More deep thoughts from liberals

I was at a Christmas party this weekend where one of the guests opined that it was no coincidence that oil prices dropped just as Bush's popularity hit rock bottom, so that his numbers could go up again. I politely refrained from pointing out that, if Bush really had control over oil prices, the smarter thing would have been to keep them low all the time, so that he didn't suffer the humiliation (and loss of Congressional control) that comes with falling numbers. The same guest was pretty sure that Bush manufactured (or at least escalated) the whole bird flu crisis because he has friends in the pharmacy business. Again, I politely held back from pointing out that America was pretty much the last to hop onto the bandwagon, with multiple other country and NGO ssweating and screaming before Bush even got around to announcing a plan to stock up on drugs. Unless this woman believes that Bush was manipulating every one of these entities to give himself plausible deniability, there just doesn't seem to be a good conspiracy there either. I should say that the person voicing these thoughts is intelligent, well-read, and in thrall to the NY Times.