{"id":7823,"date":"2006-07-01T09:16:12","date_gmt":"2006-07-01T13:16:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=7823"},"modified":"2006-07-01T09:16:12","modified_gmt":"2006-07-01T13:16:12","slug":"taking-a-weed-whacker-to-the-bushes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/taking-a-weed-whacker-to-the-bushes\/","title":{"rendered":"Taking a weed whacker to the Bushes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Guest Post by Morbo<\/a><\/p>\n

With any luck, [tag]President[\/tag] [tag]George W. Bush[\/tag]’s sagging approval ratings will put an end to the Bush family political dynasty, a reign of mediocrity that, when all is said and done, will have plagued the country for 12 (non-consecutive) years.<\/p>\n

A recent poll indicates that [tag]Bush[\/tag] II’s problems appear to be affecting his brother [tag]Jeb[\/tag] as well. Harris Interactive took a poll<\/a> asking people to react to three possible [tag]Republican[\/tag] presidential [tag]candidates[\/tag] and three Democrats. Jeb was the most unpopular of the lot, with 63 percent of respondents saying they would “definitely not” vote for him.<\/p>\n

No Democrat was that unpopular. Forty-seven percent said they would not consider voting for Sen. [tag]Hillary Clinton[\/tag], and the same number said that about Sen. [tag]John Kerry[\/tag]. Forty-eight percent said they would not vote for [tag]Al Gore[\/tag].<\/p>\n

Jeb has insisted he has no interest in running. I’ve never believed that, if only because a pathological inability to tell the truth seems to run in the Bush family. Whatever his true intentions may be, it’s good to know that daunting numbers like this exist. Perhaps they will persuade him to stay out of the race.<\/p>\n

Supposedly, Jeb is the “smart” one. Whether this would make him more or less dangerous than his brother is open to debate. A Bush who combines intelligence with the venality that marks the clan makes me tremble for the nation. On the other hand, one of the things that makes W such a dud is his uncurious nature and willingness to be led by others (who are always evil). A truly smart person is not likely to share these traits.<\/p>\n

With any luck, our country will never have to find out if Jeb would be a worse president than George II. If all goes well, he’ll leave public life later this year.<\/p>\n

Of course, this does not mean we will be entirely shed of the Bushes. Brother Neil seems content to milk the family connections to make himself rich<\/a>, and I expect the twins to pursue the same course. However, I continue to worry about George P., one of Jeb’s sons. Now 30, [tag]George P.[\/tag] is currently a lawyer in private practice in Dallas and, aside from working on W’s campaigns, has shown no interest in a political career — yet. To me, he looks like the type to pop up in 10 or 15 years, just when we think we’re safe.<\/p>\n

If that happens, one thing could save us: George P. apparently likes to stalk women. (See here<\/a>.) That should give the voters pause — but then again, criminal behavior is no barrier to high office these days. After all, just look at George P.’s uncle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Guest Post by Morbo With any luck, [tag]President[\/tag] [tag]George W. Bush[\/tag]’s sagging approval ratings will put an end to the Bush family political dynasty, a reign of mediocrity that, when all is said and done, will have plagued the country for 12 (non-consecutive) years. A recent poll indicates that [tag]Bush[\/tag] II’s problems appear to be […]<\/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-7823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7823","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=7823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7823\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}