What direct impact has Bush & Co. had on you?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Don’t like the guy or his administration. Never would vote for him.

But I do wonder what, if any, direct impact this administration has had on me. I can’t say that there has been much in the way of direct harm. Not that this can be said for thousands of casualties on both sides of the war and the impact on their families/loved ones. My heart goes out to them. Truly. But I’m fortunate enough to have escaped any quantifiable impact.

So excluding having to serve yourself or having someone close to you be called to service, or worse, be injured or killed in the line of duty… How has this administration’s antics caused your direct harm in civilian life in real terms? (Moral outrage aside.)

2

All of the casualties are unfortunate.

This President is the first of my adulthood where I’ve chosen to take an active interest. I’ve come out of it feeling like I have no connection with my government. I feel general mistrust toward them and often feel mislead and misinformed. I sometimes wonder if President George Bush gives the same speech over and over time and time again as if he actually wants me to turn off my radio, simply so people will not bother and let them go about their business.

I was fortunate to be old enough to remember Bill Clinton. I remember watching and actually feeling like I was being spoken to. There wasn’t a monotonous melodramatic tone constantly being used and the vocabulary didn’t feel designed and limited. It felt like ideas, actions, solutions. I remember seeing him appear exhausted.

3

In most ways, they haven’t caused me direct harm. Depending on the outcome of any cases that reach this SC, they may not ever.

4

Our family now owes over $40,000 more money than when he took office, and there’s still almost 3 years left of more crazy borrowing to go. To say we can’t really afford that is an understatement.

In turn that has caused the economy to be sucky. Which has affected all members of our family.

Yeah, I’d say that was direct impact.

5

Aside from the high gas prices and minor inconveniences while traveling, he hasn’t really had an impact on me or most others who aren’t serving in the military or have family in the military. And I think that’s unfortunate. During World War II, Americans were asked to sacrifice quite a bit. And I think that helped morale, both for those at home and those serving.

6

Living north of the 49th as I do, I don’t really have a dog in this fight, but aren’t you folks saying there’s been no impact kinda overlooking your ginormous federal deficit? Y’all are in a lot more debt than you were, and that’ll be coming off your paycheck for years and years to come.

7

It’s hard to measure.

I got laid off during the worst part of the recession. Would I have if he weren’t president? Dunno.

Has my phone been tapped? Probably not, but dunno.

My piece of the national standing debt has mushroomed. Will I personally feel the bite of that, or will it come after I die? Dunno.

My air is probably dirtier than it would have been if he weren’t president, but I can’t say for sure.

My prescription meds probably cost more than they would if he weren’t president.

8

Given the secrecy that surrounds this administration, how could we tell? It’s not like the NSA is going to give you a buzz and admit they’ve been spying on you or eavesdropping on your phone calls because you once donated money to the Kerry election campaign, for instance.

9

Seems to me that in my workplace, the powers-that-be are less afraid of saying ridiculous things that fly in the face of reality. I believe a tone has been set by Bush & Co. where this is perceived to be OK.

Did Bush and his people invent spin and deceit? Of course not. But I believe they have taken it to another level. Scott McClellan has gone farther in misrepresenting reality than any other press secretary in my memory (Cite: That press conference about how we don’t torture, yet can’t or won’t clearly explain why we need an exemption for such in some cases)

It feels like they have set a vibe where it’s OK to say the Emperor has his clothes on. I do believe people pick up on this and use it to suit themselves.

10

Bush & Co. think outsourcing is good for the economy. Under his watch my (very good) job went to an Indian company. I feel that whether or not his support for outsourcing directly cost me my position that my job was outsouced, that he supports outsourcing, and that it happened on his watch, and so I put it on him.

And I can tell you I’ve contributed to the economy only a fraction of what I used to when I was employed.

11

He is solely responsible for me and my wife, lifelong Republicans, changing our voter registrations to “Independent!”

12

I assuming you’re looking for negatives only, but I can honestly only think of a positive way in which the Bush administration has directly impacted me, namely, that because of the lower tax rates, my family was able to financially support my college education.

13

Endless amusement.

