No, it doesn’t. It only means that if you assume that those voting for Bush agree with you about those mistakes. That is if they agree with you that they are mistakes. Many do not. So, they are not voting to keep a “mistaker” (as it were) in office.
Obviously, that’s perfectly fair. Your vote is your vote. But try to look at the situation from another angle if you can*. If you assume that the evidence for the list of “mistakes” you gave is pretty clear cut, your positon is fairly reasonable. But what if the evidence is not so clear cut. What if, in fact, much of it is quite suspect. If you assume that the mistakes you blame Bush for are not mistakes at all, (or did not happen) then your valuation of him versuxs Kerry would certainly change. Additionally, if you imagine a Bush supporter taking this view, you can more easily see how he is not voting to keep someone in office who made mistakes (in his mind).
I probably should note that I am not trying to rehash all of the possible mistakes Bush has or hasn’t made here. I am certainly not proposing that they did nor that they did not happen. My point is that if you truly want to understand why someone can vote for Bush, you may have to imagine what he looks like from the point of view of someone who does not know about, believe, or agree with your interpretation of any number of the crimes you think Bush is guilty of. Once you let go of the presumption that your interpretation of events is “what happened”, you will be better equiped to understand how someone who has a different view of “what happened” may act.
*I’m not at all implying that you cannot see things from the other side. That is just a figure of speech.
No it does not. You cannot wrap your mind around the concept that people actually support George W. Bush. You are incapable of rational thought when it comes to figuring out why we support GW. (Even though the reasons have been listed time and time again.) Rather, you just pip up with your little ad hominem barbs and childish snide remarks, all the while ignoring the matter laid out in the OP.
The OP asked:
You in no way, shape, or form made a rational attempt to answer that. Sure, you are not a ‘Bush Republican’. But if you are a mature adult, you could have put yourself into a GW-supporters shoes, and made a good-faith effort to answer. But no, we get little drive-bys that have nothing to do with the actual discussion taking place.
You are not the only one guilty of doing this, of course. I smell desperation in Great Debates from you and yours. The polls numbers in no way reflect your ‘blinders-on’ view of reality, and it must be disconcerting. But ramping up the number of little snipes in GD will not change the poll numbers, so ease off.
Yeah, and if my aunt had wheels, she’d be a bicycle.
I agree with you perfectly on one of your main points. People who believe W is doing a fine job should certainly vote for him.
Most folks where I work are in that camp. Imho, based on what I hear them say, they don’t really know much about the administration at all. Still, there can be substantive disagreements among honest people about justifications for the Iraq war and the effectiveness of the administration’s fiscal policy.
I’m certainly not going to go out and join the Democratic Party (or the Reform Party or the Libertarians or anyone else), but this year, this candidate doesn’t get my chad.
Thanks you. But my point was really the reverse of this. That people who are going to vote for Bush likely think he is doing a fine job.
Specifically I (and perhaps they) take offence at the suggestion that support for President Bush is a result of stupidity, nefarious intent, or credulity. There is little evidence that such is the case. Unless you take a few things for granted, namely that he is not, in fact, doing a fine job.
What I am saying, is that you have to stop trying to ask question as the OP did such as “We know all this bad stuff about Bush, why don’t you all abandon him?”. And ask instead something like “Which of these “scandals” if you believed them would sway your vote from Bush to Kerry.”
Such a question would be more productive in my view because it treats both sides of the debate as reasonable people. And, of course, since many of the complaints raised about Bush have to do with occurances while he was president (I’m thinking of the economy here, the Iraq war was clearly an action taken by his administration), a serious political opponent would have to provide clear evidence that he could fix each of those complaints.
Again, I draw your attention to the 1992 campaign. Bush senior kept harping on the idea that Clinton’s character would put the United States and the world in danger. His claim rang hollow (at least to me) because of his own failed promise. Kerry has a similar problem IMHO because his complaints do not seem to live up to his solutions.
BTW:
I did not mean to suggest that the evidence actually is false. Merely to offer a way to “get into the other guy’s shoes” as it were.
I didn’t realize anyone had put a lock on the thread that said only ‘Bush Republicans’ could participate. Could you point out where thats in the charter that I can’t post in any thread on GD??
Correct me if I’m wrong (or if you THINK I’m wrong) but I don’t believe Ole Osama is running for office. Maybe you could point it out to me where he is? Because I fail to see your point otherwise.
I’m not saying that the Iraq war, 9/11, environmental issues, steel tarrifs or any of the other, er, controversial aspects of our lovely president AREN’T issues…I’m saying that the core issue, the one that will decide the presidency (IMO) is the economy. If you want to disagree with that and think it all rides on the publics perception of the Iraq war, or whether or not GW stuffed a sock down his flight suit on that carrier deck, knock yourself out. We simply disagree.
Used to be, which is why I’ve posted here. Former Bush supporter, and a supporter of the invasion of Iraq. If the OP really wants to know what it takes to make a Republican decide to vote against a sitting Republican President, well, mine’s one case in point.
Of course, if the intent was just to lead another liberal rant – which I have to trust it wasn’t, despite the way much of the thread has turned out – then I’ve wasted my time. But I have to admit, I’m angry at the man. I don’t think he’s competent to be in office.
Then again, if “Bush Republican” is defined as someone who will support Bush come hell or high water, then there’s no point in this thread at all.
I joined the thread because I had some comments to make which I felt were relevant. If you want to dispute my assertions from previous posts, be my guest. But don’t try and tell me what my own principals or ethics are or aren’t. As I said, if you don’t like what I’ve said, feel free to dispute me or ignore me. But don’t tell me where I can and can’t post. Only a Mod can do that, and I doubt they would in this case.
StD:Then again, if “Bush Republican” is defined as someone who will support Bush come hell or high water, then there’s no point in this thread at all.
Very good point, StD. I think I and rjung (in that order, chronologically) have been chiefly responsible for causing this confusion in generalizations we’ve made about “Bush Republicans”—really meaning a certain subset of Republican Bush supporters—and why we think there’s nothing that could change their minds.
Yes, there do seem to be some Bush die-hards who would vote for Bush no matter what he did (as long as it wasn’t anything liberal), and I think it’s interesting and relevant to discuss their motivations here, even if we already know that they would never “give up on Bush”. But there are also a number of non-die-hards who nonetheless still support Bush despite having some reservations about him, and I think it was to them that this thread was chiefly directed.
In other words: if you’re a Bush Republican who’s not ideologically committed to the belief that Bush is basically doing the right thing no matter what, but at present you still think it would be a good idea to re-elect him, what events or Administration actions might change your mind? StD has given a good portrait of how a Bush supporter turned into a Bush opponent out of specific dissatisfactions with the Administration. What would cause a similar level of dissatisfaction among the non-die-hard Republicans who still support Bush?
(Mind you, I’m not sure I quite see the point of the question anyway, but I think the idea is to get a clearer picture of the way that non-die-hard Bush supporters weigh his positives against his negatives.)
To be honest, given how many of George W. Bush’s policies run counter to the traditional beliefs of the conservative ideology (smaller government, less intervention in foreign affairs, fiscal responsibility), I think the number of folks who are “non-die-hards” while still backing Bush is an incredibly small number.
Seems to me the choice is simple: do you support the candidate because he’s wearing the “GOP” badge, or do you support your political ideals?
