George W. Bush

As President Obama authorizes both limited airstrikes on ISIS targets and the air-dropping of relief supplies to beleaguered religious minorities in northern Iraq, we thought it good to rewind to the early days of the war in Afghanistan when the liberal media criticized President Bush for both bombing al Qaeda and Taliban targets while simultaneously air-dropping food and medicine for civilians…

On MSNBC's Melissa Harris-Perry program on Saturday, Dean Obeidallah injected race into the debate inside the U.S. over the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict: "You saw a poll last week, young people 18 to 29: only 25 percent think it's justified what Israel is doing; 50 percent said, no. People of color, same numbers...It's really the Obama coalition versus white conservatives. That's the only…

It never fails. When the regime of center-right political leader with executive authority begins to implode, the focus is on how and why that person is failing — as it should be. When it becomes clear that a leftist mayor, governor, or president is entering the failure zone, it's because the job is impossible, or the city, state, or nation has become "ungovernable." We're entering the excuses…

The evening newscasts of all three broadcast networks tonight reported on the unanimous decision in NLRB v. Noel Canning in which the U.S. Supreme Court found that President Obama overstepped his constitutional authority in making recess appointments when the U.S. Senate was technically in session. Rather than couching the ruling as a stunning rebuke of presidential overreach by Mr. Obama,…

On Tuesday's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC, during a segment about foreign policy challenges involving Russia and the turmoil in the Middle East, MSNBC.com Executive Editor Richard Wolffe oddly suggested that President Obama finds it to be a "satisfying challenge" because it is "intellectually rigorous" to deal with such substantial foreign policy problems. He also not…

Appearing as a guest on Wednesday's The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell, MSNBC.com executive editor Richard Wolffe mocked former Vice President Dick Cheney for his recent criticism of President Obama, and inaccurately claimed that "there was no Al-Qaeda in Iraq" before Cheney "led the decision to invade Iraq." After dismissing Cheney as being in his "last throes," Wolffe recalled: "Let's…

On Tuesday's New Day show, during an interview with Paul Wolfowitz, CNN's Chris Cuomo was confrontational toward the former Bush administration Deputy Defense Secretary as the New Day co-host complained about Republicans blaming President Obama's troop withdrawal for the chaos in Iraq, arguing that such talk undermines the President from dealing with the situation because there is not a "united…

Paul Whitefield "is a 30-year veteran of the Los Angeles Times who is copy chief of the editorial pages and a writer/scold for the Opinion L.A. blog." He also has a serious but far from unique case of Bush (and Cheney) Derangement Syndrome and an extraordinary ignorance of the history of last decade's war in Iraq, which included a victory in 2008 the U.S. press, with rare exceptions, refused to…

The term “permanent revolution” is usually associated with Marxism, but American Prospect blogger Paul Waldman believes that these days, it’s movement conservatives who are talkin’ about a permanent revolution, and that their ideal Republican pol is an “agent of chaos and destruction, or at least pretend[s] that's who he is.” In a Thursday post, Waldman quoted RealClearPolitics analyst Sean…

On Friday's NBC Nightly News, Brian Williams strongly hinted that the recent Islamist blitzkrieg in Iraq was completely former President Bush's fault: "Make no mistake: what's happening in Iraq right now is a direct outgrowth of the U.S. decision to invade the country over a decade ago." However, he glossed over the Obama administration's failure to negotiate a continued U.S. presence and…

President Obama's West Point speech was panned by consensus as hard to follow, which was even acknowledged in media-elite salons like Washington Week on PBS. But on Wednesday's edition of The Diane Rehm Show on NPR, some journalists were trashing Bush instead. After Katrina Vanden Heuvel of The Nation credited Obama for "always looking out for a younger generation" that's more peaceful,…

Julie Pace at the Associated Press, aka the Administration's Press, is used to carrying water for the Obama administration. Last year, she proudly reveled in how she and her wire service sat on information it had about secret U.S.-Iran negotiations for eight months. My immediate take was that "They didn't report it until the Obama administration said it would be okay to report it." The AP…

During a live webcast on NBCNews.com immediately following Wednesday's 10 p.m. ET airing of his interview with Edward Snowden, Nightly News anchor Brian Williams wondered why the National Security Agency was not more receptive to Snowden's claims of unconstitutional spying: "Knowing that in war powers times...the Bush administration use of war powers with Bush and Cheney, isn't the general…

New York Times reporter Michael Barbaro issued a gushing profile Sunday of Jeb Bush, former Republican governor of Florida, possible presidential contender, and, apparently, the smart Bush: "Jeb Bush Gives Party Something To Think About." By contrast, President George W. Bush, who "left Yale with gentleman’s C’s after four years" (shouldn't that at least be "graduated Yale"?) is a potential…