Whether Bush wanted it or not, he did want to give his buddy and fellow governor friend a political plum.... he had actually wanted him for another cabinet post (one which escapes me now) but I think his daddy talked him out of it.

Tom Ridge will go down for all time as the first director of Homeland Security. If you get the idea I don't like Tom Ridge, that's not so. But he should have stayed in state politics, IMO. That has now become my opinion on George Bush, also.

Some people (most people) don't really have what it takes to run a nation. And with the help of those they gather around them, it can make or break them. President Bush's choices have been his biggest problem. And so many of them were from his daddy's administration or Clinton holdovers. They weren't that good then... why give them a second chance? Oh well, what's done is done.