Bush's Political Exit Strategy

[gulliver]

Bush's goal is to walk away from the the disaster he created in the ME and have it be at least arguable that he is not responsible. I consider Bush an arsonist with a good lawyer. His goal is to get away with what he did. Part of Bush's historical pattern is the inevitable "bail-out" he gets when he fails. But an equally important -- if not more important -- part of Bush's history is the rewriting of history itself to blur and delete evidence of Bush's failure.

In the case of Bush's failure in the ME, he now has sufficient cards to avoid personal political bankruptcy. Playing those cards will cost lives, gouts of money, and huge tangible and intangible losses to the rest of the world, but I think Bush will play those cards anyway. That's the way he has been playing since the Iraq War started going south, and I see no reason to expect him to change his style now. He shows every indication that he intends to brazen it out.

Baker was highlighting Bush's likely strategy when Baker said he hoped the ISG report will not be cherry picked like a "fruit salad." That is exactly what Bush will do. That is what he always does with information. He pulls out the parts that support his desired approach and ignores the parts he wants to ignore. In effect, this gives him a line item veto on information. It provides Bush with sufficient rhetorical cover to do exactly what he wants to do while hedging against liability for failure. This gives Bush unlimited upside for claiming credit and limited downside because he "consulted" with others.

That's how the Iraq War itself proceeded. It was by all objective standards a disaster in 2004, but Bush's hedge strategy of using cherry-picked CIA intelligence and IWR "consultation" with Congress paid off enough to get him re-elected in 2004. Bush was able to make his case arguable. He held off the (correct) bottom line conclusion that he and his administration are the authors of a true disaster.

This time, more of the same. Bush will take the subset of the ISG report that agrees with what he wants to do. He will incorporate parts of what the Dems want to do. But the troops will stay.

If/when it fails, Bush will simply activate his hedge strategy. Bush advocates will argue that the ISG/Dem plan did not work. The CIA got us into an unnecessary war, and a combination of Bush, the ISG, and the Dems lost the war. The truth, that Bush stampeded us into an unnecessary war that could cause the greatest disaster in history (it's still early) will remain in dispute. It will be more disputable than the Earth being flat or Adam and Eve. Recent history proves that is enough to elect Republicans.

[The Count]

1. "This is no longer my concern" - W's answer to the mess he left in Texas

as a governor, after being elected.
At this point, however, it gets more complicated to accomplish the proverbial sweep under the carpet - as the mess is way bigger. But, yeah, he'll try, and he'll have help.

[DeepModem Mom]

2. Excellent! K&R!

[Morgana LaFey]

3. Excellent nt

[Nightjock]

4. It won't work

if lying us into the war is ONE of the reasons he is impeached!

[kentuck]

5. And he will suck the Democrats into his "disaster" by playing "bi-partisanship"

...and attempt to make them all equally responsible for what happens or does not happen in Iraq.