The Credibility Depression.

I’ve Fallen! And I can’t shut up!

In the spirit of this quote by Mark Twain (approximated by me, since I can’t seem to find the exact wording) --

"I joined the Confederate Army for two weeks, and then deserted. And the Confederacy fell."

-- I think it is time to explain how I took down the Bush Administration.

Ahem.

I began this blog in March of 2005.

This was just after George Dubya Bush interrupted another month-long Crawford vacation with Tope the Magic Flagon to mule it back to D.C. with his constitution snippers cached in his rectum at the behest of his Christopath Overlords.

Measured in style points, The Schiavo Mob Action was nothing new; it has always been S.O.P. for the G.O.P. to let the vociferous scum that is their “base” do the Party of Lincoln doggy-style while they dispatch their roves and trolls and henchmen to horse-head anyone that tries to pull the curtain back on their diseased little odium-orgy.

(As it turns out, it is an immensely profitable enterprise to specialize in daubing pancake makeup onto the Administration’s open, running, chancres and syphilis sores just before they make another round of speeches denouncing the ethical promiscuity of everyone else.

And a sweet buck can be turned by being one of the guys who puts a rove Teflon-jacketed slug through the skulls of all the inconvenient boys and girls that point out that the Emperor is not only Bared-Assed Naked, but Knee-Walking Drunk.)

But measured in substance points, this was different.

Robbed of all the distracting sound and fury of the 2004 campaign with it’s Swiftboatery, high-decibel gay-bashing and Cheney’s thinly-veiled death-threats against America’s children, the only thing that was clearly audible down there in Jebylvania was the splashing of the Rubicon being crossed.

Of James Dobson emerging into the clear, bright light to explicitly order his minions around like the wait staff.

And the country watched as the Majority Leader of the United States Senate mutated himself into Dobson’s craven, slinking Renfield right before our eyes.

They also watched as George Bush – a man who routinely and conspicuously embeds himself so deeply out on his Plain of Cups that he could not bestir himself from his fake Texas ranch for actual disasters before or since – nonetheless shouted out “How High, Sir!!!” when Dobson said, “Jump, boy.” and leaped all the way across the continent in the middle of the night to do his master’s bidding.

This apparently came as a shock to Moderate Republicans, who one must therefore assume have been living for the last 40 years in papier machet shanties made of pulped copies of “Atlas Shrugged”, doing nothing but watching reruns of “Hazel”.

Mere weeks before, Bush had been the man who nearly kept Dick Cheney awake during his Second Innaugural by repeating the word “Freedom” four-hundred-and-seventeen-thousand-times.

Bush, was Mr. Mandate. Mr. Political Capital. A chief executive fronting himself of to the fawning fourth estate as so politically well-hung that he could not risk turning around abruptly in the White House lest his mighty wang knock the busts and portraits of former Presidents clean off the wall.

So how did the Bush poll numbers look after a mere eleven days of hardball blogging?

Bush's Poll Position Is Worst on Record
Second Terms are Tough, and No President Has Banked Less Political Capital for the Fights Ahead

By Terry M. Neal
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Monday, April 11, 2005; 8:29 AM

With apologies to George Tenet, the first 100 days of President Bush's second term have been no slam-dunk.

How rough has it been? Bush has the lowest approval rating of any president at this point in his second term, according to Gallup polls going back to World War II.

Bush's erosion of support among independents in particular has helped bring his overall approval rating down to 45 percent. Forty-nine percent disapprove of his performance.

Compare Bush's Gallup numbers taken in late March to poll numbers taken at the same point in the presidencies of the six previous men who served two terms:

Clinton: 59 percent approval versus 35 percent disapproval

Reagan: 56 percent versus 37 percent disapproval

Nixon: 57 percent versus 34 percent

Johnson: 69 percent versus 21 percent

Eisenhower: 65 percent versus 20 percent

Truman: 57 percent versus 24 percent

True enough, Bush's numbers weren't all that high to begin with. In the last Gallup poll before the election, he was at 48 percent approval to 47 percent disapproval -- yet he still won and helped his party in the process.

This man whose testicles were apparently so massive and brassy that they each rated their own Secret Service detail had now clearly show himself to be the poseable POTUS Barbie Doll of the Dominionists.

Then came his Summer of Sheehan, as Bush hid out in Panic Room One from the lone mother of a fallen soldier petitioning the man that had put her son into danger for a few, clear answers.

And again Bush dispatched his muscle to beat up on yet another Inconvenient Woman. Again he ran away, and again the Moderates had the nerve to act surprised. As if George Bush has ever been anything but a coward his whole life. As if beating up on the weak isn’t the only political trick in his bag, and the only reason he occupies any office higher than State Lottery Commissioner.

So then came the August numbers as reported in the Wall Street Journal, with emphasis added…

This is a decline from two months ago, when the president's ratings were 45% positive and 55% negative. The war in Iraq and the economy climbed to the top of a list of issues Americans say are most important for the U.S. to address. Social Security declined sharply.

