Recently in Dubyanomics Category

"So you've managed to create AAA and BBB securities out of a pile of stinky, risky mortgage loans. Boss, you are a genius." By way of Web Goddess, the Subprime mortgage fiasco, explained with profane stick figures.

A personal plug: Also out in stores this week, my fourth collaboration with Democratic pundit Bill Press (1, 2, 3): Trainwreck: The End of the Conservative Revolution (and not a moment too soon). If you couldn't guess from the title, it basically argues that, just as the New Deal era lasted from 1932-1968, the Age of Conservatism that began in '64 with Goldwater, hit its stride in the 70's and 80's, and gave us the likes of Reagan, Gingrich, and, of course, Dubya, has now hit the proverbial, inevitable, historical brick wall. So let's survey the wreckage: On one hand, from Katrina to Abramoff and Ed Meese to Alberto Gonzales, right-wing attempts at governance over the past thirty years have usually degenerated into dismal experiments in cronyism and/or incompetence. On the other, conservatism has strayed so far from its ideological roots in the Reagan and particularly Dubya eras that the likes of Robert Taft, Russell Kirk, and William F. Buckley would never even recognize it. (Case in point, the Ron Paul candidacy, wherein a traditional Taft conservative ended up being treated by his esteemed Republican contemporaries in every debate as either a fringe joke or a terrorist-sympathizing dupe.) Either way, the right-wing ascendancy is over, and it's our time again now (and, though it's not reflected in this tome, I think y'all know who I'd prefer to be carrying our progressive standard into battle in 2009 and beyond...)

"'Our current regulatory structure was not built to address the modern financial system with its diversity of market participants, innovation, complexity of financial instruments, convergence of financial intermediaries and trading platforms, global integration and interconnectedness among financial institutions, investors and markets,' Paulson said this morning." Stick a fork in free market fundamentalism: In light of recent economic events, Dubya Secretary of the Treasury Henry Paulson proposes a massive overhaul of the nation's regulatory apparatus. The plan, which among other things bolsters the powers of the Fed and phases out the SEC, isn't getting the most favorable reception from Dems thus far. Said Chris Dodd: "Regrettably, the Administration's blueprint, while deserving of careful consideration, would do little if anything to alleviate the current crisis -- which was brought on by a failure of will." Still, with even Team Dubya and its allies signing off on the need for it, regulatory reform of Wall Street and financial markets looks to be on the table to stay, one way or another.

"Despite sustained efforts to tear down the New Deal -- from the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act in 1999 to President George W. Bush's ill-fated 2005 efforts to dismantle Social Security -- the 1930s-vintage infrastructure has proved remarkably durable...Although the Tennessee Valley Authority has yet to pitch in, four 70-year-old agencies are helping to cushion the blow of the housing bust. Let's count them." Slate's Daniel Gross examines how the New Deal is working to mitigate today's credit crisis. (He also has a funny line about Sen. Clinton's bizarre call yesterday to have Greenspan wave a magic wand to fix things: This "is a little like Chicago appointing a cow to a panel on preventing disastrous fires.")

"The Wall Street titans have turned into a bunch of welfare clients. They are desperate to be bailed out by government from their own incompetence, and from the deregulatory regime for which they lobbied so hard...It's just fine to make it harder for the average Joe to file for bankruptcy, as did that wretched bankruptcy bill passed by Congress in 2005 at the request of the credit card industry. But the big guys are 'too big to fail' because they could bring us all down with them." After the Bear Stearns deal and all it would seem to portent about the condition of the Dubya economy, E.J. Dionne reads the riot act to free market fundies.

In related news, WP's Dan Froomkin's notes how Dubya's handling of the economy is now being compared to the aftermath of Katrina. 'As the storm clouds gathered, was President Bush once again asleep at the wheel? A consistent theme in today's political and economic coverage is that Bush's failure to recognize the severity of the ongoing financial crisis and act accordingly is reminiscent of his disastrously slow and inept response to Hurricane Katrina....'As with the war in Afghanistan, the Iraqi war aftermath, the Hurricane Katrina disaster and current efforts at Mideast peace, investors are concerned that the president is responding too late and with inadequate understanding, resources and creativity.'"

