| Opinion: George Bush
Bush:
Lie by Lie Timeline
Great
bit on Bush's inability to speak
Bush Family Affirmative Action
Where's the Shared Sacrifice?
Joe Millionaire For President
"Should any political party attempt
to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate
labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again
in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course,
that believes you can do these things. Among them are [a] few other
Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or business
man from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid."
- President Dwight D. Eisenhower, 11/8/54 (here)
"‘For,’ they said,
‘there is not another city in all the world that is ruled
by a stuffed man.’ And, so far as they knew, they were quite
right." (L. Frank Baum "The Wizard of Oz")
"Why, of course the people don't want
war. . . but, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine
the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people
along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or
a parliament or a communist dictatorship.
. . voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding
of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them
they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of
patriotism and exposing the country to danger."
--- Hermann Goering, while on trial in Nuremberg (1946) (here)
Actual Quote From Our Genius President
THE PRESIDENT: Because the -- all which is on the table begins
to address the big cost drivers. For example, how benefits are calculate,
for example, is on the table; whether or not benefits rise based
upon wage increases or price increases. There's a series of parts
of the formula that are being considered. And when you couple that,
those different cost drivers, affecting those -- changing those
with personal accounts, the idea is to get what has been promised
more likely to be -- or closer delivered to what has been promised.
Does that make any sense to you? It's kind of muddled. Look, there's
a series of things that cause the -- like, for example, benefits
are calculated based upon the increase of wages, as opposed to the
increase of prices. Some have suggested that we calculate -- the
benefits will rise based upon inflation, as opposed to wage increases.
There is a reform that would help solve the red if that were put
into effect. In other words, how fast benefits grow, how fast the
promised benefits grow, if those -- if that growth is affected,
it will help on the red.
Okay, better? I'll keep working on it. (here)
Bremer's Opinion on Bush
BAGHDAD, Iraq — L. Paul Bremer, the U.S.
administrator in Iraq, said Sunday he regrets a statement he made
more than six months before the Sept. 11 attacks that the Bush administration
was "paying no attention" to terrorism. (Here)
Bush: Totally Screwed Up Clinton's Successes
From a letter to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune
A letter writer asks, "Does Molly Ivins have any conception
of what Bush was handed from the Clinton administration?" Well,
I have.
Bush was handed a balanced budget. He was handed warnings of Al-Qaida's
plan to hijack planes. He was handed a prosperous nation that wasn't
at war. He was handed a government that had North Korea's nuclear
ambitions in check. He was handed a world where Saddam Hussein had
no WMDs.
Maybe instead of Ivins taking a vacation, the American people need
to wake up.
Bush: Waffle-man Incarnate
From a letter to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune
President Bush is fond of telling us, "If I say I'm going to
do something, I do it." Indeed, many political analysts in
the mainstream press report that the president's popularity seems
to be based on his steadfast principle of saying what he means and
meaning what he says.
I beg to differ. Following is a short list off the top of my head:
• He opposed the use of American troops anywhere in the world
for nation-building.
• He opposed United Nations involvement in Iraq.
• He opposed the creation of the Office of Homeland Security
• He opposed using overwhelming military force going into
Iraq.
• He opposed the creation of the 9/11 commission.
• He opposed sworn public testimony of presidential advisers
before the commission as a violation of separation of powers.
• He opposed his own private testimony and that of the vice
president before the commission as a violation of the separation
of powers.
• He opposed declassifying and releasing the Aug. 6, 2001,
Presidential Daily Briefing.
In each case, President Bush "changed his mind" and did
each of these things he was opposed to and said he would not do.
So it's clearly not true that he says what he means and means what
he says.
Bush denies having anything to do with the (extremely premature)
banner declaring "Mission Accomplished" gracing the bridge
of the carrier Abraham Lincoln. "The sailors put it up there,"
he said. His spokesman at the White House, Scott McClellan clarified
Bush's statement. The man responsible for the banner is Scott Sforza,
known for the production of the sophisticated backdrops that appear
behind Mr. Bush with the White House message of the day, like "Helping
Small Business," repeated over and over. (here)
One joke making the rounds is that the Republicans are going
to make a movie about Bush’s war record. It’s called
“Thirty Seconds Over Austin,” a play on the 1944 movie
starring Spencer Tracy, “Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo.”
