THE GEOERGE W. BUSH PRESIDENCY

[cpk1994]

Kudos for having the courage to discuss some issues, Oregon.

1. Nobody EVER accused Saddam of being involved in 9/11. He indeed DID have links to al Qaeda, though. Remember Zarqawi? It is well documented that he was in Iraq with Saddam's blessing long before we invaded. And then there is the Ansar al Islam al Qaeda terrorist training camp within Iraq which our troops overran. Arguably, the cost would have been a helluva lot more than 4,000 deaths and $500 billion if al Qaeda had successfully perpetrated repeats of 9/11, which the war in Iraq and al Qaeda's prioritizing of screwing up Iraq over hitting us at home was in large part responsible for preventing. THAT is the jewel in Bush's legacy--preventing repeats of 9/11 or worse.

2. Manmade global warming is a fiction which is being used to HARM the economies of America and other western capitalist countries. The Kyoto Accords, in addition to being stupidly unnecessary in general, were grossly one-sided against us, and should NOT have been signed.

3. I'll give you that one. So did every other president that ever came along. Bush also appointed far more highly qualified and competent people than the few bad examples. His judicial appointments in particular, have been spectacular--other than Miers--strict constructionist people rather than the rotten judicial activists for all the wrong things that some presidents have appointed in the past.

4. What those stats don't reflect is that virtually everyone is comfortable, prosperous, and free to enjoy their comfort and prosperity. Does it really HARM any of us to have Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, etc. be filthy rich? Or is that just irrational class envy?

5. Many of those 47 million including myself are uninsured by CHOICE. Nobody in this country goes without vital health care, even if they are uninsured and can't afford it. And our health care system is far and away the most advanced in the world in terms of research for new cures, etc. I agree, formalizing what is now accomplished informally--health care for everybody--should be done. However, it should be done without screwing up the wonderful system we now have--as the proposed Dem/lib programs undoubtedly would. BTW, Bush did propose programs, but a hostile Congress shot them down.

6. First of all, it would be interesting to hear how you define "torture", as nothing we have done comes close to classical or traditional definitions of torture. As for what we have done, hell yeah, terrorists have been harshly interrogated and locked up without due process in Guantanamo. And it damn well better continue, as that has verifiably prevented terrorist acts against Americans. Due process of law is a right reserved for us--citizens and possibly legal immigrants of this country. No way these Guantanamo terrorists should ever be afforded those rights.

Yes, history probably will treat Bush with the same irrationality and unfairness as the present. The historians, as part of the leftist educational establishment, after all, are the ones who determine such things, and as soon as all of the good sense Americans who know otherwise die off, that's the way it probably will go down. The scumbags will probably even revise history to make idiot Jimmy Carter out to be something other than the loser he was.

1.Bush did the right thing, but made the wrong case. He had a much stronger case with the Persian Gulf War Treaty, which Saddam signed, and then violated 17 times(17 UN resolutions Saddam was in breach of).

2. Agree here.

3. Its always going to be the same for all Presidents. Bush's biggest mistakes were dipping into his Fatrher's and Reagan's pool of cronies. That never wroks well.

4. I agree. "Tax cuts for the riuch" has been thrown around by the Dems with the premise of, "If you say it enough times, people will accept it as truth."

5. To add to your reponse, Anyone laying this problem at Bush's feet for failing, see Clinton, Hillary "National Universal Health Care" during the Clinton Administration. It goes both ways.

6. To add, historical definitions of toture don't apply becuase we are not fgighting a war against a state body. The US is not tied to the Geneva Conventions for that reasonand becuase these people are not in uniform and are not fighting for a particular country.

History will look back on Bush favorably becuase of 2 big points:

1. The Tailban government as a state sponsor of terror was deposed

2. Saddam Hussien was removed from power and later executed freeing millions of Irquis from a oppressive dictatorship.

[bobblehead]

ya know oregon I was reading your post and ready to type a long response about trusting any arguement that switches from hard numbers to percentages midcourse without explaining, then harvey did the heavy lifting for me.

