The President is scheduled to throw another public temper tantrum in the Rose Garden at 10 a.m. today. Apparently Harry Reid stole the presidential rubber ducky, and Bush wants it back.
I’ll watch and let you know how pathetic it is.
Update: Make that 10:10 a.m.
Here we go. Bush just said he met with General Pace and the joint chiefs of staff. He’s claiming the surge is working just fine, although it will be early June before the entire surge is in place. Having an impact, making a difference, he says.
It has now been 57 days since I requested emergency funds. Instead of passing a clean bill, the politicians have passed bills that undercut the troops and substituted the judgment of politicians in Washington for commanders on the ground.
[Update: See Think Progress about the 57 days.]
He’s playing the pork card. Democrats are bad and have left Washington for spring recess without finishing the work. How dare anyone but Bush take vacations. Dems are making a political statement. He wants the bill quickly so he can veto it, and then Congress can get down to work and do what he wants.
He’s still claiming that if the bill isn’t enacted by mid-April the troops will suffer. I have debunked that claim in earlier posts.
Blah blah blah; units will be extended, blah blah, if Congress does not act, blah blah. You’ve heard this before. I’m waiting for him to say something new.
He’s answering questions. He’s worried there are “a group of people” who don’t think we should be in Iraq (like, most of the American public) and he has “listened patiently” to their complaints and has decided he is right and they are wrong. Basically that’s all he says; I think I’m right, so I’m going ahead and do what I want to do.
He’s saying that the solution to Iraq is more than a military mission, which is why he sent more troops to Baghdad. (Yes.) He wants to provide “breathing room” for the Iraqi government to work.
He is afraid if we fail in Iraq “the enemy” will find a “safe haven” from which to plot future attacks on America, and if we fail in Iraq the enemy will follow us here, and SEPTEMBER 11 SEPTEMBER 11 SEPTEMBER 11. So there.
Have I ever mentioned how much it bothers me that the creature smiles at inappropriate times? I believe I have.
David Gregory is now “dancing man.”
Gregory said Congress is trying to exert more control over foreign policy, and isn’t that what the voters wanted? Bush says no, the voters want Congress to support the troops. And now he’s complaining about the pork again.
He’s basically dismissing what Congress passed as a political game, and he wants Congress to stop playing politics and get down to business, i.e. resume the role of rubber stamp.
He keeps harping on Congress for taking a week off at a time that’s inconvenient for him.
People have to understand what will happen if we fail, he says, grinning broadly. Oh, please, the radicals are being emboldened again. Please. And they will recruit more terrorists. Like they aren’t doing that now.
Defeat them there so we don’t have to defeat them here SEPTEMBER 11 SEPTEMBER 11 SEPTEMBER 11. And the way to defeat their ideology is by a competing ideology, one that respects human rights. Yeah, that’s what Democrats are trying to do.
Somebody is asking him about being isolated from other Republicans, especially in Congress. He is baffled by the question. He says that once Congress is brought to heel passes his supplement bill the way he wants it, from then on everybody will get along just fine. And he opposes tax increases.
Somebody is questioning the “they will follow us home” scenario. Bush is brushing it off. SEPTEMBER 11 SEPTEMBER 11 SEPTEMBER 11. I don’t know how they’ll do it, Bush says, I just know they will.
He wants the Middle East to change into a part of the world that will not serve as a threat to the civilized world. Then he changed civilized to developed.
It’s over, thank goodness. Now Chris Matthews says Bush is just trying to hold on to his base. Matthews also says that if the “surge” isn’t working by August, Bush will finally be out of time. Earth to Tweetie: Bush will never admit that he is out of time.
Well, that’s it.
Someone should ask the President if he is positively guaranteeing our safety IF the troops stay in Iraq and does that mean that if we have an attack of ANY size on U.S. soil, does that mean his policy of fighting them over here instead of over there will have failed and we would have stayed over there for nothing? Oh, and does he realize that the terrorists actually like to strike us after a NEW president has been installed and are probably waiting so its a moot point whether we fight them over there or over here.
excuse me, I meant to say fighting them over there instead of over here…
Someone should ask the President if he is positively guaranteeing our safety
I think that’s a good question. Can Bush guarantee that our presence in Iraq will prevent terrorist attacks in the U.S.? And if not, what’s the point, again?
Wow. It’s like I was there. Thanks, maha, for saving me the pain of watching the damn thing. Having seen others in the past, I feel confidant you’ve captured the essence of this one.
I’ve never had a good sense of how Bush came across to the public, because he’s always seemed like a petulant twit to me, but I wonder if he now seems that way to everyone? Is there anyone who can hear that whining tone in his voice and his recycled accusations and not wince, at least a little?
I notice that, in all the statements by those who are telling us the surge is working, I have yet to hear about any progress on how the Iraqi government is doing on the non-military issues which provided the rationale for the surge. Seems like getting that stuff in place is critical path, but neither Bush nor McCain has mentioned progress on that front.
These pressers are such a farce. I kind of wish someone would take it over the top and ask him if he has evidence that al Qaeda in Iraq is developing submarines, and why he has taken no steps to destroy their shipyards. I mean, if they’ll follow us home, how are they gonna get here? Swim?
Thanks, maha, I needed that. To have the ability to take something that depressing and make me laugh… What a rare and valuable gift.
Thanks for a great post– I much prefer your quick-witted explanatory commentary to having to listen to Bushie #1 perpetuated his usual bs.
So sick of that “…judgment of commanders on the ground” bullshit, since the Pentagon has opposed the admin’s non-policy from the get-go.
Have I ever mentioned how much it bothers me that the creature smiles at inappropriate times?
It’s the little sociopath in him. As they say over at the Smirking Chimp: “Ask not at whom the chimp smirks – he smirks at you”.
The madia needs to expose the lack of logic in his arguments.
The proof that his grand strategy is working is that there has not been another Sept 11.
Suppose there is one. DO you think he will waste a nanosecond declaring that a new attack is proof that we have to do things his way.
Heads I WIN – Tails You Lose. Ignore reality.
If Gen Petraeus is so smart …why wasn’t he smart enough to see that he’s stepping into a losing proposition?
The fact that there hasn’t been another attack may have nothing to do with him. It may be due to nothing more than dumb luck. However, he has played into their hands beautifully. It seems I read that bin Laden’s aim was to drain our treasury; and that Bush has done.