http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/images/blpic-rovegetoutofjailfree.htm

I found this wonderful bit of optimism today:

For most of the past 70 years, the U.S. economy has grown at a steady clip, generating perpetually higher incomes and wealth for American households. But since 2000, the story is starkly different.

The past decade was the worst for the U.S. economy in modern times, a sharp reversal from a long period of prosperity that is leading economists and policymakers to fundamentally rethink the underpinnings of the nation's growth.

It was, according to a wide range of data, a lost decade for American workers. The decade began in a moment of triumphalism -- there was a current of thought among economists in 1999 that recessions were a thing of the past. By the end, there were two, bookends to a debt-driven expansion that was neither robust nor sustainable.

There has been zero net job creation since December 1999. No previous decade going back to the 1940s had job growth of less than 20 percent. Economic output rose at its slowest rate of any decade since the 1930s as well.  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/01/AR2010010101196.html?hpid=topnews

About a year ago I critiqued a valedictory from old Karl Rove BUSH WAS RIGHT WHEN IT MATTERED MOST (WSJ) 

Remember? About the time that the fascist Murdoch purchased the Wall Street Journal and brought the old head of propaganda for the pigs that left this country in such a snarl?

Karl waves goodby to w and his friends as they departed in the Special Air Mission 28000 "... full of family, friends, former staff and memories of eight years in the White House." 

I don't know about you, but these memories light the corners of my mind. And also light fuses up certain of my most secret orifices. Now as that great man Gonzo once said, recollections might differ on any particular matter. Like, what really did happen when I visited my friend in the hospital?  

But if anyone knows or recollects better about the previous eight years it has to be Karl and I would like to review some of his conclusions here.

1.  The former president and his wife thanked each passenger, showing the thoughtfulness and grace so characteristic of this wonderful American family.

How could any of us forget w's thoughtfulness? Those magnificent moments when he put words together to express the hopes and dreams of a nation like no other president before him.  And what about his grace?  The way he could finish a speech and glide toward locked doors. Or speak to plants in audiences at pretend community forums.

2. Karl talks about "A video tribute produced warm laughter and inevitable tears."  One can only guess what they put in that video.  Maybe it presented those pictures from Abu Grabi that showed Muslims putting a show on for our troops. Or, perhaps, great moments in presidential speeches.

3.  Karl talks about "... a last angry frenzy his critics again distorted his record, maligned his character and repeated untruths about his years in the Oval Office. Nothing they wrote or said changes the essential facts.  Distortions have just run rampant.  Like when old footage shows w promising that we do not torture and we do not wiretap anyone without court orders. In point of fact, no one at w's WH tortured anyone.  That is what we have soldiers and CIA operatives for.  And no one at w's WH ever illegally wire tapped anyone.  That is why we have telephone companies.

4. As Karl puts it "To start with, Mr. Bush was right about Iraq. The world is safer without Saddam Hussein in power." Sure, there might be two or three million Iraqis displaced over the last six years, but they have always been a confused people anyway, and they have displaced things for centuries. Sure, there might be anywhere from 100,000 to 300,000 Iraqis dead as a result of our incursion, but these people did not have that long a lifeline anyway compared to the rest of the world.  And we may have lost 4,000 or so soldiers, but how many of those brave men and women would have died anyway in car accidents or shootings or by ingesting lead in Chinese imports if they had simply stayed in our country?  And Saddam-- think about the havoc he might have created against the Taliban or Al Qaeda or Iranis who happened to have come under his jurisdiction. Yes, a terrible man was hunted down and killed like the miserable creature he was so that others, like Osama could survive, unbothered to this day.

5. Karl points out another important fact: "He was right to take the war on terror abroad instead of waiting until dangers fully materialize here at home."  Fight them over there so that we do not have to fight them here. Oh how that sentiment has warmed my cockles over the last seven years or so. I mean, Americans can be over here and over there at the same time.  But terrorists tend to congregate together. They cannot be in two places at once like we can. As some terrorists have actually put it, when the Americans finally leave Iraq, we are taking the first plane straight to Miami and Albany. 

6.  Karl shows us that "These tough decisions -- which became unpopular in certain quarters only when memories of 9/11 began to fade -- kept America safe for seven years."  Actually of course, these tough decisions became unpopular in three of four quarters in America, but who is counting?  It is that uncertain quarter that really matters because that is the quarter that put w in office in the first place, along with an amenable Supreme Court. As our memories faded, it became harder and harder for good old Karl to keep us afraid enough to keep his disrainbow coalition in power for a thousand years; the dream of Karl's favorite historical figure.

7.  Finally "At home, Mr. Bush cut income taxes for every American who pays taxes. He also cut taxes on capital, investment and savings. The result was 52 months of growth and the strongest economy of any developed country."  We tend to forget that during  a little more than half of w's administration, fully one percent of the American people could buy big boats, and big planes and big Hummers and great mansions and travel to great estates all over the world without a care.They could ignore tax obligations as well as unnecessary regulation.

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/blogs/dikkday48yahoocom/2009/01/karl-rove-a-great-american.php

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k34COolbdmY