I’m listening to the vaunted press conference of George Bush that’s going on right now, and I’m guessing this will be remembered as one of the weirdest, most arrogant and bile-filled crankfests yet to spew out of the Whiner-in-Chief in the history of his presidency. Snark, snark, appreciative/nervous laughs from the gaggle, snark. Of course there’s the mandatory fake-humility of a call to bipartisanship, couched within a “fuck-you, Dems” remark about hanging on to his principles (as if he had any). His hubris and defensive bullying really knows no bounds.

But the real news is that this Yalie brat has finally given one of the architects of our poisonous foreign policy the heave ho, “after a series of thoughtful conversations”:

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, the hard-driving and super-confident Pentagon boss who came to symbolize President Bush’s controversial Iraq policy, is resigning, President Bush announced today.
The president said he would nominate Robert Gates, former head of the Central Intelligence Agency and now president of Texas A & M University, to replace Mr. Rumsfeld.
While praising Mr. Rumsfeld as “a superb leader in a time of change,” Mr. Bush said both he and the departing secretary recognized the “value of a fresh perspective.”
Only days ago, Mr. Bush had voiced confidence in Mr. Rumsfeld, as he had consistently done since the start of his presidency. But Tuesday’s elections produced a furious reaction from the American public over a military campaign that has cost the lives of nearly 3,000 members of the armed forces and that many people of all political stripes have described as poorly managed.

Neither of these men has ever had a fucking “thoughtful conversation”. They’re both always too busy thinking about how to strong-arm their listeners into capitulation. But this albatross finally put on one too many extra pounds. The really delightful part is that it stands as a kind of victory for the much maligned and scapegoated CIA. The really amusing (in a gallows humor kind of way) thing about it is the number of false starts this professional suicide has had. In February 2005, after more than a year of demands, suggestions, and pleas from all corners that he resign, Rummy offered the revelation that he’d already tried twice to resign, in a scenario that was beginning to take on the Pacino-like flavor of The Godfather Part III:

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld says he twice offered President Bush his resignation during the height of the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal, but the president refused to accept it.

This didn’t settle the ingrate masses, who continued to demand somebody, somewhere, be held to account. So in April of this year, Bush had to step up and tell them to sit down and shutup:

“I have seen firsthand how Don relies upon our military commanders in the field and at the Pentagon to make decisions about how best to complete these missions” of fighting terrorists while simultaneously transforming the military, Bush said. “Secretary Rumsfeld’s energetic and steady leadership is exactly what is needed at this critical period. He has my full support and deepest appreciation.”

Full into the midterm elections, the noise of the great unwashed became so unbearable that Bush was forced into the hyberbolic frothing of the insane:

Now in its fourth year, the war in Iraq is the top issue in the election. Bush said he wanted Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, the top architect of the war, and Vice President Dick Cheney to remain with him until the end of his presidency.
“Both those men are doing fantastic jobs and I strongly support them,” Bush said.

Fantastic! And this, right after the 3rd worst month for American war deaths since before mission accomplished! Not a good job, or a hard job, or the best job he can, but a fantastic job! Can a medal of freedom be far behind??

This is all just part of that lovable package we like to call George “Directions? We don’t need no stinkin’ directions!” W. Bush. The Chief Executive Screw-Up. The only leader of our country who was never a leader of our country. Why, it’s what he does! First it’s:

…Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.

Then it’s:

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Federal Emergency Management Agency Director Mike Brown resigned Monday after coming under fire over his qualifications and for what critics call a bungled response to Hurricane Katrina’s destruction.

You thought all that “stay the course” bushwa just meant he had a rod up his ass and not a clue. But really, he’s constantly adjusting…really.

After the fuckups.

More than 2000 Americans died after Bush flubbed his little joke, and the American people voted him back into office. But somehow Kerry’s remarks are on a par with child molestation or apostasy. This, in itself, seems a meta-joke so monstrous that it almost makes you believe there’s a God. Funny folks, you fellow Americans of mine.

UPDATE: For some reason the video above won’t open on this website, so click here. Thanks to Music for America for the video.

“Education — if you make the most of it and you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well,” said Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat. “If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

To quote our whimsical Secretary of Defense, “Oh, Henny-Penny, the sky is falling!” Somebody told the truth. It’s too bad Kerry left out the punch line: “Just ask President Bush.”

So now it’s dogpile-on-Kerry time again:

Some Democrats defended the senator, but others privately cringed. An unnamed Democratic congressman told ABC News: “I guess Kerry wasn’t content blowing 2004, now he wants to blow 2006, too.”

Oh, bravo, sir! Displacement is so much more constructive than confronting the source of the problem.

So, keeping alive a completely meaningless cockfight, CNN wants to know “who should apologize” over the artificial horror engendered by John Kerry’s clumsy comment on why kids should do well in school:

President Bush has called Kerry’s comments “insulting” and “shameful” and said the Democrat from Massachusetts owes an apology to the U.S. military. Kerry said the president owes the troops an apology for misleading the country into the war in Iraq. What do you think? Does Kerry owe the nation’s military an apology, or does Bush?

Rather beside the point now, since Kerry already apologized. We truly are a nation of fainting goats.

Here’s what I told them:

Nonsense.

Everyone knows—and you in the media have reported on it for years—that kids with fewer options and less money are not only more likely to enter the military for a chance at education and career-training, but the recruiters themselves focus their efforts on poor and minority candidates far more than on rich ones.

That doesn’t automatically mean that highly-educated and wealthier people don’t also join up (though they are far more likely to be officers)—and it doesn’t mean that the poor kids who do join aren’t doing it for patriotic reasons as well.

But come on…to deliberately ignore the fact that the infantry of this volunteer military is mostly made up of the working class is simply bad faith, the same bad faith in which that buffoon in the White House twists Kerry’s words to accuse him of disrespect for the troops. He gets up on the bodies of the “troops” to try to make some political hay, and you, you recorders of history; you let him get away with it. You sit there and allow Bush, a man who spent his entire so-called “military service” pulling strings and eluding responsibilities while his poorer contemporaries died like flies in the jungles of south Asia, accuse a real war hero of disrespect for the troops, and yet fail to question what standing he has to make such accusations? Bush has consistently laid out budget after budget cutting funds for veteran’s needs, and has sent billions unaccounted for into Iraq while failing to ensure the soldiers and their families got enough armor and enough pay to keep them out of the field hospitals and the food banks.

So tell me this—-who disrespects the troops:
Kerry, who fought in war, who lost dear friends in front of his eyes and had the courage to speak out against it, who tries to impress on kids at a turning point in their lives that failing to take advantage of education reduces their options and pushes them towards the devil’s bargain of the volunteer service?
Or Bush, who has never spoken a single word about the “troops” that wasn’t steeped in opportunism and disingenuousness, and who has never experienced one minute of the terror and loss of war?

But forget all that. It’s so much more fun to play the wounded ignoramus. Where are my smelling salts, Miz Liza?