Columnist Thomas Friedman in the New York Times October 1 explained succinctly what his perception of the credit crunch crisis amounts to:

"I've always believed that America's government was a unique political system -- one designed by geniuses so that it could be run by idiots.  I was wrong.  No system can be smart enough to survive this level of incompetence and recklessness by the people charged to run it.

"This is dangerous.  We have House members, many of whom I suspect can't balance their own checkbooks, rejecting a complex rescue package because some voters, who, I fear also don't understand, swamped them with phone calls.  I appreciate the popular anger against Wall Street, but you can't deal with this crisis this way.

"This is a credit crisis.  It's all about confidence.  What you can't see is how bank A will no longer lend to good company B or mortgage company C.  Because no one is sure the other guy's assets and collateral are worth anything, which is why the government needs to come in and put a floor under them.  Otherwise, the system will be choked of credit, like a body being choked of oxygen and turning blue."

Jonathan Maskit in a letter to the editors at the New York Times posted July 19, wrote the following:

"In the pursuit of security, Mr. Bush and the Republican-led Congress waged a pre-emptive war on a nation that had not attacked us (and posed little threat), thus creating a breeding ground for terrorists where none had previously existed, sacrificed the lives of tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands, both Americans and foreign, spent hundreds of billions of dollars, curtailed our precious liberty and eroded our nation's standing in the world."

Now Mr. Bush dramatically warns us that intelligence reports indicate al Qaeda is stronger than ever and uses this fact as a legitimate reason for continuing the Iraq War.  He insists that continuing the Iraq War will keep terrorists off U.S. soil.

What a line of twisted reasoning!  He is desperately attempting to get himself and his Republican robot Congress off the hook for the colossal failure of the Iraq War disaster spectacle.