X Factor losers and the outgoing President.

Every time I hear Bush or Cheney stating that they think their record in office was a good one, I am reminded of nothing as much as those deluded people on the X Factor who think they have talent and that the judges are being rude to them by pointing out that they actually have none.

So it is with Bush and Cheney. They care not how history remembers them as they think they did a good job for eight years and anyone who disagrees must be wrong or, at least, suffering from Bush Derangement Syndrome; a syndrome thought up by right wing loons when they could no longer win rational arguments.

The 43rd president is going home with less remorse and fewer regrets than my grandchildren express for spilling their cereal.

This is the tenor of the farewell tour being conducted across the landscape from ABC to the American Enterprise Institute. It’s the No Regrets Tour, the nonreflective “reflections by a guy who’s headed out of town.”

George W. Bush will be remembered with names such as Abu Ghraib, Gitmo and Katrina. With phrases such as “weapons of mass destruction” and “mission accomplished.” He came in with a budget surplus and leaves with a massive deficit. He blew the good will of the post-9/11 world. But being this president means never having to say you’re sorry.

Leaving office, he takes credit for seven years of safety and no debit for a day of disaster. He takes credit for the boom—“it’s hard to argue against 52 uninterrupted months of job growth”—without taking responsibility for the deregulated bust. He takes credit for the surge, not the disastrous pre-emptive war.

“The biggest regret of all the presidency has to have been the intelligence failure in Iraq,” he said. But would he have led us to war anyway? “It’s hard for me to speculate.”

No. 43 has the lowest approval ratings in modern presidential history. But he told Charlie Gibson, “I will leave the presidency with my head held high.” This is what puts me between a rocking chair and a hard place.

Bush says he doesn’t worry about short-term history. “I guess I don’t worry about long-term history, either, since I’m not going to be around to read it.” Yet on this farewell tour, he sounds like an artist scorned by the public and sure that he’ll be seen one day as Vincent van Gogh.

Historians, however, are already making their call:

In an offhand survey of historians, 61 percent ranked Bush dead last among presidents, below even the barrel-scraping James Buchanan. Bush, of course, prefers Harry Truman, who rose from the ashes of his reputation.

But Princeton historian Sean Wilentz has a simple way of assessing presidents. “Great presidents rise to the occasion; poor presidents fall to the occasion.”

Bush's administration sat on their hands prior to 9-11, despite warnings that bin Laden intended to attack the US, and have since led the US into two wars, neither of which is winnable, and has watched the world economic system teeter on the brink of the greatest financial collapse since the Great Depression.

So when Bush states, “I will leave the presidency with my head held high” he's being no more coherent than Rachel when she states, "Bullshit!" after being told she's not very good.

Bush doesn't like history's verdict so, like the petulant Frat boy he's always been, he's simply giving us all the finger.

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Tags: Bush, Cheney, no regrets, tour, X Factor