One of them is Jonathan Chait, a senior editor of The New Republic. He’s hardly alone. But he’s made the case far more forcefully and in greater detail than most who disdain the president. The opening paragraph of Chait’s essay will give you a feel for where he’s coming from:
“I hate President George W. Bush. There, I said it. I think his policies rank him among the worst presidents in U.S. history. And, while I'm tempted to leave it at that, the truth is that I hate him for less substantive reasons, too. I hate the inequitable way he has come to his economic and political achievements and his utter lack of humility (disguised behind transparently false modesty) at having done so. His favorite answer to the question of nepotism--"I inherited half my father's friends and all his enemies"--conveys the laughable implication that his birth bestowed more disadvantage than advantage. He reminds me of a certain type I knew in high school--the kid who was given a fancy sports car for his sixteenth birthday and believed that he had somehow earned it. I hate the way he walks--shoulders flexed, elbows splayed out from his sides like a teenage boy feigning machismo. I hate the way he talks--blustery self-assurance masked by a pseudo-populist twang. I even hate the things that everybody seems to like about him. I hate his lame nickname-bestowing-- a way to establish one's social superiority beneath a veneer of chumminess (does anybody give their boss a nickname without his consent?). And, while most people who meet Bush claim to like him, I suspect that, if I got to know him personally, I would hate him even more.”
… and why others admire him
Since Chait’s tirade on Monday, there has been an continuing online debate between him and a steadfast Bush supporter, Ramesh Ponnuru, a senior editor of National Review.
“Not everyone would be brave enough to recount their harrowing descent into madness so vividly,” Ponnuru writes Chait. “You have to go pretty far into irrational Bush hatred to suggest, as you do in your article, that the Crawford ranch is phony, part of Bush's positioning as a rough-hewn Texan. He certainly seems to enjoy going there. But what do I know? Maybe he's only pretending to like his dog Barney, and kicks him when the door is closed.”
So, is Chait deranged? Is Ponnuru a shill for the administration? Check it out. There are some good arguments on both sides.
How to wreck an army
Joe Galloway, who I’ve linked to several times since the war in Iraq began, is one of the best war correspondents to ever strap on a helmet. In 1965, as a UPI correspondent in Vietnam, he spent a month with U.S. troops in the bloody battle for the Ia Drang Valley, rescued wounded soldiers under fire and became the only civilian awarded the Bronze Star during the conflict. And he watched as the U.S. Army was gradually ground to bits by the war – damage that took 20 years to repair.
Now he’s seeing it all again, and he has no doubt who’s to blame.
Back to top