** The institution of a voting process that practically asks for election-stealing;
** The practice of politics by character assassination.
** The degradation of our public discourse through the distortion and disregard of science, the "fixing " of intelligence, and the denigration of expertise as well as by secretly-paid commentators, and administration-produced advertisements presented as real news;
** The pattern of lies by this presidency to Congress and to the American people about vital national issues, not least in the selling of an unnecessary war '
(Again, the list could be multiplied.)
In subverting our democracy, this Bushite regime is attacking the heart of America what generations of Americans going off to war have been told we must fight to protect. This is what takes this presidency beyond other failed or corrupt or criminal administrations.
Not only does this administration embody the sins of all the past administrations corruption, abuse of power, leading us along the path of destruction but the crisis of this moment in American history is unique in this crucial respect: the problem is not that this administration is mismanaging a national crisis, it is that they themselves are the crisis.
Maybe a better president than poor Herbert Hoover, one of the presidents Wilentz considers, could have ameliorated the economic crisis stemming from the stock market crash of 1929. But the crisis was coming, independent of Hoover 's leadership, and the hard times suffered in other countries in the global economy do not suggest there was any painless way out for Americans, regardless of the quality of their presidential leadership.
Buchanan mismanaged the escalating American crisis over the issue of slavery. Maybe better leadership could have averted or deferred the outbreak of war, as previous compromises had done. But maybe not. The compromises had already started to break down before Buchanan assumed the presidency.
But this crisis is different. Unlike those of 1861 or 1929 or 1941, the crisis of today is not because of anything that 's happened to our country. (Even if the official story of 9/11 were accepted as true, there 's no reason why that trauma had to precipitate a lasting crisis in our national life.) No, the reason for our present crisis is that we 're being ruled by a regime of lawbreaking, usurpatious, lying, power-lusting and blundering thugs.
It 's not that we need better leadership in this crisis. The leadership is the crisis.
The worst presidency in history? We don 't need the question mark.
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