For about thirty minutes after his chief of staff told him that
America was under attack, George W. Bush continued to sit in an
elementary school classroom listening to a second-grader tell a
story about a pet goat (here)
Bush said that his favorite book as a child was The Very Hungry
Caterpillar--published the year after he graduated from Yale.
(here)
(The Case for Bush Hatred: excellent article here)
When It
Comes To Hypocrisy, He's Brilliant!
By Ellis Henican Newsday
"To those of you who received honors, awards, and distinctions,
I say, well done. And to the C students, I say you too can be president
of the United States." George W. Bush, Yale commencement address,
33 years after graduation
He was a C student at Phillips Andover. He got a not-so-stellar
1206 on his SATs - 566 verbal, 640 math. That was a full 180 points
below the median score for the Yale University class of '68. But
boola-boola for him! In the fall of 1964, George W. Bush was
welcomed inside Yale's ivy-covered walls as a "legacy admittee."
And why not? The wisecracking Texas teen had something far more
powerful than dumb ol' test scores or silly grades. He had a father,
George H.W. Bush, who was a rich and prominent Yale alum. And a
grandfather, too. Prescott S. Bush, the aristocratic Connecticut
senator, was even a Yale trustee.
A merit decision by a highly selective admissions committee?
Not even close. If this wasn't affirmative action, nothing
is. Affirmative action for rich, white kids whose daddy and
granddaddy also went to Yale. And of course, this particular
unlevel playing field denied a place to some higher-scoring, harder-working
student who made a single, tragic mistake - not being born as well
as the Bushes. Tough luck for him or her.
But wait! Wasn't that just the kind of squeezed-out student that
now-President Bush was supposedly speaking for when his Justice
Department filed a brief with the Supreme Court challenging the
affirmative-action program at the University of Michigan?
First, Bus inaccurately derided the Michigan plan as "quotas."
Then he got all moralistic, saying that giving a leg up to black
or Latino applicants i "divisive, unfair and impossible to
square with the Constitution." That kind of system, he complained,
"unfairly rewards or penalizes prospective students."
It's unfair? Unfair like being ushered into the Ivy League by Popp
and Gramps? Unfair like getting into Yale with a 1206 and Cs? Unfair
like having an entire educational career - and much of professional
life - delivered by rich white boy affirmative action? And in W's
case, the special boosts didn't begin or end with the admissions
committee at Yale. Had the future president's name been, say,
"Arbusto" instead of Bush, would he even have made it
as far as Andover, the tony prep school that was also up to its
crinkled nose in Bushes?
At Andover, Bush never got his name on the honor roll, even one
term. The published record shows that on his very first essay assignment,
the future president's grade was zero. "Disgraceful,"
the teacher wrote in bright red ink.
With a prep-school record this sad, his college counselor suggested,
maybe he ought consider applying to a safety school in case things
didn't work out at Yale. Bush chose the University of Texas. But
he never had to fall back on Austin, the Bush name packed such a
wallop at Yale. And once classes started in New Haven, this third
generation Yalie continued not to impress academically. Oh,
his easy manner won him plenty of friends on campus. He was active
in his fraternity, rising eventually to president. He made the cheerleading
squad and the super-secret Skull and Bones society. But there is
little evidence he did much book-cracking along the way.
Freshman year, his grades put him in the 21st percentile of his
class, meaning four-fifths of his classmates did better than the
Future Leader of the Free World. And in the years that followed,
young W never pulled his average above a C. His college transcript,
in an eye-popping leak to The New Yorker magazine, showed a 73 in
Introduction to the American Political System and a 71 in Introduction
to International Relations, to cite two examples that could mean
something in hindsight.
Now, none of this is any cause for shame. Lots of people do
poorly in college and succeed grandly in life. And a crucial
lesson was obviously learned. The playing field is never level,
whatever people say. Just make sure the tilt is your way.
