Ex-Bush aides say he never recovered from Katrina

“The president broke his bond with the public. Once that bond was broken, he no longer had the capacity to talk to the American public."

True that.

and the news is what exactly? these latter day revelations were obvious from day one.

Their comments are a part of an oral history of the Bush White House that Vanity Fair magazine compiled for its February issue, which hits newsstands in New York and Los Angeles on Wednesday, and nationally on Jan 6. Vanity Fair published comments by current and former government officials, foreign ministers, campaign strategists and numerous others on topics that included Iraq, the anthrax attacks, the economy and immigration.

Wow, this is gonna be hard for Laura and Condi to counteract. Maybe it's time to bring out the heavy artillery, Mommy Dearest Babs.

The Chinese are very proud their national response to the Sichuan earthquake last spring was better than that of our federal government to Katrina in 2005.

We can't afford to have a leader who's lost public confidence in power for over three years. Things have only gone from bad to worse and partly explains why our president elect enjoys a level of support not seen since Eisenhower.

B-b-b-b-b-but bush's own WIFE said that he wasn't a bad guy and that his government was good... how could his wife be the only person who thinks so?! Oh! There's also Condi... Could these two people be wrong and the rest of the entire world, which includes the US, be right?

No comment from Louisiana's new Republican governor Bobby Jindal? First Republican (and "non-white") elected to that office since the Reconstruction.

Back to December 2003...

http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/12-6-2003-48317.asp

Vanity Fair's Editor Battles George Bush Graydon Carter is one of the biggest names in US magazines. Now Vanity Fair's editor is gunning for George Bush.

[...]

Carter has turned his normally innocuous monthly Editor's Letter into a campaign for 'regime change'.

[...]

Carter is now turning to Hillary Clinton as America's saviour. He believes she is the only Democrat with the 'X' factor - charisma, toughness and a certain je ne sais quoi that makes her a natural leader.

This weekend it emerged that he is also writing an anti-Bush book and, he told The Observer, has been campaigning behind the scenes to get Hillary to run for president 'right now'.

It's so easy shooting holes in stories like this.

It's so easy shooting holes in stories like this.

I would say that make-believe is what is so easy.

"No comment from (insert name here)". Yeah, we could play that child's game all day too.

B-b-b-b-b-but bush's own WIFE said that he wasn't a bad guy and that his government was good.

This is not about being good. This is about being competent.

Back to December 2003...

Why so selective? I mean Paul Wolfowitz revealed to Vanity Fair in May 2003 that the members of Bush's war cabinet had difficulty reaching a consensus on the reasons for the invasion of Iraq:

The truth is that for reasons that have a lot to do with the U.S. government bureaucracy we settled on the one issue that everyone could agree on which was weapons of mass destruction as the core reason, but . . . there have always been three fundamental concerns. One was weapons of mass destruction, the second is support for terrorism, the third is the criminal treatment of the Iraqi people.

I never really saw him as a Vanity Fair kinda dude. But it established the mag's credibility for gettin' the inside scoop from those connected with the GWB administration.

Why is A.P shilling for a Vanity Fair piece? Let me guess...Oh nevermind.

Well at least I'll give them credit that this a little more interesting negative article than having to read about Obama and his tight abs.

“He became vice president well before George Bush picked him,” Wilkerson said of Cheney. “And he began to manipulate things from that point on, knowing that he was going to be able to convince this guy to pick him, knowing that he was then going to be able to wade into the vacuums that existed around George Bush—personality vacuum, character vacuum, details vacuum, experience vacuum.”

Ouch!

Hard to believe that Mike Brown was not mentioned despite the fact that Katrina was. It was Bush that appointed the unqualified crony to head FEMA after all. Needless to say the Katrina pony show did not turn out very well under Brown. Not surprising after he nearly ruined IAHA I suppose.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Brown

While Katrina was busting down the storm gates on Mississippi and Louisiana condi rice was off on a junket to buy new shoes and dick cheney was off on another hunting trip.

george bush was left alone with people he didn't trust and people who said things were going fine.

george bush was a puppet without a puppetmaster. Worthless. < :-)

Too bad Katrina could not have been his only failure. :-) Here we are eight years later....

it seems a large handout (or bailout) can fix anything these days. I say they should of listened to the Corps of Engineers and addressed the levee situation 10-20 yrs ago. The people of Mississippi who had more damage toughed it out and got to work while New Orleans seeked the handout remedy.

