Clinton and his administration were no great shakes when it came to their domestic policy programs or their real successes, but Bush and his own people make their predecessors look like progressives and political geniuses if we look at not even a full two years of the current regime's reactionary policy articulations and our concomitant economic and social disasters.

Hardly an argument there, but what about foreign policy? During the Clinton era the U.S. was basically at peace and seemed to be able to look forward to a continuation of peace. We were admired by a good part of the world, or so we were led to believe, and much if not most of the planet had or was about to adopt our own well-advertised recipes for both political and economic success, especially economic success (even if the economic prescription presented perilous consequences for many, here as well as outside the country). Today U.S. influence in the world has been disastrously compromised, and what remains is in great peril. The Bush administration has totally squandered the immense good will and support which had accrued to us after the disaster of September, 2001, but its policies independent of those events had already and continue to increasingly alienate the entire planet.

Brilliant in his judgment and the economy of words, Daniel Shore delivered a scathing assessment of the White House's disastrous foreign policy failures around the globe on NPR this morning.

BUSH FOREIGN POLICY -- NPR Senior News Analyst Daniel Schorr assesses President Bush's commitment, expressed during the 2000 campaign, to a foreign policy based on humility.