I guess I will just fall back to my favorite point.....Lotta people don't have health insurance, OK, Putting the guys who bankrupted SS in charge of my health is NOT the answer I'm looking for.

Have you ever heard of rituxan? Its a lymphoma drug that very well may have saved my wifes life. Now go to the canadian NHA or the England NHA and see if they will prescribe rituxan (they won't, its too expensive). I asked my oncologist about not giving rituxan to a lymphoma patient and she said one word "unconscionable" (forgive my spelling).

National Health Care is nothing more than a socialist model which fails over and over again. It halts research and medical advancements in its steps, causes access problems, and ultimately will bankrupt this country more than they are doing already.

You can throw out any number you want as far as uninsured goes, but I am more interested in solutions. Don't think for a second your party wants us insured, then they couldn't use it as a campaign issue (remember the california DNC being caught on tape planning how to extend the recession until the elections?) They don't feel your pain, they feel your wallet.

We need to repeal the Kennedy HMO bill, deregulate the business, allow a doctor to open a private practice again, and get out of the business of daily management of health care. Insurance should only be for disastorous bills and incidents, why would we have health insurance to see a doctor if we have a fricking cold....go see a nurse practitioner at walgreens for $54 and get your script filled (generic) for 5 more. If its not that damn bad, DON'T go the doctor for it and actually save the money.

This all fell apart when they made doctors mere "employees" of major healthcare corporations and made it impossible for any doctor to make money while the businesses roll on. I got an apendectomy in february, the hospital made something like 17k, the doctor who came in to do the surgery got $166. Anyone see a problem here? Dammit, duty calls, gotta cut the thread short.

quick PS....I guess thats why said doctor had to charge me $30 to fill out my FMLA paperwork when I missed work for the surgery....yay, more red tape.

[Scott Campbell]

The economy is stable............

People who think this economy is stable are in for a rude awakening when they're finally able to put a price tag on the bailouts from the housing bubble.

When you say bailouts do you mean foreclosures or free money from the Government to people who's homes lost value?

That counts too, but the bailout of Bear Stearns and other pillars of this countries financial markets that are overweighted in mortgage backed securities.

[Partial]

George W. Bush, IMO, has been a terrible President. His presidency has been marred by:

1. Starting a war in Iraq based on false accusations of Iraq'sWMD's, Hussain's involvemtent in 9/11 and al-Qaida. This has led to the loss of over 4,000 American service people, tens of thousands of Iraqi civilian lives, and $500 billion in costs where the bill is still running...

2. lack of concern for the nation's and world's physical environment. The USA is the only major world power to rufuse to sign the Kyoto Clean Air Act.

3. As Leaper noted, W. assigned many unqualified people to positions of authority. Michael Brown was appointed head of FEMA. He has previously directed a horse breeding farm. Though Harriet Miers graduated from law school, she never appeared in a court room as a lawyer or a judge. W. tried to appoint her to the U. S. Supreme Court.

4. helped facillitate transfer of wealth in the country to an elite few by tax breaks aimed at the primarily very rich and corportations. In America, 1% of the country owns 33% of the nation's wealth and the bottom 80% owns 26% of the nation's wealth(Stats from Thom Hartmann)

5. Did little to address the growing issue of health care in the country. 47 million Americans cannot afford health insurance.

6. Violated both national and international law through the use of torture and holding political prisoners for years without even charging them or giving them a trial. Perhaps some of the people held at Gitmo are terrorists. There is a strong chance many of them are not. All of them should at least be charged and given a fair trial.

Whether it be 20 years from now or 100 years from now, history will show that George W. Bush was one of the worst Presidents the country has ever had

1) I think I covered at nauseum why we had to start a war in Iraq, and no one lifted a finger to make the situation otherwise.

2) I 'm all for clean air, nuclear has ZERO greenhouse gas emissions....lets start building. But if you think there is any possible way to stop using oil without crippling the entire way of life we enjoy....please, fill me in, and don't get me started on the validity of man made global warming.

