Time for a do-over

On a related note, I give you this comment from Atrios, also inspired by the aforementioned Tomasky article:

One of Bush's biggest failures (and, yes, it's a very long list) both for country and for himself and his political party was to fail to genuinely tap into the uniting post-9/11 spirit. To use his lame expression, he decided to be a divider, not a uniter, and failed to transform American politics in a way which quite likely would've led to Republican domination for decades.

I can remember in the waning months of the Clinton administration a lot of talking heads bemoaning the "lost opportunities" of that administration; lost because Clinton couldn't keep it in his pants.

That kind of loss pales in comparison to the monumental failure of Bush to transform the tragedy of 9/11 with an inspiring leadership that would have united not just America but the World. The outpouring of good will towards the United States was monumental in the days following that tragedy. We all remember the French paper LaMonde with its half page headline proclaiming, "We are All Americans", right?

All of that is gone. Utterly gone. Pissed to the four winds as a result of Bush's mismanagement and hubris.

Is it time for a do-over? Is it time to roll back the clock to September 12th, 2001 and call for a real program of shared sacrifice for the "Greater Good"?

Can we just pretend that the last five years never happened?