It's not President Bush I bash, but his policies and priorities

[dmcowen674]

1-6-2004 It's not President Bush I bash, but his policies and priorities

By Joan King

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Are you now or have you ever been a ... basher? Fill in the blank: Carter, Bush (either one), Clinton. Come on. You know who you are.

I've been accused of being a Bush basher, but I don't think I've ever spoken ill of George W. as a person. I hear he is a very nice guy. It's his politics I find objectionable. The Bush agenda is motivated by ideology rather than reality, and Mr. Bush has isolated himself from any voice that challenges that agenda. It's a dangerous philosophy, one that has backfired on nations and their leaders before.

Mr. Bush has stated publicly that he doesn't read the papers or watch newscasts. All his information comes to him prescreened and summarized by his advisers. When he travels, he is protected from protesters who are kept far away in what euphemistically are called "free speech zones."

His public speeches are usually at military bases where dissent is unthinkable. Contact with the press is infrequent and highly structured. He moves in a tight circle of friends whose status and economic welfare are dependent on oil and its related industries, the same people and industries that put him in power and control the flow of information to and from his administration.

The Bush family has strong ties to Saudi Arabia and its royal family. So strong that after Sept. 11, 2001, when Muslims of all nationalities were being taken into custody on the merest suspicion, his administration gathered members of the Saudi family from various points around the nation and flew them out of the country before they could be questioned.

Considering the fact that 15 out of those 19 terrorists from 2001 were Saudi nationals, this is remarkable. It reinforces my belief that the interests of those around President Bush, the people who provide him with information, who socialize with him and keep him in power, are not the interests of the American people.

I distrust George W's environmental policies. He doesn't listen to the scientific community as a whole, only to those individuals who support his political agenda. In fact, many decisions concerning the climate, the nation's energy policy, our forests, our air, and our water, are decided by powerful forces entirely outside the scientific community.

The Bush administration has lost so much credibility in this arena that the House Committee on Government Reform says his administration is "gagging scientists." The report accuses the administration of "misleading statements, altered Web sites, inaccurate responses to Congress, and suppressed agency reports."

Pretty damning stuff. It should be challenged by the president and debated publicly in Congress, but it won't be. It will be ignored because it was initiated by a liberal, Henry Waxman of California. In these troubled times people simply don't want to hear anything that questions their political beliefs or undermines their confidence in the president.

This isn't the first time in history ideology has triumphed over science. Galileo almost was burned at the stake when he said the earth was not the center of the universe because science ran counter to Church dogma.

In the Soviet Union, biologists were silenced because Denisovich Lysenko believed acquired characteristics could be inherited. His theory supported Communist philosophy, and the state suppressed all other voices. Soviet biology was set back 25 years.

Just recently a Nobel Prize-winning scientist tried to reach the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture with a warning about mad cow disease but could not get an appointment. The secretary said she didn't need any advice because the administration's actions already were based on the best available science. Just where does "best available science" come from if not a Nobel Prize winner?

Finally, Mr. Bush has put our nation at odds with much of the world. In a recent poll by the European Union, 53 percent of Europeans said the United States is a threat to world peace, the same rating received by North Korea and Iran. It is easy to say we don't care because we know we're right and they are wrong. But in a highly interconnected world where money, microbes, and missiles can move at breakneck speed, this is a very dangerous philosophy.

My prayers and best wishes for the New Year go out to Mr. Bush, but I no longer trust him to lead this country.

Joan King lives in Sautee; e-mail, joank@ alltel.net. Her column appears every other Tuesday

 

[Bitdog]

I may be a Bush basher ?
I think I usually stick to the issues & policies, but I did visit this site once.

http://bushorchimp.com/
Bush or Chimp dot com

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

You know, I want to like GWB. I voted for him, because Gore was part of the Clinton administration, and I knew wayyyy back about them, and how the political machine worked in Arkansas. I was a great supporter of his father against Clinton. Can you tell I don't care for Clinton as a person? Tis true.

If the situation was different, and I had to socialize with Bush if he were not a politician, I would think him a likeable guy. I remember seeing something about a tailor to the Presidents, and they were universally pretentious, but GW let his picture be taken when it when his suit was half finished. I thought that was a good sign. A man with some sense of proportion.

Unfortunately, my like of these characteristics does not mitigate serious shortcomings in policy as I see it.

I have been an opponent of this war from long before it started. I think when all this was starting, there were perhaps a handful of people who were not fearful to speak against it, or not to let popular sentiment (peer pressure for some) sway them. Some of those reasons were from an ethical perspective, some practical. In any case, I did not buy the concept that carefully crafted reports equaled proof of threat to the US.

Bush has done exactly what Johnson did in the 60's. Johnson believed in the Domino Theory. In fact he believed in it so much, that his judgment became clouded, and the ends came to justify the means. Well, there were no dominoes. There was a hell of an escalation though. Well, the Gulf of Tonkin happened, and lots of things followed. Our consolation was that we would not get fooled again. Some of us did not, but some did. More, those who are relatively new to global conflicts and the US swallowed the bait perfectly. That bait? WMD's. The motivation? 9/11. I have heard too many times we have to get "them". Who are "they"? Any Islamic despot. Saddam filled that bill nicely. Collectively, the US wanted blood, and what the US wants it usually gets, at least when it comes to conflicts.

Now, we have dismissed WMDs as irrelevant. I say they always were. The goal was to get Saddam, and whatever justification sells was fine by this administration, AND THAT is the problem I have with GWB. He had an idea, selected like minded people to cull like minded intel, and use that as proof. People like to use the Kay report. Well, I like to ask, where are the weapons the were claimed to exist? Spirited off by ghosts?

