The Texas Rangers have a new name for their owner's suite: "President George W. Bush Owner's Suite", in honor of the 43rd President who bought an $800,000 stake in the team in April of 1989. After serving as general managing partner for five years, he sold the stake in 1998 for more than $15 million.

"I've looked this up, and in the 133-year history of Major League Baseball, never has a president been an owner except President Bush," Rangers owner Tom Hicks told MLB.com. "I'm glad he's home and can reconnect with this place. We thought it would be fitting to have the suite named after him."

"I was actually thinking of my time in baseball driving up here on the turnpike," Bush said. "Baseball is a great sport, and the Rangers are a great organization. Tom is a wonderful owner and has built this team up, hopefully guiding it to an American League pennant."

"I'm thrilled to accept it," Bush said. "I used to [sit in the crowd during the game], but my life changed in January 2001. I have a little less anonymity now."

I would love to see President Bush come to Fenway Park and try to take in a game from the bleachers.

In one of my previous blogs: Is the stock market spring loaded? I coined the phrase Lightspeed Inflation in reference to the rate at which the government was able to dilute our currency. It is time we stopped referring to the government's over spending as "running the printing presses".

We have reached a point, given our maximum note size of $100, that we would actually be better off if the government did have to print the money. Now they can just add whatever amount they want to the balance sheet electronically.

We've all been wondering what President Bush would do after leaving office with the lowest approval ratings in history and now we have our answer: He's writing a book.

"I want people to understand the environment in which I was making decisions. I want people to get a sense of how decisions were made and I want people to understand the options that were placed before me," he told the Associated Press.

Flying shoe-dodger, President George W. Bush, has a track record of rewarding the guilty. After the faked intelligence that gave him the ammunition he needed to invade Iraq in 2004, Bush awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom to CIA Director George "Slam Dunk" Tenet. And to reward the banks that got us into the current financial catastrophe, Bush rammed through Congress a bill that uses $700 billion of our tax dollars to pay bonuses to the executives who run those banks.

How did he do that? As usual, he did it secretively. The law that created the bailout bill includes provisions that limit executive compensation for banks that get bailout money. Specifically, the bill requires that banks report to the IRS any compensation above $500,000 paid to their top five executives. If that reporting does not occur, the IRS can impose tax penalties. Not only that, but there is no limit to what people below the top five can get paid -- so there never was any way to keep taxpayer money from paying millions to the traders and investment bankers who often get more than the CEO.

The elections are upon us with less than 24 hours before the polls open. Our current president George W. Bush has sat by as the economy went from good to bad to worse and his reputation and political standing went with it.

I have voted Republican and I have voted Democrat. I vote for the person, not the party. As the nation ponders who will be sitting in the Oval Office in 2009 I am quite confident that I am not alone. From day one I have felt that Dubya was in the White House because of dear old dad, the senior being far more qualified than junior. Junior became the front man for ideologues more intent on forcing their will upon others after a very dubious election result than all else.

From what I have seen and read, GWB has never been a great success at anything but politics, and now that reputation is toast too. While history has been kind to some past presidents allowing at least partial redemption -- Truman as direct, honest and a strong leader, Nixon on foreign policy issues, and most recently Carter as a humanitarian -- our current president has little to show for his eight years.

We have finally reached a point where all denial is gone and we are ready to admit the error of our ways. Sure, there were plenty of folks ringing the alarm bells years ago, but universal acceptance of the fundamental economic calamity that faces us from every corner of the world, and every person with two cents to rub together, has just now taken hold.

I wrote quite some time ago that the turning point in the economy cannot come about until President Bush admits there is a problem and that he will be the last person to do so. While I do not have a high opinion of President Bush, the facts speak for themselves as I wrote one year ago. (See Is Bush giving the country away without knowing it?)

The storm is not over, but we are coming to grips with it at very great expense. Admitting our errors is only the start; now we will have to spend years fixing problems and making many compromises. Unfortunately many people may lose their homes, jobs or both before we see significant growth.

This is my 800th post, so I thought I would have to mark the occasion with something very serious, and R. P. Overmyer once again supplied the kindling for my fire.

Many comments we receive ask why George W. Bush should be blamed for the dire state of the economy; that the President is just one more victim of circumstance. Others think the legislature should take the blame, or that it's a Democratic vs. Republican dilemma.

