Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Bush Relaxes as Gaza Burns.

I'm sightly stunned that a man who is due to be out of a job in twenty odd days needs a vacation right now, especially as Gaza burns, but according to ABC News Bush is remaining in Crawford, Texas, and has no plans to cut short his vacation:

Even an emerging crisis in the Middle East, one he pledged to resolve just 13 months ago, has not drawn President George W. Bush from his final vacation before leaving office. Despite his personal pledge at Annapolis last year to broker a deal between Israel and the Palestinians before 2009, this weekend Bush sent his spokesmen to comment in his stead.

The spokesman's statement, while blaming Hamas for the outbreak of violence, did not signal that the United States is prepared to step in to resolve the conflict, suggesting that this president is content to leave the matter for his successor.

Since departing Washington for Crawford on Friday, President Bush has made no attempt to be seen in public. In fact, he has yet to leave his ranch.

His spokesmen said that the president has stayed in the loop, receiving his usual briefings and consulting with his top advisors. He had at least one talk with a foreign leader, a conversation with Saudi King Abdullah, yesterday.

Not atypically, we have yet to learn anything more about what is keeping the commander in chief busy, though one can assume there is brush to be cleared, trails to be biked, and perhaps even fish to be caught.

From Think Progress:
Today, in a press briefing delivered from the “Western White House” in Crawford, TX, White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe was asked what is on Bush’s schedule today. In addition to receiving “updates on the ongoing situation,” Johndroe said, “I expect he’ll probably ride his bicycle today and spend time with Mrs. Bush.” Watch it:



He promised that he would have resolved this in his last thirteen months in office but, like the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and the crumbling economy, this becomes simply yet another thing which he will pass on to his successor.

As he appears to be doing bugger all I am even more confused as to why this transition period has to be so bloody long.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The percentage of time he has spent on vacation during his presidency is a staggering statement about his commitment. He is somewhere in the range of 500 days of vacation so far. Working for an average U.S. company I have had 40 paid days off in that time, and needless to say, I'm not the leader of the free world. That said, I'm glad he has taken all that time off.

Kel said...

SP, It does say a lot that this man has had as many holidays as he has.

But I tend to think that he can do as much damage with inaction as he can do with action. I'm counting the days till this arse is out of power.