A tale of two peoples and different leadership. I think the Fed should of closed the state down since the elected officials were incapable in LA.

Hard to believe that Mike Brown was not mentioned despite the fact that Katrina was." Yeah, as well as Nagin too.... If you visit NO right now, Nagin is not on anyone's Xmas invitation lists.

So face it, not only was George's years a failure, but so was the entire US government from the top to the bottom.

Yeah, as well as Nagin too.... If you visit NO right now, Nagin is not on anyone's Xmas invitation lists.

You have access to politicians' Xmas invitation lists?!?

Well, not really sure what Nagin was supposed to do, put his finger in the dike or order an evacuation unprececedented since the Civil war by somehow knowing the levees would break or drive dozens of buses by himself or get just anybody to do it.

Honestly, I really can't think of much Nagin could have done differently to make GWB look good or to assist FEMA or to make the Katrina disaster significantly less devastating. To compare the mayor of a city to the Bush appointed head of a federal disaster response agency, an agency that went from being indepedent to being "streamlined" by Bush incidentally, is really, really, really stretching things to blame a Democrat.

Anyway, if Nagin is really that unpopular, it might have more to do with his Chocolate City remarks or claiming that "God is mad at America".

It is true that Bush is very slow to response the Cyclone Katherina. Even he made some jokes about the cyclone at that time.

Kathernia reconstruction effort were also corrupted & contracts were awarded for his cronies. He betrayed the trust of the victims. He also destroyed the hopes of victims.

Matthew Dowd, Bush's pollster: "The president broke his bond with the public"

He did not.

"Once that bond was broken..."

It wasn't.

"... he no longer had the capacity to talk to the American public."

He's never lost the capacity to talk to the American public. Dowd's an idiot.

Lawrence Wilkerson, aide to Colin Powell ( who supported Obama ): this Sarah Palin-like president"

I wish! Sarah Palin is a breath of fresh air!

"He ( Cheney ) became vice president well before Bush picked him..."

Delusional.

"knowing that he was then going to be able to wade into the vacuums that existed around George Bush - personality vacuum, chracter vacuum, details vacuum, experience vacuum."

The only vacuum that existed around George Bush was the Wilkerson brain vacuum.

"the government's poor handling of the catastrophic natural disaster"

Schoolbus Nagin, anyone?

sarge: your 08:01 post is HILARIOUS! Wrong on every level, and nearly made me spit out a bit of coffee at how deep your denial is. It must just make you crazy, this kind of article popping up every day, from every corner of the US (been printed world-wide for 8 years now), with only bush's wife, condi, and now you left to defend him.

"Dowd's an idiot"

Well, then that makes bush an idiot's moron, since everyone except you agrees what a failure he was. He did lose the capacity to talk to the American public, and he has been a complete failure, else why (again, despite his wife's nation wide, 'my husband is not a failure' tour) does he have possibly the lowest popularity rating in history? Other presidents have made 'tough choices' and still come out on top, so it's not that. Moronic decisions, yes, bush made plenty, and in particular the subject of this thread next to Iraq was his worst (and with Iraq even he said himself he regrets it).

Sorry, sarge, but no one buy's your simple denial of the facts.

One more thing, sarge... don't you find it a bit strange that you are the only one saying 'all these people are idiots' or, 'brain vacuums', etc. It's like a kid with no friends in the school yard saying, "No, you're a loser! and you, and you, and you, and you, and you... hell, you ALL are!"

So, basically, sarge, more than 70% of the US population, and 100% of the world's population outside the US are idiots, but you, condi, and bush's wife are not?