As I have tried to do in each of my posts that stray into politics, I will try my best to focus on the financial issues. If anyone cares, I tend to vote independent of party affiliation and tend to follow a moderate path. Interestingly each party tries to paint the other as more extremist in an attempt to get my vote.

The easy things first; the Republicans controlled the executive and legislative branches of government for the majority of GWB's term. It is true that the Democrats were less than cooperative these last 20 months and all too eager to watch Bush boil in his own stew, but for half that time everyone has been cooperating to make sure the financial markets do not collapse. All the blame should not fall on Bush or the Republicans, but I think it is not a hard case to make that the leadership and opportunity was theirs this go round and they screwed up -- he screwed up!

There are many ironies in the fact that President George W. Bush will throw the first pitch at Major League Baseball's All-Star Game in New York. For one, President Bush is the first managing general partner of a Major League team (the Texas Rangers) to become President of the United States.

President Franklin Roosevelt was the first to attend an All-Star Game and throw out the first pitch, starting the tradition. He too had to deal with a poor economy and by the time he threw out that first ball the groundwork was being laid for World War II. President Bush has had to contend with his own war.

While there are differing views as to whether we should have gone into Iraq and whether we should stay or get out, this will always be viewed as George's war, fair or not. And the state of our economy in 2008 will also be viewed as George's economy, fair or not.

The ultimate irony for me is that Yankee Stadium is scheduled to be torn apart at the end of the season. This is YANKEE Stadium and the last president to set foot in it will be George W. Bush. The stadium with the greatest heritage in baseball, the 'House That Ruth Built', is going to be torn apart while our economy is also being torn apart. It is being torn out at its roots.

Despite excellent earnings from Boeing Co. (NYSE: BA) yesterday, a bit of a shadow still hangs over the company. That's because in February the Air Force awarded a $100 billion contract for in-flight refueling craft -- known as tankers -- to EADS's Airbus and Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC). Boeing is currently challenging this award. But an interview I did for my book on Boeing suggests that Boeing will not win this contract because George W. Bush and John McCain want to award the contract to Bush's new friends: France's Nicolas Sarkozy and Germany's Angela Merkel.

I got this theory from a veteran Wall Street analyst who covers the aircraft industry. He suggested that Boeing lost the Tanker bid because John McCain -- who is ranking member on the Senate Armed Services Committee -- had the Air Force change the specifications for the tanker bid so Airbus and Northrop would be able to field a competitive bid. My source noted that the one problem with the change was that the Air Force did not inform Boeing about it.

After the bid was awarded to Airbus, it became clear that the original specifications had changed from a small, 767-sized craft to a medium-sized 777 one. During the review process, my source contends that Boeing asked the Air Force if the 767-sized craft was what it wanted. Boeing also told the Air Force that it would be happy to bid with a different model if the Air Force wanted. But the Air Force told Boeing that it still wanted the 767-sized craft.

In describing the results of last night's Iowa caucuses, The Washington Post's David Broder minced no words: "Eight years after Iowa voters did the conventional -- sending George W. Bush and Al Gore on to meet in the election of 2000, they shook up the status quo in both parties as never before. The victories of Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee jolted the expectations of establishment candidates with far stronger conventional credentials."

The New York Times' David Brooks was similarly thunderstruck. "I've been through election nights that brought a political earthquake to the country. I've never been through an election night that brought two."

While I admit the results were exciting, there is something that people often forget that the Philadelphia Inquirer's Dick Polman argues they need to remember: "Incumbents aside, exactly one victorious Iowa candidate -- George W. Bush in 2000 -- has ever gone on to win the presidency in the same year. Even though (Jimmy) Carter got an historic boost in Iowa, on the way to his November election, he actually finished second in Iowa -- behind 'Uncommitted.'"

Oh, so all of the hot air that's been expounded in the past 24 hours over this antiquated political system is that one of the least representative states in the country may not actually mean much in the long term. That's unbelievable, but what's worse is that we are about to go through this whole exercise yet again in an equally non-representative state, New Hampshire.

I have been wondering lately if the sagging value of the dollar is actually going down through economic gyrations or being pushed down by design.

