It used to be that our country was strong enough--and, thanks to the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, distant enough from the rest of the world -- to wait out the four-year administration of a dangerously incompetent president, like Ulysses S. Grant and Warren G. Harding. But times have changed, and ever-more-sophisticated technology has brought all us nations to each others' doorsteps. A day's inadvertence on the part of an inept president can bring an end to us all -- in a heartbeat.

We've all had enough time, now, to appraise George Bush, Jr.'s performance as President of the United States. By the time he leaves office, he'll have spent eight years guiding us through the mine-laden fields of foreign and domestic policies. That much time can make or break a 21st- century nation, do you agree?

First and foremost, since George, Jr., is the one who inaugurated it, how is George's war in Iraq and Afghanistan coming along?. So far, he's spent untold billions of OUR tax dollars on it. Yes, elections were held in Iraq, but the winners, the politicians and police, for instance, are afraid to appear in the streets of Baghdad because they're rightly afraid they'll be gunned down or car-bombed by the hoodlum insurgent gunmen, who think we Americans are on the wrong continent.. (If the truth be known, I think these gunmen probably learned a thing or two from America's colonial guerillas who popped up from behind trees to gun down the oppressive British red-coats, who, we were convinced, were on the wrong continent.)

Let's face it: Iraq is no more OURS now than it was before George, Jr., started his war.

Those elected officials who call in sick each morning are most of the police who're damned if they want to be killed. Next thing you know, the Americans will want a few McDonald's on the corners of Baghdad.. Some Iraqi people look at American soldiers and see, not their liberators but invasive foreigners from another continent.

Massive U.S. forces are deployed to the farthest reaches of Iraq, but when they get there, it doesn't seem as if the enemy forces are at home. The Iraqis have learned their early U.S. history well.

The real question looming in the future is, Who is willing to out-wait whom? Chances are, of course, that American voters seldom care to outlast anyone. History shows we are a very impatient people. The first George Bush didn't enter Baghdad to clean up the Saddam Hussein mess there because his advisers told him, rightly, that he'd better shut down Desert Storm before American voters got impatient with it and started to riot, as they did in Vietnam.

George Jr., had to mop up what his father left unfinished. in Baghdad. Isn't it strange how much of George, Jr.'s foreign policy is only a completion of his old man's? The war in Iraq seems like a John Wayne movie, but without John Wayne to ride out of the sagebrush and save the U.S. troops. Enemy action and tactics are slowly draining American troops of their will. Last month, U.S. army enrollment fell way below expectations. And the U.S. government had better be prepared for more months like it. And the sobering question is, What's George Jr., going to use for troops when it comes time -- as it surely will -- to invade North Korea, when that little nation has nuclear weapons capable of reaching and vaporizing Disneyland? Advisers have for ages been warning George, Jr., against spreading U.S. forces too thin.

And speaking of spreading ourselves too thin, how are we doing in Afghanistan, a funny little country hitherto known only to stamp collectors and hashish dealers. It is quickly becoming a narco-state. How is George, Jr., doing in that part of the globe against which he declared war? As anyone knows who has studied the current economic situation in that country, and according to an article in the June 6, 2005, issue of The New Yorker Magazine, "The sheer number of people (in Afghanistan) who make their living from opium and heroin has made it politically difficult for Karzai(head of the country) to act. On this issue he has not had the full backing of the United States …Nearly $800 million has been budgeted for counter-narcotics, but an American official in Kabul admitted that the U.S. was at a loss about how to solve the problem."

Well, duh! And how do you like the prospect of subsidizing nine-tenths of the citizens of Afghanistan so they'll stop growing and exporting immensely lucrative heroin and opium to our country? Sounds a tad like the American government's subsidizing farmers, doesn't it? Are you willing, additionally, to confront the "proliferation of gangster capitalism" that has already taken root in Afghanistan, as it did in Russia after the collapse of Soviet communism?

Afghanistan and Iraq will become independent states only when their people have the conviction and confidence to stand on their own two feet and take the streets back from the gunmen. They will never become independent states if they're willing/happy to let those footloose Americans do it for them..

How's Jr. doing at home? For one thing, he's trying to slash the budget of public radio and television. Why? I think it's because the independent public radio and TV stations and their commentator are more likely to criticize him and his misdeeds than the major networks. Ed Murrow of CBS died a long time ago, you know.

Finally, what kind of success is Jr. having with the all-important problem of global warming? Well, it turns out, precious little. George Bush and Dick Cheney are oil men, first, last, and always. Their very souls are soaked, saturated, with it.

This next is from a recent article called, "The Climate of Man," by Elizabeth Kolbert (The New Yorker, May 9, 2005): "Barely a month passes without a new finding on the dangers posed by rising CO2 levels---to the polar ice cap, to the survival of the world's coral reefs, to the continued existence of low-lying nations. Yet the world has barely even begun to take action. This is particularly true of the United States, which is the largest emitter of carbon dioxide by far. 'We have only a few years and not ten years but less to do something," the Dutch state secretary for the environment said. Running for President in 2000, George, Jr. called global warming "an issue that we need to take very seriously." He promised, if elected, to impose federal limits on CO2. In fact, he sent our head of EPA, Christine Whitman, to a meeting of "environment ministers" to elaborate on Bush, Jr.,'s position. "Ten days after (Whitman's) presentation, Bush announced that not only was he withdrawing the United States from the ongoing negotiations over Kyoto -- he was now opposed to any mandatory curbs on carbon dioxide. Explaining his change of heart, Bush asserted that he no longer believed that CO2 limits were justified, owing to the 'state of scientific knowledge of the causes of , and solutions to, global climate change,' which he labeled 'incomplete.' So, what do we have now in the way of protection against the rapidly rising levels of CO2? What does the government plan? Well, nothing!

Essentially, the president's approach amounts to following the path of 'business as usual.'") Isn't that comforting? From the sidelines, in the 1960's and '70's, I followed the administration of President Richard M. Nixon. At every turn, I came to hate and distrust the man more. History, as you'll agree, has justified me. And, I believe history, at whose bar every president is bound to appear sooner or later, will justify me in my distrust and hatred of George, Jr. He's the kind of man who grew up with great wealth. For him, being President of the United States does not entail looking out for the welfare of the poor and middle-class, of all countries, but seeing to it that his buddies the very wealthiest are in no way hindered in their relentless pursuit of the very best objects their society has to offer.