were conservatives that were worried that he would become a squishy appeaser once he got to washington. because he was much more the compromiser than the idealogue in austin.
    i saw in texas that bush can be pretty pragmatic when he’s forced to. with a republican rubberstamp congress, he hasn’t experienced that kind of pressure. hopefully, the new democratic majorities will soon begin to respectfully apply it.

    • He’s taking some responsibility for what a disaster Iraq has been and hired one of GHWB’s old CIA hands, probably on Jim Baker’s advice.

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      He’s bringing in the realist team to try and salvage what he can in Iraq.  Better late than never.

        • But as far as his actions so far today, good for him.  The move must have been planned a bit in advance, I wonder if they would have still done it if they maintained control of the senate.

  6. Probably a sign that they know the Senate is going to fall as well.  Cheney’s influence is over?  Well maybe not, but it could be that he’s taking some advice from Bush Sr.  I’m also hopeful that something can be accomplished.  I don’t think Dubya wants to go down as one of the worst in history.

  7. Avoid being fooled again… and again… and again.  The guy is a lying sociopath and always will be. 

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    Remember it!  Write it down on your hand if you have too!  Never trust Bush-league W!

      • You can’t give sociopaths one little break since they don’t have the internal limits we have.  He’s trying to disarm us now that we have him cornered.  It’s really that simple. 

  8. and I think he’s apt to take it, in some part.  Bush is a guy who’s used to being liked.  I see this as sort of like Arnold in California.  Arnold offered up an extremely right wing agenda and it was soundly defeated by the people.  He then ran to the middle and became popular once again.  of course, Bush won’t run that far to the middle, but I do think he wants to restore his legacy.

  9. A chastened President humby reaches out to an angry opposition Congress, just after his party has lost the Congress in an election widely regarded as a referendum on his administration.  Before and during the elction, the whiff of the abuse of executive authority lingers over the electroal landlscape…

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    Wait, we’ve seen this before, haven’t we?

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    Someone give bim a blowjob so he can be impeached!

  10. George Bush has been stomping on the civil rights of our citizens for the last 6 years. Whenever he gets put on the spot, or backed into a corner, he reponds by talking the talk of conciliation. Well, he hasn’t walked the walk, yet, and I don’t expect him to now. This is just a tactic to take the pressure off him. Remember, it’s more important to watch what he does, than to listen to what he says.

  11. And I didn’t hear anything except what he has been all along.  When unexcerpted by news clips and sound bites.

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    I’m going to have to teach him how to blog….

    • I would classify your statement as an appeal to misplaced authority. 

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      So you met him and we have not.  Big deal. Your attempt to say we have been manipulated by the media into what we think of him is laughable. 

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      Here’s what we think:  2,800 and counting U.S. dead for a war that he and his administration lied us into with the help of the complicit media you now imply is manipulating us. 

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      And in your meeting with George Bush you met the person we didn’t?  Who gives a damn?

      • Here’s what we think:  2,800 and counting U.S. dead for a war that he and his administration lied us into with the help of the complicit media you now imply is manipulating us.

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        The media is sometimes complicit but never manipulative ?  Scant difference.

  12. He is throwing down the gauntlet to the Dems. He does not intend to change “course” one bit.

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    Now that Rummy is gone, Pelosi should go straight after Bush and Cheney. This is the other part of the challenge Bush is issuing. But I doubt that she has the courage to do it.

  13. He is throwing down the gauntlet to the Dems. He does not intend to change “course” one bit.

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    Now that Rummy is gone, Pelosi should go straight after Bush and Cheney. This is the other part of the challenge Bush is issuing. But I doubt that she has the courage to do it.

    • Why should she waste the political capital doing that?  There is a minimum wage to be increased, and middle-class tax cut to enact. 

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      Why would Pelosi lead the charge and invite a TORRENT of media attack when she has Conyers already leading the charge?  You think Conyers is going to roll over?  Fat Chance. 

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      Then Pelosi can face the media, throw up her hands and say, “Chairman’s perogative!”  It’s not guts, it’s calculaton.

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      Go Conyers Go!!!!

      • Roboy3 has it right.

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        The House Democrats need to first demonstrate that they will do what they promised to do.  Particularly on corruption.