"The feeding frenzy begins this week at the Senate Finance Committee. At least that's the hope of dozens of interests eager to get a free ride on the first must-pass piece of legislation of the year: the economic stimulus package." As the House passes its bipartisan economic stimulus package 385-35, lobbyists make a mad dash across the Capitol to get their hooks into any Senate tampering with the legislation. "That's why every lobbyist worth his e-mail address has trained his sights on the marble floors and wood paneling of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, home to the powerful finance panel."

So, as you may have heard, George W. Bush delivered his final (a lovely word, isn't it?) State of the Union address last night. [Transcript.] I actually saw it two and a half times, as I had CNN running in the background while I websurfed well into the evening. And, maybe I've been getting ruined by the recent slew of memorable Obama-related speeches but, for the life of me, it didn't make an impression at all. Right around the time Dubya made that goofy and somewhat undignified joke about the IRS accepting checks and money orders, something in my brain went *click*, and all I could hear was a lame duck quacking. So, if Dubya actually managed to say anything of substance, or discuss a program that might actually happen this year, please let me know. Update: Sen. Obama's response. Update 2: James Fallows offers his usual worthwhile post-mortem.

"Today’s American system values upheaval; it’s been a while since we’ve seen too much of it. But Americans who lived through the Depression knew the pain real disruption can bring. Today’s Chinese, looking back on their country’s last century, know, too. With a lack of tragic imagination, Americans have drifted into an arrangement that is comfortable while it lasts, and could last for a while more. But not much longer." The Atlantic's James Fallows examines the unstable financial codependence between China and the United States, and how it could all too easily unravel. "Lawrence Summers calls today’s arrangement 'the balance of financial terror,' and says that it is flawed in the same way that the 'mutually assured destruction' of the Cold War era was...With allowances for hyperbole, something similar applies to the dollar standoff. China can’t afford to stop feeding dollars to Americans, because China’s own dollar holdings would be devastated if it did. As long as that logic holds, the system works. As soon as it doesn’t, we have a big problem." Update: Make that 1.53 trillion.

"The wealthiest 1 percent of Americans earn more than 21 percent of all income. That's a postwar record. The bottom 50 percent of all Americans, when all their wages are combined, earn just 12.8 percent of the nation's income...If the Democrats stand for anything, it's a fair allocation of the responsibility for paying the costs of maintaining this nation. So far, neither the Democratic candidates for president nor the Senate Democrats have shown much eagerness to advocate this fundamental principle. It seems the rich have bought them out." Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich laments the cooptation of the Democrats by the super-rich. "It turns out that Democrats are getting more campaign contributions these days from hedge-fund and private-equity partners than Republicans are getting. In the run-up to the 2006 election, donations from hedge-fund employees were running better than 2-to-1 Democratic. The party doesn't want to bite the hands that feed."

"We have no choice but to approve it. If we fail to raise the debt ceiling soon, the U.S. Treasury will default for the first time in its history." Here we go again: The Senate votes 53-42 to raise America's debt ceiling by $850 billion "to $9.815 trillion, the fifth increase in the U.S. credit limit since President George W. Bush took office...[This,] the second largest since Bush took office, should be enough to last the government through next year's congressional and presidential elections. U.S. debt stood at about $5.6 trillion at the start of Bush's presidency."

"'Instead of having all of us pay our fair share, we've got over $1 trillion worth of loopholes in the corporate tax code,' he said. 'This isn't the invisible hand of the market at work. It's the successful work of special interests." In a speech at Washington's Tax Policy Center, Barack Obama unveils his tax plan. "The plan means billions in breaks by: nixing income taxes for the 7 million senior citizens making less than $50,000 a year, establishing a universal credit for the 10 million homeowners who make less than $50,000 annually and do not itemize their deductions, and providing 150 million Americans with tax cuts of up to $1,000...Obama proposes funding the tax cuts by closing corporate loopholes, cracking down on international tax havens and increasing the dividend-and-capital-gains tax for the wealthy, he said."

Meanwhile, not to be outdone, Hillary Clinton unveils her new health care plan. "A Clinton adviser compares the plan's 'individual mandate' -- which requires everyone to have health insurance -- to current rules in most states that require all drivers to purchase auto insurance...Clinton is the third of the front-running Democratic White House hopefuls to formally unveil her plan, following Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, and former Sen. John Edwards." Said Edwards of the Clinton plan: "I'm glad that, today, the architect of the 1993 plan has another care proposal -- and if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then I'm flattered...The lesson Senator Clinton seems to have learned from her experience with health care is, 'If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.' I learned a very different lesson from decades of fighting powerful interests -- you can never join 'em, you just have to beat 'em."

