Effective Governing?
Hurricane Katrina struck at the core of Bush's presidency by undermining the central assertion of his reelection campaign, that he was a strong and decisive leader who could keep the country safe in a crisis.
To paraphrase the favorite question of an earlier Republican president, do y'all feel safer than you did 5 years ago?
But the critical question is whether the damage will limit his ability to govern effectively in the remaining 40 months of his presidency and whether he will successfully rebuild the Gulf Coast and Iraq, let alone win approval for other major initiatives on taxes and Social Security.
"But Doctor, will I be able to play piano after this?"
It's clear that the Bush League is unable to govern, so whether their ability to govern effectively has been affected, I think, is a moot point.
However, there still remains the important question of whether the president will continue to be as effective on his other "major initiatives" that funnel money into the pockets of the rich, both individual rich and corporate rich, those who own stock in this administration. It looks just possible that that ability might be on the wane, for which we can all be grateful — except, of course, the Bush-League stockholders.
Both quotations are from: Dan Balz, "A Bid to Repair a Presidency", The Washington Post, 16 September 2005.
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on Saturday, 17 September 2005 at 02.56
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Bush and his crew have no concept of governing well. It's neither a goal nor an issue with them. They're all about advancing their ideological agenda, making their fat-cat ilk fatter yet and always, no matter what, gaining and keeping political advantage over opponents and critics.
Hell, between all that and fund raising, they don't have time to govern well, even if they decided to give it a try just to see if they could actually do it.