In deference to LS:
“Just dropped in” said: Pretty sad that folks blame all their troubles on a single party or person. It is pretty clear that nearly everyone who posts here is pro something other than Republican and I see a lot of Bush bashing going on here. If you all would take the time to go back many decades of presidential party changes, it’s pretty clear that each new president inherits the legacy of his predecessor. Just as Obama faces what Bush left for him to solve, so did Bush inherit from Clinton from H.W. Bush from Reagan from Carter and so forth. Sure we are all hurting in some way or another, but is it really ALL Bush’s fault? I don’t think so…
What horseshit.
I am sure there is a better and more comprehensive comparison than this link, but before you go blathering nonsense, take a look at this snapshot showing the country Bush inherited, and the one he is leaving us: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/chi-changegraphic-html,0,3087501.htmlpage
What is truly pretty sad is that there are so many people who bury their head in the sand and enable people like Bush and Cheney to get into power. They want to be Republican. If the Republicans nuked their home, they would find a way to say that it was Democrats fault and just fine anyway.
I asked a two-time Bush voter, who also voted for McCain recently, to name one good thing Bush did in eight years.
He said, “Bush prevented a terrorist attack.”
Hello? The most devastating terrorist attack in the history of our country took place on Bush’s watch.
He said, “well, he kept taxes low.”
No. He gutted taxes on the non-working wealthy and investment class. Under Bush, if you inherit money, your taxes were cut by millions of dollars. If you sit on your ass and collect dividends, you pay a maximum 15% rate. If you are in the top 3% of income earners, you saw a meaningful reduction in your top marginal rate. But if you actually work for a living, and get paid something that has some relation to the value you provide (i.e., you are not in the top 3% where other factors besides the value of your efforts drive your compensation), you actually are paying far more today, in taxes, fees, and amounts to private corporations who now have the monopoly on what are public services in other countries. If you add the debt load Bush has thrown on every man, woman and child, the average person is paying far more than before. And getting less for it.
Think about that. Bush rewarded indolence, and punished work. He jimmied the system so that the least of us – the inheritors, the people who sit on their ass, the ideologue incompetents – can control the capital and government, calling the shots on what the best of us – our actual working people who get up early every morning and make things happen – can do. That is a recipe for failure in any country. And it is just the opposite of what built us into what we were in prouder times.
He said: “He put in the surge.”
I just looked at him. Get real.
Then he said, “well, the Democrats would have …”
I stopped him. “Stick to what Bush and Cheney actually did. I don’t care how minor it was. Just name one thing they actually did that was unequivocally good. One thing that a kindergartner would understand as good.”
He said: “He funded AIDS drugs in Africa.”
That’s an interesting one. Recall what actually happened. African countries and India were about to break U.S. Pharma’s patents, produce the drugs and distribute them themselves to their people who are dying. Bush came in and said, no, we’ll have the U.S. taxpayer buy the drugs and provide them.
Was that really “good”?
Anything else?
He thought about it. And had to admit, he was stumped.
He voted twice for someone who never did a single thing he, on reflection, could identify as good. “just-dropped-in,” THAT is what has brought this country to the sad place it is in. Too many people refuse to pay attention to reality and vote in their own interests.
Bush himself knows he hasn’t done anything good. How else do you explain the last-minute designation of the new maritime national monuments, something diametrically opposed to everything Bush has stood for over the last eight years? You know Laura said to him, George, after we’re out of here and I’ve divorced your ass, I’m still going to have to go out and face people. Could you please just do one thing that normal people will think of as good? Something that will let me with a straight face say you are a decent man? A basically decent guy who just got every single thing horribly wrong?
What is truly sad in the new ridiculous narrative Republican apologists are trying to spin is that while in the past, it has been true that you could not blame all the terrible things that are happening on just the administration, or just one administration – that just is not the case this time. Bush/Cheney, their policies, their choices, the things they did are precisely what has brought us to the sad place we are in now. They, their ideology, their ideas, their actions, and their people, really are to blame. Until we can all acknowledge that, we remain likely to repeat the mistakes of the past.
Can we really afford that?
