Classy   

From the latest Nixon document dump, the Los Angeles Times has further evidence of Richard Nixon’s bottomless boorishness.

The President’s first year in office was marked by a memo from Presidential  aide Alexander Butterfield, giving Nixon a progress report on efforts to purge the White House of past president’s photographs.

Particular focus was given to the office of Edna Rosenberg, a civil servant since the Hoover administration. Nixon had spotted two photos of John F.Kennedy in her office,  one inscribed to her by Kennedy.

Butterfield reported triumphantly that she had been forced to remove the photos, and the White House was now predecessor-free.

“On January 14th,” Butterfield reported to Nixon, “the project was completed and all 35 offices displayed only your photograph.”

Back ‘N Flat!     

Long hinted, now we know: it’s back to Dallas for the George W. Bushs! The featureless plains of Texas and it’s sprawl will be graced by both home, ranch and Presidential Library after Bush’s retirement.

Never Call Retreat  

The then former President will join two other Sons of Texas who returned after troubled Washington tenures.

  One shipped back to Texas was Education Secretary Rod Paige, who faced allegations of faking Houston graduation rates before going to Washington, and who spent Department funds on illegal propaganda for “No Child Left Behind.”

  And proud Dallasian Alphonso Jackson served as Housing & Urban Development Secretary until his favoritism and pay for play faux pas brought him low.

Fireside Crap   

George W. Bush’s rush to the exits is throwing up all sorts of amusing history-ish oddities, and now we know:

it’s another fall rollout!

Bush boy apologist Steven Hayes says its only just begun.

” We’re going to be seeing a lot more of this and there’s an ongoing Bush legacy project that’s been meeting in the White House, really, with senior advisers, Karl Rove, Karen Hughes has been involved, current senior Bush administration advisers and they are looking at how to sort of roll out the President’s legacy.”

Hayes may be an unreliable narrator,   as the single most prominent conduit for al Qaeda/Saddam Hussein conspiracy theories, but Dick Cheney called him”effective,” so it must be gold.

The rollout began with the President’s trademark cackling over the sweet release of death:

“I don’t spend a lot of time really worrying about short-term history. I guess I don’t worry about long-term history, either, since I’m not going to be around to read it — (laughter)“

…but then Bush’s exit interview with Charlie Gibson  took a new tack on explaining away the war.

Did you know that his biggest disappointment was the failure to find Iraqi WMD?

Gosh that peeved him, and he expressed sorrow for all the foreign governments and Senators who fell for the pipe dream as well.  Left out was just where all this “bad intelligence” came from, or how in the course of confecting it his people ignored and suppressed evidence to the contrary.

As Talking Points Memo pointed out, for media reports to present this as Bush giving ground is to help him in his new lie.

“For Bush to blame the failure of intel for his decision to invade is not a concession at all, and it is not an admission of failure on his part. Rather, it is the opposite of these things. It is an evasion of responsibility for what happened “

Also disapointing was Charlie Gibson, who failed to follow up on his groundbreaking Sarah Palin interivew  and ask Bush himself what the hell the Bush Doctrine was. 

The free floating weirdness of the final days is popping up all over. A DC screening of Frost/Nixon featured renowned Republican suck-up Chris Wallace    taking umbrage at breezy comparisons of Richard Nixon’s criminality with George Bush fightin’ terror.

“I think to compare what Nixon did, and the abuses of power for pure political self-preservation, to George W. Bush trying to protect this country — even if you disagree with rendition or waterboarding — it seems to me is both a gross misreading of history both then and now,” Mr. Wallace said.

Nobody dast blame this man, for he tortured flesh and reality for us!

Sure Knows How To Pickens 

Judging from the Death From Above wingnuts who inhabit its comment section, T. Boone Pickens’  “Pickens Plan” followers need a little less wind power.

The place is a haven for those stirred by the clarion call of

“Where is Ronald Reagan when we need him?“

But Reagan’s energy policies don’t seem to be the draw for this crowd.

The stirring question prompts “Terrence Abrams” to muse

“I’d like some of those jungle assassins to get another shot at Chavez. He is really bad news…”   what with the “Muslim extremist’s plans to keep moving terror troops to staging areas in Cental America.”

To which one “John Galt” replies:

“It sure was great when he sent that missile up Quadafy’s ass.”

Sweet Dreams Are Made Of This  

History Varmints! 

The Lincoln Studies blog downplays the New York Times story on a Lincoln commemorative issue of American Heritage running Confederate tchotsky ads.

Eric Foner and a writer for the special issue are suitably outraged, but the Lincoln Students are rather relaxed.

“How many Confederate-themed items are available at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum gift shop?  I’m not absolutely positive, but I bet you could buy a rebel flag if you wished.”

  Actually, a year ago you could buy this Confederate trinket from the Lincoln Library, but not currently.

The problem with this is the dilution of knowledge such commercial crap can only further, the 21st century version of the post-war reconciliation where everyone agreed to be heroes, do down the blacks, and build the empire.     Fudging up facts, and that great sin in the eyes of neo-cons, relativism, ends us up with bad history, and in schlock.