It's finally sinking in. This thing is winding down.
The 2,922-day presidency of George W. Bush is down to its last 400 as of today. Assuming the tin-foil hat crowd is wrong and he doesn’t end up declaring martial law, the wannabe king and his court will leave the White House (probably in a shambles, with booby traps aplenty) in a little over a year. Tick tock. Tick tock.
For a while---perhaps longer than usual because of the extent of the damage---the reverberations of the past eight years will continue ringing in our ears as the new president (likely a Democrat but don’t quote me on that) gets his or her footing and charts the nation's new course. But rest assured: On January 20, 2009, the Bush presidency will be over and his legacy will immediately start turning yellow around the edges.
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So what kind of legacy will it be? How will I describe the Bush-Cheney years when I'm sitting at a table eating strained peas and pudding in the nursing home cafeteria surrounded by visiting children? What shorthand answer will I give when they ask, "What was it like under President Bush?" I think I'll say: "It was like waking up every morning and knowing that, at some point in the day, you were going to suffer whiplash."
He pledged to promote peace, and then waged war against a country without provocation and based on twisted intelligence.
He assured us he would promote a healthier environment, and then actively made it sicker.
He promised to promote scientific and medical research, and then held it back.
He said he wanted to unify Americans in the pursuit of common goals, and then divided them by catering only to a radical faction of his party that had no problem labeling the rest as traitors and America-haters.
He told us all the time that "I understand" this or that, and then took actions that suggested he didn't understand at all...and probably didn’t care.
He created a program he said would "leave no child behind," and it left a bunch of children behind.
He said that only his party knew how to run the military efficiently, and then proceeded to efficiently run it into the ground.
He said he wanted to close the Guantanamo gulag, and then kept it open.
He said he would fire anyone involved in the outing of an undercover CIA agent, and then circled the wagons to protect those involved and even commuted the prison sentence of one of those involved.
He said he would save a beloved American city from the massive destruction caused by a hurricane and breeched levees, and then set about not saving it.
He said he wanted to "have a dialog" on this or that pressing issue, and then never had the dialog and did what he planned to do in the first place anyway.
He promised tax cuts to the poor and middle class, and gave them mostly to the rich.
He said he wanted to work on a bipartisan basis with congress, and then demanded that they do everything his way or no way.
He preached fiscal responsibility and practiced fiscal irresponsibility.
He said he would bring competence back to the government, and then hired some of the most incompetent cronies ever to work in the executive branch.
He said our dependence on foreign oil was a grave threat to the nation, and then lavished his attention on protecting oil companies' profits.
He said he was a champion of civil liberties, and then stomped all over them by ditching habeas corpus, advocating torture, and secretly wiretapping American citizens without a warrant.
"Yeah, that sums up the Bush presidency," I'll tell my young visitors at the home. "The W stood for whiplash. And we felt it every goddam day!" And then I'll spit my teeth at 'em.
And they'll call me crotchety and count the seconds before they can get outta there. Nursing homes are creepy places.
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