{"id":12564,"date":"2007-08-16T14:15:16","date_gmt":"2007-08-16T18:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/12564.html"},"modified":"2007-08-16T14:15:16","modified_gmt":"2007-08-16T18:15:16","slug":"sinking-ship-to-lose-several-more-rats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/sinking-ship-to-lose-several-more-rats\/","title":{"rendered":"Sinking ship to lose several more rats"},"content":{"rendered":"

The AP, noting the president’s dwindling hopes of enacting any kind of agenda, described the landscape<\/a> fairly well today: “[Bush’s] strength is sapped by an unpopular war, Democrats are running Congress, and the 2008 presidential election is in full roar, distracting attention from the president’s priorities. With dwindling options, Bush has decided he might get more done in his final months by going it alone.”<\/p>\n

At this rate, Bush may not have a choice but to “go it alone”; there won’t be anyone left at the White House. Tony Snow told<\/a> conservative media personality Hugh Hewitt that he’ll be stepping down in the not-too-distant future — and he won’t be alone.<\/p>\n

HEWITT: Are there any other resignations upcoming, Tony Snow?<\/p>\n

SNOW: I think that probably…as Josh said the other day, he thinks there are probably a couple coming up in the next month or so….<\/p>\n

HEWITT: Your intention to go the distance, Tony Snow?<\/p>\n

SNOW: No, I’m not going to be…I’ve already made it clear I’m not going to be able to go the distance, but that’s primarily for financial reasons. I’ve told people when my money runs out, then I’ve got to go.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s worth noting, by the way, that Tony Snow feels compelled to leave his White House job, which pays him $168,000<\/a> with a sweet benefits package, because he’s running out of money. If a guy can’t get by on $168,000, the economy can’t be that<\/i> good.<\/p>\n

Looking at the big picture, however, it’s worth noting that it is not at all unusual for a White House to undergo major staffing changes shortly before the end of a second term, but the Bush gang is hemorrhaging staff with about 15 months<\/i> to go.
\n
\nThinkProgress did a nice job coming up with a list<\/a> of recently-announced resignations, including White House Senior Political Adviser Karl Rove<\/a>, White House Counselor Dan Bartlett<\/a>, White House Political Director Sara Taylor<\/a>, and White House Director of Strategic Initiatives Pete Wehner<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What’s more, let’s not forget the cabinet. Bush has already lost two members of his cabinet since the election — Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld<\/a> and Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jim Nicholson<\/a> — and Bob Novak reported<\/a> recently that “there are a number of [other] cabinet members who would like to leave.”<\/p>\n

If he looks like a lame duck, and he quacks like a lame duck….<\/p>\n

For what it’s worth, John Podesta, Bill Clinton’s final chief of staff, has some advice<\/a> for keeping Bush focused on getting something<\/i> done before leaving office, most notably keeping a “positive and robust” agenda.<\/p>\n

I have no idea what that might include, and I suspect Bush doesn’t either.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The AP, noting the president’s dwindling hopes of enacting any kind of agenda, described the landscape fairly well today: “[Bush’s] strength is sapped by an unpopular war, Democrats are running Congress, and the 2008 presidential election is in full roar, distracting attention from the president’s priorities. With dwindling options, Bush has decided he might get […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12564\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}