I was relaxing with a cup of tea the other day. Thinking that in these tumultuous times we need to look for help from any place we can find it, I decided to consult the leaves at the bottom of my cup.
Here is what they said (approximately):
George W. Bush (The President) is, contrary to common belief, really a very clever man. So clever that he has, in fact, created a new thing in American politics.
Since the office of Vice President became an elected office, rather than being awarded to the second-place finisher in the presidential sweepstakes, the candidates running for president have typically selected V.P running mates they hoped would help their own election chances. Afterwards, toward the end of their term of office, the presidents would try, in one way or another, to help their veeps advance to the top position. This requires a kind of makeover whereby someone who has spent years carrying out the presidential garbage is magically transformed into someone who looks presidential himself. This is a difficult thing to do - particularly if the president dislikes his v.p., or vice versa, as is usually the case.
President Bush has completely changed this paradigm (I apologize, but this much-abused word is sometimes the appropriate one). He (Bush) chose for his v.p. running mate a place-holder. Someone who is not going to be running in his turn for president, whether
Dick Cheney realizes it or not. The v.p. is an excellent attack dog it is true, and much loved by a bellicose, perhaps even apocalyptic, segment of the population, but he really has not brought any voters to President Bush that Bush would not otherwise have had. He is thus, as I (or rather, my tea leaves) have said, a place-holder. A cypher. Nil. Nada. Nothing. {I loved writing that}
Here comes the cleverness.
When some member of the neo-con class emerges from that morass and assumes a presidential appearance, expect Dick Cheney to experience "A Cardiac Incident". This will cause him to decide to "Wish To Spend More Time With My Family And Loved Ones." He will, regretfully, offer his resignation. President Bush will, also regretfully, accept the tendered resignation. The President will, after a diligent search, turn up his already-determined successor.
The new Vice President will be:
1. Already presidential in appearance;
2. Unencubered by the negative baggage the office of Vice President always accumulates;
3. Able to avail himself of the opportunities the office affords in the awarding of patronage and consequent accumulation of political IOUs.
Thus, the V.P. will begin his presidential campaign against Candidate Hillary already looking presidential, and the GOP won't have to attempt a makeover.
Brilliant!The one hitch, which of course the attentive reader will have already spotted, is finding that presidential-looking far-right Republican Stalwart. Looking back, it's pretty clear that President Bush has been previewing potential candidates right along. Unfortunately (or otherwise, depending on your viewpoint), they have all flopped.
The first, certainly, was
Colin Powell. The man looks and sounds presidential all right, but his long and heretofore honored record shows him to be a reliable follower, but no leader. Fotrunately he knows this about himself and declines to pursue an office beyond his competence.
The next offering was, I think,
Tom Ridge. President Bush made use of the otherwise useless office of Homeland Security forced upon him by
Joseph Lieberman to present his friend Tom Ridge to the public. However, Gov. Ridge always appeard in public looking as if he was waiting for a Drop Drill to begin. He won the award for Most Uncomfortable Looking Personality On TV two years running and has now, blessedly, retired.
Senator
Bill Frist was next, elevated before his time to Senate Majority Leader. A telegenic man, with truly wonderful credentials. A man of demonstrated intelligence, skill, humanity. The Senate, in no mood to be trifled with by a relative rookie, routinely savaged him until he retreated into the background. They may be trying to rehabilitate Sen. Frist by bringing him out once again to talk to us about the Indian Ocean Tsunami Disaster.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is today the obvious choice (you knew this was coming, didn't you?). There are some problems of course. The obvious one is that he can't legally be president. There is a comma in Section v. of Article II of the Constitution of the United States of America, put there by his enemies to prevent Alexander Hamilton from becoming president, that keeps Gov. Schwarzenegger ineligible. A Constitutional Amendment to make it legal for native Americans
AND Austrian-born bodybuilders to be president would likely take too long in the tortuous pathways of Constitutional-Amendment-Passing to qualify him for 2008. He's also too easygoing on those un-American homosexuals and abortionists, as far as the hard-right-moral-rectitude-above-all GOP shadow leadership is concerned.
Porter Goss has just been trotted forth, and in Father Bush's old job, even! However, Spook-in-Chief Goss has almost immediately fallen into the -umm-... manure of the Augean stables that the national intelligence services have shown themselves to be. For a worse performance by an administrator, you'd have to look at the current resident of the White House himself.
The man Pres. Bush really would like for a successor is probably Brother
Jeb Bush. And he certainly owes B.J. big-time. But he (Jeb) also fails the public appearance test. And besides, the dynastic appearance of candidate Jeb would just be too much - I think we'll have to wait for 2016 and George Prescott Bush for the next Bush presidency. By which time the Bush-Iraq war will have cost America, or rather the "Coalition of the Willing", more lives than Vietnam, possibly finally making Yet-Another-President-Bush problematic.
So, who is it to be?
Who will step up to the plate?
Who will take on Senator
Hilary Clinton in 2008?
It's going to have to be someone who is abjectly sycophantic to the present administration, yet one who doesn't appear to be so. Who?
Condoleeza Rice? Tommy Franks? Paul Wolfowitz? Don Rumsfeld? Anybody Else?
The field is wide open!
The tea leaves have spoken.
