Bush Isolated Like Nixon's Last Days

Bush Isolated Like Nixon's Last Days
Viewpoint: "Most Dangerous Foreign Policy Since Vietnam"
01/14/2007 11:00 AM ET
Mark Pitzke of Germany's largest newsweekly magazine Der Spiegel writes a searing chronicle of Bush's last attempt to win the war in Iraq -- efforts that are meeting with great opposition. He says that Republicans are criticizing Bush with brutal candor, calling his new ideas for Iraq a disaster.
He writes: "Bush is almost completely isolated -- like Richard Nixon during his final days in office. Chuck Hagel, the Republican senator from Nebraska, has ambitions to move into the White House. And since the race for electoral victory in 2008 has already begun, Mr. Hagel has no more time for losers -- even if one of those losers happens to be George W. Bush, his own president. That became brutally clear on Thursday in the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, which invited Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to explain President Bush's newest approach to Iraq. Despite being at pains to perform well, the conscientious emissary didn't get very far -- especially since five designated presidential candidates are sitting on the committee."