From the Department of Very Small Blessings.

I’m amazed that George Bush hasn’t pulled several hundred muscles in his stretching to find rationales for his actions and silver linings in a huge wall of black clouds. For instance, who could forget his hyping the “benefit” from global warming, that it will make ship traffic through the Artic easier?

Here’s one via Dan Froomkin:

And in yet another exit interview, Bush tells Tara Wall of the Washington Times about the upside to the current economic crisis: "One aspect of these recent times that has been overlooked is the fact that the price of gasoline has gone down from near $4 to under $2, which is stimulative, because people have got nearly $2,000 on an annualized basis in their pocket -- that's $2,000 per family -- as a result of gasoline going down," Bush said. "That's stimulative."

Is this really something to be bragging about? The economy of this country seems to be collapsing around us. There are numerous and varying reasons why this is occurring, but many of them seem to stem directly out of the free market (read, “no regulations”) economic policies that are the cornerstone of the modern Republican party. To scale that down a bit, you also might say that one positive aspect of having the engine in your 1987 Volvo blow up is that you won’t have to buy gas for it anymore. You aren’t able to actually, you know, GO anywhere. But you don’t have to pay those pesky gas bills. Lots more money in the pocket!

Sheesh. After next Tuesday, I am hoping we all hear very little from George W. Bush.