"Wrecking Ball Policies"

Okay, first up, Our President:

President Bush told Nightline co-anchor Terry Moran, "I'm sure people view me as a war monger and I view myself as peacemaker. They view me as so pro-Israeli I can't be open-minded about Palestinian peace, and yet I'm the only president ever to have articulated a two-state solution. And you just have to fight through stereotypes by actions."

Uh-huh. George Bush: "I'm pretty sure everyone on the planet sees me as a doltish, ignorant, jobbernowl but, hey, I think I'm great! You just have to fight through stereotypes!" (To be fair, I'm quite sure that GWB would never use the word "jobbernowl.")

UPDATE: Oh, dear God. In the You-Can't-Make-This-Shit-Up Category, Majablog points us to a more thorough vetting of Bush's Big Adventure via Dan Froomkin which includeds this little jewel:

Apparently forgetting his "I'm a war president" motto of the 2004 campaign, Bush said: "I don't believe democracies, you know, generally lead to war-like governments. You know, 'Please vote for me, I promise you war.' It's not something that tends to win elections."

In other news, it appears that many of us were entirely too eager to grasp good news the other day and we jumped the gun. You know, I love Glenn Greenwald but, damn, reading him sure is depressing a lot of the time.

And finally, digby has a doozy:

I'm not saying that Obama is DLC. But the interpretation of that election as being a reaction against liberalism and big government certainly is and that acceptance of their myth has served conservatives very well. There's a reason their movement has developed this ridiculous St. Ronnie hagiography --- it's to inextricably associate their dark, divisive ideology with his carefully manufactured cheerful persona. It protects their movement from the harmful consequences of their wrecking ball policies. "We're not like those losers --- we're the party of Reagan, the sunny, optimistic, winner everybody loved! Look, here's our new Reagan! Vote for him!" (Check this scary thing out. And this from the man who said bipartisanship is date rape.)

Aaaa-MEN, Sister!

Look, I know this is weedy stuff and probably doesn't matter to the average voter under the age of 45. But to long time liberals who lived through this period as an adult, it's like waving a red flag in our faces. Reagan ran explicitly against the left(and in the process normalized the kind of indecent talk that made Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter millionaires.) Because he won big in 1984, leaders in both parties accepted this omnipotent Reagan myth and have run against liberalism ever since --- and have ended up, through both commission and omission, advancing the destructive conservative policies that brought us to a place where we are debating things like torture. It would be helpful if ending the era of Democrats running against the liberal base could be part of this new progressive "trajectory."

Please read the whole thing.