There you have it. Incredible.
Bush and the Republicans have taken refuge in the hurricane by fleeing... St. Paul.
Here's the brief item.
How much hypocrisy, cowardice, and perverse opportunism can be stuffed into a little AP story?
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The White House says President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney will skip the Republican National Convention because of Hurricane Gustav.
One might raise several points of course.... What more prominent national media venue would there be for Bush to make some statement of effective leadership? Why do both Bush and Cheney have to skip? (Simple answer: They are both COWARDS.)
First lady Laura Bush still is scheduled to address delegates in St. Paul, Minn., on Monday, the opening day.
And she will have all kinds of compassionate things to say as her husband's surrogate. (And I am sure they will coach her not to allude in any way whatsoever to the senior Mrs. Bush's Katrina moment, suggesting that all was "working well" for the displaced poor of New Orleans.)
Bush spokeswoman Dana Perino says the White House is working on possible alternatives that would allow Bush to make a speech at the convention, which begins Monday.
One word: COWARD.
But Cheney is to leave Tuesday on a four-country trip that includes a stop in Georgia.
See Dick. See Dick run. See Dick run away. Run, Dick, run!
With all of you, I have been appalled more times than I will ever be able to count by the subterfuges, incompetencies, and failures of the Bush administration. But this brings to the surface what we have all known all along: these people are irresponsible cowards, afraid even to show up in front of their most stalwart supporters, and using a natural disaster as an excuse not to do so. For the last generation neoconservatives have played the tough guys, spouted their crap, inflicted their simplistic ideologies on the nation, and hidden behind their own deep insecurities. "Mission Accomplished" showed Bush masking it in adolescent triumphalism. His post-Katrina speech in NOLA showed him hiding in front of a stage set. Well, I give them credit: they learned the lessons from those expereiences.
You know, I was no fan of Bill Clinton when he used the 2000 Democratic convention platform to strut his stuff. I thought it was way over the top and un-classy. But I'll take that kind of blatant self-aggrandizement over this kind of petty denial, smugness, and insecurity. And what does it say about Bush after all: afraid to be a leader, even of his own diehard party hacks, as they gather in St. Paul.
Coward.