Bush Family: The Cats in the Cradle and the Silver Foot



(image via uspatriotsinc)

Is it just The Corsair or does the Bush Family Narrative (tm) currently unravelling upon the world stage resemble, however slightly, that buttery, pseudo-existentialist Harry Chapin song "The Cat's In The Cradle"? The one where the saucer-eyed son sang, optimistically, "I'm gonna be like you dad/ You know I'm gonna be like you."

Such are the generational battles of politics where, like Shakespeare's Histories (And Maureen's Dowdian tragi-comedies), sons follow fathers, some hot-blooded, and some of a milder, sweeter disposition (The Corsair pours himself a 2001 Alyssa Golden Dry Port).

James Baker, Il Consigliere, courtier of the First Magnitude, is particularly Shakespearean as a stinking little fixer. He just doesn't ever evaporate, now does he? Shuttling betweeen Bush the Elder to reagan to bush the Elder, and now, as if by magic, back to Bush the Younger ("And the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon .."). Seeing The Vulcans (tm), though, boozy over their hot-blooded Rummy punch, we almost welcome his polished Machiavellianism. Somewhere, Hans Morgenthau's deteriorating corpse is smiling in a skeletal ricktor at The Revenge of the Realists.

What a surprise when Bush the Younger won the Presidency, immediately following The Clinton's -- Hatfield's to the Bushes McCoys -- resurrecting, at least, the Bush Family honor ("Well, he came home from college just the other day/ So much like a man I just had to say"). Bush the Younger's hot-blooded pursuit of Ending Tyrannies, aided by Dick Cheney, he of the mechanical heart, was diametrically opposed to Bush the Elder's wise, measured multilateral foreign policy ("I said, 'I'd like to see you if you don't mind'/He said, "I'd love to, Dad, if I can find the time")

The Pendulum swings. The Midterm elections. Hot buttery Rum is shown the door and Il Consigliere, James Baker, oily courtier of Two Presidents returnes to power. Baker once remarked that you know you're out of power when your limosine is yellow -- not black -- and your driver speaks Farsi. Charmed, i'm sure (Exaggerated cough suggesting feigned detachment). Enter: Gates.

It looks like the Bush 43 Presidency has morphed into Bush 41 ("And as I hung up the phone it occurred to me /He'd grown up just like me/ My boy was just like me."

And the Cat's in the Cradle and the Silver Foot.