Great Underroos of Mars am I tired! For some damned reason I woke up this morning around 4:30 AM, and found myself unable to fall asleep again. Going into work early seemed like a reasonable thing to do at the time, though I now deeply regret, and wish to disavow myself of, that decision. Please, someone, anyone, find an excuse for me to go home that magically does not make me look like an irresponsible and therefore dispensible employee.

A few things puzzle me. First, why is it when you’re extremely tired, you can’t actually fall asleep in your own bed, and yet nothing induces near coma conditions like sitting in your office? Second, why is it 60 degrees and chilly in Los Angeles in September? Jesus, 2 weeks ago the heat exhausted before you even stepped outside your home, and now I’m wearing a scarf on the way to work*.

And third, will this story cause the media and the Dems to stop taking their prescribed doses of Ballsamine?:

WASHINGTON - President Bush said Tuesday that “I take responsibility” for failures in dealing with Hurricane Katrina and said the disaster raised broader questions about the government’s ability to respond to natural disasters as well as terror attacks.

“Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government,” Bush said at joint White House news conference with the president of Iraq.

“To the extent the federal government didn’t fully do its job right, I take responsibility,” Bush said.

Obviously, this sounds much like the right thing for Bush to do, though his terminal inability to offer a mea culpa without caveat remains full blown:

He said he wanted to know both what went wrong and what went right.

As for blunders in the federal response, “I’m not going to defend the process going in,” Bush said. “I am going to defend the people saving lives.”

It will be interesting to see if this kind of “aknowledgement” of responsibility becomes the basis by which, as always, Bush and Co. manage to skate by without actually being held responsible by anyone. My feeling is, sadly, that we will once again see any serious attempt to reform the system stymied, and the only people to suffer any political punishment will be the people who were most vocally calling for accountability in the first place. Count on the so called opposition to treat this statement as an excuse not to actually go after the president’s record or policies during the next election, and as they always do, lose badly, to our national detriment.

At least the media, so far, seems to have their gonads attached. This article includes the following (much too subtle) barb:

It was the closest Bush has come to publicly finding fault with any federal officials involved in the hurricane response, which has been widely criticized as disjointed and slow. Some federal officials have sought to fault state and local officials for being unprepared to cope with the disaster.

That said, I am at the very least willing to admit that it’s heartening to see something resembling assumption of responsibility coming from this adminstration, even if I remain convinced that nothing will change. No matter how appropriate (or inappropriate… ‘what went right’ anyone?) this is, it does not change the fact that Bush constantly fucks up and constantly fucks up even worse on the rebound. No matter how he handles it from this point onward, he should not have been in charge in the first place, and he should not find himself or his party rewarded for it next year.

What do you guys think about this?

* To be fair, I don’t drive a car and I ride a scooter exclusively, so I tend to notice the weather with a bit more intensity than I might otherwise. Currently, I own a Honda Elite 80, and I LOVE it. I’m hoping to upgrade to a faster, or at least a more powerful bike as soon as possible. I’m leaning towards a Baron Retro 150, or a TNG Milano, though my surprisingly awesome father is teasing me with the possibility that I might assume command of his 79′ Yamaha 750. Does anyone anyone else reading this ride? Feel free to comment.