Bush, to my knowledge, has not deserted Cox. Bush may be a lot of things, but he is loyal to his political allies. Bush said that about Cox (“… legislative record … primary qualification”) back in 2005.

McCain has deserted Cox, however. In spite of having plenty of opportunity to “raise the flag” himself as Chairman of the Commerce Committee, McCain has “flip-flopped” on this one now and is blaming Cox for much of the present disaster. McCain may have that one right. Hey! Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

That depends on what the definition of “all” is.

(Sorta like Clinton’s “that depends on what the definition of “is” is”)

This might have been survivable if Bush hadn’t spent whatever “wiggle room” money we had in Iraq. (And given what little was left to millionaires in tax breaks.) But the combination of ballooning balance of trade deficits on the Bush watch with ballooning federal deficit spending has left us in a position where the current banking crisis may well be fatal rather than just a serious disease.

Here’s a couple of examples to illustrate why Bush deserves the blame for where we are today. Just check out how Bush manipulated the primary players in this disaster.

Christopher Cox is the SEC chairman that Bush appointed in 2005. Before Cox, his predecessor at the SEC, William Donaldson, was catching flak because he was actually enforcing regulations. While Donaldson was in charge, penalties for violating SEC rules were on the rise and peaked at $1.5 billion in 2005. Bush couldn’t have that! As soon as Cox took over penalties dropped by two-thirds, to $507 million last year.

Virtually the same story is there for Bush’s Treasury Secretary before Paulson, Paul O’Neill. He was also forced from office because he insisted on doing his job. O’Neill collaborated on a tell-all book about it: The Price of Loyalty George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill.

While it might be argued that more enforcement and better regulation could have been done before Bush, he pushed it to a totally new level of incompetence and political interference. Before Bush, we were getting along. But he took us way beyond the “tipping point”.

As for raising the flag while there was still time to do something about it, here’s a New York Times article from 2005: Bush S.E.C. Pick Is Seen as Friend to Corporations

A quote from the article:

President Bush, hearing complaints about Mr. Donaldson’s record from across the business spectrum, responded on Thursday by nominating Representative Christopher Cox, a conservative Republican from California, as a successor whose loyalties seem clear.

…

Mr. Cox – a devoted student of Ayn Rand, the high priestess of unfettered capitalism – has a long record in the House of promoting the agenda of business interests that are a cornerstone of the Republican Party’s political and financial support.

A major recipient of contributions from business groups, the accounting profession and Silicon Valley, he has fought against accounting rules that would give less favorable treatment to corporate mergers and executive stock options. He opposes taxes on dividends and capital gains. And he helped to steer through the House a bill making investor lawsuits more difficult.

That measure, which Congress adopted over President Bill Clinton’s veto, [My emphasis added -- Bill did his best.] was hailed by business groups, which say it has reduced costly and frivolous cases.

It has also been criticized by consumer and investor organizations. They say its adoption in 1995 contributed to an unaccountable climate that fostered the big accounting scandals at companies like Enron and WorldCom a few years later.

Mr. Cox’s legislative record was cited on Thursday by President Bush as a primary qualification.