Blame Dubya First

The new mantra for liberals is "Blame Dubya First!". Combined with a low popularity of the president, it is extremely fashionable to blame the president for everything that goes wrong. Blame Bush for the dandruff and for the dog that chases you during your morning run. I just hit my thumb with a hammer and I swore : "Damn you Bush!"

However, with the pain long gone, let me inspect the rationality of blaming the President for the various problems, perceived or real, that the country is facing. I have chosen four areas: Iraq war, energy crisis, sagging economy and mismanagement of Hurricane Katrina.

I am not an ardent supporter of wars. Not even Iraq war. But to hold the President as the sole scapegoat for whatever shortcomings of the Iraq war is delusional. The Senate and the House, both Republicans and Democrats supported the war. The same people who are blaming Bush for the failures in Iraq were spineless to oppose it before it started. Now that it is fashionable to oppose war, majority of them are against it. Blaming Bush is the way they are refusing to own up their responsibility. Why were they afraid to oppose back then? Because the polls said that the majority of Americans wanted it. They did not have guts to take a moral stand when it was unpopular. Democrats were screaming for Bush to stop Saddam and his WMD. The same people would flip again if the war in Iraq suddenly becomes very popular with the American public. This morality of convenience also makes them forget about the achievements of the war. Back then there was no question about the need of liberating a country from a tyrant who was oppressing all opposition brutally. Now that Saddam is dead and gone, people are forgetting, conveniently, about the positive effects of the invasion. If there is a mess in Iraq, we have to deal with it and let the process complete itself. We cannot just cut and run.

Everybody is bashing bush for the high gas prices. They fail to recognize two things. One: the current high prices are the result of market forces that are beyond the control of the American president. The global supply of oil is almost constant and the consumption is getting higher by the day. This results in an imbalance in the supply-demand equilibrium and the market readjusts by the way of higher prices. This brings to account the second accusation. It is his energy policy that created this mess which could have been avoided. Highly unlikely. Energy policy cannot alter the way a nation consumes energy in a few years. If any flaw in the American energy policy was responsible for the crisis, then the flaw existed for decades. So the blame should be borne by the previous administrations, including Bush Sr, Clinton, Reagan and beyond. However, whether they could have predicted the changes in the global economy that results in the higher oil prices is yet another question. Blaming bush is escapism. Again, let's consider some of the short term measures that can ease the prices a bit. The White House has repeatedly asked/begged Congress to pass legislation that allow drilling in Alaska, which has more oil than Saudi Arabia; allow offshore drilling in the Gulf Coast and California and to allow more nuclear plants to be built. Answers to all of the above from the Democrats and many Republicans is a staunch NO! The technology has evolved so much in the past decade and anyone who is for protecting the environment should add limits/provisions to ensure that in the bill. A blind opposition to any of these is downright moronic.

The main factor behind the economic downturn is the mortgage crisis and the resulting credit crunch. These are the results of decades of indiscipline and over inflation of house prices. Everyone said the house prices will continue to rise perpetually. This led to widespread fiscal irresponsibility by home owners and the lenders. George W Bush did not force these folks to buy bigger houses than they could afford by lying about their income. He did not force the hordes of people to ignore the contracts while signing Adjustable Rate Mortgages and then again use any available inflated equity to buy Plasma TVs. There is only one policy that could have saved thousands from home-foreclosures. There is only one action that could have stopped the credit crunch from happening. It is called personal responsibility.

Another blame that George W Bush has borne singlehandedly is that he is behind everything evil that happened with the Hurricane Katrina. Bush did not create the hurricane. It is a natural phenomenon. He did not make it more severe. There have been far worse hurricanes in the past. He did not designed or built the levees that were broken. Again, the Office of the President of the United States of America has nothing to do with the Hurricane Contingency plans for the area. They are formulated by the state of Louisiana and the city of New Orleans. The plan was put in action by the state effectively. It gave plenty of warnings and asked for mandatory evacuation from the area. It is not Dubya's fault that one in five people in New Orleans refused to leave. They were amply warned. It is not his fault that there were many people in New Orleans who had no cars or were sick. I've never read anywhere that the duties of the president includes making sure that every citizen is healthy, owns a car and shows common sense. Well, some of these are failings, but you cannot blame Bush alone for that. He rushed all the help that he could as fast as he can. You cannot expect him to go down there and start airlifting people out of rooftops all by himself. The convoys of food and other stuff takes time to organize and to reach a flooded area.

I am not claiming that George W Bush is the finest president that America has ever seen. But he is not the monster that the liberals portray him to be. To counter their claims, these facts are out there to be seen by anyone who cares to look. But as I have read in the internet, "If the sun were to explode, the Liberals would spend their last few minutes blaming it on Bush."