"Snow has also been a chief spokesman for the Bush administration's domestic agenda, forced to argue continually that the typical American is doing just fine, and bravely pushing the unpopular elements of Bush's vaunted 'ownership society'...And yet Snow's own life in many ways symbolizes the downside of the ownership society -- and suggests how much a government role in health and retirement benefits is necessary." Slate's Daniel Gross explains how the unfortunate plight of Tony Snow exemplifies the problems with Dubyanomics.

Where does the GOP's commitment to free market fundamentalism reach its limit? Where there's money to be made, of course. The Post looks into the rise of no-bid contracts under Dubya. "A recent congressional report estimated that federal spending on contracts awarded without 'full and open' competition has tripled, to $207 billion, since 2000, with a $60 billion increase last year alone."

"Call it the 'special relationship'; call it, as Churchill did, the 'joint inheritance'; call it, when we meet, as a form of homecoming, as President Reagan did. The strength of this relationship...is not just built on the shared problems that we have to deal with together or on the shared history, but is built...on shared values." Wanna know who (is Mr Brown)? So does Dubya...The new British prime minister and Bush held their first joint press conference yesterday (transcript), and -- so far -- it's all smiles. Still, "[t]he British leader did not hide his differences with the president, describing Afghanistan as 'the front line against terrorism.'...[He also] avoided using the phrase "war on terror" in describing the effort to hunt down and defeat Islamic radicals. He referred to terrorism 'as a crime' and 'not a cause,' though he went on to say that 'there should be no safe haven and no hiding place for those who practice terrorist violence or preach terrorist extremism.'"

"The historic depth of Bush's public standing has whipsawed his White House, sapped his clout, drained his advisers, encouraged his enemies and jeopardized his legacy. Around the White House, aides make gallows-humor jokes about how they can alienate their remaining supporters -- at least those aides not heading for the door." Round the decay of that colossal wreck, nothing beside remains: The WP contextualizes Dubya's dismal presidential approval ratings. "The emerging strategy is to play off a Congress that is also deeply unpopular and to look strong by vetoing spending bills."

White House Budget Director Rob Portman steps down, to be replaced by former congressman Jim Nussle (R-IA). Said Dem congressional leader Steny Hoyer of Portman's replacement, "'Mr. Nussle is a Dane.' Both Hoyer and Nussle are of Danish ancestry. 'You can read into that into what you want to read into it, and what you want to read into it is correct.'" Thrift, thrift, Horatio!

"'What strikes me now is the degree to which the fairly fiscally irresponsible policies of the last six years have put Democrats in a box,' Mr. Greenstein said. 'They've got these large tax cuts in place, they have even larger fiscal problems in the coming decades and they have large unmet needs right now, such as 45 million uninsured people. Addressing all three of those things will be very difficult.'" The NYT discusses briefly how the 2008 Dems are planning to approach Dubya's tax cuts -- As you might expect, everyone agrees that the giveaways to the tiny percentage of wealthiest Americans, those with incomes over $200,000, will have to stop. "'Yes, we'll have to raise taxes,' Mr. Edwards declared in February in one of the first statements by a Democratic candidate on the issue."

"[A]s those who believe that he is following a wise course shrink to an almost insignificant remnant, as the very architects of the policies he now defends repudiate their own work, as the political cost of his current path becomes increasingly apparent to almost any sentient person, Bush -- who may still have time to redeem at least some part of his legacy -- still appears to be oblivious both to the downward spiral of his presidency and to his own likely place in history." Ted of The Late Adopter points the way to New York Magazine's roundtable discussion of Dubya's mindset these days, which includes a diagnosis by my advisor/employer, Alan Brinkley. (Other notable participants include Dahlia Lithwick, Frank Foer, Jonathan Alter, Ted Sorenson, Melvin Laird, and Gary Hart.)

Following up on one of the first orders of business of the "100 Hours," the Senate passes a minimum-wage increase 94-3 for the first time in almost a decade...but not before burdening the House bill with sundry small-business tax breaks to appease the GOP. "House leaders have demanded that the tax measures be stripped from the bill...Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.), chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, said he may have other plans for the $8.3 billion that the Senate would use for business tax breaks."

