A little over three years ago, Natalie Maines of the Dixie Chicks told a London concert audience “Just so you know, we’re ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas.” To many at the time, this statement seemed outrageous and disrespectful. Conservatives gunned for the Dixie Chicks like Dick Cheney at a quail shoot.

My how times have changed! Our President rushed us (lied us) into an unnecessary war, condones torture and indefinite detainment of prisoners, has no qualms in exposing the identity of a CIA agent for political advantage or retribution, thinks it’s O.K. to perform warrantless wiretaps of American citizens, has spent us into record debt and left it for future generations to repay, completely ignores port and border security, hasn’t a clue of what to do in the event of a natural disaster, and pretty much turns everything he touches into a man-made disaster.

Did I forget underfunding No Child Left Behind, cutting government scholarships, gutting environmental protection laws, wartime tax cuts to the rich, a growing number of families in poverty and a vanishing middle class, a looming healthcare crisis, cutting funding of basic sciences, presiding over a brain-drain of talent to overseas and an increasing lack of skilled labor at home, outsourcing of our domestic industries, ignoring investment in our national infrastructure, blurring the separation of church and state, corrupt and crony politics, dividing a nation, radicalizing Islam, polarizing a world, and treating the Constitution like “a goddamn piece of paper?”

Yes, with a little bit of water under the bridge, the comments of the Dixie Chicks seem quite tame and innocent . . . nostalgic if you will. Given the perspective of the last three years, it would be more accurate to say that I am ashamed that the President of the United States is from the United States. In fact, I am ashamed that the President is a homo sapiens. So like the Dixie Chicks speaking to their foreign audience and asking for forgiveness, I beseech any extraterrestrials reading this on the GWW (Galactic Wide Web), please don’t judge the human race on the basis of this one subhuman from Crawford.