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        The country will go nuts if House Democrats push for impeachment.  That’s because we have not convinced enough of the country that this President deserves impeachment.  Think for example of the wiretap/FISA issue.  Our Democratic leaders — outside Feingold and maybe 6 others — has not made this issue crystal clear.  Instead, they’ve been hiding from it.

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        Or signing statements.  The Boston Globe (!) has had the best coverage of this violation of Constitutional government in the country.  What about the low information voter — or the sister or brother of the low information voter?

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        Until the case is made and it is as well understood as a stained dress or as buglars caught in the Watergate Hotel, it is asking for political trouble with no tangible benefit to call for impeachment.

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        Call today for exposure.

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        Then tomorrow, you won’t be alone calling for impeachment.

        • …It’s about revenge for impeachment.

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          There is a bitter, seething faction within the party, who will never, ever, be satisfied, until the old score has been settled.

  14. some of the non sequiturs coming out of Bush today, but he’s trying to salvage a shred of credibility, so it was to be expected. After just recently boasting that the GOP wouldn’t lose the House, and saying that Rumsfeld was staying on, even Bush has to face reality sometime.
    And the reality is that the GOP just had their a$$es handed to them, Bush is in trouble, and he’s turning to Papa Bush’s buddies (again) to bail him out of Iraq. Baker & Gates can’t rescue his hide this time.
    Oh, and keep in mind that Abrahmoff is still talking to the Feds, and Bush/Cheney did everything possible to keep the lid on the corruption probes. Now that the Dems hold subpoena power, they can make things even more uncomfortable for Bush and especially Cheney.

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    I want to like and respect the POTUS, but this guy is pathological.

  15. I clearly recall the President extending a hand of friendship and bipartisanship immediately following his 2000 Inauguration.

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    I also clearly recall that hand being savagely bitten by a certain uncouth, disgraced senator from the northeast. The craven pack followed his lead, and here we are.

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    Talk from Washington dems of bipartisanship is stalking-horse manure. They have never intended that there be any cooperation with this President.

    • Hypocrisy does loom large in Washington. Although I seem to remember it a bit differently.
      Here are a few quotes from the soon to be indicted Tom Delay farewell speech of 6/8/2006:

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      ” In preparing for today, I found that it is customary in speeches such as these to reminisce about the good old days of political harmony and across-the-aisle camaraderie, and to lament the bitter, divisive partisan rancor that supposedly now weakens our democracy.

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      Well, I can’t do that because partisanship, Mr. Speaker, properly understood, is not a symptom of democracy’s weakness but of its health and its strength, especially from the perspective of a political conservative.

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      ………….

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      Indeed, the common lament over the recent rise in political partisanship is often nothing more than a veiled complaint instead about the recent rise of political conservatism.”

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      This is from the man who ruled the House for the past decade. Hypocrisy indeed.

      • ..described an actual incident from 2001, the facts of which are not in doubt.

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        I have no qualms with partisanship, per se. Properly exercised, it is the bedrock of an adversarial political system.

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        However, the manner in which it is practiced by the above mentioned senator, his ilk and yes, those like Delay as well, is disgusting. And certainly, it is nothing of which any of us should be proud.

        • as long as the GOP is in control of all three branches of Govt, slamming the Dems over the head with God & Patriotism & Gays at every opportunity, excluding them from any participation in the legislative process, and lying us into a war.

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          But because a Democrat criticized GWB back in 2001, and every Dem of his “ilk” apparently followed suit, it’s “disgusting” and that’s why we’re “here”?
          Got it.
          Look, the GOP Congress spent $70 million on a Ken Starr led witch hunt to determine that Clinton got blow job. We still have no idea what Bush’s “reconstruction” team did with tens of Billions of our tax money in Iraq, never mind tens of thousands killed (just to name a few), thanks to a rubber stamp GOP Congress

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          So cry me a freaking river if someone said something mean about GWB.

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          • I made no statement that could be construed, rationally, to mean anything approaching your panoply of talking points.

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            I don’t defend the GOP, I don’t even like them.

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            Your over-the-top reply, dredging up old impeachment baggage, did more to butress, than it did to refute my original point.

            • Huh. I thought that in your above mentioned posts you were clearly defending George Bush and his alleged efforts at bipartisan outreach, and that you were denigrating the Democrats and their “ilk” for having the temerity to criticize him.
              I must have misunderestimated your post.
              And sorry to bring up the old Clinton-blowjob-impeachment stuff. What was I thinking.

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