14

[ul]
[li]I’m a researcher (graduate student). Funding to the NSF has been cut drastically, with the effect that our lab (and many others nationwide) are struggling.[/li][li]Thankfully, I finished my undergraduate work prior to Bush; with the new loan guidelines in place, I’m not sure I would’ve been able to get my degree. I no longer watch cable news; I can’t stomach seeing the Republicans spew their crap anymore.[/li][li]I’ve pretty much decided to become a Dixiecrat in a sense – I’m pretty sure I will never vote Republican in my lifetime.[/li][li]I have seen no tax benefit.[/li][li]I now tend to keep my political opinions more to myself in real life, as I’m an atheist liberal. The zeitgeist fostered nowadays makes me uncomfortable to express my opinions for fear of being noticed by the powers that be.[/li][li]I tend to be more careful with my purchases and avoid using credit cards, as I don’t want to leave a record.[/li][li]I refuse to participate in research done in another lab where I work; they do computer vision/facial recognition, and I strongly disapprove of the way it’ll be used, knowing how bad it really is.[/li][li]It is much more difficult to collaborate with researchers from other countries.[/li][li]I trust the government less (or not at all?), choosing a default position of skepticism regarding anything and everything they produce (including scientific research, which is an egregious offense IMO).[/li][/ul]
That’s all I can come up with right now. Perhaps there’s more…

15

I feel I’m in more danger of being killed by terrorism, thanks to his invasion of Iraq. What a beautiful al-Qaeda recruitment tool that’s been, I’ll bet.

But I’m still pretty sure I’m more likely to be killed on the highway in my commute to or from work.

16

I feel personally demoralized by his stated desires to write bigotry into the US Constitution. He might as well be flipping me the bird whenever I see him on television.

17

I basically search corporate email and voice mail for a living :smiley:

18

[QUOTE=Digital Stimulus]
[list]
[li]I’m a researcher (graduate student). Funding to the NSF has been cut drastically, with the effect that our lab (and many others nationwide) are struggling.[/li][/QUOTE]

As a researcher, you might want to actually research some facts. The appropriations for the NSF (National Science Foundation, right? One can never be sure with the variety of government acronyms) when Bush came into office (FY2001) were $4,416,390,000. This year (FY06) the NSF appropriation is around $5.6 billion. That’s an increase, not a “drastic” cut.

Can you please give more detail on how exactly Bush or his policies caused you to owe this much money? If you are going to blame your borrowing on Bush, I want to know exactly how he or his administration forced you to borrow money.

19

To be honest, other than fodder for armchair punditry: none.

20

As a teacher, his No Child Left Behind act has made my job an extremely stressful and decidedly unfun place to be for both teacher and student.

I am SO SICK of hearing about testing, testing, testing; numbers, numbers, numbers…that’s all my students, my school, and my teaching is reduced to: the numbers that result from a few weeks of bubbling in scan-trons in late April.

I’m not against accountability, and I fully recognize SOMEthing has to be done to help underperforming students and schools, but this heavy-handed approach has made it a MISERABLE time to teach. We are expected to triple the number of proficient second-language learners this year. TRIPLE. IN ONE YEAR.

Why? IMHO…because the results have to be seen NOW while the guy’s in office. Politicians like fad educational reform that can give immediate–as in, during their time in office and before re-election time–results, however temporary or ineffective they are. Studies have shown it takes 7 years of full implementation (as opposed to the cheap, half-assed, save money, push it on your staff to learn it with missing materials in one 8 hour workshop) of a program for its full effectiveness to be seen.

And those who want to become teachers now have umpteen new hurdles to jump, and worse, they keep changing the requirements and hurdles in the middle of the race. I have a friend who got out of a teacher prep program just in time for all the rules to change and all of her tests, and some of her coursework, to be obsolete. She has a degree in molecular biology, wants to teach science, and currently is not “highly qualified.”

Sigh. Don’t get me started. Oh wait–you already did.

(Note: I am not opposed to education reform or the basic idea behind the need for something like the NCLB act. But how it’s been implemented is a complete mess, at least in my nick of the woods.)