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Tuesday, November 04, 2008
As evidence that some people just lack a firm grasp of reality, a number of Bush loyalists feel Bush has gotten a 'bad rap'...
Why would they think that? Well, could it have anything to do with his:
* mishandling of the Iraq conflict?
* exponential expansion of the federal budget?
* mishandling the aftermath of Katrina? (not only did he come across as out-of-touch and incompetent during the immediate aftermath, he compounded his errors by writing a blank check for rebuilding New Orleans, further undermining conservative doctrine that there are some things best left to state and local government).
* "let's not call it an amnesty amnesty immigration reform? (p*** off the base, get nothing done, what a great result)
* failing to actually take the fight in any meaningful way to those countries who support terror? (other than invading Iraq, what has Bush done that any Democratic President wouldn't have done following 9/11?)
* attempting to foist Harriet Miers on us?
* over-reacting to a relative small number of corporate crimes by allowing the Justice Department to run roughshod over the rights of those suspected of criminal behavior (the infamous Thompson Memo instituting these policies was eviscerated by a federal judge and ultimately withdrawn)?
* failing to stand up to Democrat demagogues on the corporate crimes by signing Sarbanes-Oxley, a law which adds incredible amounts of hassle and expense but does almost nothing to prevent corporate malfeasance?
* signing McCain-Feingold campaign reform, and even though he had previously viewed it as an unconstitutional impingement of free speech?
* caving into the Democrats and agreeing to form two more federal bureaucracies, the Department of Homeland Security and the 'Intelligence Czar', both of which have done no better than would have been accomplished with the earlier national security structure.
* standing idly by while the Democrats had a field day with Scooter Libby.
* pushing for and signing the Medicare drug bill, yet another insufficiently funded government entitlement? (and again, further undermining conservative positions that the role of the federal government is NOT to serve as a giant ATM for dispersing funds to favored segments of the populace)
* appointing Alberto Gonzales as Attorney General, someone totally incapable of carrying out and defending Administration policy?
* standing and doing nothing while Iran continued its progress towards developing and using nuclear weapons?
* standing around like an idiot during this financial crisis, saying nothing more than a canned repetition of 'tough times, fundamentally strong America'?
* failing to develop (and advocate for) a consistent and effective way of detaining and interrogating terrorists (just how many approaches were developed? how many times did we read of changes in the charges being dropped, the venue in which terrorists were charged?)?
* instituting such restrictive 'rules of engagement' on our troops that their lives were deemed less important than not damaging a mosque or incurring 'collateral damage' (on those unlucky or stupid enough to be in the vicinity of terrorists)?
* failing to push earlier and more aggressively to kill the restrictions on drilling offshore and in areas off-limits in Alaska and elsewhere? (we wouldn't have had to deal with $4 a gallon gas, even for a short time, if Bush had acted earlier)
* supporting non-supportive Republican incumbents (such as Specter) instead of their more conservative primary challengers?
* pushing the 'No Child Left Behind' which, while admirable in its desire to reform education, not only injected the federal government even more into an area that is properly the domain of the states (if the people of a state wants to be stupid enough to not teach their kids how to be productive, functioning adults, then that is their problem), it has gotten very little results for the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on the program.
* never working on his abominable public speaking skills? (one can listen only so long before tuning out to his garbled sentence fragments that sound as if he's trying to remember the prepared list of talking points) Time after time I saw him butcher an argument, so much so that the public stopped trying to understand what he was trying to say and leaving them susceptible to the twists and distorted arguments put up by the Democrats.
* hiring (and failing to fire) so many bad personnel choices? How could Scott McClellan have lasted so long as Press Secretary? How did Paul O'Neill ever get picked as Treasury Secretary? And, my personal favorite, what was Bush drinking when he thought Colin Powell would make a supportive and effective Secretary of State?
* failing to intervene and resolve the constant in-fighting among the various factions in his Administration? (it is incredible that anyone with a business degree doesn't know that the effectiveness of any organization is crippled if everybody isn't on the same page)
* failing to clamp down on the incessant leaking of national security secrets?
* failing to replace Cheney in 2004 with someone able and willing to run to succeed Bush in 2008? (again, it is just smart business to plan your succession, what good does it do if you're replaced by someone who is going to tear down and reverse everything you've tried to do during your term? Then again, to be fair, given the p***-poor job Bush has done, his Vice President's campaign to succeed Bush would have been DOA)
Yeah, with a list of accomplishments such as this, it is hard to understand how Bush could have gotten a bad rap...
