{"id":5935,"date":"2007-03-17T01:11:00","date_gmt":"2007-03-16T16:11:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/haakondahl.com\/blog\/2007\/03\/17\/gonzocalypse-now\/"},"modified":"2007-03-17T01:11:00","modified_gmt":"2007-03-16T16:11:00","slug":"gonzocalypse-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/gonzocalypse-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Gonzocalypse Now"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have been over at the Free Republic<\/a>, wading among the ruins after Hurricane Gonzales. This looks bad.<\/p>\n

Name a single fight the President hasn’t backed away from.
Situation A) An appointee of his is incompetent and he covers for them.
Situation B) An opponent of his is winning and he gives ground which will never be regained.
Situation C) He is unable to deliver on a promise, and avoids unscripted appearances for months, until the subject changes.<\/p>\n

It feels dirty to say this, but the one fight he hasn’t backed away from is — the one he doesn’t have to fight. I don’t mean in the sense that somebody else has to march and shoot and perhaps die–that goes with the job. He is the Commander, not the Corporal.<\/p>\n

I mean that the military provides him with the one thing that no other part of government does–a corps of unquestionedly knowledgeable experts, to whom he can always punt.<\/p>\n

And so that one, he is winning. Won’t walk away from.<\/p>\n

This has been described as Battered President Syndrome. The result of years of a hostile and bitterly partisan media is that the White House no longer engages in public. Not for Scooter Libby, not for WMD, not for anything.<\/p>\n

I saw a great post at FR, part of which I will reproduce here:<\/p>\n

I’m afraid GWB has suffered a mental breakdown.
Oh, it’s not outward. It’s inward, in his soul, where all Presidents REALLY formulate their legacy.
I have been so loyal to this President and the GOP these past 15 years.
THAT’s what really makes me ill in this whole matter.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I thought that was a good distinction. It’s not as though he lost his marbles, or even his balls. He’s just broken. This something I have suspected in G.W., and have outright said about Rice (she was the first to go, oddly enough, and will likely be the last one standing with the President). <\/p>\n

Anyway, The Gonzocalypse is so bad because it not only brings out the most fevered of the left, but it also is EXACTLY the type of “flaming incompetence”, to quote a Hugh Hewitt caller, that cost us the 2006 election through a disgusted and demoralized base. And still nothing changes.<\/p>\n

But don’t get me wrong–I’d still vote for Bush again over any Democrat.<\/p>\n

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I have been over at the Free Republic<\/a>, wading among the ruins after Hurricane Gonzales. This looks bad.<\/p>\n

Name a single fight the President hasn’t backed away from.
Situation A) An appointee of his is incompetent and he covers for them.
Situation B) An opponent of his is winning and he gives ground which will never be regained.
Situation C) He is unable to deliver on a promise, and avoids unscripted appearances for months, until the subject changes.<\/p>\n

It feels dirty to say this, but the one fight he hasn’t backed away from is — the one he doesn’t have to fight. I don’t mean in the sense that somebody else has to march and shoot and perhaps die–that goes with the job. He is the Commander, … Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34128,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[273],"class_list":["post-5935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-mainfeed"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34128"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5935"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5935\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}