3) Agree fully, too much nepitism in this administration, although many that were criticized as good old boys were still very qualified. Every president does this and gets embarassed some, but I agree, its still wrong.

4) During bushs term "poor" people increased their earnings and wealth by a much greater percentage than "the rich" (don't have numbers at my disposal right now) If your point is that a guy making 1 million got a 1% raise and a guy making 20k got a 10% raise the the millionaire got 400% more of a raise than the poor guy, congratulations you passed number fudging 101. Now if you can show me ANY system that works better than capitilism as a way to raise the standard of living of EVERYONE I'm all for learning, but it will take an entire new thread to show you the full folly of the points you make here.

While I'm at it I guess pointing out that every person in america who paid taxes under clinton got a tax cut from bush and that as a percentage of taxes paid the poor got much bigger tax cuts. Again, if the rich pay all the taxes when you make sensible tax cuts....well, they might actually get more of the benefit.

5) If you wanna look at the source of the healthcare issue, again this is an entire new thread, but look at the Kennedy HMO bill back in the day. It stifled competition, put in new regulations was touted as "a breakthrough so every american can afford healthcare" and basically ran the costs of care thru the roof and allowed a few corporations to dominate the playing field without actually competing for business....interestingly the very thing libs complain about. EVERY time gov't tinkers with the free market model the results are disastorous. I do agree though that bush did little to help this problem like deregulating the industry and allowing companies to cross state lines, allowing start ups to offer individual disastor insurance to compete with the big boys without a crushing amount of red tape in the way.
sidenote: Most people can afford healthcare and choose not to, here in nevada a disastor policy with a 5k decuctible for a middle aged person is under $100 a month. This protects against bankruptcy and puts a person in charge of his own healthcare if coupled with a healthcare savings account (another tax cut for middle america that bush put through)

6) there is no law anywhere that says if you fire at our troops you get a fair trial. there is no law that says if you aren't wearing a uniform you get the geneva treatment. As far as gitmo goes, after the libs threw such a fit we solved the problem....when they tried to surrender on the battlefield we shot them since we had nowhere to put them (you won't here that in the news will you). I agree with you on torture, we don't need it, with al qaida there is no jack bauer situation going on. But to call people who took arms against our troops "political prisoners" thats laughable. Just like in any war when we leave iraq and the war is over the PRISONERS OF WAR will be released to their countries of origin, what would you do, release them back to the battlefield?? Should we re-arm them while we are at it?

7) While bush won't be considered a great president, the title of worst ever still goes to LBJ who decided the social security trust fund was there for him to spend and started the idea of unfunded liabilities in our govenment....you know, spend now pay when I'm dead. This opened us up for programs like medicare and medicaid that we can't really afford, ooo....oooo....and national healthcare.

OPF, I believe the correct term is "you got served"

[rdanomly]

The percentage of Americans without health insurance has been almost level for more than a decade. In 1993, the year of the great health care crisis, it was 15.3 percent. Last year, a nearly identical 15.6 percent of Americans were uninsured.

Fun with statistics There were about 250 million people in the U.S. back in the early 1990's, now there are closer to 300 million. So even though the rate remains similar, there are now an additional 8 million people that are still uninsured. That's more people than the entire population of Wisconsin that are now uninsured.

More importantly, how many people do you all know that could benefit from having it? Things might be ok in Wisco where there is still some appreciation for rewarding hard work with decent benefits. Four out of my seven brother & sister-in-laws are uninsured. My mother & farther-in-law are also uninsured. Luckily he is now eligible for SS so he can collect his benefit and be eligible for gov't health benefits. Previously he's been paying for his diabetes supplies out of his own pocket. This is a hard working man that was doing fine until the inept management ran the plastic molding company into the ground and he was left w/o a job that pays health benefits.

Sorry for the rant, I need to remind myself although I'm currently doing great, there are those out there that really can benefit from a few of my tax dollars.