Now, here's a guy who hopes there's something to this Blue Monday business: On the eve of the State of the Union, Dubya faces the lowest poll numbers of his presidency. "Bush's overall approval rating in the new poll is 33 percent, matching the lowest it has been in Post-ABC polls since he took office in 2001...Equally telling is the finding that 51 percent of Americans now strongly disapprove of his performance in office, the worst rating of his presidency."

"For our daughters and granddaughters, today we have broken the marble ceiling. To our daughters and our granddaughters, the sky is the limit." On a day marked by celebration and the temporary cooling of partisan rancor, the Speaker Pelosi era officially begins in Washington. And, true to their word, the Democratic House got an early start on their "100 Hours" platform, passing a comprehensive ethics reform package 435-1 on Thursday (right-wing nut-job and former Clinton nemesis Dan Burton was the sole opposing vote) and a "pay-go" commitment to a balanced budget (as well as an end to anonymous earmarks) on Friday. "'The one thing we can say about George Bush and his economic policy is: "We are forever in your debt,"' Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) told his colleagues on the House floor. 'On day number two, Democrats have said, "Enough is enough with running up the debt of this country. We're going to put our fiscal house in order."'"

"'When the president talks about staying the course, he never mentions cost as a factor,' Spratt said. 'But it is a factor, particularly when you get costs over $100 billion a year.'" Facing very little room to work with, the Dems attempt to sort out the fiscal fiasco Dubya has created over the past six years and counting.

"Historians are loath to predict the future. It is impossible to say with certainty how Bush will be ranked in, say, 2050. But somehow, in his first six years in office he has managed to combine the lapses of leadership, misguided policies and abuse of power of his failed predecessors. I think there is no alternative but to rank him as the worst president in U.S. history." Columbia's Eric Foner makes the case for Dubya as the worst president ever. Also weighing in on the question: Columbia PhD (and Slate columnist) David Greenberg, Douglas Brinkley, Michael Lind, and Vincent J. Cannato. (I discussed Dubya's ranking briefly here.)

Considered historically horrible by the ever-expanding reality-based community, Dubya and his advocates plan to remedy the damage by buying their way into the hearts of historians. "Bush's institute will hire conservative scholars and 'give them money to write papers and books favorable to the President's policies,' one Bush insider said." Hmm...don't expect too many Bancroft winners out of that bunch. (Via The Oak.)

"As George Shultz liked to say: 'Everybody loves to argue with Milton, particularly when he isn't there.'" Milton Friedman, 1912-2006.

Regarding ballot initiatives, it was a bad night for same-sex marriage and marijuana decriminalization. Still, there's cause for hope around the country in the six state minimum-wage hikes that passed, as well as the repudiation of the stringent abortion law in South Dakota (Justice Kennedy: take note.) Speaking of the Court, its eminent domain decision of last year took a beating in nine states, although California, Idaho, and Washington thankfully repudiated stronger measures that would effectively hobble any kind of federal land regulation.

It's true in the West, it's true in the Southwest, it's even true among the reddest of the red. And, in perhaps the final straw for the GOP this November, a new poll puts independents breaking for the Dems 59%-31%. Yes, y'all, it looks like a wave is coming...(provided, of course, Diebold doesn't ride to Dubya's rescue.)

"[W]ages and salaries now make up the lowest share of the nation's gross domestic product since the government began recording the data in 1947, while corporate profits have climbed to their highest share since the 1960's." An examination of the economy by the NYT reveals the bitter fruit of Dubyanomics for 90% of the nation: "At the very top of the income spectrum, many workers have continued to receive raises that outpace inflation, and the gains have been large enough to keep average income and consumer spending rising...[but e]ven for workers at the 90th percentile of earners -- making about $80,000 a year -- inflation has outpaced their pay increases over the last three years, according to the Labor Department."

Pathetic...these guys really have no shame. In yet another desperate and disgusting bid to pamper the rich by stealing from the poor, Catkiller Frist and the Senate GOP try to game the Senate Dems into backing a repeal of the estate tax by coupling it with a long-overdue minimum wage hike. To put this ploy in perspective, a recent report "concluded that the estate tax reduction would cut government income by $753 billion in the first 10 years, forcing lower spending for Medicaid, food stamps and unemployment insurance, which help low-wage workers." Update: Thankfully, the bill failed on a 56-42 cloture vote, three shorts shy of the necessary 60 (Catkiller switched his vote to enable reconsideration later.)