As it was for George W. Bush. His own family-sponsored affirmative-action
plan kept pulling through. Despite the Yale grades, he was accepted
at the Harvard Business School. Despite repeated business failures,
cronies of his father's kept bailing him out.
His big-jackpot investment, the Texas Rangers baseball team, was
pretty much a gift from pals of his dad. And the rest, as
they say in the Ivy League, is Bush family history.
You don't think some black kid in Michigan would have a problem
with that? (Originally published in Newsday.)
This Time, Where's the Shared Sacrifice?
David S. Broder Washington Post
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on
Dec. 7, 1941, every American knew that our lives had been changed,
even those of us who were so young we could hardly grasp the enormity
of what had happened. Within a week, we were dealing not just with
the first casualty reports but with shortages and impending rationing.
Higher taxes were soon to come and even 12-year-olds like myself
were recruited to help out on local farms to replace the men who
had gone off to war.
This Pearl Harbor Day finds us engaged in a worldwide war on terrorism
and preparing for a possible ground war with Iraq. But the notion
of shared sacrifice is notably missing.
Earlier that week, in connection with signing the legislation to
create a new Cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security, he addressed
federal employees in a memorandum about what he called "my
highest and most urgent priority," protecting the American
people from another terrorist attack. He praised the civil servants
for their "hard work and unwavering dedication" and said,
"Americans owe you their gratitude for helping to keep their
families and their communities secure."
A few days later, Bush told those same federal workers that he
was curtailing their pay increases because granting the "full
statutory pay increases in 2003 would interfere with our nation's
ability to pursue the war on terrorism." Instead of the 4.1
percent raise that was moving through Congress before it adjourned
for the year, the president said they would get a 3.1 percent boost.
For the average federal employee in Washington, that means a loss
of about $700, but the administration said it would save $1 billion
nationally.
As the late Sen. Everett Dirksen liked to say, "a billion
here and a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money."
But the billion-dollar savings has to be put in context. The Pentagon
budget for next year -- which does not include funding of an Iraqi
war -- is $355 billion, up 10 percent over 2002.
The farm bill, which Bush signed in May with an eye to November's
Midwest Senate races, will cost $248 billion over the next six years.
Fiscal conservatives in both parties objected to its expanded subsidies
to large farm operators, but the president did not hesitate to give
it his blessing. And he has regularly defended his 10-year tax cut,
which will cost the Treasury $1.3 trillion and mostly will go to
top-bracket earners. Indeed, he wants to make the tax cuts permanent
and there's talk in the White House of accelerating them.
Oddly enough, the same president who says, with a straight face,
that a $1 billion federal pay raise would "interfere with .
. . the war on terrorism" insists the tax cut can go forward
just as if the budget were still in surplus and Al-Qaida had never
struck.
The mixed message to federal workers -- words of praise followed
by a lump of coal in their Christmas stockings -- comes at a time
when administration officials and private foundations are trying
to persuade thousands of talented young people to take up government
careers and replace those who are slated for retirement.
Much the same thing is happening in the armed services. Recruitment
has not become easier since 9/11 -- another great difference from
Pearl Harbor. The draft is long gone, and what was once a military
reflective of the whole society is now made up largely of those
with backgrounds that narrow their prospects and reduce their options.
As my friend, columnist Mark Shields, pointed out recently, when
Congress authorized the use of force in Iraq, not a single member
of the House and only one senator had a son or daughter serving
in the enlisted ranks of the armed services. And only three House
members have children who are officers.
More than 130,000 reservists have been activated -- taken from
their civilian jobs and their families -- since the attacks on the
World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Some of them are in their second
year of service, because no one is available to replace them. Thousands
more will be called up if we fight Iraq. Almost everywhere you look,
the element of shared sacrifice that should be expected in a nation
at war is missing. A few people are being asked to give up a lot
-- measured in time or money -- while others are being indulged
in ways no can claim are fair.
So spare me, please, the comparisons to Pearl Harbor. (here)
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