[bobblehead]

couldn't agree more, there are plenty of people who could benefit from my tax dollars. My neighbor would like a mercedes and would benefit greatly if I bought him one, but umm.....well I hope you get my point.

I feel for your mother and father in law, honestly I do, this is why its unfair to bring personal examples into an arguement. I can't point out that your father in law should have bought cobra, and immediately went out and gotten a policy the day he got laid off. I can't point out that he should have passed on whatever superfluous spending he may have engaged in when he should have been planning for contingencies. See if I attack his behavior that put him in that situation I'm the bad guy. Again, I blame the Kennedy HMO bill that basically tied Health insurance to employment and made it difficult (and unpopular) to carry your own health insurance, does your employer carry your auto insurance?

I work with a LOT of people making over 70k a year, as do I. You know how many mercedes, bmw's, lexus there are in the parking lot....are you kidding me, buy a fricking toyota until you are in position to drive such a nice car. Most of them are whining now cuz the mortgage on their 500,000 dollar homes is getting tough, OK, but I been living in a condo that is paid for, might wanna try it before stepping up. Now they tell me I'm "LUCKY" that I don't have many bills each month. News alert...luck had nothing to do with it.

I am sure the people you speak of are good people who work hard and deserve a good life, but at some point we gotta quit trying to make everyone dependent on the public dole. What your stepfather needed was lower taxes in his district (and country) to provide a favorable atmosphere for investment and other companies would have come in and had a job to offer him. Corporations aren't relocating in Mexico because of cheap labor, its because of a MUCH more favorable operating environment. We have the highest corporate tax rates in the world, and the most burdensome regulatory structure.

Again, what I said to tex remains true, I'm not cruel hearted, I'm just deep thinking enough to actually see that giving my money to your stepfather won't fix the problem, it will merely stop me from starting my own business in 3 years and offering people like him a good job.

[HarveyWallbangers]

Fun with statistics There were about 250 million people in the U.S. back in the early 1990's, now there are closer to 300 million. So even though the rate remains similar, there are now an additional 8 million people that are still uninsured. That's more people than the entire population of Wisconsin that are now uninsured.

Fun with statistics. That also means more ~42M more people are insured. Did you read the article? The numbers cited by MSM based on Census Bureau report are EXTREMELY flawed. The point is that the % of those that are uninsured remains stagnant because there are those that choose not to get insurance or don't realize they are insured because everybody under a certain income threshold is covered--even if they don't know it.

Let's see, of the 45M claimed to be uninsured in 2004:

While the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) reported Medicaid enrollment at 51 million in 2002, the Census tabulated only 33 million, a difference of 18 million people. This is no minor statistical snag, as the Census Bureau reports there are more than 15 million "uninsured" individuals in households with less than $25,000 of income. Many of these individuals meet the income test for Medicaid or SCHIP eligibility, but they are not technically enrolled and are therefore considered by the Census Bureau to be uninsured. However, as soon as a person who is eligible for Medicaid, but not enrolled, enters the health care system through a hospital or clinic, he or she is automatically enrolled into the Medicaid plan. Therefore, counting this population as "uninsured" distorts the data significantly, since these individuals can enroll at any time and have their medical expenses paid whenever they require health care.

18M are just plain false. That's 18M that apparently are covered, but claimed on the Census Bureau they were not. Who knows how many don't have insurance but actually meet the minimum income threshold.

Many interviewees said they don't consider government-run health care to be insurance because they do not pay premiums and often have no co-pays or deductibles.

These are the people that don't pay for insurance, but the government covers them. Then, they say they don't consider it insurance. That's nice of them.

Roughly 9 million documented and undocumented aliens are generally included in the Census estimates. Many immigrants hesitate to participate in a government program of any kind, for fear of establishing a paper trail for immigration and national security authorities. Cultural mores, folkways, and language barriers also conspire to keep these people uninsured.

Hmmm...

Interestingly, the Census data for 2003 show almost 15 million uninsured people in households with annual incomes above $50,000, with 7.6 million of them in households with incomes of more than $75,000. That is certainly adequate income to afford health insurance in most states.

