Two Hundred and Forty-Five days.

That’s the good news.

Two Hundred and Forty-Five days.

That’s the bad news.

If you haven’t figured it out already, the 245 days are the number of days George Bush has left in office. While it’s nice to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel, it is terrifying to think about how much more damage Bush can do in his final eight months.

Undeterred by his miserable approval ratings, Bush is unwilling to let his presidency quietly expire. To the contrary, he appears hell bent on going out with a bang… looking for the elusive defining moment in his presidency. 

A bit late in the game, Bush has decided that his legacy will be a lasting peace in the Middle East. His ambitious goal is for an accord between Israel and the Palestinians in place by the end of 2008.  While the goal is an admirable one, Bush clearly has no idea of how to reach it. 

This is the same George Bush who has been in office since 2001 and didn’t even bother visiting Israel until 2008. Now he wants to wave a magic wand over the region and create peace out of thin air.

Nice plan. Unfortunately, it has all of the depth and detail of a Miss America speech.

Bush’s Kumbaya scenario- with Israelis and Palestinians holding hands and living in complete harmony- doesn’t include any discussions with Hamas. It also doesn’t take into account that both Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have only weak support from their own people. And it certainly doesn’t take into account the fact that violence in the region is getting worse every day.

Of course, Bush has never let facts or reality get in the way of his policies.

Bush’s plan is to have all of the young Palestinians surf the Web (he actually said this) just to see how great life is in America and how much fun it is to live in a democracy. Give every Palestinian teenager a page on Facebook and they will immediately kick Hamas out and embrace both democracy and Israel.

Perhaps we should also ship them IPods loaded with songs from the Beach Boys, Brittney Spears and the Backstreet Boys. That all-American music should do the trick. 

Bush’s arrogance was in rare form during last week’s trip to the Middle East.

“America is deeply concerned about the plight of political prisoners in this region, as well as democratic activists who are intimidated or repressed, newspapers and civil society organizations that are shut down, and dissidents whose voices are stifled,” Bush said to area leaders. “Too often in the Middle East, politics has consisted of one leader in power and the opposition in jail.”

This hypocrisy is almost astounding. Political prisoners? Shutting down newspapers? Imprisoning the opposition? Now… why do those things sound so familiar?

Having Bush as the spokesman for democracy is like having Pat Buchanan as the spokesman for the United Jewish Appeal.

There was a time when American presidents had the kind of diplomatic skills and gravitas to broker a peace. Franklin Delano Roosevelt had it. Bill Clinton had it.

George Bush… forget it.

Peace is possible in the Middle East, but we can’t even begin to hope for it… at least not for the next 245 days.