# Bush...whats he doing right? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 29, 2004, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035 "2004-03-29T05:54:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/81 "2004-04-01T02:19:05Z")
Let’s not ignore the president’s [“Partnership for Prosperity”](http://www.cpa-iraq.org/transcripts/20040329_bremer_hafidh_nash.html) program. > [@](#): > > Managed properly and administered properly the economy will once again provide a good life with good jobs for all Iraqis. The American taxpayer-funded Partnership for Prosperity in Iraq has the potential to propel Iraq out of decades of economic slump and toward a future of hope. It sounds as if Bush is really turning _that_ economy around. ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/82 "2004-04-01T03:41:11Z")
> [@Mr2001](#): > > [Bush calls for broadband [internet access] for all by 2007](http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/03/29/HNbushbroadband_1.html) > > It’s a good goal, but I’m hesitant to call it something he’s “doing right” since he doesn’t seem to have actually _done_ anything about it yet. Not that I’m in favor of huge government programs, but if he had to proprose something like that, why not propose doing something about social security or medicare or something like that. So instead he proposes Free Internet access? WTF? ---
**Author:** ![Plan\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Plan\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Plan_B)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/83 "2004-04-01T04:03:42Z")
> [@jshore](#): > > (1) **Responded well to 9-11:** In what way has he responded that well to it? I mean, let’s face it, 9-11 while a horrible event is the sort of thing that makes it hard for a leader to look bad as everyone rallies around him. Look at Giuliani who was pretty much reviled before 9-11 and loved afterwards. What exactly has Bush done that is so wonderful and different from what others would have done? I may not be adding much to Sam Stone’s posts but I’d like to include my two cents here. I remember quite well the mindset of the country, especially the leftists, immediately after 9/11. On the afternoon of 9/11 one of my friends told me she would be scared to get on an airplane again if we retaliated. Prior to the invasion of Afghanistan there was a lot of hand wringing and fear about taking on Afghanistan, the unbeatable. How many times did you hear during that month that they had whupped the British, whupped the Soviets, whupped anyone that even thought of entering the country without a visa? So, if you put the above together with the Clinton-Gore refusal to respond to the 1993 WTC attack, it’s entirely possible that President Gore would have handled this as a police action - a strategy which BTW has worked wonders for Spain. We’d still be negotiating with Mullah Omar over whether or not we had given him enough evidence to go after UBL yet. And the Jihadists would have doubled in strength after their victory. As for what GWB personally has done, in addition to making the right decisions about Afghanistan locking up the Al Qaeda suspects in the US, I’d say he’s shown amazing leadership skills at a time when they were critical. Two images stand out. On 9/14 when he visited the ground zero site and ad libbed to the crowd, and on opening night of the World Series. His courage under pressure was remarkable. Finally, the “reviled” Giuliani was elected and re-elected in a ciy which is predominantly minority and Democratic prior to 9/11. And somehow I seem to remember that LBJ and Nixon both managed to look bad in times of war. I don’t have the energy or time to respond to all the other points. ---
**Author:** ![jshore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5e925/32.png) [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 4:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/84 "2004-04-01T04:52:20Z")
> [@Plan B](#): > > Finally, the “reviled” Giuliani was elected and re-elected in a ciy which is predominantly minority and Democratic prior to 9/11. And somehow I seem to remember that LBJ and Nixon both managed to look bad in times of war. Yes, but I am not talking about 1994 or 1998. I am talking about 2001. Perhaps “reviled” was too strong a word but [here](http://www.usnews.com/usnews/9_11/articles/911ny.b.htm) is one description that I found: > [@](#): > > Gradually, the New York attitude caught up with him. “The mayor’s constant public bullying of those who disagree with him has begun to trouble even his strong supporters,” wrote the New York Times in 1995. By April 1999, Giuliani’s approval rating had dropped to 40 percent, and a year later, his failing marriage had become a daily tabloid soap opera. And [here](http://www.wnbc.com/091103/2461783/detail.html) is what happened post-9/11: > [@](#): > > His post-Sept. 11 approval rating soared to 90 percent in a statewide poll conducted by the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/85 "2004-04-01T04:53:39Z")
