Incomplete

[Plaid Adder]

Listening to the Petraues Report hoop-la while giving PJ a bath, I found myself wondering why they bother going through with it. Nobody believes that things are getting better in Iraq, and I don't see how anyone on Bush's team can imagine that they will. Even Petraeus, when asked by one of the Congresspeople why they should believe that the next six months in Iraq will be significantly different from the last six, answered, basically, "They won't be." So what exactly are they trying to do by dragging this out? His "legacy" is already as deep into the toilet as it could reasonably get. From that standpoint, there's nothing to save. So what's the object of this constant deferral of the inevitable withdrawal?

And then it came to me. Bush knows he's flunking Iraq, but he figures that if he never turns in the final product before his term ends, he'll leave with an incomplete instead of an F.

The "incomplete" is a grade peculiar to graduate school. In many graduate programs, if you fail to complete the big final project before the semester ends, you can take an incomplete, which shows up on your transcript as an I. You are then supposed to eventually complete the project and turn it in, at which point the professor will assign you a grade and the I will convert into something else. Though it seems like a neat backup plan, incompletes are one of the many banes of the grad student's existence, because a lot of them never actually are converted. They accumulate around the unfortunate student, hanging on his/her neck like so many albatrosses, until their combined weight pulls him/her down and s/he quits the program.

Anyway. It all makes sense to me now. All Bush is trying to do--because this is about all he can do, now--is keep that F off his transcript. He'd rather take an incomplete. And of course it's Bush's record that matters, not, you know, people's lives. So that's why we can't withdraw the troops until, you know, January 2009.

:argh:

The Plaid Adder

[patrice]

1. The Backlash cometh.

I think they just about increased it exponentially now. Every new death will be regarded as another sacrifice to the Bush Family.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. My dear Plaid Adder...

You have hit the nail on the head with your analysis, as always...

He wants that incomplete...

He's never completed anything good.......even with help...

He makes me sick.

K&R

[alittlelark]

3. His entire life has been an 'Incomplete'

Why should he change now?

[Cleita]

4. He will have to complete this with an F-minus.

The cosmos just isn't going to give him a pass. Be patient and see.

[cui bono]

5. Yep, it came out that he wants to keep the occupation going so that the

next president will want to pursue it further.

Basically, he wants it to keep going until there IS a next president. It's the only thing that makes me relax my thinking that he won't give up power. I think he'll be GLAD to give it up and hand over the mess.

[Ian_rd]

6. It's theater

The Democrats think there are millions of swing voters out here who will be shocked and consider them traitors if they vote to end the war. These voters don't exist, but they are playing to them anyway. The only people who would actually think that are the mouth-breathers who still answer polls approving of Bush's job performance - people who would never vote for Democrats no matter what. Everyone in that room knows that it's getting worse and yet the script for the play in which they're performing requires them to keep giving it more time, and more, and just a little more, until they feel politically safe in stopping the funding for our self-inflicted bloody and bankrupt blackhole.

I really don't see how it will change. I'm 99% sure that come January 2009, we will still be there, fighting, giving it "just a little more time," spending $4000 per second as we are now, allowing Al Qaeda to bleed us dry indefinitely as we did the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 80s.

[tkmorris]

7. I agree, but I fear for the future as well

It's not just Bush's legacy that is at stake here. The damage these people have done to this country could well be the beginning of the end to this nation.

I fear that the Great American Experiment in Democracy may well come to a close with that same dreaded notation: Incomplete.

[FloridaJudy]

8. Brilliant Observation

In academia however, if a student collects too many "incompletes", the unfortunate scholar is encouraged by his faculty adviser to seek some other endeavor in which prove his talents. Too bad Bu$h has never had that kind of oversight. At least the average feckless student can't do all that much damage.

[Coexist]

9. maybe he will receive a 'gentleman's C'??

[Netbeavis]

10. I agree. If another President withdraws the troops....

then Bush can argue hypothetical and say "we would have won if we stayed the course, it failed because you pulled out." Of course the echo chamber of Krystal, Broder and other neo-cons would use that as the reason why their ideas failed. They would all try to repaint the withdraw and Iraq as the existing presidents bungle and not their own.

Bush's biggest fear is that the world knows just how below average he is. He thinks he has most of us snookered and he is doing his damnest to try and paint himself into history in a positive light.

He can feel that big Scarlet W being painted on his chest and he's doing all he can to wipe it off.

[JBoy]

11. Need more terror warnings

That's just * running out into the hallway to pull the fire alarm. He'll do anything to avoid having to take that test.

[Ganja Ninja]

12. We're fighting today for tomorrow's GOP talking points.

American troops are being killed and maimed, American tax payers are paying 3 billion a week, all so that the GOP can have a talking point in 2009. Imagine that, not fighting for freedom or honor or American security, fighting for a half baked talking point. How much lower can the GOP go?

[humbled_opinion]

13. Scary thought ...

His incomplete becomes the next Presidents problem... So as LBJ turned over to Nixon a war that was failing from its inception but held out long enough to get passed on so will this war turn over to a Democratic President who will have to end it....

Which candidate will honestly end this fiasco? I am afraid that our top runners will not end it and like Nixon will fall prey to the same scenarios of failure that may cause petitioning for even more patience... for just one more year... just a little more blood.... sadly that is how I see this unfolding.

and God forbid we suffer another attack no matter how hard our leaders scream that it was Bush lack of taking action, that caused it... The GOP machine will make it appear that it is the Democrats that are weak and ineffective.

[Cleita]

14. Which is all the more reason we should support Dennis Kucinich.

He's the only candidate that I believe will end this nightmare war for sure. He would not be concerned about his future political career and legacy as much as doing the right thing. I don't believe the other candidates would be as straightforward in doing this as Dennis would be.

[humbled_opinion]

16. I agree, however

The Leading Democrats do not give Dennis the respect that he deserves. Not only has he been right about this Iraqi misadventure from the beginning, he is the only true Progressive candidate... How do we get him elected?

[kdmorris]

15. Sounds like Bush, that's for sure.

Long time, no see! Glad you are back. :toast:

[klyon]

17. Things maybe improving but it is not because of our military.

It's because of sectarian violence, Shiites have run out or killed the Sunnis in most areas they dominate, and the Sunnis have done the same in the other areas. There maybe less killing because people are either dead or gone away to neighboring regions or countries. The refugee problem is hardly ever mentioned.