This Week's Attitude
President's Reality Show Doomed From The Start
By Neil S. Friedman

The new television season is underway. There have only been a few debuts so far, but it kicks into high gear over the next two weeks with the return of many favorites and the debut of several new shows.

But one reality show revived last Thursday evening was the same tired, tenuous premise rashly introduced over four years ago that has gradually lost most of its audience. It has no formal title, so let's call it "George of the Bungle." The current White House chief resident, George W. Bush, hosts it. More than 60 percent of Americans prefer it was canceled. The rest of us anxiously await its demise as it has already cost countless lives and trillions of dollars.

Why is this show still operational? Merely because the chief executive producer's got a four-year deal, based on his personal flawed, inflexible reality. Whether or not a successor fares any better remains to be seen following his exodus late next year, but he/she (it's safe to say she for the first time) will surely have to find the speediest resolution to the inherited mess.

In case you haven't grasped it yet, I'm referring to the President's dog-and-pony show.

During the 15-minute opus, Bush said that America must maintain its obligations in Iraq or it will become a haven for anti-American terrorists after he's retired. For the umpteenth time, he employed fear to convince the nation that the mission can still be accomplished.

As The Who's Pete Townsend wrote in a classic rock song,, "We won't get fooled again."

Sponsored by those who brought us the abortive Gulf War under George Bush the First, the sequel is much worse, especially now that over 3,700 GIs and tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians have died, not to mention the countless soldiers who will forever be maimed physically and psychologically. (There are those who would callously remark, "Oh well, that's the price of war.")

Though last week's program was puffed up to be fresh, it was nothing more than the same old whine slightly modified. Nonetheless, it is time for those in Congress with a conscience to cautiously pull the plug on it to show the producers that when a program is as unpopular and ill fated as the Iraqi War for Freedom, it makes no sense to retool it.

When Bush concluded his political choreography - clearly designed to coincide with the sixth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on 9/11/01 - most of the audience was just as bewildered, not to mention as frustrated as it has been for some time about the plot.

The President's math couldn't fool a third grader. The number of soldiers in Iraq before the surge was executed earlier this year was reported at 130,000. The additional manpower raised it to 160,000, but the extra troops were only sent there for a limited period, which happens to expire precisely when Bush said we would start bringing home 30,000 troops. Therefore, when those troops leave, we'll still have the identical number we had back in January.

If anybody fell for the White House withdrawal plan, I've got a 120-year-old bridge - in pretty good condition - I'd like to sell 'em.

General Patraeus may be a respected career soldier, but his Congressional testimony 48 hours before the Bush's speech was nothing more than keeping step with his Commander-in-Chief. And generals don't defy orders! Anybody who believes otherwise is as naive as those who still believe Iraq had more of a direct link to 9/11 than our Saudi Arabian allies.

President Bush can't see the forest for the trees. It is quite obvious that he got into the war he wanted and has refused to heed the advice of commissions and former intelligence and military advisors who warned him that the road he had taken was risky and misguided. Nevertheless, he stubbornly pursued it and will likely leave his predicament for others to put an end to.

Bush and his weakened bunch of supporters champion the war hoping to secure a victory - as if nothing else matters - but that objective seems farfetched, particularly since the government we are propping up can't seem to stand on its own. (Sorta like Vietnam déjà vu. Human lives and money sacrificed with no light at the end of the tunnel.)

Consequently, when few care and a program continues to reap low ratings, it is destined for failure - just like George W. Bush's presidential legacy.