George W. Bush: The Gift That Keeps On Giving

Sometimes we peruse old entries in this blog for inspiration. OK, really it's because we don't remember what we've written from day to day and we chalk that up to the Ambien and Stoly cocktails that make up the better part of our lunches.

Anyway, as we were skimming through the last few entries trying to figure out what we might have been thinking that would result in an entry like that, it occurred to us that the last few entries, save Friday Hound Blogging, have been about the man who likes to call himself CEO of America. We'll let you apply your own verbiage to that acronym, our point is we seem to be stuck on the guy.

Not wishing to bore our readers (both of them) by becoming ensnared in a rut (something that happens far too frequently after lunch--but that's another story) we resolve to cast our gaze to the wide horizon and bring forth an entry that will be both dazzling in its wit and composure as well as felicitous and contemporaneous in its expression.

Then we run across this. Just when you think you're out, they pull you back in.

President George W. Bush expressed support on Monday for U.S. Sen. Conrad Burns, who is under pressure over his links with Jack Abramoff, a Republican lobbyist at the heart of an influence-peddling scandal. "He's not the biggest crook in Washington," Bush told an enthusiastic crowd of people who didn't speak English. "At least that's what Dick tells me. And he should know."

"He's the kind of person I need here. Somebody who's clueless when it comes to defending the country, and who's more than willing to spend your money," Bush said.

"I'm proud to stand by this man," the president said. "He's someone whose poll numbers are actually lower than mine. You're doing a great job Connie."

Burns said he would return $150,000 he had received from Abramoff-related sources over the past several years. Insisting they were "legal and fully disclosed," he said they had undermined public confidence in the government. Then his head exploded.

Later, a staffer explained that the Senator wasn't really concerned with public confidence, but knew that Abramoff had reserved the skybox for the baseball season and "he was just trying to hold off the indictment until the playoffs are over."

In Vanity Fair magazine's April edition, Abramoff said he worked closely with many top Republicans, despite their claims to the contrary. According to the article, Abramoff said Burns was especially cooperative. "Around the office we called him Easy B," Abramoff said. "He was even cheaper than DeLay."

Jason Klindt, a spokesman for Burns' campaign, said it had asked the Justice Department to review documents in the matter. "He (Burns) has done nothing wrong and the sooner it's reviewed the sooner his name will be cleared," Klindt said.

Later Klindt was found wandering in a local park trying to hand out campaign literature to squirrels. Representatives of the Burns campaign said he had been under a lot of stress lately.