George Bush: Worst American president in history

[GeezerSue 7]

... Still, the Christian religion does not, as a matter of course, put all their kids in schools that teach them to kill themselves and as many Jews, Muslims, and Catholics as possible, in the name of Jesus. This is what happens in Muslim schools. ...

It is scary that some people are so bigoted and ill-informed that they believe this. But it wold be nice if you wouldn't spread around such malicious claims.

In fact, the really scary militant Christians are predominantly home schoolers who keep their kids out of the mainstream altogether. And historically, while we Catholics were not taught to kill anyone, we were taught that the sacrament of Confirmation made us "soldiers for Jesus Christ."

Likewise, Muslims are taught to "defend the faith." Devout Muslims cannot fathom keeping their religion in one pocket and their daily lives in another. Their religion is part of every minute of every day. THEREFORE, when we butt the hell into their governments and their politics and their daily lives, we are attacking their faith because their faith is a part of everything.

[GeezerSue 7]

The Geneva convention (and I don't have one in my purse, so I'm paraphrasing) applies to uniformed and declared military combatants. It does not and has never applied to "guerilla" or terrorist, un-uniformed combatants.

....

So, because we have uniforms, we're the good guys? I think not.

We were an almost unilateral force (we bulldozed the little guys into helping us), which invaded another country without the support of the UN, but under the pretenses of enforcing UN mandates. But we have uniforms!

You ever see Eddie Izzard? (paraphrased)

"We stake this flag on this land and claim this land for the British Empire."

"But, there are several milllion of us here in India and we don't need you here."

"Do you have a flag?"

"No."

"Then we win. We have a flag."

[Carlene 12]

From the AP wire....

In his annual address to Congress, Bush will offer to work with lawmakers on a handful of domestic issues while urging them to support his plans for Iraq. He'll call for expanding health-insurance coverage, tout a foreign guest-worker program and offer initiatives intended to slow global warming.

But he has never gone to Capitol Hill under such difficult circumstances, and he's so weak politically that his effort to set the national agenda is unlikely to succeed.

He'll speak at 8 p.m. CST to a Congress controlled by his political opponents and to a national television audience that has lost confidence in him. An ABC News-Washington Post poll released Monday found that Bush was more unpopular on the eve of this State of the Union speech than any president since Richard Nixon in 1974, during the Watergate scandal.

Nearly two-thirds of Americans say they disapprove of Bush's job performance.

[gailannr 1]

Mousecrazy and Jack,

I borrowed this from Newsbusters.org this morning but thought you might enjoy it, just didn't want you to feel like you were out on that "melting iceberg" by yourselves. It's a little rusty but I understood exactly what they are saying.

------------

Bigtimer says:

January 22, 2006

Isn't it nice that the leftist media in all forms want to tell us...make laws for us...ban us...from our own freedoms of choice with our own lives. That includes our children that we, not them bore.

I have had my fill...we need to up-rise and I am not kidding.

I do not care if you smoke or not, I do not care if you eat trans fat or not, I do not care if you spare the rod and spoil the child, I do not care if you wear a seat belt, I do not care if you put on a helmet when you ride on a motor-cycle, I do not care what the heck you do the night before you go to work as long as you perform your job well, I do not care if you drive a humongous gas eatin' rig or a VW, I do not care if you wear real fur or leather or not, I do not care if you shop at Walmart or a high falutin' place, I do not care if you want to go to a private school or club or not, I do not care if women or minorities are allowed in to any of these private clubs, I do not care if you want a different symbol that you believe in to represent you or not if the majority if this country believes in a simple symbol as the cross, I do not care if you do not like the word GOD expressed in all different forms on our currency to our courthouses, I do not care if you do not like seeing The Ten Commandments posted on Govt. property, I do not care if you do not like the word Christmas inserted anywhere during a joyous season, including making our children leave words out of music because it might offend the minority, I do not care if you do not know how to speak English so therefore you say you cannot vote, or listen on television or the phone let alone five hundred different languages put on all instructions anymore.......on and on it goes...I am leaving out the simplistic law-suits too...let alone the leftist org like the ACLU for just one, go away, quit inflicting your leftist, socialistic, communistic views on the majority and making our little children grow up to think this is the way this country is supposed to be and normal...the ones that aren't normal are YOU!

Leave this country...move to a country that does. Our forefathers and others have given their lives for us to have these freedoms...they are being slowly stripped from us...we are doing nothing about it.... I pledge allegiance to the flag to the US of America that I am going to try to keep informing my congressmen and others in the media to just shut up, go away, let us be free or die.....with my hand over my heart I pledge this...indivisible with justice for all.

I personally would love to run you all out on a railroad with a one way ticket and never see the whites of your evil eyes again.

This country would be afresh with glory.