And, in quite related news, new Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson admits the Dubya economy has been leaving people behind: "'Many aren't seeing significant increases in their take-home pay. Their increases in wages are being eaten up by high energy prices and rising health care costs, among others.'"

"'The universe of offshore tax cheating has become so large that no one, not even the United States government, could go after all of it." A new Senate report delves into offshore tax shelter schemes by extremely wealthy individuals, ones which cost the American public billions in federal tax revenues (and which often utilized fronts based in the Isle of Man, once the long-time home of my now-deceased English grandparents.) "'We need to significantly strengthen the aiding and abetting statutes to get at the lawyers and accountants and other advisers who enable this cheating,' Senator Levin said, adding that 'we need major changes in law to stop the use of tax havens' by tax cheats."

"'The Republicans say the economy is great for everyone,' Clinton said. 'They've done nothing about these costs that are eating away at the paychecks of hard-working Americans. Democrats will work to get health-care costs down, to get college tuitions under control, to address the rising costs of gas prices, to cut middle-class taxes and reward companies that create jobs here at home.'" With November in the not-too-distant future (and 2008 only a step beyond), Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton announces the American Dream Initiative, a.k.a. the DLC centrists' stab at a Contract with America-type campaign agenda: "The centerpiece proposal would provide additional support for college costs, with the goal of increasing the number of college graduates by 1 million a year by 2015...Other ideas include requirements for employers to establish retirement accounts for all workers and a refundable tax credit for savers; 'baby bonds' that would create a government-funded savings account of $500 for every child born in the United States; a refundable tax credit to help provide the down payment on housing; universal health care for children; and benefits for small businesses to lower the cost of providing health insurance to workers." This all sounds good, if a bit classically Clintonesque. OK, the name is goofy (as was Hillary's "It's the American Dream, stupid."), and IMHO there needs to be more here regarding both campaign finance and lobbying reform. But, still, there's very little of the usual protective camouflage-y cruft that usually accompanies anything put out by the DLC, so that's a good start. Let's see where it goes.

So, the pre-born aside, how does Dubya feel about the plight of actual, honest-to-goodness post-born American kids living in poverty these days? Well, judging from his recent statements on poverty, or complete and utter lack thereof since Katrina faded from public memory, he couldn't care less. "Domestic poverty did not come up in his State of the Union address in January, and his most recent budget included no new initiatives directed at the poor."

"If government is necessary, bad government, at least for conservatives, is inevitable, and conservatives have been exceptionally good at showing just how bad it can be. Hence the truth revealed by the Bush years: Bad government--indeed, bloated, inefficient, corrupt, and unfair government--is the only kind of conservative government there is. Conservatives cannot govern well for the same reason that vegetarians cannot prepare a world-class boeuf bourguignon: If you believe that what you are called upon to do is wrong, you are not likely to do it very well." Perhaps overplaying the Hartzian "America is liberal and liberal only" card just a bit, Boston College professor Alan Wolfe argues convincingly why conservatives can't govern, and explains how, despite the emerging right-wing consensus to the contrary, Dubya's many failures and Boss DeLay's corruption aren't a betrayal of conservative thinking, but a culmination of it. (By way of Blivet.)

Forced to capitulate somewhat on the estate tax in the House, the Republicans nevertheless illustrated anew their grotesque economic priorities in the Senate by voting down a raise in the minimum wage (Still at $5.15, it hasn't been raised in nine years.) "Just last week, the House rejected an effort to block a $3,300 annual increase in the base salary for a member of Congress. If the raise goes through, rank-and-file members will earn $168,500 -- a $31,600 increase since the last minimum-wage increase was enacted in 1997."

"'Enron is one of the great frauds in American business history,' said James Post, a professor of management at Boston University. 'But it is also a symbol of a particular era of management practice.'" In a strange confluence of ill omens for the current administration, a jury finds finds Enron heads Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling guilty on multiple counts of conspiracy, wire fraud, and securities fraud, with sentencing set for 9/11. For their part, Lay and Skilling immediately began talking appeal, but perhaps that'll be unnecessary. After all, surely "Kenny-Boy" can wrangle a pardon from his boy Dubya, particularly after he spent all that time crafting Dubya's energy policy.

