Bush runs, but can't hide, from failures

Bush runs, but can't hide, from failures
By DOUG THOMPSON
Capitol Hill Blue
Nov 15, 2005

As President George W. Bush jets off to Asia, he flees a country bitterly divided by his policies and a Republican party in open revolt over his many failures.

“The mood in both the White House and the nation harkens back to the days of Lyndon Johnson and Richard M. Nixon,” says retired political science professor George Harleigh, who served in the Nixon administration. “Nixon was able to fly to China and, for a while, bury his problems with diplomatic triumphs. Nixon, like Bush, was a flawed President. Unlike Bush, Nixon had diplomatic skills.”

Bush leaves behind a nation in turmoil, ripped apart by an unpopular war in Iraq and increasingly distrustful of the leader who sent Americans to die there. His use of Veterans Day to attack opponents of his war has angered and further alienated veterans’ groups – another political misstep by an administration marred by frequent and escalating screw ups.

“The president resorted to his old playbook of discredited rhetoric about the war on terror and political attacks, as his own political fortunes and credibility diminish,” says Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid.

With polls showing 57 percent of the American people believe Bush lied to lead this country into war in Iraq, Republican political strategists now tell their candidates to avoid any association with the President and to moderate their views away from the extreme right wing positions of the GOP....