As it should be.

iveseenitall Says:

January 22, 2007 - 20:28

Right on, Bigtimer. Great post.

Perhaps the most despicable thing about liberals is their rabid desire to force all their "values" ( and their thick-headed ignorance ) on everyone else. They just can't live and let live---ever. It is the height of hypocrisy. And yes, it is antithetical to everything this nation stands for. If given the opportunity, they would force you to think, speak, and act only as they do. And then they'd make you pay for it with your sweat and your taxes. Sounds like Communism, doesn't it? It is.

NEVER,NEVER trust a liberal

[Carlene 12]

iveseenitall Says:

January 22, 2007 - 20:28

Right on, Bigtimer. Great post.

Perhaps the most despicable thing about liberals is their rabid desire to force all their "values" ( and their thick-headed ignorance ) on everyone else. They just can't live and let live---ever. It is the height of hypocrisy. And yes, it is antithetical to everything this nation stands for. If given the opportunity, they would force you to think, speak, and act only as they do. And then they'd make you pay for it with your sweat and your taxes. Sounds like Communism, doesn't it? It is.

NEVER,NEVER trust a liberal

Hello.....I think you're a little mixed up. They call us "Liberals" for a reason. We are the ones who are AGAINST limiting personal freedoms - like the right of gays/lesbians to marry. And, much as I don't personally embrace it, we are the pro-choice group.

A "rabid desire to force all their "values" (and their thick-headed ignorance) on everyone else".....does that sound LIBERAL to you? Seems to me that would be the CONSERVATIVES.

[anonemouse 1]

I don't know too many liberals who are in favor of the Patriot Act, or anti-gay marriage, or anti-choice, or anti-freedom of speech, or.... Well, you get the point.

[BJean 16]

Gosh Jack, I really appreciate your response. I agree with some of the points you make about diplomacy often winding up with us or others in some kind of war anyway. No argument here on that. As I posted earlier, if war is needed, then war is what we'll do.

However, I don't think that bad events or bad people should always make us pursue war or keep us from working for peace. If we give up on living in a peaceful world we won't ever have one, and there is good chance that Americans will lose life and limb for what isn't necessarily a direct threat to our freedom. Death and destruction can happen for much less reason that that if we too quickly abandon the possibility of negotiations and diplomacy. This war is one example of that.

That is one reason why many of us believe that the BushCo tenure in the White House is different and worse than those of most other periods in history.

[mousecrazy 2]

Big sigh.

Again, I ask: Outline the future for us poor conservatives or realists. Show me how it's gonna be. Show me why I don't need to be "paranoid", unlike those here who have the very same "paranoia" against us. Show me why liberals are tolerant and accepting...because, with the exception of BJean, I have not seen it demonstrated.

If, oh, 80% or better of the Muslim medressas in the Middle East are turning out tens of thousands of children ready to be suicide bombers...can I apologize for the 20% I inadvertently tainted with my generalization? I am aware that my statements do not apply to 100% of Muslims, but they do apply to enough to make a valid argument that there is an issue out there. I want one of you to explain how just backing out quietly, turning out the light, saying "excuse me" and "sorry" will change this? This was going on BEFORE we went into Iraq this time. I believe this "solution" is extremely simplistic and naieve and has the chance of a snowball in Hades of dealing with the problem of radical Islam and jihadists in the world. If we never interacted with any other country in the world, ever again, this situation would still exist. The difference would be that they would continue to come to our country, and would work harder, because they would certainly have more time and energy to do so, to attack us here.

I am also aware of the public opinion polls...I do not base my evaluation of anything on public opinion polls. I know that many other people do. That is certainly their choice. Most people I know do not make such good choices about most things that I would base my own choices on theirs, if you know what I mean. That's no way to run your life, much less a country or a business or anything else. I certainly don't teach my daughter to base her opinions on what the majority think...because these days, the majority think it's okay for pre-teens to wear tight pants with words across the bottom, or make-up. I don't agree with that.

Does it show that the MSM has done a fine job in swaying people through sound bites that the world is going to hell in a handbasket and we should be very unhappy? Sure. What if they used their power to encourage people to hang together and accomplish this very difficult job? Wouldn't it be better for all of us, and even for the (most likely) new Democrat president in two years?

Also...it's not the UNIFORM that makes the difference (and I did quote from the actual Geneva convention; it is what it is)...it is the FACT that terrorists are not accorded the same rights as bona fide soldiers. There IS a difference. Sorry you do not like that, but there it is. I did not write the Geneva conventions; I did not interpret them; I just quoted it for the purpose of clarity.

Back to the task, and one I am looking forward to reading about later. Tell me about the future. How will the world, or our country be a better place for me to live in 4 more years? Bush is gone...someone else is in the Oval Office. Presumably, there are new Cabinet officers, new diplomats, new foreign policy, etc. Tell me about my new tax rates (I'm a retired teacher, my DH still teachers, one child), my security in relation to the world, my personal freedoms/rights (seriously, I haven't noticed these being abridged, but some of you are worried about that), what new laws are on the horizon...lay it all out for me. How are things going to be?