At the same time, Vice President Dick Cheney's approval ratings slipped to 35% from 38% in June, while Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's approval ratings dropped to 40% from 42%. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is the only cabinet member whose approval ratings rose, to 57% from 52% in June.

And after August came the national tragedy of Katrina, and the national travesty of the Bush Administration’s response to the disaster.

Then came Harriet Meirs, and Dubya hanging his dick waaaay out over the plate and declaring her to be the “most qualified person” in the nation to sit on the Supreme Court. And again the Religious Right calls Dubya on the Jebus Phone and ORDERS the President of the United State back the fuck off.

And, again, Dubya folds up like origami and capitulates completely.

And now, almost exactly one year ago to the day that molerats swarmed out of their warrens in their millions – flushed to the polls by gay bashing amendments and the promise by Dick Cheney that, if you didn’t vote Bush/Cheney, your kid’s would probably be murdered in their sleep – the Bush Administration sits in a pool of it's own filth and loudly wonders who they can find to blame for their plight.

Here are the numbers...

Bush's Job Approval Hits New Low
Nov. 3, 2005
(CBS) Tempers cooled a bit in Washington today after the partisan meltdown that brought Senate business to a halt Tuesday.

Even so, neither Congress nor the White House will find much in a new CBS News poll to put them in a better humor. President Bush's job approval has reached the lowest level yet. Only 35 percent approve of the job he's doing.

PRESIDENT BUSH'S JOB APPROVAL
Approve
35%
Disapprove
57%

Congress is rated even lower. Only 34 percent approve of its work.

Vice President Cheney has never been as popular as the president, but his favorable rating is down nine points this year to just 19 percent.

So where does the White House go from here? Mr. Bush is finding no shortage of advice, reports CBS News White House correspondent John Roberts.

The plunge in poll numbers is another dose of bad news for a White House mired in it. The only recent president lower at this point in their second term was Richard Nixon.

What's behind the slide? Two thousand war dead in Iraq, an indictment in the CIA leak, the aborted nomination of Harriet Miers, and the disastrous response to Hurricane Katrina.

"The president I think has bottomed out. I think last week was the bottom," said Ken Duberstein, who worked in the team that Ronald Reagan brought in to help recover from the Iran-Contra scandal. Duberstein wrote a prescription for change in today's New York Times.

I actually agree with Ken Duberstein (who, like any hooker that wants to make the rent, will say whatever the client scrawls on the napkin and tells him to say) on one point: there is an irreducible minimum number of Americans who are so hopelessly, mentally and morally decomposed that it literally does not matter what Dubya does, they will always side with him in the end.

Strafe a pack of snuggly puppies while singing “Wake Up, Little Susie”? Throw burning kittens at homeless children? Beat pregnant women with prosthetic limbs pilfered from wounded veterans? About 1/3 of this country would find a way to call such things “Strong Leadership in Troubled Times.”

These critters are often found being led away in their stained-wifebeater-and-steel-bracelet-combos on “Cops”.

Or blotting out the Sun with their CGI-halo-hair, playing the Body of Christ like a shrieking accordion while bilking addled widows and the terminally ill out of their house coats and life savings.

Or slipping a crisp, white, sheet-and-pillowcase set on over their stained wifebeaters and going out with a few friends to throw cinderblocks off of Democracy’s overpass and into the multicultural rush hour of American civilization.

Or thumb-bending the truth until it passes out on major television networks.

Or tapping out columns with a See-N-Spell for the New York Times.

Then came Scooter, and the revelation that the entire U.S. foreign policy – from pre-invasion lying to post-invasion treason -- really is run by Dick Cheney and his Privateers, while the Bicycle Chief pedals around Texas apparently looking for Osama, WMD’s…and Nicole Brown
Simpson and Ronald Goldman’s real murderers.

And now here we are in November…

Poor approval ratings add to Bush's hurdles

Second-term agenda, '06 elections at risk

By Caren Bohan, Reuters | November 5, 2005

WASHINGTON -- A poll indicating rising doubts among Americans about President Bush's integrity has raised a new hurdle to the fresh start he is seeking after the indictment of a senior White House aide and other political woes.

A week after vice presidential aide Lewis Libby resigned and was indicted on charges related to the leaking of a CIA operative's identity, an ABC News/Washington Post poll indicated that less than half of Americans viewed Bush as trustworthy and honest. The president's overall approval rating dropped to a new low of 39 percent.

''That's a very ominous sign for Bush," Ross Baker, professor of political science at Rutgers University, said of the integrity rating. Bush ran for office in 2000 with a pledge to uphold ''honor and dignity" in the presidency after former President Bill Clinton's impeachment scandal.

A CBS poll Wednesday put Bush's job approval rating at 35 percent, his lowest since taking office in 2001.

