Tucker Turns

I don't have cable, so I don't have the opportunity to watch Tucker Carlson on CNN's Crossfire. But I've seen him on PBS' Tucker Carlson Unfiltered and I don't care much for him. He is extremely manipulative in presenting his conservative point of view while posing as a unbiased journalist. Still, as Kos alludes to below, we'll take anti-Bush people wherever we can get them, especially when they happen to have a sphere of influence.

I agree with Kos, too... as the TV talking heads were praising Bush for being a leader on September 11, I was constantly doing the cartoon-like rubbing my eyes thing, wondering if the Bush they were seeing was the same Bush that I was seeing -- or not seeing as the case might be.

Guiliani was the voice of calm that gave this country, and particularly New York, the ability to catch its breath on one of the most insane days we are likely ever to experience as a nation.

Bush simply swooped in and grabbed the thunder after Cheney told him it was time to take his head out of the ground.

Bush's 9-11 cowardice

So what does it mean when Tucker Carlson and Andrew Sullivan both declare they can't vote for Bush in November? That they're whores? That they're reading the tea leaves and don't want to get stuck on the wrong side of history? That they're tools and hacks and don't matter?

Perhaps. But they do have their own sphere of relevance, and frankly, every right-wing pundit that turns away from Bush is a victory for us. And the latest Esquire magazine, in addition to running Ron Reagan's anti-Bush screed, also treats us to Carlson and Sullivan declaring their disappointment in the failed Bush presidency.

Carlson, in particular, is brutal on Bush, taking him to task for his cowardice on 9-11 (no free online version):

... The attacks initially made me sorry I voted for him. For most of that day, as my wife and children stayed inside our house listening to the roar of fighter jets overhead, and black smoke from the Pentagon hovered above our neighborhood, Bush failed to return to Washington. My family sat unprotected a few miles from the scene of a terrorist attack; Bush hid in a bunker on some faraway military base.

It infuriated me, as did the subsequent excuses from White House spokesman. There was a risk in coming back, they said. There was a risk in coming back, they said. Of course there was. That's the point: Leaders must take risks, sometimes physical ones. Bush should have elbowed his Secret Service detail out of the way and returned in a display of fearlessness to his nation's capital. I found it distressingly revealing that he didn't.

So did I. It was one of my earliest thoughts that fateful day. Say what you will about Giuliani, and most of what I would say is bad. But Rudi showed the type of leadership Bush only wishes he could muster.

What's worse, Rove knew how bad Bush's cowardice looked, so much the same way they handle any obstacle they face, they lied. Rove claimed they had received credible threats against Air Force One, a ludicrous assertion that was proven false days later. But in the chaos of the moment, both Bush's palpable fear and the lies used to cover it up were lost.

But as Carlson says, the incident was revealing. Just as Kerry's heroism half a world away is revealing. There's a reason the Swift Boat Liars are going after the story so hard. Kerry turned his boat into the danger he faced. Bush ran to Nebraska and cowered in fear.