If X, Then _____?

via Brad Delong, a truly startling example of illogic at the New York Times. First, the assertion:

After President Bush's disastrous visit to Latin America, it's unnerving to realize that his presidency still has more than three years to run. An administration with no agenda and no competence would be hard enough to live with on the domestic front. But the rest of the world simply can't afford an American government this bad for that long.

Pretty strong stuff. It gets better:

...But the central problem is not Karl Rove or Treasury Secretary John Snow or even Donald Rumsfeld, the defense secretary. It is President Bush himself.

Wow. So we've identified the problem: White House incompetence - and the cause: George W. Bush. So what is the NYT's stated solution:

... The place to begin is with Dick Cheney...

Guh? Did I miss something?

Mr. Bush cannot fire Mr. Cheney, but he could do what other presidents have done to vice presidents: keep him too busy attending funerals and acting as the chairman of studies to do more harm. Mr. Bush would still have to turn his administration around, but it would at least send a signal to the nation and the world that he was in charge, and the next three years might not be as dreadful as they threaten to be right now.

Two things wrong with this, and the first is simple: If the problem is Bush, then Bush should go, not Cheney. I understand that the editorial board of the NY Times might get the vapors at suggesting that a President should be impeached for something other than blowjobs, but if the problem is Bush's incompetence, then fixing the Vice-President's office (remember, "not worth a glass of warm spit") does nothing. At best it's a diversion. At worst, it exonerates Bush.

In short, the NY Times has finally come to the barricades, and is bearing arms with the rest of us. It's just that their aim sucks.

The second big problem is that of course the President can ask for his VP's resignation. Should Cheney refuse, I'm sure the President can ask cabinet - or if necessary, Congress - to remove his own VP. (Honestly, there are more than enough medical grounds to remove Cheney and give the White House cover.) The reality of course is that neither Bush nor the Republicans in Congress would be willing to pay the political price for doing that. Cheney is staying right where he is because Bush can't afford to lose him, not when there are three more years of political wilderness ahead of him.

On the other hand, it might actually be better for Bush to lose Cheney now. Name a young, healthy successor to the Presidency so that the GOP is set up for 2008. Cheney can leave for medical reasons, the President loses a political albatross, and the Democrats spend a year learning how to fight the new guy. Of course, this would also require Bush to have some backbone.

Won't happen, then.