Hmmm...

sarge: No thanks, I'd rather spend New Year's with my wife. Happy New Year's to you anyway, though. Appreciate the offer all the same.

sarge: Your president is a failure, and let the American people, and some around the world, down. The only real question in relation to this thread is not at all if that's true, but only if it was indeed Katrina that was the turning point or one of his other countless blunders. In either case, he's already ranked up their as one of the worst presidents in history, despite his wife's objections. In a few years it'll be cemented as fact that he was the worst, and his wife or he will not be available for comment.

Katrina was one of many sad events under bush's watch, but the scale of all of them, and the scale of the failures of all them, 'cannot be debated'; your president is a worthless excuse for a leader, and it's good riddance in less than two weeks to some very, very bad rubbish.

Give me a shoe, sarge, and I'll happily throw it at the man.

Sarge, everyone who got out of elementary school knows that "Did not! Did too!" combined with name calling is simply not acceptable argumentation. You have to support what you say with something, anything.

Matthew Dowd has chosen a hell of a time to find a conscience. Where were you a couple of years ago, Matt?

And to add insult to injury, I read the guy's comments and now I can only see spots. The blinding light of the obvious really hit me.

Taka

Long before Katrina george bush lost the confidence of the American people. We had already seen his selling of America to the pharmeceutical companies, Wall Street, the top 1% of the population.

Then when Katrina hit it affected poor black people mainly. he could care less about poor blacks. They couldn't get him any rewards in his post presidential years.

We, just like the president, watched the TV/news stories as people stayed inside the Louisiana Superdome and how they were left like animals without water or food. The world watched as patients and staff at hospitals were cut off from aid for the people they were caring for. They were watching people die and still sat on their hands for days.

Remember when the Coast Guard was saving people. They were doing this after their commands told them they weren't allowed to go into New Orleans? If it wasn't for people who said, this government is allowing people to die, who did what they were ordered not to do... many more people would have died.

Yes, I know some of this is Louisiana's faught, but remember this is why they put FEMA under Homeland Defense, the Whitehouse and those who could assist in emergencies could be monitored and corrected.

And then we look at the 100,000s of FEMA trailers that were and are making people sick. Real good deal there. This was just a continuence of bad decisions made by george bush and his administration.

But let's not forget those new shoes for condi and dick cheney absent hunting. These activities were so much more important than aiding and helping people who really needed it.

Long before Katrina hit, george bush had shown his true colors. he cared less for people who needed help.

Maybe Sarge is right in some respect. george bush tried. But he was so inept as a leader that this was the best he could do. < :-)

Part of the reason the Bush presidency never recovered is because New Orleans has still not recovered. Katrina was such a monumental failure it's shocking. It showed exactly where our weaknesses lie.

"New Orleans has still not recovered"

A couple hundred years ago the natives asked the French, "Are you really going to build a city here? We don't recommend that."

Last I heard New Orleans is still right next to the sea, and below sea level.

likeitis ( what the hell kind of handle is that, anyway? ): "Sarge, everyone who got out of elementary school knows that "Did not! Did too!" combined with name calling simply is not acceptable argumentation. You have to support what you say with something, anything."

And you have supported what you said with...?

smith: "Give me a shoe, sarge, and I'll happily throw it at the man."

Throw your own shoe, smith. Oh, I so hope you do, ha ha ha!

Hell I turned my back on dick cheney a couple of years ago as he was coming in Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas City, MO.

Damn never thought about the shoe bit then. < :-)

Sarge, apparently doesn't know that New Orleans was founded by the French 290 years ago on high ground (the areas that didn't flood). Nor does he seem to understand that the Port of New Orleans can't be moved elsewhere... a clue, it has to do with the Mississippi River and the Gulf.

"Sarge apparently doesn't know that New Orleans was founded by the French 290 years ago on high ground"

They must've moved it to low ground.

sarge: "Throw your own shoe, smith. Oh, I so hope you do, ha ha ha!"

Put him in front of me and I will, my friend. That and/or spit on his face. Whichever is easier at the time. If I have shoes with laces it might take time to take them off.

Anyway, sargie... you have yet to comment on the fact that bush has lost the public trust of Americans, instead of simply talking about whether the French should have built one of the only great areas of your country where they did or not.

Louisianans and Mississippians haven't recovered either. < :-)