Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)

Scowcraft and Baker equal Poppy and the Carlisle money machine. Must be getting nervous about losing access and riparian rights to exchequers of the powerful. Much like the potty mouth Washington Post's Weinstein. What a sniviler.

Off-topic, but it came up at lunch: Does Stanley Roach have a political affiliation?

Do you mean Stephen Roach?

Yeah, the Morgan Stanley guy. Is Stanley Roach anyone? my bad.

Greenspan "used" O'Neill to send a message? Gives O'Neill to little credit. That said, Greenspan is among Washington's busiest thinkers, so surely dismayed at the decision making process he has witnessed these past three years.

Is the book a way for one or both men to make up for past sins? O'Neill was Treasury Secretary when Bush began to whiz away the surplus. Greenspan offered cock-eyed intellectual cover for cutting taxes, but must be sickened at the result. Greenspan's fiscal rule has always been simple: taxes are bad, deficits worse.

Given Roach's failure to tow the Bush economic line, his political affiliation must be with al-Qeida.

nice

My take on the Scowcroft/Baker/Greenspan story is perhaps relevant only to those of us over 50 who will remember the same fairy tales told about Nixon ... he was misled by bad advice, he was kept in the dark, if only he had known what was going on, etc, none of these terrible things would have happened. It is the same story with W.

I'm sorry, but no matter what happens, after Alan Greenspan and the fed choked off the entire economy in 2000 because "Jobs weren't being lost fast enough" or something like that, and then went on to sign off on and endorse the Bush tax cuts, I just don't trust him or his opinion on really anything.

Of course, I've mostly tried to avoid using Paul O'Neil as a source either, becasue after that whole debacle with the SEC commission on accounting or whatever it was called, he's pretty low on my trust list too.

If I recall correctly, Stephen Roach was an advisor on economics to the presidential campaign of Bill Bradley in 2000.

"the naive, underbriefed, simple, but well-meaning ... George W. Bush."

I'll give you "naive," "underbriefed" and "simple", but why do so many writers insist that Bush is "well-meaning"? Truth to tell, there are so few people who fall into the opposite category that I cannot immediately think of an antonym to "well-meaning."
"Evil-meaning"? Nah.. nobody says that.

Well, this well-meaning simpleton rather relished his god-like role as executioner in Texas, fantasizes that he is some kind of macho war hero and has an almost limitless sense of entitlement (this last being pretty true to his experience to date). Can we give this a name? Such as "narcissistic personality disorder"?

Then I guess he's a Democrat. But I guess, also, that his main concern now is to be neutral so Morgan Stanley can use his advice to, you know, make as much money as they can. Thanks.

I find it intensely depressing to be sitting here hoping that CIA director Tenet or James Baker will save us. Baker is a "moderate", sure, but he's a really nasty piece of work.

malevolent?

Lewis's article is a well-written little piece ( esp the vampires), but the AG connection is a little tenuous, No?
Anybody else find "his finger prints all over it"? Here is another guy ( like Roach) who doesn't need to do anything for the money so we can expect some integrity, No?
If AG wanted to tell us BushCo is not behaving, he could just come out and say so, No?
Of course it would need several analysists/interpreters and a few weeks before consensus could be reached on what he actually said. But I'd wait for that.

Handy Fuse says,

"I'll give you "naive," "underbriefed" and "simple", but why do so many writers insist that Bush is "well-meaning"? Truth to tell, there are so few people who fall into the opposite category that I cannot immediately think of an antonym to "well-meaning."
"Evil-meaning"? Nah.. nobody says that."

How about "unwell-meaning"? The idea, possibly not original, came to me from the title of a book on my shelf, rarely referenced, called "101 Unuseless Japanese Inventions". Anyone who has ever seen this book will probably recognize the strong similarity between the Republican Party and what the Japanese call Chingodu-- inventions that fail completely, but heroically, magnificently, and beautifully-- except take away the heroism, magnificence, and beauty.

Hmmm, maybe malevolent was the right word afterall.

You're not pushing hard. "Well-meaning" is better characterized as "dysphrenetic", as in, "The naive, underbriefed, simple, yet dysphrenetic ... Grandee George W. Bush."
'Dysphrenetic' being a word coined in much
the same as Shrub maligns them, an amalgam of 'dysphasia' and 'phrenetic'. King George
is a dysphrenetic if there ever was one.
You heard it at Brad DeLong's Journal first!

Malevolent would be evil-wishing or desiring; our sultan goes beyond that; I suggest evil-intentioned.

"That makes three grownup Republicans trying to bring the Bush administration back from the Delta Quadrant--Baker, Scowcroft, and Greenspan."

First you have to get past the Borg. Tricky. Helps to have quantum slipstream drives and stuff.

I sense danger, captain.

Facito aliquid operis, ut te semper diabolus inveniat occupatum - Always do something, so that the devil always finds you occupied. (St. Jerome)

Omnes lagani pistrinae gelate male sapiunt - All frozen pizzas taste lousy

Omnia mea mecum porto - All that is mine, I carry with me. (Cicero)

Ubi dubium ibi libertas - Where there is doubt, there is freedom