Bush's Risky Move

"Indeed, despite George W. Bush and Dick Cheney's howls of outrage at Russian aggression in Georgia and the disputed province of South Ossetia, the Bush administration set a deep precedent for Moscow's actions -- with its own systematic assault on international law over the past seven years. Now, the administration's condemnations of Russia ring hollow. . . .

"The problem with international law for a superpower is that it is a constraint on overweening ambition. Its virtue is that it constrains the aggressive ambitions of others. Bush gutted it because he thought the United States would not need it anytime soon. But Russia is now demonstrating that the Bush doctrine can just as easily be the Putin doctrine. And that leaves America less secure in a world of vigilante powers that spout rhetoric about high ideals to justify their unchecked military interventions. It is the world that Bush has helped build."

Seumas Milne writes in an opinion piece for the Guardian that "underlying the conflict of the past week has . . . been the Bush administration's wider, explicit determination to enforce US global hegemony and prevent any regional challenge, particularly from a resurgent Russia. . . .

"Over the past decade, Nato's relentless eastward expansion has brought the western military alliance hard up against Russia's borders and deep into former Soviet territory. American military bases have spread across eastern Europe and central Asia, as the US has helped install one anti-Russian client government after another through a series of colour-coded revolutions. Now the Bush administration is preparing to site a missile defence system in eastern Europe transparently targeted at Russia.

"By any sensible reckoning, this is not a story of Russian aggression, but of US imperial expansion and ever tighter encirclement of Russia by a potentially hostile power. That a stronger Russia has now used the South Ossetian imbroglio to put a check on that expansion should hardly come as a surprise. What is harder to work out is why Saakashvili launched last week's attack and whether he was given any encouragement by his friends in Washington.

"If so, it has spectacularly backfired, at savage human cost. And despite Bush's attempts to talk tough yesterday, the war has also exposed the limits of US power in the region."

Rosa Brooks writes in her Los Angeles Times opinion column: "Once he stopped swooning over the soulfulness of 'Vladimir's' baby blues, Bush seemed intent on showing Putin and other Russian leaders that he no longer gave a damn. . . .

"Meanwhile, the administration singled out Georgia for the 'Our Best Buddy in the Caucasus' award. . . .

"But it's all gone disastrously wrong for our best buddies, and we're sitting on the sidelines, offering empty reassurances to the Georgians and empty threats to the Russians.

"Moscow will stop pummeling Georgia when it decides the Georgians have truly been punished enough. And this being the real world, punishment will rain down on the pawns -- but those who egged them on (to score political points, seek power or gain profit) will, of course, face no punishment at all."

The Washington Post editorial board scolds "the foreign policy sophisticates" who "cluck and murmur that, after all, the Georgians should have known better than to chart an independent course -- and what was the Bush administration thinking when it encouraged them in their dangerous delusions? . . .

"[I]f the charge is that the Bush administration encouraged Georgia's yearnings for true independence, the verdict surely is 'guilty'. . . .

"[I]f Ukrainians -- or Georgians, Armenians or anyone else -- recoil at Russia's authoritarian model and choose to associate with the West, should the United States refrain from 'egging them on'? Since the days of the Soviet Union, when the United States never abandoned the cause of 'captive nations,' American policy has been that independent nations should be free to rule themselves and shape their future. How, and how effectively, the United States can support those aspirations inevitably will vary from case to case and from time to time, and supporting those aspirations certainly won't always involve military force. But for the United States to counsel a 'realistic' acceptance of vassal status to any nation would mark a radical departure from past principles and practices."

Pushing Bush

Mikheil Saakashvili himself writes in a Washington Post op-ed: "Russia's invasion of Georgia strikes at the heart of Western values and our 21st-century system of security. If the international community allows Russia to crush our democratic, independent state, it will be giving carte blanche to authoritarian governments everywhere. Russia intends to destroy not just a country but an idea."

Saakashvili calls for the establishment of "a modern version of the Berlin Airlift; the United Nations, the United States, Canada and others are moving in this direction, for which we are deeply grateful."

Charles Krauthammer writes in his Washington Post opinion column that "Bush needs to make up for his mini-Katrina moment when he lingered in Beijing yukking it up with our beach volleyball team while Putin flew to North Ossetia to direct the invasion of a neighboring country. Bush is dispatching Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to France and Georgia. Not a moment too soon. Her task must be to present [a series of] sanctions, get European agreement on as many as possible and begin imposing them, calibrated to Russian behavior."

Putin's Soul

Olivier Knox writes for AFP: "Bush has always been 'clear-eyed' about Russian leaders, the White House insisted Wednesday, as it battled any suggestion that the Georgia crisis showed he had misjudged Moscow.

"But spokeswoman Dana Perino's description recalled Bush's judgment after meeting with Russian then-president Vladimir Putin in June 2001 that he had 'looked the man in the eye,' and gained 'a sense of his soul.'

"'I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy,' said the US president, who also asked Putin to his Texas estate. 'I wouldn't have invited him to my ranch if I didn't trust him.'

"Seven years later, Bush postponed his annual August pilgrimage to that same 'Prairie Chapel' property -- by one or two days -- to track Russia's operations in former Soviet Georgia and publicly called Moscow's word into question."