15M are uninsured, but probably have the resources to insure themselves.

I don't buy that we have a health care coverage crisis. We have a crisis in health care costs.

[Partial]

bobblehead, you're bringing up the points that the libs fail to acknowledge time and time again

[bobblehead]

bobblehead, you're bringing up the points that the libs fail to acknowledge time and time again

Yea, unfair of me, I know

[retailguy]

Sorry for the rant, I need to remind myself although I'm currently doing great, there are those out there that really can benefit from a few of my tax dollars.

How do you know this? Really? See, they'll always (in my mind) be those that "need" things. Some, like your father in law legitimately, other, not so much. When you create an "entitlement", those that don't need it come flooding out of the woodwork for a "free" handout.

Government is NOT the solution for most of our problems. Health care is THE poster child for this.

It is very telling that YOU are doing great. so am I, and so are the majority of poster in this thread. Yet, Bush has a less than 30% approval rating.... Yet, statistically, HALF of us are OK, and that's just the sample that voted.

I smell a little "repeat the same thing over and over till they believe it politics" going on.... but I am a self described cynic, so believe me or don't believe me...

[Tyrone Bigguns]

bobblehead, you're bringing up the points that the libs fail to acknowledge time and time again

Perhaps they arent' addressed because the ridiculous hypocrisy that weaves itself thru his posts.

[Partial]

bobblehead, you're bringing up the points that the libs fail to acknowledge time and time again

Perhaps they arent' addressed because the ridiculous hypocrisy that weaves itself thru his posts.

Such as?

[hoosier]

Have you ever heard of rituxan? Its a lymphoma drug that very well may have saved my wifes life. Now go to the canadian NHA or the England NHA and see if they will prescribe rituxan (they won't, its too expensive). I asked my oncologist about not giving rituxan to a lymphoma patient and she said one word "unconscionable" (forgive my spelling).

National Health Care is nothing more than a socialist model which fails over and over again. It halts research and medical advancements in its steps, causes access problems, and ultimately will bankrupt this country more than they are doing already.

Where on earth are you pulling this stuff from??? Rituxan is part of the standard treatment for B-cell lymphomas all around the world. There is no protocol in England or Canada for refusing it to patients who need it. According to Britain's National Institute for Clinical Excellence:

MAJOR RECOMMENDATIONS
Rituximab is recommended for use in combination with a regimen of cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine and prednisolone (CHOP) for the first-line treatment of people with CD20-positive diffuse large-B-cell lymphoma at clinical stage II, III or IV (see Section 2.3 of the original guideline document).

http://209.85.215.104/search?q=cache:xrbKcRnrqHYJ:www.guideline.gov/summary/summary.aspx%3Fss%3D15%26doc_id%3D9093%26nbr%3D4907+rituxan+england&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us

[bobblehead]

sorry, doing research so I am deleting this.

[bobblehead]

Ok after doing as much research as I can, it does appear that in late 2003, about 6 years after america was using rituxan it became availabe in england. More than likely the people from england that I got my information from were in america before 2003.

Now I'm not sure that tyrones well thought out response of:
'
Perhaps they arent' addressed because the ridiculous hypocrisy that weaves itself thru his posts.


is fair, i would like to think I am consistent and am willing to stand behind my arguements if you just point out WHERE i am being ridiculous instead of simply declaring me to be so and feeling proud of yourself. Tyrone is using the time tried liberal tactic of make fun of the person and you will discredit his arguement. Hoosier actually did a little legwork and showed me something new...thank you.

I still stand by my point that national health care is a terrible thing. Remember it is free market capitalism that created rituxan and people suffering in england before 2003 couldn't get it. Furthermore if not for free market capitalism, it never would have even been discovered/created.

I'm still open to any dissent/debate from y'all, but lets try to keep the personal attack crap to a minimum ok tyrone....after all, if you say I'm ridiculous, there is no need to back it up.