Dubya's True Colors

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"Redefining the role of the United States from enablers to keep the peace to enablers to keep the peace from peacekeepers is going to be an assignment."

You cannot say the Bush II years will not have entertainment value. The above quote about....well, about who-knows-what comes from a pre-inauguration interview George W. granted to The New York Times. Usually, when the Prince of Midland mugs the English language you can suss out what he meant to say. But this remark was a humdinger. Many more are to come.

It will be as if Norm Crosby, the Friars-generation comedian whose stock-in-trade was malapropisms, has moved into the Circle-Like-Thing Office. Sure, environmental protection will suffer, the labor unions will be under assault, abortion rights will be threatened, health and safety regulations will be undermined, corporate money will continue to flood the political system, the Pentagon will throw tens of billions of dollars down the national-missile-defense rathole, affirmative action programs will be targeted, plans to turn Social Security over to Wall Street will be hatched, and tax-cuts-for-the-rich will remain the holy grail. But Bush will keep us in stitches.

Asked by U.S.A Today what he would feel upon assuming the presidency, Bush replied, "It'll be hard to articulate." You betcha.

Actually, Bush's appointment to be CEO of U.S. Government, Inc. will make life easier, in a way, for Democrats and left-of-center sorts.

Six years ago, as Newt Gingrich was about to assume control of Congress as the Speaker of the House, I asked Representative Barney Frank what that meant for congressional Democrats.

"This will be great," he said, his glee only half-in-jest. "It's more fun and easier to be in the opposition."

It was plain what he meant. With the Republicans wielding power, the congressional Democrats, facing a common enemy, would be unified. Rather than bicker among themselves, as they had during the first two years of the Clinton presidency (wasting the opportunity to achieve major gains in health care reform and campaign finance reform), they would be able to fixate together on the evil Newtites. No longer in charge, the Democrats could shoot poison darts at the GOPers and not have to bear responsibility for the tough job of governing. And, perhaps more importantly, it was not crucial that they resolve internal conflicts within the party -- the longstanding tensions that Clinton exacerbated rather than salved.

In the U.S. political system, there are two main parties, one (the Republicans) is the party of capital, the other (the Democrats) is the party of capital but with a few asteriks. Those asteriks cover the unions, environmentalists, abortion-rights advocates, and civil rights community. The Democrats, like the Republicans, are largely subsidized by corporate dollars. But they also claim to be the party of those who question the laissez-faire perogatives of Corporate America. That does lead to uncomfortable confusion -- within the party, and among progressives outside the party who attempt to fashion a relationship with the party.

Clinton embodied the party's dissonance. He pushed for a minimum wage; he pissed off unionists by crusading for Nafta, GATT, no-conditions trade with China, and globalization.

He fought GOP attempts to rollback environmental regulation; he disappointed enviros by doing little on global warming, alternative energy, and automobile fuel efficiency.

He battled for abortion-rights and modest gun control, but he angered liberals by pushing welfare reform, expanding the death penalty, and pressing for a crime bill that trampled civil liberties.

He expanded the federal health insurance program for low-income children; he and Hillary botched health care reform by proposing a cockamamie plan designed to win the support of the business community (which predictably shot it down), and the numbers of uninsured grew.