The LA Times recently revealed two pages of White House correspondence entitled "Speech Topper on the Bush Record." The feel good memo essentially lends "a few helpful suggestions" to Bush cabinet members and high-level staffers in order to summarize how the Bushy one would prefer his two term choo-choo crash to be remembered... as an "unalloyed success" no less... perhaps "colossal fuckup" would have been more accurate...
Among the memo's bullet points are these whoppers:
* He "kept the American people safe" after 9/11... (I think the operative word here is AFTER...)
* He upheld "the honor and the dignity of his office" (Politspeak for "He didn't get blown in the Oval Office.")
* He "responded with bold measures to prevent an economic meltdown" (Bold Measures?!?!? Prevent?!?!? Excuse me for a moment, I think I just threw up in my mouth a little bit... all that monkey did was hand our entire economy over to that henchman Hank Paulson so that he could steal the future earnings of our great, great, great grandchildren...)
* "He promised to raise standards and accountability in public schools and delivered the No Child Left Behind Act" (Yeah, he delivered it all right... unfortunately he forgot to fund it... as for the raised standards, can someone please tell why India has more engineers than we have people?!)
* "He lifted the economy through tax cuts" (Actually he briefly "lifted" the economy by deregulating the hell out of it which therefore allowed banking institutions to go hog wild, which in turn brought us the lovely market conditions we enjoy today... along with 533,000 lost jobs in the month of November... but hey, at least they got their taxes cut... permanently)
See folks, it's not so bad... a frown is a smile, only upside down...
Apparently big blue meanies such as yours truly have gotten it all wrong these past eight years... How typical of me to accentuate the negative... Little insignificant things like the epic collapse of the housing market and major banks going tits up... a spiraling stock market and a devalued currency... but hey, I've always wondered what horse meat tastes like... guess I'll soon find out... and I love being served by 80-year-olds working double shifts at IHOP... nothing like hard work and perseverance... until you drop dead... that's the American way!
And will you look over here... flawed intelligence in the flawed run-up to a flawed war, along with over 4,000 dead soldiers and countless civilian casualties... but hey, democracy is messy, you are gonna need to break some eggs to make an omelet... ever try to make an omelet with the barrel of an M16..? Apparently the eggs fight back and even worse, they taste icky...
Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo? Hey... what's wrong with a little frat-house hazing...? so it gotta a little out of hand... stop being such pussies... and besides, everyone knows they are guilty... of having non-western names and brown complexions...
Katrina? Clearly an act of God... and besides, that is all just water over the levees now anyways...
Think your 401K looks bad now? Just imagine if president dunderhead had been able to privatize social security...
And who can forget the Harriet Myers debacle, where he nominated his babysitter to the Supreme Court...
Torture, illegal wiretapping, voter fraud, incompetence, indifference, ideological warfare, secrecy and contempt... and on and on... please stop me before I hurt myself...
We as a nation ask, expect, and deserve competence from our elected officials... What we got from the Bush administration was eight years of theft, lies, and apathy from which it will take at least two generations to recover... if ever... Republicans commonly complain that the Federal Government is incapable of running things... I find that I agree with them, but with the following modification... the Federal Government is incapable of running things when Republicans are in charge... (not that Democrats are that much better, to be honest...)
The Center for Public Integrity undertook a web project of herculean proportions in an attempt to study, document and determine the scope of failure during the Bush era. Thirteen reporters deconstructed hundreds government documents, investigations, budget reports.. they interviewed dozens of experts and government workers... they sent out 5,000 solicitation emails to federal employees... the results overwhelmed the reporters to such degree that they had to pare the list down to 125 from 250 suggested failures...