[lisah25 3]

I want one of you to explain how just backing out quietly, turning out the light, saying "excuse me" and "sorry" will change this? This was going on BEFORE we went into Iraq this time.

I think you hit on it yourself. This was going on before we went into Iraq. I see no signs our being there changed anything. This was going on long before Saddam was put into power, heck before his grandparents were born. I don't see how staying longer, putting more troops in or really anything we can do there is going to change things that are so deeply entrenched.

[Sunta 5]

Tell me about the future. How will the world, or our country be a better place for me to live in 4 more years? Bush is gone...someone else is in the Oval Office. Presumably, there are new Cabinet officers, new diplomats, new foreign policy, etc. Tell me about my new tax rates (I'm a retired teacher, my DH still teachers, one child), my security in relation to the world, my personal freedoms/rights (seriously, I haven't noticed these being abridged, but some of you are worried about that), what new laws are on the horizon...lay it all out for me. How are things going to be?

How could we possibly know that when we don't know who will be in office or even who the nominees will be?

I think it's quite easy though, for you to figure out for yourself what each candidate thinks about taxes, laws, and Iraq strategy. All you have to do is research these questions and the answers are abundant.

I'll give you a head start. Here's an excerpt from several of Hillary Clinton's recent speechs that addresses exactly what she will do about American's privacy plus some of her Iraq strategy. I'm sure her views on taxes are also easy to find, but I don't have time to go searching all over the Web right now. These two excerpts were simple to find on her official site:

Quote:

My privacy bill of rights will be encapsulated in the PROTECT Act, which stands for – you know when you’re in the Congress you have to find acronyms; you spend hours trying to find legislation in words that can eventually spell something, so I give my staff full credit for this – but The PROTECT Act, Privacy Rights and Oversight for Electronic and Commercial Transactions Act. Pretty good, huh? This legislation not only provides clear privacy rules, it gives you clear protections for your most private information, the right to sue when those rules have been violated, the right to protect your phone records, the right to freeze your credit when your identity has been stolen, the right to know what businesses are doing with your credit and credit reports, and the right to expect the government to use the best privacy practices itself with your information.

We should start with the principle that, for the most deeply personal information about how we spend money on a daily basis, your information should be shared only when you “opt-in.” We know that a booming industry is tracking every purchase you’ve made with your debit or credit cards or personal checks. This means that if you’ve failed to check that tiny little opt out box on your credit card company’s or your bank’s privacy statement, there may be a profile on what you read, what you wear – and what size – what over the counter drugs you take and what books and music you buy. And that profile then may be bought and sold and shared with third parties everyday.

The opt out protections under current law can be helpful, but for some things the default privacy agreement should be that companies cannot share this information without your explicit agreement to “opt in”. Opt out protections essentially assign property rights for your personal information to financial institutions, while opt-in awards ownership to consumers. I believe applying opting in for these types of transactions would reinforce the relatively simple and reasonable concept, that you own your information about yourself and you should have control when, how, or if it is shared.

Quote:

We need a fundamental change in course and I believe there are three basic parts to that. First, we need to press consistently, privately and publicly the Iraqis to become serious about achieving an internal reconciliation and political solution, and present real consequences for their failing to do so.

Only the Iraqi government can take action to create the conditions for a political settlement. Instead, the government in recent days seems to be going out of its way to rebuff our efforts to move in that direction. American credibility is held hostage by an Iraqi government that will not fulfill its pledge to seek a political resolution of the rights and role of the Sunni minority and to determine how oil revenue is allocated. For several years, actually since the summer of 2003, I have pushed the idea that we should establish in Iraq an oil trust guaranteeing that every individual Iraqi would share part of the country's oil wealth every year.

Instead, the oil distribution remains unsettled. Sunnis have no incentive to stop fighting, Kurds have no incentive to operate within Iraq and Shiites have no incentive to stop participating in militias and internecine conflict. Guaranteeing every Iraqi a share of the oil revenues at the individual level is one way to try to begin to move beyond the impasse -- and to give Iraqis some reason to believe number one, we aren't there for oil; we aren't there to support big oil; we aren't there to line the pockets of the new Iraqi elite and fatten their Swiss bank accounts; and to give the Iraqis also some reason to feel positive about their national government.

Second, we do need what many of us have been calling for now for months even years at some point -- a public international conference of the parties in the region -- the Turks, the Saudis, the Egyptians, the Emirates, the Jordanians but also the Syrians and Iranians. We need to put everybody on the record to whether they will make public commitments to respect Iraq's sovereignty and to further the task of Iraq's stability. Instead of fearing to negotiate, we should fear what happens if we never attempt to negotiate a regional commitment to a stable, unified Iraq. And also, Iraq's neighbors should fear that as well. They would bear the brunt of an all-out civil war, including millions of fleeing refugees and new bases for regional terrorist operations.

