There’s being critical and then there’s being an asshole. Pointing out mistakes or being against a decision? Being critical. Calling Bush a deserting smirking chimp? Being an asshole. I am happy to read and listen to criticism of the Bush administration. I hate having to wade through pages and pages of assholism.
Either that, or he is a willing dupe of those who have. (They were planning an invasion of Iraq from Day One of his Administration, you know.)
Fair enough, but who says you have to wade through them? Why can’t you just avoid Bush-bashing rants if you don’t like them? There are plenty of GD threads where Bush’s actions are criticized without any “pages and pages” of deserting-smirking-chimp comments.
George Bush is not the leader of the free world. That title is an honor that he has not earned. He is scorned and reviled wherever he goes internationally with few, if any, exceptions.
Rush did not commit treason with his criticism of Clinton. He exasperated a lot of people with his smears and lies and half-truths. So did Clinton. That does not rise to the level of treason which is serious business. Treason is selling out your country, not your president. And it takes a lot more than mere criticism.
In fact, one of our founders and earliest presidents, Thomas Jefferson, encouraged citizens to criticize the government. That’s the way we turn it around right. That’s how new laws get made.
Sometimes he does. He has been known to be a man who retaliates on a personal level. And his tragic flaw is his stubbornness. Rather than admitting that he was wrong, he will stay with a decision until it takes everybody to hell because there is always the chance that he will be proven right after all. There is something that is “mental” in that attitude.
Some very manipulative people have seized upon that frame of mind and have used it to promote their own agenda. Many of us believe that they have committed war crimes and treason themselves.
I would prefer being divided that to cooperate with war crimes and the dismantling of the civil liberties in this country. Would you want to stick by a poor choice that wasn’t working out?
What is it that you have seen that you consider uncivil in our protests?
How uncivil is it to take a country to war and not tell the citizens the reason? How uncivil are body bags?
Who killed more Americans – the terrorists on 9-11 or those who sent troops to Iraq?
The man and his cronies are actively trying to destroy everything that America has stood for, and you worry that we are being impolite and divisive? Blow me.
Quite right. I missp… um… wrote.
Actually, from several years beforehand.
As a fellow citizen of Dutch, I agree with you Kimstu. The only way a radio host could become “treasonous” would be if he/she called for waging war against his/her country. Anything else, while it may be stupid or dishonest, is okay.
First, by remaining silent when others are doing wrong, you are tacitly supporting them in what they’re doing. Public censor can be a useful and powerful tool.
Second, Bush knew the job was dangerous when he took it. He chose to run for the nation’s highest political office and facing political criticism is part of that job.
Third, what goes around comes around. Bush and his supporters are often the same people who were and are in the lead of outrageously attacking other people.
Fourth, Bush really is that bad. It’s not unfair criticism to call him a terrible President - it’s just a rational assessment of the objective evidence.
At this point I’m annoyed at it because people are taking the supremely ignorant position of thinking he’s done nothing right. A President does a lot of things. Some will be right, some not.
Personally, I think the Iraq war is despicable and every soldier should have been home yesterday, but that still doesn’t mean everything he touches goes bad. But judging by the responses to the OP’s GD thread, which I’m sure was what made him open this one, the idea that Bush does nothing at all right seems to be accepted not just as hyperbole, but as fact.
I’d thought the maturity level in this place surpassed that of a pimply 13-year old, but every day I see something else that proves me wrong.
Civility, incidence of:
As of post #27, (with 24 respondents and a couple of repeats), there have been six rude posters (loosely defined as someone who has deliberately insulted either the OP or the president rather than simply taking forceful issue with the OP or the president) and eighteen civil posters (loosely defined as having expressed no personal animosity to the OP or having not resorted to name-calling regarding the president.
Given the intensity of the emotions involved, I would think that a 3:1 ratio of civil to incivil is actually pretty good.
(I wound up counting Der Trihs only once. I was torn between counting him twice for sheer vehemence or ignoring him, completely, because his vehemence almost seems to be an automatic programmed response, so I compromised and counted him once.)
I do it for the same reasons I rag on a worthless Blockbuster cashier, who’s content with talking to his friend on the phone rather than actually provide his employer’s customers with quality service.
