It is indeed possible to argue that some of the broader accusations regarding the Katrina disaster are poorly founded (that the hurricane was caused by the Bush refusal to sign Kyoto, that the Bushies robbed the New Orleans levee projects to seek cheap oil in Iraq, that a Cat 4 hurricane can hit a major metropolis that sits below water and within three days everyone in the city can be sitting in government-paid-for comfort at Hyatt hotels around the country, sipping afternoon tea and playing Fantasy Football).
That said, even if every single politico, from Bush down to Joe-Bob Police Commissioner in NOLA, were as innocent as the driven snow and as diligent as Javert in having tried to avert the catastrophe and recover from it as quickly and intelligently and compassionately as possible, the very nature of what’s happened and the inevitable difficulty in recovering from it would have spelled political doom for all of them. The fact that the preparation and recovery effort have been filled with — to this day are filled with — not just the normal difficulties of getting past a cataclysm of this sort, but difficulties compounded by missteps, miscommunication, abdication of leadership, imposition of piss-poor leadership, and just general mismanagement from soup to nuts — aided and abetted by obstinacy, barbarism, and cruelty amongst some of the the citizenry of the NOLA area — makes that doom even more certain.
The fact is, I expect nearly every elected official in Louisiana to be shown the door in the next election, certainly in the executive branch, regardless of political party. And I expect the GOP to take it in the shorts in the midterm elections next year, quite possibly losing majority in status in the House. And I suspect that Bush’s ostensible successor, whomever that turns out to be, to lose pretty substantially to a Democratic challenger in ’08.
At the very least, 2008 is now even more the Dem’s election to lose — which, to be fair, they’ve shown admirable ability to do over the years. All the Dems have to do is show themselves more interested in solving the problems than in shrilly pointing fingers at their opponents or coming across as trying to exploit this politically. The fact is, the Katrina disaster is a huge political win for the opposition party, without the need to rub it in. It demonstrates just how ill-prepared the Bush Administration is, after four years of post-9/11 activities, to keep the US safe. I mean, substitute a dirty bomb or a bio-weapons release or some similar mass destructive event for a Cat 4 hurricane, and NOLA could have been any of a dozen different scenarios that the DoD and DHS and everyone else in DC should have been preparing for since September 12, 2001. That, even with advance warning, they’ve so bungled the recovery (and washing one’s hands and saying it’s a “local” matter is hardly convincing in this case), puts lie to the idea that we are significantly safer today than we were back then.
Today, let alone in 2008, the US populace is generally tired of the Iraq War, even if they agree(d) with it. The economic recovery is real, but hardly the booming ’90s (as unrealistic as that would be, or was), and is likely to get seriously dinged by Katrina and fuel prices. The “values” position is still up in the air, but the Right has gotten progressively more tarnished on the matter (lack of backing up words with deeds in Louisiana being a fine example of this). And the final pillar of Bush/GOP political success since 2001, the idea of being secure and protected by the Federal Government against terror attacks and their aftermath, has taken a catastrophic hit in the levees by Katrina.
Unless the Dems manage to completely blow it (not beyond the realm of possibility, sadly), I expect things to mightily change in Washington after the ’06 elections, and even moreso after ’08. And, frankly, I’m looking forward to it.
And, now that I’ve said it, watch it all not come true, dagnabbit.
It’s highly likely the big Dem suits will blow it completely, unfortunately. The current process for choosing a candidate is totally antiquated and gives some states way too much say in picking the horse we pin all our hopes on (or in some cases, the horse’s ass, but that’s another matter).
It’ll never happen, but I wish that there would be a series of nationally televised candidate forums for the major parties with serious discussion of the issues, followed by a period where candidates could make personal appearances in a variety of states of their own choosing, and then a one-day national primary. For everyone.
It would just be nice for the whole country to be able to vote on who they think would be their party’s best candidate heading into the conventions, where the details of the campaigns would be finalized.
But of course, pipe dream. Never happen. The powers that be (and those all-important early-primary states will never allow sweeping reform.
Thing is, with one exception I can’t think of a single Dem who could be a real leader, and he’s too young to run in ’08 IMHO: Obama.
Obama Rocks!
I would love to have him run in ’08.
MrsDoF lay awake last night, and sighed… “How much longer will Bush be in office?”
Sadly, I must agree with Ginny – the Dems will come up with a spectacularly annoying candidate who will lose in ’08. Also, watch the spin machine go into super-warp overdrive to posit the President and his crowd as apolitical heroes wading through a hurricane of criticism to deliver much-needed aid to the suffering folks on the gulf coast. After all, they’re not playing “the blame game.”
(As John Stewart says, “Blame Game” is how you denigrate accountability when it applies to you.)
So my prediction is that the Dems will blow it in ’06 and ’08.
I like Obama too. A lot.
What I’ve seen of Obama so far looks very promising.
While the Dems are certainly capable of putting together someone who will completely blow the election — the DNC drives toward the inoffensive, and the Vocal Left drives to the far Left, so as a result Dems usually end up choosing a gray non-entity whose discredited by the shrill ideologues that ran against him — the GOP is not without its problems here.
In particular, there’s nobody in the Republican wings with a shadow of Dubya’s populist appeal (we can debate the extent to which that appeal is worth a damn, but if you don’t engage the electorate, you don’t win — see the last two presidential elections). Neither Frist nor DeLay have, I think, much popular support, Cheney (assuming he survives that long) is a serious non-starter, and, so far, Bush can’t run for a third term (insert paranoid speculation about martial law and suspension of the elections here).
Add to that the GOP populist appeal is, itself, pretty tarnished, even without the huge hit its taken from Katrina. This whole thing has, I think, shaken the whole GOP hold on the Deep South — to the extent that they think the GOP still holds to their Red State *values*, the idea that they are getting much more than lip service to their *needs* is going to be pretty dubious. And note that if the GOP takes a hit in the southeast statehouses in the ’06 elections, that’s going to have an indirect effect on some of the electoral maneuverings leading up to ’08.
But, again, if we end up with someone who’s *not* a dynamic just-left-of-centrist running on the Dem ticket in ’08, it’s anyone’s bet whose troubles will alienate more of the electorate and hand the election to the extremes in three years.
I was reading the bios of the dudes (and 1 dudette) on the Senate Judiciary Committee today, and was surprised to see that Joe Biden (who I like more than mosta da Dem suits) spoke at Strom Thurmond’s funeral. Which, naturally, took place in South Carolina, one of those early primary states. He’s a grandstander, though. He’ll have to watch that.
Biden’s a mixed bag. There are aspects of him I like, and aspects of him I find business-as-usual politico. Then there’s his plagiarism problem from a few years back.
Still, there are certainly worse out there.
On the other hand, he’s been a big supporter of Big Media/DMCA/copy-protection/broadcast-flag kind of stuff. Which irks me sorely.