"Unbeknownst to almost all of Washington and the financial world, Bush and every other President since Jimmy Carter have had the authority to exempt companies working on certain top-secret defense projects from portions of the 1934 Securities Exchange Act. Administration officials told BusinessWeek that they believe this is the first time a President has ever delegated the authority to someone outside the Oval Office." In related news (and as seen at Ed Rants), Dubya has apparently, on the sly, "bestowed on his intelligence czar, John Negroponte, broad authority, in the name of national security, to excuse publicly traded companies from their usual accounting and securities-disclosure obligations."

"'If you want to look at why the Republican Party is down in the dumps and why the president's numbers are down in the dumps,' Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said this afternoon, 'it's that the American people are beginning to understand that when they talk about tax cuts, they're not talking about helping middle-class people. They're talking about helping the wealthiest corporations and individuals among us.'" True, that. And, since Dubya signed the dividend tax giveaway extension into law this afternoon, the Dems now have another potent issue in their arsenal through November. "'Today's really a good day to be a millionaire, but it's a bad day if you want to be a millionaire,' Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) said at a news conference minutes after Bush signed the bill."

"'The point is the preponderance of these revenues will go to upper-income people, people who make a million dollars or more,' Sen. Olympia J. Snowe (R-Maine) said yesterday. 'It's a question of priorities.'" Nevertheless, as expected, House and Senate GOP leaders strike a deal to extend Dubya's tax breaks for the wealthy to 2010, with the House passing their end 244-185 today. Well, this tax gambit may help the GOP with their base among the "haves and have-mores," I guess, but I really don't see how this will stop the GOP's 14-point freefall across the rest of the country. Update: The Senate follows suit, 54-44.

"'This administration may be over,' Lance Tarrance, a chief architect of the Republicans' 1960s and '70s Southern strategy, told a gathering of journalists and political wonks last week. 'By and large, if you want to be tough about it, the relevancy of this administration on policy may be over.'" Are we at the turn of the tide? As even committed conservatives and right-leaning observers start sticking a fork in the Dubya administration, newly confident Dems begin to prepare for a return of the House. Foremost in their plans is "a legislative blitz during their first week in power that would raise the minimum wage, roll back parts of the Republican prescription drug law, implement homeland security measures and reinstate lapsed budget deficit controls...a Democratic House would [also] launch a series of investigations of the Bush administration, beginning with the White House's first-term energy task force and probably including the use of intelligence in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq."

Defying Dubya's talk of a veto -- in keeping with the Operation Offset line of thinking, he wants less spending to help mitigate his ridiculous tax giveaways -- and Dennis Hastert's declaration that it was "dead on arrival" in the House, the Senate passes an $109 billion emergency spending bill 77-21. "The Senate bill would provide $70.9 billion to the military to pay for personnel, operation and maintenance, and procurement costs, along with diplomatic efforts such as democracy-building programs. The Senate more than doubled a $58 million request for peacekeeping assistance in Sudan, providing $173 million. Bush requested $19.8 billion in hurricane-related assistance, and the Senate responded with $28.9 billion -- adding projects large and small."

"'You talk about completely detached from reality, that's this place,' said Sen. Kent Conrad (N.D.), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee." Throwing caution to the wind despite their imploding poll numbers and the ballooning deficit, the White House and congressional Republicans craft a deal to extend Dubya's dividend and capital gains tax breaks for the wealthy. Still, the "compromise measure falls well short of making Bush's first-term tax cuts permanent. Instead, all of the major tax cuts passed in 2001 and 2003 would expire at the end of 2010."

Update: The WP dissects the GOP's tax gamesmanship: "If the deal wins congressional approval, every major tax cut passed in Bush's first term will be set to expire on the same day five years from now. [Jan. 1, 2011.] At that moment, politicians would face a choice: Either allow taxes to rise suddenly and sharply on everyone who pays income taxes, is married, has children, holds stocks and bonds, or expects a large inheritance, or impose mounting budget deficits on the government far into the future, according to projections by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office."

"I believe that the government that governs best is a government that governs least, and by these standards we have set up a fabulous government in Iraq." In a must-watch (or at least must-read) event, the inimitable Stephen Colbert took it to Dubya hard at last night's White House Correspondent's dinner, and Bush, according to press reports, was not amused. Great stuff throughout:

* "I believe in pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps. I believe it is possible -- I saw this guy do it once in Cirque du Soleil. It was magical. And though I am a committed Christian, I believe that everyone has the right to their own religion, be it Hindu, Jewish or Muslim. I believe our infinite paths to accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior."