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Why would they think that? Well, could it have anything to do with his:
* mishandling of the Iraq conflict?
* exponential expansion of the federal budget?
* mishandling the aftermath of Katrina? (not only did he come across as out-of-touch and incompetent during the immediate aftermath, he compounded his errors by writing a blank check for rebuilding New Orleans, further undermining conservative doctrine that there are some things best left to state and local government).
* "let's not call it an amnesty amnesty immigration reform? (p*** off the base, get nothing done, what a great result)
* failing to actually take the fight in any meaningful way to those countries who support terror? (other than invading Iraq, what has Bush done that any Democratic President wouldn't have done following 9/11?)
* attempting to foist Harriet Miers on us?
* over-reacting to a relative small number of corporate crimes by allowing the Justice Department to run roughshod over the rights of those suspected of criminal behavior (the infamous Thompson Memo instituting these policies was eviscerated by a federal judge and ultimately withdrawn)?
* failing to stand up to Democrat demagogues on the corporate crimes by signing Sarbanes-Oxley, a law which adds incredible amounts of hassle and expense but does almost nothing to prevent corporate malfeasance?
* signing McCain-Feingold campaign reform, and even though he had previously viewed it as an unconstitutional impingement of free speech?
* caving into the Democrats and agreeing to form two more federal bureaucracies, the Department of Homeland Security and the 'Intelligence Czar', both of which have done no better than would have been accomplished with the earlier national security structure.
* standing idly by while the Democrats had a field day with Scooter Libby.
* pushing for and signing the Medicare drug bill, yet another insufficiently funded government entitlement? (and again, further undermining conservative positions that the role of the federal government is NOT to serve as a giant ATM for dispersing funds to favored segments of the populace)
* appointing Alberto Gonzales as Attorney General, someone totally incapable of carrying out and defending Administration policy?
* standing and doing nothing while Iran continued its progress towards developing and using nuclear weapons?
* standing around like an idiot during this financial crisis, saying nothing more than a canned repetition of 'tough times, fundamentally strong America'?
* failing to develop (and advocate for) a consistent and effective way of detaining and interrogating terrorists (just how many approaches were developed? how many times did we read of changes in the charges being dropped, the venue in which terrorists were charged?)?
* instituting such restrictive 'rules of engagement' on our troops that their lives were deemed less important than not damaging a mosque or incurring 'collateral damage' (on those unlucky or stupid enough to be in the vicinity of terrorists)?
* failing to push earlier and more aggressively to kill the restrictions on drilling offshore and in areas off-limits in Alaska and elsewhere? (we wouldn't have had to deal with $4 a gallon gas, even for a short time, if Bush had acted earlier)
* supporting non-supportive Republican incumbents (such as Specter) instead of their more conservative primary challengers?
* pushing the 'No Child Left Behind' which, while admirable in its desire to reform education, not only injected the federal government even more into an area that is properly the domain of the states (if the people of a state wants to be stupid enough to not teach their kids how to be productive, functioning adults, then that is their problem), it has gotten very little results for the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on the program.
* never working on his abominable public speaking skills? (one can listen only so long before tuning out to his garbled sentence fragments that sound as if he's trying to remember the prepared list of talking points) Time after time I saw him butcher an argument, so much so that the public stopped trying to understand what he was trying to say and leaving them susceptible to the twists and distorted arguments put up by the Democrats.
* hiring (and failing to fire) so many bad personnel choices? How could Scott McClellan have lasted so long as Press Secretary? How did Paul O'Neill ever get picked as Treasury Secretary? And, my personal favorite, what was Bush drinking when he thought Colin Powell would make a supportive and effective Secretary of State?
* failing to intervene and resolve the constant in-fighting among the various factions in his Administration? (it is incredible that anyone with a business degree doesn't know that the effectiveness of any organization is crippled if everybody isn't on the same page)
* failing to clamp down on the incessant leaking of national security secrets?
* failing to replace Cheney in 2004 with someone able and willing to run to succeed Bush in 2008? (again, it is just smart business to plan your succession, what good does it do if you're replaced by someone who is going to tear down and reverse everything you've tried to do during your term? Then again, to be fair, given the p***-poor job Bush has done, his Vice President's campaign to succeed Bush would have been DOA)
Yeah, with a list of accomplishments such as this, it is hard to understand how Bush could have gotten a bad rap...
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