And thirdly, we do need to begin, I had hoped by the end of this year, a phased redeployment. I joined Senators Levin and Reed, and the Democratic leadership in the Senate and House, in proposing a phased redeployment of U.S. troops from Iraq during this year, 2006. That would include a change in the mission of US forces to one of training and supporting Iraqi troops and targeting counter-terrorism as well as protection American operations and personnel and facilities. You know, Richard Holbrooke in his recent article was right; we really have three choices. We muddle along not necessarily going forward but, as my Chairman on the Armed Services Committee, John Warner, has said, moving sideways. We begin some kind of sensible, prudent de-escalation, or we escalate. And we can't do any of those in the absence of the full-hearted attempt on the political reconciliation front, the oil allocation front, and the regional parties being involved.

[BJean 16]

Hey Mouse. Thanks for small kindnesses.

Were things the same for you when Clinton was in office? They weren't for me. They weren't for a lot of people. Things were different under Jack Kennedy than they were under Richard Nixon. There will be some changes that affect us when a different president takes office, whether he's a Democrat or a Republican. Which party controls Congress also has a bearing.

The reason anti-war people talk about about loss of freedom here, at least for me, is because people who are suppport Bush and this war in Iraq keep talking about it being a war that is being waged to protect our freedoms, that it is an effort to keep terrorists busy over there so they won't come over here and force us pray to Allah one day.

You can't be serious if you are saying that an "excuse me" or "I'm sorry" is a stab at negotiations or diplomacy. You know what is involved in diplomacy and negotiations, probably as well as anyone here. You also know that for one of us to come up with a plan or how-to book is a pointless exercise. What we need are people in the White House who care enough and who are smart enough to work at it. It isn't something that is accomplished overnight, like flattening Saddam's residence.

Do you remember the diplomacy that Clinton accomplished while he was in office? As soon as he left office, it went down the tubes. It makes a difference who we have represent us. If it didn't none of us would need to get all involved in discussions and research trying to figure out who will be the most honest and effective person we can elect.

I know I don't sound like I understand that you and Jack are trying to show us the big picture. I know you all think we are just air-headed idealists, who would mess around and let the bad guys infliltrate our country to do us harm. But that is not the case with me. I may be air-headed, but I don't want our country to be overtaken by Muslims, Iranians, Chinese, Korean or anybody else. But I also do not think we have the right, nor is it correct, for us to invade and overtake them unless they have threatened us. I care about evil dictators and how they treat people. I just disagree that it is our job to invade a country, kill its' citizens and flatten their infrastructure, in order to take him out.

[BJean 16]

Sunta: Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!

[mousecrazy 2]

Hey, BJean. The kindness was not so very small. I respect your disagreement. Reasonable people can disagree and should.

I voted for Clinton the first time, not the second. I am better off in many ways now than I was then. Whether or not it is tied to who is in the office of President would be difficult to determine. I am not so sure that I'm singing the praises of Clinton diplomacy, though. As with all presidents, there were some victories, and some dismal failures. It is the same for all of us, is it not?

One thing I see as a difference between "us" and "them", at least here in this thread, is that "we" seem to understand that there is disagreement, and accept that there is disagreement. OF COURSE we do not all agree. It is the tenor of the discussion, the level of the discourse, where we can aim for better. Laying the blame for all that is wrong at the feet of Pres. Bush is impossible and wrong. Some of it, yes; all of it, no. Remember, some of those senators who are on the record for their votes in Congress, are running for the office next time...you must reserve some of your ire for them, too.

It is too simple to say there are not intelligent people in the executive branch. That is not worthy of your argument. They are at least as intelligent as a man who would stuff classified documents down his pants and steal them, wouldn't you say? Disagreeing with the policies is quite different from saying the people making policy are stupid. Anyway, I see the two things as very different.

[anonemouse 1]

Laying the blame for all that is wrong at the feet of Pres. Bush is impossible and wrong.

Of course it is. I don't know anyone who blames him for everything. But I do think we can blame him for a worsening situation. Do I also blame Congress for allowing him to do basically whatever he wanted? You bet. I think most of the U.S. did too, which is why the Democrats now have both houses. I think people are tired of sacrificing soldiers and their rights for a situation that isn't getting any better.

[green 6]

Mouse, with a change in leaders you may well see America regain her international standing, you may see something done about the Patriot Acts, and you may see those prisoners who are currently being held without rights and under cloak of darkness dealt with in an American manner.

I doubt that you would see your taxes skyrocket and I doubt that this continent would be overrun by Islamic fanatics either.