Let’s not forget just about amazingly quickly the U.S. acted against Afghanistan. The WTC attack happened on Sept. 11, and the first bombs began dropping on Afghanistan on Oct. 7. On that same day, ten to twelve thousand protestors marched in New York City in opposition to the war. There were also protests in Europe, in Pakistan, and in several countries in the Middle East. The notion that this rapid, forceful response was obvious and that any other President would have done the same is revisionism. I can easily imagine Al Gore calling for a bipartisan commission to evaluate options, to report back in three months. Maybe he would have attacked the Taliban anyway, but within three weeks? That kind of decisive leadership is pretty rare. And it’s also a myth that the world was all united singing Kumbayah after Sept. 11. The universal sympathy for the U.S. lasted exactly three weeks, until the U.S. started fighting back. Then we had stories like this: [Anti-US Protests Worldwide](http://www.guardian.co.uk/waronterror/story/0,1361,573313,00.html) Or, for example: [War on Afghanistan Polarizes Italy](http://www.slp.at/cwi/infos_int/neu_0111_it.html) > [@](#): > > Two days after the first air attacks on Afghanistan, tens of thousands of students and left activists were on the streets of Italy’s cities to say No to War! In the week leading up to the traditional Peace March from Perugia to Assisi on October 14, transport workers had been walking off the job for an hour’s anti war protest, or as much as a day, in pursuit of their own demands against deregulation and privatisation as well as against the attacks on Afghanistan. School students had been walking out of classes to express their hatred of the idea of war. All Rome schools had been out on Friday 12 for example. > > The march of 14 October itself was phenomenal - bigger than on any occasion in its 41 year history… [Even in Britain](http://perc.ca/PEN/2001-12-01/s-briefs.html), the protests were huge: > [@](#): > > On November 18, around 100,000 people joined a protest in London to call for an end to the invasion of Afghanistan. People marched from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square in what has been called the largest anti-war protest in the UK since the Vietnam War. (Reuters, November 18, 2001, [www.commondreams.org/headlines01/1118-06.htm](http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/1118-06.htm)) And of course, on the Straight Dope Board, many of the people who now claim that the war in Afghanistan was an obvious, easy call were far from sure about it then. I remember the debates well. Unfortunately, that time period is now lost to the great board crash. ---
**Author:** ![jshore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5e925/32.png) [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/86 "2004-04-01T04:55:11Z")
Oh yeah, and in regards to Nixon and Johnson: What we are talking about in regards to 9/11 is not just “times of war” but after America has been attacked. (Sending troops to some far-off land for obscure reasons is not the same thing.) ---
**Author:** ![jshore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/b5e925/32.png) [@jshore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jshore)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/87 "2004-04-01T05:02:12Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > And of course, on the Straight Dope Board, many of the people who now claim that the war in Afghanistan was an obvious, easy call were far from sure about it then. I remember the debates well. Unfortunately, that time period is now lost to the great board crash. But the question is not whether the war would have happened or not if some of us on the SDMB had been President but whether it would have happened under another President who might actually have been elected, such as Al Gore. As you may have noticed, some of us here on the SDMB are to the left of Al Gore. (I consider myself quite a bit left of Al Gore and I was pretty ambivalent about the Afghanistan war.) ---
**Author:** ![Ms2001](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ms2001/32/18463_2.png) [@Ms2001](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ms2001)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/88 "2004-04-01T05:26:38Z")
> [@HPL](#): > > Not that I’m in favor of huge government programs, but if he had to proprose something like that, why not propose doing something about social security or medicare or something like that. > > So instead he proposes Free Internet access? WTF? Well, I interpreted it as something like the rural electrification plans from decades past, or the rural, er, telephonification plans that we all pay for on our phone bills - some kind of incentive/mandate for the broadband companies to extend their service to customers who would otherwise be too unprofitable to care about. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 6:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/89 "2004-04-01T06:39:33Z")
> [@](#): > > [ > But the question is not whether the war would have happened or not if some of us on the SDMB had been President but whether it would have happened under another President who might actually have been elected, such as Al Gore. And you feel quite comfortable saying that you’re sure that Al Gore would have launched an invasion of a sovereign nation within 3 weeks after being attacked? Because I’m sure not. I think it took big brass cajones for that administration to kick ass the way it did, and I’m not sure a president Gore could have done the same thing. Bush also took the right tone, when he came out and said we’ll dig you out from whatever rock you’re under. Remember how much heat he took for that back then? Remember all the mocking he took on this forum for saying things like, “Wanted - Dead or Alive”? Too much of a cowboy, not sensitive enough to the feelings of the world, yada yada. You can criticise Bush for plenty of other things, but when the chips were down that administration stood up and did the job splendidly. All of them. ---