* "Now, I know there's some polls out there saying this man has a 32% approval rating. But guys like us, we don't pay attention to the polls. We know that polls are just a collection of statistics that reflect what people are thinking in 'reality.' And reality has a well-known liberal bias...Sir pay no attention to the people who say the glass is half empty, because 32% means it's 2/3 empty. There's still some liquid in that glass is my point, but I wouldn't drink it. The last third is usually backwash."

* "I stand by this man. I stand by this man because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message, that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world."

* "I'm sorry, but this reading initiative. I've never been a fan of books. I don't trust them. They're all fact, no heart. I mean, they're elitist telling us what is or isn't true, what did or didn't happen. What's Britannica to tell me the Panama Canal was built in 1914. If I want to say it was built in 1941, that's my right as an American. I'm with the president, let history decide what did or did not happen. The greatest thing about this man is he's steady. You know where he stands. He believes the same thing Wednesday, that he believed on Monday, no matter what happened Tuesday."

* "But the rest of you, what are you thinking, reporting on N.S.A. wiretapping or secret prisons in Eastern Europe? Those things are secret for a very important reason, they're superdepressing. And if that's your goal, well, misery accomplished. Over the last five years you people were so good over tax cuts, W.M.D. intelligence, the effect of global warming. We Americans didn't want to know, and you had the courtesy not to try to find out. Those were good times, as far as we knew."

* "But, listen, let's review the rules. Here's how it works. The President makes decisions, he's the decider. The Press Secretary announces those decisions, and you people of the press type those decisions down. Make, announce, type. Put them through a spell check and go home. Get to know your family again. Make love to your wife. Write that novel you got kicking around in your head. You know, the one about the intrepid Washington reporter with the courage to stand up to the administration. You know, fiction."

* "I mean, nothing satisfies you. Everybody asks for personnel changes. So the White House has personnel changes. Then you write they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg."

* "See who we've got here tonight. General Mowsly, Air Force Chief of Staff. General Peter Pace. They still support Rumsfeld. You guys aren't retired yet, right? Right, they still support Rumsfeld."

* "Jesse Jackson is here. I had him on the show. Very interesting and challenging interview. You can ask him anything, but he's going to say what he wants at the pace that he wants. It's like boxing a glacier. Enjoy that metaphor, because your grandchildren will have no idea what a glacier is." (Note: YouTube has smaller clips, too.)

Feeling the heat from his nose-diving poll numbers (and spurred by GOP congressional leaders' desperate pleas for political cover), Dubya announces a probe into high oil prices (and sings the praises of ethanol like it was a week before the Iowa primary.) Ok, but if our oilman-president (who, to be fair, failed at both callings) really wants to get the bottom of the situation, it'd be nice if he'd look into not only oil company price-gouging but also exactly what went on at Cheney's infamous Energy Task Force meetings...

TIME Magazine unveils Josh Bolten's new five-point plan for righting the Dubya presidency: 1) Act tough on immigration with "guns and badges"; 2) Humor Wall Street with extensions on capital gains and dividend tax cuts; 3) "brag more"; 4) Talk tough at Iran; and 5) play nice with the press. So, wait, we're going to war with Iran just so Bolten can squeeze six more months out of lame duck Dubya? Brilliant.

"Calamitous presidents, faced with enormous difficulties -- Buchanan, Andrew Johnson, Hoover and now Bush -- have divided the nation, governed erratically and left the nation worse off. In each case, different factors contributed to the failure: disastrous domestic policies, foreign-policy blunders and military setbacks, executive misconduct, crises of credibility and public trust. Bush, however, is one of the rarities in presidential history: He has not only stumbled badly in every one of these key areas, he has also displayed a weakness common among the greatest presidential failures -- an unswerving adherence to a simplistic ideology that abjures deviation from dogma as heresy, thus preventing any pragmatic adjustment to changing realities." As seen all over the place, historian Sean Wilentz wonders aloud in Rolling Stone if Dubya is the worst president in American history.

To my mind, the only other president that even comes close is James Buchanan. Sure, Warren Harding was lousy, but he knew it ("I am a man of limited talents from a small town. I don't seem to grasp that I am President."), and thus didn't go out of his way to be actively terrible like Bush has been. (Plus, for all the corruption of the