-He pulled off a complete turnaround in US terrorism policy (we’re against it now- can you believe it?) by cleverly manipulating the public hysteria and fear post-9/11.
-He’s managed to convince a whole hell of a lot of people that invading Iraq is in some way important to fighting terrorism
-He did manage to find Saddam, although those pesky WMDs still elude us. Gone to ground in a bunker somewhere waiting for the all-clear, probably.
-Somebody in the Administration managed to make “not fighting in a war because you didn’t have to” sound just as noble as “fighting in a war you disagreed with despite not being forced to and then leading the campaign to keep others from being forced to fight”. Very impressive.
-He made the guy who lost an election to a dead man to seem like an acceptable choice as the nation’s most important lawyer.
-He overcame the handicap of looking like a chimpanzee in a nation where the better looking guy always gets elected. Self-esteem boost for ugly people everywhere!
-He got Roe v. Wade overturned, just like he promised. Well, maybe not, but his Justice Department has pretty much ignored it.
-His daughters are pretty hot, and they’re good Christian girls. Clearly the product of a father who believes in family values and all that. Alright, so they were arrested for underage drinking, but who hasn’t these days? Yeah, yeah, it’s Jenna’s third alcohol-related offense, but clearly it’s the influence of all those pesky liberals down in Texas.
You forgot to point out how he’s furthered medical research to save lives by leading the crusade to define which stem cell lines are officially approved for use. Wouldn’t want any inferior, nay, perhaps even foreign lines polluting our health care, now, would we? I’m sure, thanks to his efforts, now there’s light at the end of the tunnel for the heartbreak of psoriasis.
He’s been a tremendous help for me. I always used to be a moderate on the fence never able to say I was one thing or the other.
Now I’m a democrat. So I’m grateful for that. He’s stirred up a passion for politics I thought was impossible for me. If you asked me five years ago if there was a way to make me hate a human I’d never met. Hate everything about them. Everything they do say or think I would have laughed at you. It has made me realize how small and petty and full of rage I can be.
Once he finally put down the children’s book he was reading, and once his handlers decided this was not “hide the Prez in the deep Montana caves” day after all and set him back down on ground and handed him a mike, he actually gave a damn good speech, one that emphasized that our nemesis was a set of outlaw terrorists, not Islam or the people who identify with it. He hit lots of other high notes and key points with an admirable poise.
He was not by any means the person I’d’ve liked to be occupying that office, but he got kudos from me that day nevertheless.
(Too bad he’s subsequently torn every bit of that to meaningless shreds and vacated any higher opinion I might have momentarily held for him)
I will also confess that I found his shtick where he makes fun of himself hunting for the missing WMD under desks in the Oval Office, etc., to be cute, and while some said they were appalled that he made light of it that way, I found it encouraging to see that he could laugh at himself and make fun of himself.
OK, that’s the best I can do at the moment, and he’s still the worst Prez we’ve had during my half-century lifetime and I’d still sacrifice my left ball with a plastic knife if it would guarantee his failure to get reelected in November.
I, too, thought he did a pretty good job in the few months after 9/11. I was actually kind of glad that Cheney and Rumsfeld and other assorted hardasses were in there because I thought they’d get rid of the Taliban and Al Q. But if you think about it, those were times when almost everyone knew what had to be done, and we had most of the world behind us. I don’t think it took a lot of brains or backbone to get things right at that time.
He can vacation like nobody’s business. I mean, he’s really, really good. I’m trying to take his example, and I’ve asked my boss to support me in my attempt to be more like our nation’s leader by giving me at least 75 vacation days a year. Thus far, she’s not impressed.
I thought Nixon’s election solved that for all time.
I agree with AHunter3 and Hyperelastic. I was almost completely content with his handling of the aftermath of 9-11. (At least once he finished scurrying about the country like a scared rabbit.) I still wouldn’t vote for his re-lection; even ignoring Iraq there are simply too many other things I strongly disagree with his stances on, but in re the terrorist threat I think he took mostly very appropriate actions for a while.
In this thread, I’ll dispense with my feelings about his actions after “a while.”
If you’d read my OP you’d realize that isn’t necessary.
I did intend this to be entirely tongue-in-cheek, but I do have to admit that he steered the nation through the aftermath of 9/11 rather well. Thanks in large part to that, I firmly believe that the Twin Towers will be a footnote in the history books rather than a turning point.
I mean that in a good way- not that we’ll forget the victims, but that people will come to see it as an unusually severe terrorist attack rather than the event which permanently put civil liberties under the heel of public safety.
Oh. My. God. I may have to re-think my passion for B5.
He actually did do something this week with which I agree, although his motives may not be mine. He refused to release the strategic oil reserve to relieve gas prices.
He’s serves as an inspiration to other pompous, smug, intellectually challenged, recovering alcoholic and coke snorting, failed businessmen with rich family connections that they, too, can make something of themselves in this crazy, mixed-up world of ours.
Well, since I was mentioned in the OP, can I offer up Afghanistan? Or is there nothing to bash about that and therefore not allowed?
Great snarkiness for the thread. I almost felt a swell of pride that I got under your skin so much to deserve a Pit. Then I saw it was mostly tongue-in0cheek. sigh Oh well, I’ll try harder next time.
I really was afraid right after 9-11 that he was going to start WWIII by dropping nukes on the Middle East. He didn’t, for whatever reason. He still started an idiotic war, but at least it wasn’t the sort where we would all be toast.
