...our hands. You're making reasonable points, Frank, and I can sense you trying to maintain an even strain. The tone of this thread might resemble "BDS", but the theme is a serious one in terms of learning from the past and trying to do better in the future.

My primary fear for a long time that has been that Bush would so undermine America's credibility and authority that when a situation like this arose, the world would just laugh in his face when he tries to wag his finger at another country. As, no doubt, Vlad The Soulmate Putin is laughing right now.

I don't like it when people laugh at America, and I hold Bush responsible.

But he'll be gone in 155 days, 2 hours, 12 minutes and some seconds, as of this writing (see countdown clock). I think the useful path to navigate through this minefield is to keep our eyes on the lessons learned, and turn the awareness into a constructive resolve that the next President should know, in no uncertain terms, that Bush's way is not the way we want things done.

At least, there seems to be a large majority that views things this way, though I know that there's still a significant minority that seems inexplicably (to me) pleased with Bush's performance in office. The McCain campaign's schizophrenic rhetoric about change-while-staying-the-course signals that Republicans are fully aware of the problem, but haven't figured out how to square that circle.

"As for the media, is there any possibility that they agree with the message he is deliverling in this instance, without feeling compelled to change their overall assessment of Bush?"

Yep. Bush is hoist on his own petard--he has to say what he's saying, even if he has no credibility left to back it up. I really wouldn't infer any change in policy or thinking on Bush's part, so no reason to change the assessment of Bush.

Our domestic media knows a lot more about domestic politics than they know about foreign affairs, and like a dog that's been kicked for years, they're still skittish about challenging the Bush party line. The combination is likely why the media isn't drawing more attention to the emperor's state of undress. Not that they really have to, in any case: Seems as though everybody appreciates the sad irony of the situation Bush has put us in.

And give the media a little credit: They seem to remember that America can have only one president at a time, even if McCain seems to have forgotten, what with his declamation that "We're all Georgians now!" and bellicose promises to fight Russia in the air, on the sea, and in the trenches, and to nevuh surrenduh in the ideological struggle against International Communism...or something like that.