Bush Revisited?

"'While this solely private mission to secure the release of two Americans is on the ground we will have no comment ' White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said in a statement."
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One of the things about Bush, aside from "strategery" and "ironical," was that administration's separation from reality. The willful choosing to think something that goes counter to reality. And now here's Obama, and the administration is saying "this is private." Umm... ok... Bill Clinton meeting with Kim Jong Ill'n regarding the release of the journalists who were recently sentenced to years of hard labor for no good reason.

Bill Clinton is a former President. His wife is the current Secretary of State. Pictures of Kim Jong Ill'n and President Clinton are all over the place right now, and he's there to try and gain the release of the journalists.

So... what the hell is so private? Is Bill trying to do Mrs. Ill'n? Is that the private part? Is Bill there on a sight-seeing trip? No, this is so obviously not a private matter that it's pretty an insult to the public intelligence to have the mouth of Obama declare that it's not what we see, that this is just some private deal between Bill and Ill.

But then, most Americans are pretty stupid... so yeah, why not. Good job Obama, way to highlight for the rest of the world just how stupid most Americans are.

But, then again, I predicted as much. No matter who the President is, things just don't change that much. Granted, I was mainly thinking of institutional changes, and I may be naive in thinking that this isn't an institutional way of dealing with the public, but perhaps the whole culture of D.C. politics won't change quickly.

Jimmy Carter tried to change things... and he got slapped pretty hard with reality. I believe his choosing to walk instead of riding in a car pissed off a lot of those that make up the culture over there too. I remember always seeing that pissed off guy... Speaker of the House, Tip O'Neill. I was too young to really know what all he was pissed about, but I knew that he didn't really care for Jimmy Carter and seemed to block a lot of what Carter was trying to change.

So, no. This is not Bush revisited... it's simply the continuation of things as before. Change happens, just not in leeps and bounds. And that may be a good thing.