**Author:** ![Aeschines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aeschines/32/16251_2.png) [@Aeschines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aeschines)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/90 "2004-04-01T07:18:45Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > And you feel quite comfortable saying that you’re sure that Al Gore would have launched an invasion of a sovereign nation within 3 weeks after being attacked? Because I’m sure not. I think it took big brass cajones for that administration to kick ass the way it did, and I’m not sure a president Gore could have done the same thing. Bush fans are liable to see him as a great President in time of war. But non-fans such as myself also see him as partly responsible for 9/11, so it is difficult to feel too positive about his military performance after that date. Needless to say, Iraq has been a big error overall. (I would also say that Roosevelt was partly responsible for Pearl Harbor. Not so much because he should have seen it coming, although that factors in as well. But more because of the generally inept diplomacy with Japan that preceded it.) > [@](#): > > Bush also took the right tone, when he came out and said we’ll dig you out from whatever rock you’re under. Remember how much heat he took for that back then? Remember all the mocking he took on this forum for saying things like, “Wanted - Dead or Alive”? Too much of a cowboy, not sensitive enough to the feelings of the world, yada yada. Of course, his political enemies are going to try to spin every little thing he does the wrong way. But Bush has been incompetent in his rhetoric and diplomacy right from the get-go. The fact that he probably handled this series of wars better than Gore had done is small comfort when one looks at the big picture: highly competent fighting, aggressive incompetence elsewhere. > [@](#): > > You can criticise Bush for plenty of other things, but when the chips were down that administration stood up and did the job splendidly. All of them. No way. Iraq has been a mess; now we’ll have to babysit the region for decades. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/91 "2004-04-01T07:40:26Z")
I’m not talking about Iraq. I’m talking about the way they handled the immediate aftermath, taking down the Taliban, setting up Guantanamo, going after al-Qaida in the mountains, etc. There were a lot of things that Bush did right even before 9/11. For instance, speeding up development of the armed Predator. And Afghanistan could have been dealt with in many ways - trade embargos, trying to get the Northern Alliance to try and overthrow the Taliban without direct U.S. military aid (i.e. CIA advisors and funding as was done with the Mujahadeen), or a large scale invasion that would take months to prepare. The Bush administration’s plan was the perfect blend of all elements - air power, coupled with special forces on the ground working with the Northern Alliance. It worked beautifully. Bush also took the right tone on the world stage - everything from his speech at the WTC, and subsequent speeches to the American people, the U.N., his State of the Union that year, etc. He was hitting them out of the park. His performance after that period certainly depends on your view on the Iraq war, but before that period, you’d have a hard time convincing anyone that the Bush Administration wasn’t up to the job, and the polls showed it. Bush’s approval ratings were in the 90’s. Now I know you’re going to say that any president would have had those numbers, but I think the points above indicate that the Bush administration really deserves credit for a lot that went right after 9/11. ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/92 "2004-04-01T07:40:32Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > Are you familiar with the new program? Funding for science goes way up… You keep saying that, but the reality is that _some_ areas of science gets more funding, and some get less. As a research astrophysicist, my opinion is that Bush’s proposed NASA budget is strongly driven by publicity and will have a negative effect on the less visible areas of science. Whether the overall net effect is positive or negative will depend on whom you ask. To call it the “best thing to happen to the cause of space since Apollo” is quite a stretch. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/93 "2004-04-01T07:51:21Z")
So, you think it would have been smarter to re-certify the shuttle? The cost would have been very high, and the Columbia investigation board’s recommendation is that the Shuttle not fly past 2010 unless it is recertified. So if it’s recertified, and tens of billions are spent on that task, how long would the Shuttle have to fly? BEcause there’s no way you could spend that kind of money just to scrap it in five years. The Shuttle would have wound up flying until 2020 or 2025 or something. Flights would have gotten increasingly expensive, and eaten up more of the budget. I fail to see how that helps science in the long run. Instead, that money is being directed at a new type of modern vehicle - one which can be used for a station lifeboat, and has a modular design that lets it be configured for orbital, trans-lunar, or interplanetary flight. Now we’ve got a vehicle that can get us out to the Lagrange points and back - something that might be very necessary once we try to fly large telescope arrays and such. The new direction is not just good for science, it’s healthy for NASA. Because the way things are going, the workforce there is getting older, there is a scarcity of quality engineers who want to work there, the Shuttle is aging, and NASA was going to get its budget cut by three billion dollars a year by 2006. Now NASA gets an increase every year. And it has a vision to work towards. And well get to explore some new frontiers instead of flying a truck into orbit once in a while. ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 9:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/94 "2004-04-01T09:29:51Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > So, you think it would have been smarter to re-certify the shuttle? The cost would have been very high, and the Columbia investigation board’s recommendation is that the Shuttle not fly past 2010 unless it is recertified. When did I _ever_ imply that I want the Shuttle saved? What I object to is the reduced funding for Beyond Einestein and Sun-Earth Connections objectives and the long-term development work towards reusable launch systems. Instead the money from the Shuttle is diverted into a Soyuz-style spacecraft. Yes, the other scientific objectives did get more funding, so I won’t (and didn’t) say the overall effect is negative. But the issue is not as clear-cut as you make it sound. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/95 "2004-04-01T13:11:59Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > And you feel quite comfortable saying that you’re sure that Al Gore would have launched an invasion of a sovereign nation within 3 weeks after being attacked? Because I’m sure not. I think it took big brass cajones for that administration to kick ass the way it did, and I’m not sure a president Gore could have done the same thing. Absolute mularky. What exactly took cajones about invading Afghanistan? Certainly there was little potential domestic risk. Internationally, even the uber-fem wimpy freedom hating French contributed significantly to the operation. Where was the risk that required such cajones? I’ll tell you where the cajones didn’t come through - our actions were too heavily dominated by air strikes; we failed to capture bin Laden because we were too afraid to put our people in harm’s way. And you realize that your slip is showing when you describe it as the liberation of Afghanistan, right? Who gave a shit about Afghans freedoms? We attacked because they harbored the mfer and wouldn’t hand him over. We were supported by our NATO allies for this reason. This retrospective glorification of Bush’s actions is just so much tripe - non-sensical and brainless gushing. ---
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/96 "2004-04-01T14:10:51Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > There were a lot of things that Bush did right even before 9/11. For instance, speeding up development of the armed Predator. For f… sake, where do you cut-and-paste this rubbish from? > [@](#): > > [Missed Opportunity > Officials: Bush Administration Was Slow to Approve Drones to Kill Bin Laden > By Ted Bridis and John Solomon > The Associated Press](http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/2020/predator030624.html) > > W A S H I N G T O N, June 24 [2003] — When President Bush took office in January 2001, the White House was told that Predator drones had recently spotted Osama bin Laden as many as three times and officials were urged to arm the unmanned planes with missiles to kill the al Qaeda leader. > > But the administration failed to get drones back into the Afghan skies until after the Sept. 11 attacks later that year, current and former U.S. officials say. > > Top administration officials discussed the mission to kill bin Laden as late as one week before the suicide attacks on New York and Washington, but they had not yet resolved a debate over whether the CIA or Pentagon should operate the armed Predators and whether the missiles would be sufficiently lethal, officials told The Associated Press. > > In the month before that meeting, the Pentagon and CIA successfully tested an armed Predator on at least three occasions — including once when it destroyed a mockup home resembling an Afghan structure bin Laden supposedly used, the officials said. > > The disappearance in 2001 of U.S. Predators from the skies over Afghanistan is discussed in classified sections of Congress’ report into pre-Sept. 11 intelligence failures and is expected to be examined by an independent commission appointed by the president and Congress, officials said. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/97 "2004-04-01T14:44:55Z")
It takes an earthquake of the magnitude of 9/11 to shift the tectonic plates of international politics **Desmo**. Predator couldn’t shoot down North Korean ICBM’s. ---
**Author:** ![Sevastopol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cdc98d/32.png) [@Sevastopol](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sevastopol)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/98 "2004-04-01T15:43:02Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > I’m not talking about Iraq. I’m talking about the way they handled the immediate aftermath, taking down the Taliban, setting up Guantanamo, going after al-Qaida in the mountains, etc. > > 9/11. Guantanamo is a continuing war crime. If the US was a country ruled by laws, not men, Bush and all his suborndinate war criminals involved in that ongoing criminality would be imprisoned or worse by now. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/99 "2004-04-01T15:46:17Z")
**Demostylus** : Reports I’ve read indicated that there were development delays in the armed Predator program which prevented it from going into use before 9/11. In fact, I seem to remember news reports after the start of the Afghan war about the armed Predator not being available immediately because it still had teething problems. ---
**Author:** ![kidchameleon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/898d66/32.png) [@kidchameleon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kidchameleon)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2004, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035/100 "2004-04-01T16:16:48Z")
Sheesh, the greatest thing President Bush has done is institute the ‘no-call list’. I’d re-elect him just for that. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-whats-he-doing-right/237035.md?page=6)