MR. BUSH VS. MR. BEAN

Read this. Just trust me.

These two avoidable disasters – New Orleans and Iraq – have inflicted a massive double blow to American prestige. A country that can go to war by mistake and mislay the lives of thousands of its own inhabitants, does not credit the name of superpower. The economic impact is already being seen in the price of petrol and the collapse of the dollar. But it is first a moral rather than an economic crisis for Republican America. The superpower that won the Cold War is beginning to resemble the one it defeated. Like Putin's Russia, America is looking like a belligerent country, with a dysfunctional democracy, a third-rate leadership and intractable social problems bogged down in war it cannot win.

...It brings no satisfaction to see America humbled. The land that used to be the beacon for the free world has become an international pariah. This is Bush's black September.

Macwhirter gives Bush too much of a pass on the ineptitude of the federal hurricane relief effort. He thinks Bush is a hayseed figurehead who bungled an opportunity to look strong and leaderlike as opposed to his 9/11 flight to safety in a bunker. But the piece does discuss the various theories of WHY this happened and is gloriously blunt in his assessments of the Chimpster's abilities.

To see what other foreign papers are saying about the crisis, click here. It isn't pretty.