Below is a short list of forty ways in which the federal government failed to perform under the administration of George W. Bush from 2001-2008:
• 45 million Americans without health care
• 60 percent of EPA scientists report political interference with their work
• 1,273 whistleblower complaints filed from 2002-2008; 1,256 were dismissed
• 190,000 U.S.-supplied weapons missing in Iraq
• $212.3 million in overcharges by Halliburton for Iraq oil reconstruction work
• $455 billion deficit for fiscal year 2008; estimated to reach up to $1 trillion in 2009
• $9.91 billion for government secrecy in 2007 — a record
• 809 government laptops with sensitive information lost by FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives
• 30 million pounds of beef recalled in 2007
• $300 billion over budget for Department of Defense weapons acquisitions
• Less than 3 percent of U.S. electricity needs met by alternative energy
• 2,145 troops killed and 21,000 injured in Iraq from March 2003 through November 1, 2008, by IEDs (improvised explosive devices) and other explosives — many while awaiting body armor. Additionally, tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed in the conflict
• 34.8 percent of oil used in America imported during Nixon administration; 42.2 percent during first Gulf War; 59.9 percent in 2006
• $100 million for failed FBI computer network
• $100 billion in federal tax revenues lost annually to corporations using off-shore tax shelters
• 163 million airline passengers delayed 320 million hours; cost to U.S. economy: more than $41 billion in 2007
• $60 billion stolen in Medicare fraud each year
• 2.5 million toxic toys recalled in summer of 2007
• $12.5 billion for defective National Polar-Orbiting Environmental Satellite System
• $4 billion to upgrade National Security Agency computers that often crash, have trouble talking to each other, and lose key intelligence
• 60,000 flights made by 46 Southwest Airline jets in violation of FAA safety directives due to lax FAA enforcement
• 12.8 percent job turnover at Department of Homeland Security in 2006 — double that of any other cabinet-level agency
• 730,000 backlogged patent applications
• 148,000 troops not enough to secure Iraq, enabling insurgency to take root
• $1 billion, six-year “Reading First” program called ineffective by Department of Education Inspector General
• 20,000 U.S. deaths annually from lack of pollution controls on diesel vehicles and power plants
• 60,000 newborns a year at risk for neurological problems due to mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants
• Two-thirds fewer clean ups of EPA Superfund toxic waste sites during 2001-2006 than in previous six years
• 935 demonstrably false statements in lead-up to Iraq war by President Bush and seven members of his administration
• At least $500 million for FEMA trailers contaminated by formaldehyde occupied by thousands displaced after Hurricane Katrina
• 558 detainees at Guantanamo detention facility reduced to 255 after court-ordered case reviews
• 26 percent of corporations holding at least $250 million in assets audited in 2006; percent audited in 1990: more than 70 percent. IRS audit staff slashed by 30 percent
• $431.5 billion spent on Medicare in 2007, double amount in 2001
• 47 dead in mining accidents in 2006 blamed on lax oversight
• $9 billion in federal oil and gas royalties mismanaged by agency linked to drug-and-sex scandal
• 275 largest U.S. corporations pay, on average, about 17 percent in taxes in 2007, half the standard corporate tax rate
• $45 trillion in credit-default swaps, without federal oversight, in 2007
• 760,800 disability claims backlogged, awaiting hearings at Social Security Administration as of October 2008
• 806,000 Veterans Affairs disability claims in 2006, up 39 percent since 2000; backlog reached 400,000 claims by February 2007
• 2,640 days Osama bin Laden at large since September 11, 2001 (as of December 10, 2008)
Remember folks... this is the list that was edited DOWN...
Is everything on this list George's fault? Of course not... that would be a gross oversimplification. However, I don't think I am editorializing when I say that when all is said and done, George W. Bush will be considered the worst chief executive in this nation's history.
At least he's number one at something...
Barack Obama has a tough act to follow...
GO ON... LEAVE YOUR "THOUGHTS" IN THE COMMENTS SECTION...
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9 comments:
While I'm certainly no fan of W., I tend to rank him of a piece with his predecessors. Reagan/Dad/Clinton/Bush/(Obama?). Neo- conservoliberal take your pick. Interventionist anti-freedom crusaders all. Worst ever? I'm not so sure of that. My unending antipathy to Reagan even prevents me from crowning him most irritating. Dumbest, maybe, but worst? Sorry, no dice. Harry "Hiroshima/Nagasaki" Truman ring any bells? Andrew Jackson all but bathing in native blood. Teddy "Democracy has justified itself by keeping for the white race the best portions of the earth's surface" Roosevelt?