It seems like it’s either that option, or that he’s surprisingly dense. I’m not sure which I’d prefer.
LilShieste
Maybe we’re reading different GD threads, cause I seem to run into a lot of them.
One presumes that he is able to tie his own shoes and does not routinely shit himself (his ability to feed himself and ride a bicycle without injuring others having already been called into doubt.) Other than that, attempting to address the remarkable scope of wrongdoing and ineptitude of the Bush administration with a whimpered “But he has done some things right” fails both because:
a. It is a pathetic attempt to distract or to establish some sort of equivalence between two vastly incomparable sets of behaviors (e.g. “Well, yes, we did strike the iceberg and the ship did sink to the bottom of the ocean, but hey, the band sounded great! Up, of course, until it was drowned out by the screaming and rending and drowning.”)
and
b. In addition to being exceptionally bad (both in the sense of being inept and being heinous), this administration has actually achieved very, very little in terms of demonstrable, positive accomplishments.
It is my patriotic duty, Duh!
No.
I don’t think we all schmoozes have a rich family and cronies to bail us out of our mistakes during all our lifetimes.
I’m afraid to ask: if he is a pawn, what chess piece we are?
The Daily Mirror said it best:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Dailymirror.jpg
But many got better…
So he is the ruler of the world? I really can’t imagine being more insulting of other free nations.
Not much, even if I think that he was selected for his capacity to be manipulated by few with malevolent intent, the distinction has very little meaning seeing what it is coming from the administration. When recently a guy who financed the Swiftboaters was rammed trough as an ambassador, Bush showed that his innocent act (What? Me allied with the swiftboaters? Please!) back then was bollocks.
So was Tricky Dick.
ditto, and then we run him out of office.
Bush pretended to joke when he called his rich financiers **his base ** in a fun filled fund racer of his.
The leadership (Bush) now is choosing that path.
Do you have a cite where a prominent leftist insulted you in Great Debates?
Don’t you think it would be simpler to dump Bush and join more than 60% of Americans against this sorry administration?
Well at least I thank you for noticing that indeed the mainstream media is not liberal. However, it is important to notice that the media then during the Nixon administration was investigating malfeasance by that administration.
The media of today, controlled even more by corporations, was caught in bed with the administration in the Plame affair and it seems that only recently they are beginning to notice that 60% or more of the eyeballs are belonging now to people that demand more scrutiny and responsibility.
Yes, it’s exceptionally bad.
No, that doesn’t mean it’s accomplished nothing positive.
This should be obvious.
“Leader of the free world” is so 1980s. “Leader of the biggest de facto superpower - who is fucking everything up at the moment” is a bit more accurate.
I know you aimed your rant at Americans, but if he “leads the free world”, then as a member of “the free world”, then he “leads” me; and if you take that attitude, I think the rest of the free world should have the right to let you know what the rest of the world thinks of him. I’m afraid to say that the news isn’t good, pretty much anywhere on the globe, outside the US heartland.
You’re right. Just because Bush is exceptionally bad, it does not necessarily follow that he has accomplished nothing positive.
It’s just that it happens to be accurate in this case.
No no no.
For example, he did sign that legislation creating the big marine sanctuary in the Pacific. It wasn’t his idea, of course (it was based in Clinton-era legislation). He didn’t really do anything except sign off when it was finalized, and show up for a photo op. But by gum, he approved it! He didn’t get in the way and cause trouble when he had the chance! He let it happen! That’s got to count for something.
Also, there was…
Um…
I mean, we had that one…
Uh…
…
Did I mention the sanctuary is really really big?
ETA: Just remembered another one. He was on the right side of the Dubai Port World debate. Of course, in the end, he screwed the pooch on it, but at least his position was right.
I’m reminded of a comment I heard about Osama bin Laden, in response to a claim that Osama was pure evil; “If he’s so much as patted the head of a goat sometime in his life, he’s not pure evil.” I’m sure that at some point Bush has done something right, probably by sheer luck or by mistake. That’s doesn’t mean that his Presidency and life aren’t a near solid mass of failure, greed and malice.
Probably just wanted to fuck a dolphin.