Stopped Clocks and Time Machines

Obama Beyond Bush - NYTimes.com:

The mental pain and gyrations that liberals are going through as they come to realize that BO is and always was a disaster, the world is blowing up all over, and the domestic economy is disastrously stuck in late '70s mode, is interesting to watch. I started this with a somewhat hopeful note for dawning reason in an obviously "progressive" ideological brain.

And with the Middle East, those defenders sometimes turn Bush’s epic mistakes into Obama’s hall pass. Perhaps he hasn’t figured out what’s right, but he isn’t guilty of the original wrong, which is constantly being litigated anew, as if a fresh verdict on the events of 2003 could alter the challenges and stakes of 2014.

It looked like this guy had figured out that any policy which requires a time machine to be successful is not very likely to be successful, but alas, this columnist is still stuck in his ideological cave, staring at shadows on the wall trying to make the shadows he sees fit his ideological model. He is in a bad way.

The I.R.S. scandal was not as bad as Watergate. (Nothing’s ever as bad as Watergate, which serves a nifty historical function as the gold standard of executive malfeasance and mendacity.)

NOTHING is ever as bad as Watergate? It is true that everyone believes in something -- Christians believe in the deity and saving Grace of Christ, some folks just "believe they will have another beer". I submit that "I believe I will have another beer" is INFINITELY better on the "gotta believe in something" front than "nothing's ever as bad as Watergate"!

Nobody died in Watergate, nobody even had their donor lists released or summarily audited on an ideological basis. Yes, yes, I understand that if your ideology rules all else in your brain, it is OK to see those that don't agree with that ideology punished by your party, but even worse than people dying? Try another beer

If we’re determined to glance back at a figure who flatters Obama, let’s really have at it and look all the way to Warren Harding. Golf wasn’t his only distraction. He also had a thing for poker. And when it came to seeming and feeling overwhelmed, the 29th president, an Ohio Republican, reputedly confessed to friends that he was lost in the job.

By that measure Obama is a rock. But it doesn’t make him a boulder.

How far the mighty have fallen. I understand that someone with the ideological model of this columnist MUST find a Republican rather than the actual 20th century gold standard for failed presidents, Carter, but to see the mental gyrations required is almost painful.

Harding and Coolidge presided over the "roaring 20's" a period of peace and prosperity in America. "Progressives" easily forget the harm an activist president can do, especially one that fails the Outlaw Josie Wales test ("A man's got to know his limitations"). This means they lack the understanding that a stopped clock is at least right twice a day, but a clock that is actively off is NEVER right.

"First do no harm" is an EXCEEDINGLY wise maxim, impossible for "progressives" to understand because they demand that "SOMETHING be done!". One would hope that maybe they won't forget it quite so quickly after BO., but I'm quite certain that is a vain hope.

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