Bush created another Tonkin, and that is my problem with him. He tricks himself.

Bush at a bar with a beer? Sure.

President? Na.

 

[maluckey]

Winston: I don't care for Bush as an individual, so I'm not for socializing with him. I do feel that he has the interest of the U.S. first, before his own ego, and that of typical self-promotion.

I too know the Arkansas Clinton scandals (typing this letter from Little Rock), and voted for Bush to avoid the Clinton- Gore legacies that would follow. I never met Clinton, but I know former members of his Arkansas staff, and have shared a some stories and beers with a few of them. I could drink with Clinton, but couldn't stand his attitude of government through polls, as President.

It's kinda funny how I can dislike someone so much as Bush, but for the most part agree with his handling of things. Sure, there are issues that I disagree with him, but he's a politician and has to give and take, or be rendered ineffective.

 

[Red Dawn]

The only President I disliked (actually hated) as a man was Richard Nixon. I lked Ronald Reagan as a Person but I hated some of his subordinates, Ollie North for one. Bush seems like a decent person but I really dislike Rummy, Wolfowitz and Ashcroft and I distrust Cheney. I can't stand Dean, reminds me of a little asshole with a Napolean Complex.

 

[TerryMathews]

Sometimes people confuse the way I voted with my support. Personally, I don't care for GWB. Some of the things he has done are idiotic. I would have rather voted for McCain; that wasn't an option. Presented with Bush and Gore, I chose the lesser of two evils. Neither candidate was strong, but Gore would have just put us into a deeper hole.

I honestly believe that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, specifically chemical. They were there in 1992, and they were there after the war was put on hold. If they aren't there now, that should be something to worry about, not lambast GWB over. Chemical weapons don't simply disappear; if they were truly disposed of, Saddam wouldn't have had a problem showing us how and where the leftover neutralized agent was placed. Logically, then the weapons are still in hiding there, or were sold or given to another country.

I think GWB would have been better off to simply invade Iraq without the whole speech, hindsight being 20/20. It was within his power under UN 1441 since technically, we and Iraq were in a state of perpetual war since 1992. That's what burns me up about the liberal arguments; "We have no right to invade a soverign country." But we have every right to invade a country we are at war with.

Although the "Military should stay at home" line is funny too; home is the one place where it is useless (Excluding the National Guard). Constitution prohibits using the military in a law enforcement role on US soil.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Maluckey- I suspect you are considerably younger than I, and therefore I have a certain perspective you do not. The parellels between this and VN are spooky, in both the way it is being presented by the government, and how the public is reacting. You see the protests against the war in historical footage, however it was not always so. After the Gulf of Tonkin incident, Johnson had correctly calculated that if it were presented in a certain way, he would have support for sending more troops. The current administration knows this, and being older than even I, they remember it all well. If it worked once, it can work again. It did.

One can say that the Iraqis are better off with Saddam gone than with. I agree. That however is not the bill of goods sold to the US. Remember on the eve of the war, the press secretary said that the "Battle for the disarmament of Iraq" had begun. Well, that was no suprise. What was though was Bush announcing the war of the liberation of Iraq had begun. Whoa! Where did that come from? I thought this was about WMD's. Trailers for the manufacture of chemical and biological weapons. Aluminum tubes for nukes. That is what was emphasized. Until that moment. Although I didn't buy many things, I expected to find something concrete, and that something to be what the administration claimed to know about, if in perhaps lesser amounts than inferred. But no. This was the war for liberation. At that instant, I knew that Bush didn't know. He was hedging. If they went in and found nothing, then liberation was the thing. If they did, then he could claim credit for both.

I understand politicians. In general I have no love for any of them. I have seen them manipulate. Bush turned out to be better at that than I would have expected, and his dishonesty in this matter is not appreciated.

Well, maybe I don't like him after all

 

[maluckey]

Winston, I remember the sixties. Though less than you, (you are right). We kind of lost a little of our innocence through politics, and the realization that our leaders were no better than we. It was a scary time. My father was gone to Viet-Nam, my uncle, and everybody I knew and loved as father figures. They didn't support it, but like myself today, knew that politics has a way of getting you three miles down the road to screwed up if left unattended too long. The key is (in my book) to weigh the end results, and learn to live with the fact that anyone that wants to be president, is likely to be unfit for the job in one way or another. They are all politicians, and in order to get things done have to do things that might fly in the face of their own convictions at times. Give and take, and moderation is almost par for the course. Too much in either direction, and both parties tear the President a new one, and lame duck him where he stands. Just my take on how it is that I don't like Bush, but can deal with him as President, especially when presented with the alternatives in this case. He may not win my vote if the Democratic party can offer someone other than Dean.

Later, Mark

 

[Witling]

Maluckey, you said, "anyone that wants to be president, is likely to be unfit for the job in one way or another."

Boy! Do I think this is true. If you're a normal, well-adjusted person, you would never do the things you had to do to be a successful politician. When I was young, I used to think I might be a great politician enforcing principles. Wrong. That's not what it's about. It's about working in the sewer. Eventually you do what you have to do to get the sewage flowing before it drowns you. (Sorry to put too fine a gloss on politics).

 

[maluckey]

Whitling: To further what you said, I firmly beleive that working in the "sewers" as you put it sullies you at least externally. It could do so internally as well if you weren't careful. To make a stand on principle as far as politics is concerned, would be trying to balance yourself on a three legged stool, without two of the legs. In short, almost impossible.