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Culling the Herd

The prospective presidential pachyderm parade was the talk of the blogs yesterday and there was definitely a prevailing theme during the debate: don't mention Bush. While there were numerous invocations of former president Ronald Reagan, only once was Bush mentioned, and only then was it about how the candidates would be different from the current White House occupant.

One way they are trying to differentiate themselves from Bush is in combating terrorism, an area in which the Bush administration has been rather delinquent despite recent attempts to blame all the ills of Iraq on Al-Qaeda. John McCain gave a rather creepy tirade about following Osama Bin Laden to the gates of hell. But the award for the most asinine anti-terror policy goes to Mitt Romney. According to Mitt, Bin Laden doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things because there will always be someone to take his place. I tend to agree with that sentiment but I think it down plays his importance in the terms of closure for the victims of his violence. But then there was Mitt's claim that this war is about the efforts of a whole horde of organizations bent on causing the collapse of moderate Islamic governments and the establishment of a modern day caliphate in the Middle East. No mention of Iran though, guess he forget they're the latest boogeyman de jour.

Such ignorance of the intricacies of the geopolitical landscape is only matched by the Bush administration's similar lack of vision. If this is the best the GOP has to offer, more tough-guyism lacking any basis in reality, we may find ourselves longing for the good old days of Bush II.

(Filed at State of the Day)