Wishing for disaster?

In Slate, Christopher Hitchens has a diatribe today against Democrats who are wishing for disaster -- some ill turn in the Iraq war, a stock market crash or a terrorist attack that will dislodge Bush. I don't think Hitchens is being fair here. I don't know anyone who wants people to lose their lives or even their retirement nest-eggs just so Bush will be booted from office.

The more subtle frustration, really, is with Bush's luck. The War in Iraq, for example, isn't really going well. We've lost mroe than a thousand soliders, the country is in chaos, and the prospects for demcoracy seem iffy. We were told that our soldiers would be greeted as liberators and now they're in a guerilla war. We've also alienated our the rest of the world and embarassed ourselves in the Abu Ghraib prison.

Thing is, due to the resourcefulness of the soldiers on the ground, it hasn't turned out as badly as it could have. For this, Bush gets the credit. And it is frustrating to watch Bush strut around like a hero as our soldiers make the best they can out of the cruddy situation he created for them.

Hitchens is right that Kerry supporters have been heard hoping for some disaster or speculating that Osama bin Laden will be delivered up as some sort of October Surprise and, really, they should stop saying such things because it makes Kerry look bad and makes Bush's opponents look paranoid. I think that what they're really expressing through such sentiments is a massive frustration which the fact that Bush seems to be cruising towards re-election despite presiding over a terrible economy and then swindling the nation into a a war of choice that has killed more than a thousand on our side and many more in Iraq. What's it going to take to convince America that Bush is not a good President?