Conservative War on Poverty?

"What excited people, initially, was the news that a third of the Louisiana National Guard were in Iraq. That lost its potency when it was understood that the two-thirds who were in Louisiana were not properly deployed at all. It was as though 100 percent were unavailable.

"But I have yet to see a poll that asked (for example), 'Would you favor a cutback on farm subsidies to provide federal aid to New Orleans?' You can almost see media folk sitting back and asking themselves, 'What do I hate? I know what I hate: the Iraq war. Therefore, I'll ask people whether they want to take from the Iraq war to give to New Orleans.'"

Huffington Post blogger Ari Emanuel says Bush is no Truman, having "fallen back on his longstanding inability to own up to his many mistakes. Instead of coming clean, Bush's been repeating again and again that this isn't the time to play the 'blame game.' Actually, Mr. President this is precisely the time to assign blame and accept responsibility.

"And Tuesday's half-hearted 'To the extent the federal government didn't fully do its job right, I take responsibility' doesn't count. It had all the sincerity of a little kid forced by his parents to apologize. Only in this case, it wasn't Bush's parents taking him by the ear (they were too busy worrying about all the underprivileged folks invading Texas), but his pollsters, who clearly let him know that the American people were not buying his blame it on the other guy, shrug and grin approach.

"Watching Bush choke on his carefully-parsed acceptance of responsibility, it hit me that what we need is a 12-step program for presidents addicted to shirking hard truths. Forget impeachment, we need an intervention!"

The Note enumerates how Bush is in a deep hole:

"He has never seen his poll numbers take this kind of hit among Republicans before.

"He has never seen his poll numbers on "strong leader" and "can handle a crisis" take such a hit before.

"He has never seen his efforts to build the Republican Party among African-Americans be so thoroughly undermined before.

"He has never been rolled by Nancy Pelosi before.

"He has never been without Dr. Rice or Ambassador Hughes down the hall during a crisis before.

"He has never had two open-ended spending commitments of tens of billions of dollars before.

"He has never had to take 'responsibility' for such death-infused tragedy before.

"He has never had to rethink whether he has put fully qualified people in critical jobs before.

"He has never had so many well-meaning Republican strategists and Administration aides whole-heartedly agreeing that the White House was too slow off the mark in dealing with a crisis before."

There's more, but you get the idea.

In the New Republic, T.A. Frank says the Roberts hearings have been-- how shall I put it?-- a snooze:

"Perhaps we were spoiled by the Clarence Thomas hearings. There was rage, there was grandstanding, there were references to 'pornographic films,' 'perjury,' and 'pubic hair on my Coke.' . . .

"The Roberts hearings are numbing. They can perhaps be watched in a state of denial, in the hope that drama is just around the corner--the stumble, the incautious phrase that might become an endless sound bite ('I support well-regulated cannibalism,' or something like that)-- but it takes faith and fortitude. When even the subsequent newspaper accounts -- which are free to pounce on just a few seconds of excitement out of many hours of material -- are bland, it's a sign that things are seriously dull.

"And it's for a simple reason: Roberts is a smart fellow, an expert at saying nothing, and no one on the Judiciary Committee is going to get him to say more than nothing."

Newsweek's Michael Hastings was given a tour of a school in Tikrit as the U.S. military tried to show "progress":

"But this is Iraq, and there's inevitably bad news as well. Wednesday, it was even worse than usual. Around the same time I chatted with the teacher, 100 miles to the south in Baghdad, about a dozen bombs went off throughout the city, killing more than 150 and injuring hundreds more . . .

"The jaunt was also intended to highlight Tikrit as town where security was under control. But to get our little group of about a dozen people to the school required 13 armored Humvees and two helicopters--one of them an Apache attack craft--flying close air support. With three soldiers in each Humvee, that makes for about 39 troops, or roughly four soldiers for each 'VIP.' Hundreds of Iraqi police lined the streets from the base to the school, both to show the visiting muckety-mucks their strength and to make sure we didn't get hit."

Finally, Atrios has the photo of that note Bush wrote Condi at the U.N.: "I think I may need a bathroom break. Is this possible." Nothing in this presidency goes unscrutinized.