A Fishy Story, Part II

So was Bush joking when he told a German newspaper recently that his best moment in office occurred while he was fishing? I discussed the ramification in my previous post.

I found the transcript (finally) the other day, you can read it at the White House here.

Turns out Bush was joking, assuming that the laughter cue in the transcript is accurate. But the White House failed to clarify, and the media were perfectly content to leave the question of Bush's state of mind hanging in the air.

I am still not sure exactly how Bush intended his statement to be taken. Is Bush tired of petty attacks? Is he trying to mock his 31 percent approval rating? The humor is a little imprecise and people aren't sure he was joking. Not good. A sharper point could have been made by stating that his best moment in office was catching a fish, but adding the tagline "... or at least that's what my Democratic friends in Congress would like you to believe."

Or something like that. Maybe next time.

The Bush Legacy: A Fishy Story

In today's Washington Post, we read that the Democrats are poised to swiftly enact their agenda and "launch a series of investigations of the Bush administration" should they take over the House in November. Furthermore,

[Democratic House Minority Leader] Pelosi denied Republican allegations that a Democratic House would move quickly to impeach President Bush. But, she said of the planned investigations, "You never know where it leads to."

And so the war cry has gone out:

Campaign chiefs for Republican Senate and House candidates have already begun using the threat of such investigations to raise money and rile core Republican voters. A recent mailing by Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.), chairwoman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, warned that Democrats "will call for endless congressional investigations and possibly call for the impeachment of President Bush!"

Strange, but I feel more riled up about the fact that Dole's NRSC spent money on attack ads against Senator Lincoln Chafee's conservative primary opponent. Chafee was the sole Republican to vote against Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito.

Meanwhile, George Bush has informed everyone of the greatest moment of his presidency thus far:

BERLIN (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush told a German newspaper his best moment in more than five years in office was catching a big perch in his own lake. * * * "I would say the best moment of all was when I caught a 7.5 pound(3.402 kilos) perch in my lake," he told the newspaper in an interview published on Sunday.

More suitable answers that are hard to disagree with do come to mind. How about, for starters, the moment he announced the liberation of the people of Iraq from the iron grip of a ruthless dictator? Or the moment he stood with the firefighters of New York City at the World Trade Center site and vowed to fight?

Maybe he was joking. Or trying to be "down to earth." Whatever it was, it was not inspiring.

This President is in a funk. The Republican Party is in a funk. Republican leaders must take decisive action and return the party to its fiscally conservative Reaganesque roots or Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats will be in charge of the House.