Another Poke

And just to make sure it didn't go under the radar, the White House press office this morning called attention to this Jan Cienski story in the Financial Times: "Talks on building part of a US missile defence shield on Polish soil restarted on Wednesday, with Polish officials sending much more positive signals than recently, in part because of fears awakened by the Russian attack on Georgia.

"Donald Tusk, the Polish prime minister, said this week: 'The Georgian issue shows that in the generally understood area of the former Soviet bloc, real security guarantees are important.'"

The Endangered Species End-Run

The Bush administration push for a last-minute regulatory overhaul that would effectively gut the Endangered Species Act is prompting howls of protest from editorial boards across America.

The Detroit Free Press editorial board writes: "No one yelled louder than the Bush administration 7 1/2 years ago when President Bill Clinton's agency chiefs filed several new regulations on their way out the door. But clearly the current administration learned from the Clinton actions. How many other regulatory changes are up their sleeves, do you suppose?"

The Ventura County Star editorial board writes: "It's no secret the Bush administration, along with conservative Republican lawmakers and special-interest industries -- mining, logging and oil -- dislike environmental laws, complaining they are costly and run roughshod over property rights.

"Since taking office, this administration has disregarded scientific advice and worked steadily, with some success, to weaken federal environmental laws, often behind closed doors, as a favor to special interests. . . .

"Congress needs to act quickly to stop the dismantling of this safety net for endangered plants and animals when it returns to work in September."

The Raleigh News and Observer editorial board writes: "Besides the administration's poor environmental track record, another thing that makes this entire move suspicious is that it comes as President Bush is winding down his two disappointing terms as president. It's as if he's trying to give his 'pave paradise' buddies a few meaty favors before he leaves office."

The Casper (Wyo.) Star-Tribune editorial board writes: "A loud public outcry is needed to halt the process. If not, it will take some time to undo the damage the outgoing administration will have done to the Endangered Species Act. A new administration could freeze any pending regulations or reverse them, but the process could take months. Congress could overturn the rules, but it would require legislation that could take even longer.

"It doesn't happen often, but it's time for Wyoming's congressional delegation to stand up to the Bush administration and let it know that it's not going to let the executive branch usurp its lawmaking authority."

The San Jose Mercury News editorial board writes: "The last year in office can bring out the best or worst in an American president. For President Bush it's the worst, as he maneuvers to circumvent Congress and gut the Endangered Species Act.

"The president must not be allowed to achieve this dishonorable goal. . . .

"[T]he simplest approach would be for McCain and Obama to announce that they would reverse the rules when they take office Jan. 20.

"That should discourage the president and his appointees from wasting time on this fight."

Mukasey Watch

The San Francisco Chronicle editorial board writes: "United States Attorney General Michael Mukasey was advertised as the calm-and-considered choice to succeed the scandalously inept Alberto Gonzales to head the Justice Department. But beginning with his confirmation hearings - when he refused to disavow torturing terrorist suspects - his tenure has become a major letdown.

"His latest action - make that, inaction - was a blithe brush-off to findings that Bush administration gate-keepers used a conservative checklist in vetting appointees to nonpolitical law enforcement posts. . . .

"His shrug-shoulders stance may please the White House, which wants to bottle up the outrage over its legal over-reaching. But it won't assure anyone who was looking to Mukasey, a former federal judge, to be the needed leader to restore impartiality, restraint and morale in a tarnished department."

Marisa Taylor writes for McClatchy Newspapers: "Attorney General Michael Mukasey confirmed plans Wednesday to loosen post-Watergate restrictions on the FBI's national security and criminal investigations, saying the changes were necessary to improve the bureau's ability to detect terrorists.

"Mukasey said he expected criticism of the new rules because 'they expressly authorize the FBI to engage in intelligence collection inside the United States.' However, he said the criticism would be misplaced because the bureau has long had authority to do so.

"Mukasey said the new rules 'remove unnecessary barriers' to cooperation between law enforcement agencies and 'eliminate the artificial distinctions' in the way agents conduct surveillance in criminal and national security investigations."

Helen Thomas Watch

Over at NiemanWatchdog.org, where I am deputy editor, I ask Hearst columnist Helen Thomas what questions she'd be asking at the White House press briefings if she weren't out on medical leave.

Among her questions: "Why does this administration continue to threaten in volatile disputes, despite knowing it cannot follow through?"

Worst President Ever

James Gerstenzang blogs for the Los Angeles Times about a Rasmussen report that finds only 41 percent of Americans believe Bush will go down in history as the worst U.S. President ever. Some nine percent of Republicans rate Bush the worst president ever, compared to 69 percent of Democrats.

Late Night Humor

Stephen Colbert defends Mukasey's decision not to take any further action about the political hiring of career employees. "No one saw this coming. Monica Goodling was an opposition researcher for George Bush's 2000 presidential campaign, which means she dug up dirt on Democratic rivals in order to destroy them. Now, whoever hired her had no way of knowing she would interview employees for the Justice Department in a partisan manner."

Cartoon Watch

Pat Oliphant on brutal, stupid wars, Dwane Powell on Bush's strategy, Stuart Carlson on the motes in Putin's eyes, and Jim Borgman on Bush's fear; Chan Lowe on the missing eagle and John Sherffius on where it went; Dwane Powell on justice, Mukasey-style; and Lee Judge on McCain's Bush problems.