The Buck Has Stopped

 Luck is a big part of all of our lives.

For some of us that's more important than for others.

When my luck turns bad, for example, only I - or maybe a couple family members also - am affected.

So recovery from the bad luck is a pretty simple - to imagine and implement - the time required for that recovery may be long and its results may be spotty, but what to do is always pretty obvious.

And then also, the whole recovery process often is ameliorated by off-setting subsequent good luck.

For Presidents of the United States it isn't so simple.

Not only is luck involved, the buck is also involved.

The buck is that invisible but unavoidable thing called ultimate responsibility.

Harry Truman acknowledged and enthusiastically accepted the buck.

If not for that thing, he reasoned, why do we need a President?

George W. Bush conjured a buck into existence when he went into Afghanistan to get Osama bin Laden.

He made it a more complicated buck when he muffed getting Osama when Osama was cornered in a labyrinth of caves.

That made it necessary for us to stay around looking for Osama and ultimately trying to shore up a non existent nation.

That buck got passed to Obama.

Obama wanted out but had to surge instead.

The surge morphed on and on and Obama was able to pass the buck to trump.

trump actually brought us to the verge of getting out, but he did it by announcing an exit date and then contacting the Taliban to see if they wanted a deal.

The people of the middle east are uniformly shrewd: the Taliban saw no art in that deal; they only saw a really good deal; and they started taking back the country while they negotiated nothing in Doha.

So donnie passed the buck to Joe Biden.

And Joe's luck has become distinctly bad.

The buck has stopped.

On his desk.

Now the future of Joe's presidency hangs in the balance depending upon what he manages to say and do in the next few hours and the next few days.

I can't imagine how this turns out well.