One of the pop-up phrases floating up through the ether nowadays is “exit strategy,” which means just how are we supposed to get out of this complete and total mess. Custer didn’t have one at the Little Big Horn. The Vietnam conflict didn’t have one. And now Decider George doesn’t have one either, not for Iraq, not for his criminal-blighted Justice Department, not for anything. Lifeboats are non-existent.

Not only has Decider George screwed up the American government, but the entire freakin’ world. Writing in Salon.com, Sidney Blumenthal reported after a trip to Europe talking to leaders there the main concern for them is attempting to avoid crap-fallout from any more of Decider George’s decisions.

Blumenthal wrote Europeans are most worried with “somehow making it through the last 18 months of the Bush administration without further major disasters.”

Not with any kind of hope, but instead with great dread. Is that any way to run a country? Do a 360 and what do you see? Nothing but failure on all fronts, and it’s just not ineffectiveness, but catastrophic disasters.

• Just about anyone who has any walking-around sense can see the so-called “surge” in Iraq has failed. Not only has it not worked, but it’s caused more destruction, more death, more horror. And it’s caused the top soldier to speak out of his ass. Gen. David Petraeus said in an interview this week that he’s seen “astonishing signs of normalcy” around Baghdad. The asshole needs to get out more! And even if that wasn’t enough, a Pentagon task force revealed this week that 40 percent of Army soldiers and one third of Marines suffer from some kind of heavy mental problem upon returning home from the war zone. That’s a huge bunch of guys. Looks like Petraeus suffers from some mental disorder too! Even Decider George is suffering: In a press conference Thursday he waxed eloquent about the war. “You know, it’s an interesting debate we’re having in America about how to handle Iraq. There’s a lot of people — good, decent people — saying ‘Withdraw now.’ They’re absolutely wrong. It would be a huge mistake for this country.” Decider George, there is no debate here because you’re a hardheaded, cold-hearted sonofabitch!
• In Gaza, Hamas has driven out the the US-backed Fatah and caused a major realignment in the area and rippled down the unity government of Mahmoud Abbas. Decider George’s big push for Democracy caused voters to cast okay ballots for Hamas last year and turn the region into an unstable boat in a stormy sea.
• Another splash in the ongoing attorney mess at the US Justice Department occurred Friday on the resignation of Mike Elston, chief of staff to Deputy AG Paul McNulty. That makes five who have quit since the whole scandal started earlier this year. Head huncho AG Alberto “Don’t Recall” Gonzales is himself now under investigation by Justice Department lawyers for trying to influence the Congessional testimony of Monica Goodling, Don’t Recall’s former aide. Goodling told the Senate Judiciary Committee last month she felt “a little uncomfortable” about Don’t Recall’s prodding before she appeared before the committee. Talk about a sordid mess! And the endgame in that caper is far from over.

And there you have it, and in only three little peeps at what Decider George has done in just the last six months. No wonder the Europeans are holding their collective breaths.

Endgame is from chess, usually in the final moves when there are but a few pieces left on the board. Strategic moves are calculated by several points, a couple being the use of an aggressive king and the employment of zugzwang, which where a player is forced into a position where he must make an undesirable, or even a disastrous move. What is Decider George going to do with his arrogant, failed endgame situation? Bomb Iran? North Korea?

There is no exit strategy in a box canyon except to turn around. Is Decider George going to do that? Shit no.