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
In deference to LS:
“Just dropped in” said: Pretty sad that folks blame all their troubles on a single party or person. It is pretty clear that nearly everyone who posts here is pro something other than Republican and I see a lot of Bush bashing going on here. If you all would take the time to go back many decades of presidential party changes, it’s pretty clear that each new president inherits the legacy of his predecessor. Just as Obama faces what Bush left for him to solve, so did Bush inherit from Clinton from H.W. Bush from Reagan from Carter and so forth. Sure we are all hurting in some way or another, but is it really ALL Bush’s fault? I don’t think so…
What horseshit.
I am sure there is a better and more comprehensive comparison than this link, but before you go blathering nonsense, take a look at this snapshot showing the country Bush inherited, and the one he is leaving us:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/chi-changegraphic-html,0,3087501.htmlpage
What is truly pretty sad is that there are so many people who bury their head in the sand and enable people like Bush and Cheney to get into power. They want to be Republican. If the Republicans nuked their home, they would find a way to say that it was Democrats fault and just fine anyway.
I asked a two-time Bush voter, who also voted for McCain recently, to name one good thing Bush did in eight years.
He said, “Bush prevented a terrorist attack.”
Hello? The most devastating terrorist attack in the history of our country took place on Bush’s watch.
He said, “well, he kept taxes low.”
No. He gutted taxes on the non-working wealthy and investment class. Under Bush, if you inherit money, your taxes were cut by millions of dollars. If you sit on your ass and collect dividends, you pay a maximum 15% rate. If you are in the top 3% of income earners, you saw a meaningful reduction in your top marginal rate. But if you actually work for a living, and get paid something that has some relation to the value you provide (i.e., you are not in the top 3% where other factors besides the value of your efforts drive your compensation), you actually are paying far more today, in taxes, fees, and amounts to private corporations who now have the monopoly on what are public services in other countries. If you add the debt load Bush has thrown on every man, woman and child, the average person is paying far more than before. And getting less for it.
Think about that. Bush rewarded indolence, and punished work. He jimmied the system so that the least of us – the inheritors, the people who sit on their ass, the ideologue incompetents – can control the capital and government, calling the shots on what the best of us – our actual working people who get up early every morning and make things happen – can do. That is a recipe for failure in any country. And it is just the opposite of what built us into what we were in prouder times.
He said: “He put in the surge.”
I just looked at him. Get real.
Then he said, “well, the Democrats would have …”
I stopped him. “Stick to what Bush and Cheney actually did. I don’t care how minor it was. Just name one thing they actually did that was unequivocally good. One thing that a kindergartner would understand as good.”
He said: “He funded AIDS drugs in Africa.”
That’s an interesting one. Recall what actually happened. African countries and India were about to break U.S. Pharma’s patents, produce the drugs and distribute them themselves to their people who are dying. Bush came in and said, no, we’ll have the U.S. taxpayer buy the drugs and provide them.
Was that really “good”?
Anything else?
He thought about it. And had to admit, he was stumped.
He voted twice for someone who never did a single thing he, on reflection, could identify as good. “just-dropped-in,” THAT is what has brought this country to the sad place it is in. Too many people refuse to pay attention to reality and vote in their own interests.
Bush himself knows he hasn’t done anything good. How else do you explain the last-minute designation of the new maritime national monuments, something diametrically opposed to everything Bush has stood for over the last eight years? You know Laura said to him, George, after we’re out of here and I’ve divorced your ass, I’m still going to have to go out and face people. Could you please just do one thing that normal people will think of as good? Something that will let me with a straight face say you are a decent man? A basically decent guy who just got every single thing horribly wrong?
What is truly sad in the new ridiculous narrative Republican apologists are trying to spin is that while in the past, it has been true that you could not blame all the terrible things that are happening on just the administration, or just one administration – that just is not the case this time. Bush/Cheney, their policies, their choices, the things they did are precisely what has brought us to the sad place we are in now. They, their ideology, their ideas, their actions, and their people, really are to blame. Until we can all acknowledge that, we remain likely to repeat the mistakes of the past.
Can we really afford that?