Baker said such numbers could portend difficulties for Republican congressional candidates in the 2006 midterm elections as well as for Bush's effectiveness in pushing his second-term agenda.

In Virignia... (Continued from above)

Virginia's Republican candidate for governor, Jerry Kilgore, declined to attend a Bush speech in his state last week, but the White House said Bush would make an election-eve stop next Monday in the tight race seen as a potential national bellwether.
…

In California…

President Bush's approval rating among California voters hit an all-time low as his Supreme Court nominee foundered and an indictment was prepared against a senior White House aide on charges relating to the CIA leak investigation, according to a Field Poll released today.

The poll found increasing percentages of Republicans unhappy with Bush's effort on issues ranging from the war in Iraq to the economy.

"I think there has been an overarching re-evaluation of Bush among some members of his own party,'' said pollster Mark DiCamillo.

Six in 10 voters surveyed disapprove of the job Bush is doing, while just 34 percent approve.

The results track closely with a national AP-Ipsos poll that showed 59 percent of those surveyed disapproved of Bush's job performance, while 37 percent approved.

Sixty-four percent of California voters surveyed in the Field Poll say they don't like the way Bush is handling the war in Iraq. There is a significant partisan divide over the issue, but the latest poll found that 38 percent of Republicans rated the president poorly on the Iraq war. Eighty-four percent of Democrats opposed his Iraq policies.

Only 34 percent of California voters said Bush can be trusted, while 65 percent said they have doubts or reservations about his trustworthiness.
…

In (believe it or not) Minnesota…

In St. Paul mayoral race, the biggest issue is ... Bush
Democratic incumbent Randy Kelly endorsed the president last fall - a move that could cost him reelection Tuesday.

By Amanda Paulson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

ST. PAUL, MINN. - By all conventional wisdom, the mayor's race here in Minnesota's capital city should be an easy win for first-term incumbent Randy Kelly.

Unemployment is low, property taxes haven't gone up, new development has come in, and most residents are happy with the direction the city is headed. A sitting mayor hasn't lost a reelection bid here in more than three decades.

But if the polls are right, Mayor Kelly faces not just defeat but a trouncing in Tuesday's election. He was defeated in the open primary by nearly a 2-to-1 margin, and the latest poll has him trailing his opponent, former city council member Chris Coleman, 66 percent to 25 percent. Kelly's mistake?

This moderate Democrat endorsed President Bush last November.
...

There are the natural peaks and valleys through which every person travels, but this is something else entirely.

Remember, this is an Administration that was falling like a stone before the election and only found a way to prop itself up long enough to totter across the re-election finish line because it had a blank check to cover the expenses of its Two Minutes Hate campaign…and an enemy to slime and shiv and use to distract it’s own voters.

The GOP hasn’t just hit a bad patch: they’ve “lost the room.”

If, in economics, the definition of recession is a period of a mere two quarters of negative GDP growth, what is going on inside the GOP right now can only be described as a full-on Depression.

A Credibility Depression.

A Leadership Depression.

An Integrity Depression.

And in ways that are virtually identical to Republican Herbert Hoover’s response to the Great Depression, the GOP’s response to the calamity their own policies have created is to freeze up, do nothing, and hope it’ll all just blows over, even though that path leads to ruin.

Why?



Because they are ideologically bound on all sides.

Because like the Christopaths that ate their Party, Republicans are congenitally unable to admit error. They would literally rather let the country go to rot than acknowledge a mistake and change course. And like the duty-shirking coward that leads them, and the inept cronies with which he has infected the entire Federal Government like bone cancer, the GOP will spend millions on scapegoats, but not one cent on solutions.

Hoover’s failure to deal decisively with the Great Depression effectively killed the Republican Party for a generation. Eisenhower brought it back, but with a humane and moderate touch that this generation of anti-American Gingrich and Falwell Republicans have completely repudiated, and now the brighter among them are beginning to dimly perceive the size and shape of the pit into which Bush has led them.

Because they can’t get rid of him.

If instead of yapping about it, the GOP really ran the government (which they now completely control) like a business, George W. Bush would have been out on his ass in April. He has bankrupted the United States in every way conceivable, blow his performance evaluation worse than any other man in modern history for four quarters in a row, and has presented no turnaround plan to the Board beyond three more years of the same corruption, deception and bumblefuckery that got us here in the first place.

And there is no way to get him the hell off the stage.

Their Chickenhawk-in-Chief has become a 500-pound albatross hanging around the neck of the Republicans Party.

And every fucking day for the next three years, the Cult-of-Bush wing of the Party that looooves the sweet smell of that putrefaction will bind the hopes and dreams of the Moderates deeper and deeper into the Hoover Box and drive the GOP further and further towards self-annihilation and extinction.

So,

"I started a blog in March.
Blogged the GOP for seven months.
And the Republican Party fell."

Glad I could help.

And hey, I couldnt'a done it without 'cha! ;-)