While I naturally share your revulsion towards the rather egregiously moronic reign of the W/Cheney gang, let's not use them to conveniently forget the deeds of their predecessors. Frankly I find it tough to choose a worst ever.
best,
mj
you certainly raise good points... but I also have to consider the era in which these men presided... what looks bigoted and repulsive today didnt look so back then... A friend of mine said it best, stating that we put far too much credit (good or bad) on any sitting president... While all the presidents you named were indeed quite awful... none of them sat idly while Rome burned... none of them took down the empire... but then again... maybe our time has come... we've had a good run of evil...
To be honest, it's the Bush gang and it's myriad crimes that led me to dig into the history of our country and the crimes of it's chief executives. Nevertheless, I can no longer buy the "changing times" argument. It looks more like a linear progression. Witness Kennedy's Vietnam adventure or Carter's signing off on the slaughter in East Timor or Clinton's Iraq sanctions (not to mention his VP's strenuous urging of military action on said country).
Of course I'm committing the leftist sin of concentrating on foreign policy.
We lost two towers, we almost lost the entire city of New Orleans, we lost all of our allies, we lost countless lives in the Iraq war and we lost the entire Financial Market all under "W's" watch!!!...hmmm...I don't think it was all coincidence. Obama must feel like the cleaning lady after a ridiculous college party at the White House.
My argument is based on the quantity of incompetance, not just a single aspect...
If Obama manages to keep this ship afloat, he deserves to be canonized...
I remain unconvinced. What us rational folks see as failure Bush & Co. Inc. see as mission accomplished. Ethnically cleanse a major U.S. city - check. 9/11 was a dream come true. My argument is they are of a piece with their predecessors, just clumsier in practice. The current financial meltdown has more Clinton fingerprints on it than Bush. And let's not forget the Crime Bill and NAFTA (a couple of Rahm Emanuel faves). Obama has his work cut out for him. He might want to consult the soviets on the wisdom of escalation in Afghanistan. No?
True... Clinton recalled the Glass-Steagal act which allowed commercial banks into the arena that previously only investment banks were allowed to play in, which led to trillions in derivatives and default swaps... but one must also remember that the banking industry was fervently behind this... as was a Republican senator named Phil Gramm... and a Republican House and Senate... but yeah, Clinton signed it... but had he not GWB would surely have signed it a year later... Under Bush's watch not only was there further deregulation but... (and here is the key) THERE WAS NO OVERSIGHT... all the agencies who were supposed to referee this mess had their whistles taken away... financial entities could do WHATEVER THEY WANTED WITHOUT CONSEQUENCES... until of course, the whole thing went to shit and now they want bailouts... at this point, we should welcome the introduction of some form of socialism, at least for a period of time... because look at what "no rules" capitalism has given us... socialism will at least put people back to work in the interim... maybe I'm just being naive and hopeful... all things go in cycles... that said, we will never actually have true socialism in this country... hell, Obama the "leftist" is is still to the right of Sarkozy of France, who is arguably the most far right leader in Europe...
(let's try this again)
Indeed. Politicians are a venal lot by nature (though I like this Olivier Besancenot guy quite a bit) and as such Sarkozy demagogued the immigration issue to woo the Le Pen crowd but now is governing from the (Euro) center (supposedly under the influence of his "lefty" wife).
As always, change will come only from the people. The sit in last week in Chicago is a positive sign that if folks get pushed hard enough they might push back.
And you're right about Phil Gramm, but Bob Rubin and Larry Summers are enthusiastic anti-regulation plutocrats as well. Bi-partisans in the very worst way.
I was NOT pleased with the hiring of Robert Rubin and Larry Summers, as those two are some the same "free market" zealots responsible for this whole mess.
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