There are many repercussions. No one less than Rodrigo Rato, head of the International Monetary Fund, warned Monday of a potential "abrupt fall" in the US dollar that could roil the global economy. "There are risks that an abrupt fall in the dollar could either be triggered by, or itself trigger, a loss of confidence in dollar assets," Rato said at the close of annual meetings here of the IMF and the World Bank, according to news reports.

Here is what is really on his mind: Europe may take steps to temper the strong appreciation of the Euro, which is weighing on exports from the 13-nation bloc. "There is a risk that exchange rate appreciation in countries with flexible exchange rates -- including the Euro area -- could hurt their growth prospects, and that in these circumstances protectionist pressures could worsen," he said.

From my perspective I have wondered if the Bush administration is at least applauding the weak dollar as it improves U.S. trade imbalances, helps prop up the stock market and worried investment bankers, and strengthens American companies in many regards.

"Don't come whining to us with your problems" could be the summary of both President Bush's declaration Friday afternoon basically repeating the commentary of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke earlier in the day. This is not to say that sympathy cannot be found for those home owners caught in the squeeze of rising interest rates and lower home values. However, people who entered the housing market late speculating on continued rising prices hoping for quick flips will be left without a chair because the music has stopped playing. All except the funeral march perhaps.

Big Ben said "It is not the responsibility of the Federal Reserve-nor would it be appropriate- to protect lenders and investors from the consequences of their financial decisions."

The New York Times reports that President George W. Bush is seeking to blame the housing market collapse on excess liquidity and views the current correction as normal. What are his goals? To keep "history" from blaming him for yet another "worst U.S. President ever" accomplishment.

As a "recovering alcoholic," Bush excels at motivating other people to cover up for his inadequacies (this is known as co-dependence). For instance, when his oil company, Spectrum 7, collapsed in 1986, he got Harken Energy to bail him out through his father's political connections. In the case of the current debt-fueled economic reversal, he has gotten his Treasury Secretary, Henry Paulson and Fed Chair Ben Bernanke to repeat the talking point that the subprime collapse is "contained" and won't affect the rest of the economy.

I think Bush is responsible for the housing collapse for three reasons:

We have been expecting to see this for a few days now, and today oil was finally able to close the session above the psychological $70 mark at $70.55, gaining $0.98 on the session. Earlier in the day prices were able to trade as high as $71.06 before settling down a bit to head into the weekend.

Today's close above $70 marks the first time in almost a year that prices have been at this level, with the last time oil was above $70 being back in August '06. The primary reasons behind the move today were more of the same that we have seen lately... concerns over gasoline surprises and political tensions around the globe.

American refineries have been the center of attention over the past couple of months with concerns over how well refineries are going to be able to keep up with the growing demand during the peak summer driving months. This week those concerns were once again brought to the surface after the weekly inventory numbers out of the Energy Department showed n unexpected decline in gasoline supplies. Analysts had been expecting to see a rise of 1.1 million barrels when in fact the numbers showed that gasoline stocks fell by 700,000 barrels.

I think Crocs Inc. (NASDAQ: CROX) wants you to consider the deeper story behind George W. Bush being photographed wearing Crocs beach shoes. Does he think they're stylish? I don't suppose he gives much thought to style. Does he find them comfortable? If he was after strict comfort, a cross trainer from Nike Inc. (NYSE: NKE) would do a better job on pavement. Is he giving a friendly endorsement opportunity to his buddy Rick Sharp? That's probably the gist of it, but wait, there's more. Think just a little bit deeper to the true message that was sent by President Bush wearing those shoes.

The Crooks and Liars blog reports that President Bush's approval rating is at 29%, its lowest point ever. I don't put much stock in polls, I never did, and I never will. The reason being that no matter how unbiased a polling organization claims to be, poll numbers can be very easily manipulated. Even something as simple as the time of day that opinions are solicited can seriously change outcomes, but that's not what I want to bring to you.

The matter is simply this: If President Bush was as widely disliked as the left-wing, mainstream media would like you to believe he is, do you really think that Rick Sharp would have put those shoes on him? The wearing of Crocs by George W. Bush was as much an endorsement of that man by a hip and young company as it was an endorsement of those shoes. The leftist spin-meisters can tell you all they want about how the nation hates Bush, but the fact of the matter is this: A flourishing retailer doesn't generally present its product with the use of disliked individuals.

You didn't see Crocs on the feet of Jack Kevorkian as he left prison, did you?