Not Your Father's Harley!

Harley Sorensen spews out typical anti-Bush bile for SF Gate in A Preview of Four More Years. What's most amusing about the column is not its droll doom-and-gloom tone (which it has), or its unfamiliarity with well-known facts (which it has, like Bill Clinton's refusal to accept the handover of Osama bin Laden), but its blatant self-contradiction.

On the economy, Sorenson writes:

Bush is a man who has defied all expectations, including his own. There was no way he should have won the presidency four years ago. The economy, although headed for a recession [emphasis added], was bringing prosperity to investors and workers alike.

but in the next paragraph, he says:

We were at peace. All the social indicators, such as crime rates and unwanted pregnancy rates, were looking good. The trends were so favorable there was little reason to believe the voters would reject a member of the team that brought us all that good news.

To rephrase the italics above, "the economy was trending towards recession." Or was he talking about social trends alone? But is being at peace a social trend? If not, what trends? This is just sloppy emotionalism on the part of someone who is not too terribly critical of Clinton.

On Bush's honesty, Sorensen ignores the four years' worth of evidence and looks for him to be like his father (you know, the one who quit half-way through the first Persian Gulf War):

A predictable Bush will soon prove to be his father's son when he breaks his solemn campaign promise to not institute a military draft. Read his lips. They're moving? Words are coming out? He's a politician? He's lying.

Bush not only never said, "Read my lips," he has already shown that he keeps his own promises. As even Sorensen is aware, Bush "lowered taxes." I do believe that was a campaign promise, Harley.

Sorensen isn't even happy when Bush does look to continue one of those "so favorable" trends that make him puzzled that Bush ever got elected in the first place! (Unless I'm wrong that locking up criminals does contribute to a lower crime rate....)

The prison-building industry, inspired by Ronald Reagan, continued by Bush (41), and greatly accelerated by Bill Clinton, will prosper.

And finally, the "un-Davidson" ends with this doozie: "Take heart, boys and girls. ... sooner or later morning will return to America." That sounds a whole lot like Ronald Reagan's reelection slogan, but the rest of that column sure didn't sound like Sorensen thought of Dub's presidency as the "dawn!"

But heck, I'd take another Reagan any time! Kudos to Sorensen for that thought -- and all the laughs, of course!

-- CAV