The Case Against Bush - Ten Reasons America Needs A Change

[anotherway83]

The Case Against Bush

Ten Reasons America Needs a Change

by Ted Rall

George W. Bush has been a busy boy these past four years. Because his Administration's policies are so radical and his attempts to change our country so far-reaching, it is sometimes difficult to remember them all. Here's a summary of why Bush and his gang of bloodthirsty corporate goons must go; voters may take them along to the polls to help them cast their ballots.

1. He stole the 2000 election. Voting to "reelect" an illegitimate commander-in-chief who seized power by judicial coup d'état is a tacit endorsement of how he got into the White House in the first place. How the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Bush v. Gore is irrelevant. As a federal court, the five runaway Supreme Court justices had no right to agree to hear the case. Under our system of government, elections--and election disputes--fall under state jurisdiction. Their decision to take the case, the way they fixed the outcome in Bush's favor, and Bush's willingness to assume the presidency extraconstitutionally are outrages that no patriotic American, even if they agree with his policies, can forgive.

2. He politicized 9/11. During the early days after the attacks on New York and Washington, a stunned nation came together to mourn, and to assess the motivations of the 19 men who despised us so much they were willing to commit suicide as mass murderers to drive home the point. Rather than channel our newfound solidarity into positive initiatives, however, Bush used 9/11 to push for the USA Patriot Act, fast-track signing authority on free trade, tax cuts for the wealthy, lax regulations for polluters and a multitude of items from the partisan Republican Party wish list. He portrayed Democrats and others who disagreed with him as un-American traitors.

3. He let the terrorists get away while giving them a payraise. The 9/11 hijackers were Egyptians and Saudis recruited by an Egyptian group, Islamic Jihad, with funding from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, some of whom received training at camps which were mostly in Pakistan, all of which were funded by Pakistani secret intelligence. Osama bin Laden, who may have funded all or part of the operation via Al Qaeda, was in Pakistan on 9/11. So who does Bush go after? Afghanistan, at best a back lot of Pakistani-backed Islamists and Iraq--which had nothing to do with 9/11. And what does he do about our real enemies in Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia? He sells them more weapons. Egypt becomes the second largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid after Israel, collecting over $2 billion annually. Pakistan, ruled by a pro-Taliban general who jailed and tortured his democratically elected predecessor, is encouraged to develop its nascent nuclear capabilities. The 3,000 victims of 9/11 remain unavenged--and the stage is set for future attacks.

4. He murdered nearly 100,000 people. The war in Afghanistan killed at least 10,000 civilians and 20,000 Afghan soldiers (of which 10,000 were POWs allegedly massacred by Northern Alliance soldiers as U.S. Special Forces troops supervised the slaughter.) As of three weeks after the fall of Baghdad, General Tommy Franks estimated Iraqi dead at 30,000 civilians and 30,000 Iraqi soldiers, men who were fighting to defend their country from a hostile invasion army. At least 10,000 more civilians and 5,000 Iraqi resistance soldiers have died since then. Neither Afghanistan nor Iraq have anything to do with the war on terrorism, which has yet to start. Both wars were waged to expand American military and economic hegemony and Dick Cheney's policy of "total energy dominance" over oil and natural gas resources. The world would be safer if Charles Manson, a mere amateur killer by comparison, were released and Bush was sitting in prison.

5. He bankrupted the treasury. When Bush took the oath of office in January 2001, the U.S. Congressional Budget Office projected a surplus of $5 trillion over the next ten years. Now, after two expensive wars of aggression and two series of extravagant tax cuts for the ultrarich--including the elimination of inheritance taxes on multimillionaires' estates--the federal budget is facing a $5 trillion shortfall. That's a $10 trillion net deficit--ten times more than the Reagan deficit that took Clinton his entire tenure to pay off--for giveaways to Bush-connected defense contractors like Halliburton and a fraction of one percent of wealthy individuals. Most Americans will get nothing out of this but the bill which, if history serves a guide, won't be repaid until our children are dead. Goodbye national healthcare, sayonara help with college tuition. Bush has stolen our future.

6. He threw thousands of innocent people into concentration camps. Drawing from another of fascism's greatest hits, Bush used his fictional war on terrorism as a lame pretext to throw thousands of Muslims and Arabs into a new gulag archipelago spanning the globe from secret CIA-run prisons in Afghanistan and Iraq--including the infamous Abu Ghraib--to INS detention centers in Brooklyn to the naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Detainees caught in battle were denied their Geneva Convention rights as POWs, tortured and even murdered. Illegal immigrants who should have been deported were jailed indefinitely without access to attorneys, or visits from family. In the ultimate Orwellian twist, they were turned into "unpersons"; even their names were withheld from the media. Any president who endorses such atrocities, as Bush has repeatedly done in speeches, is against everything that America purports to stands for. Bush has even signed a secret directive authorizing himself with the right to assassinate anyone, anywhere--including American citizens--as "enemy combatants."

7. We are more feared than Al Qaeda. Bush's radical new policy of "preemption"--a self-ascribed right to invade other countries based on a presumed hunch--has terrorized then international community. Even though they have never threatened us, nations like Iran and Syria wonder whether or not Bush will invade them next--and are racing to develop nuclear weapons to protect themselves from the U.S. threat. Our traditional allies, who still want to engage themselves with the rest of the world, have been forced to distance themselves from our bull-in-a-china-shop foreign policy. We, not Islamist terrorists, are the world's most feared power. We are feared, which is why we are hated. Because we are hated, we are in greater danger.

8. Bush has done nothing to improve the economy. At one of the presidential debates, Bush was asked what he would tell someone who had lost their job to outsourcing overseas. He answered that the unemployed had received their $300 tax cuts, and that within five years his education policies would start to help children. The truth is, Bush did nothing to jumpstart the weak post-dot-com economy he inherited in 2000. Like most Republicans, he favors high unemployment as a way to keep labor week and salaries cheap. A Bush victory would ensure more of the same--fewer jobs, lower salaries, reduced unemployment benefits. A president can do a lot to stimulate the economy: jobs programs funded by the government, tax cuts for the working class. But Bush won't act because it would run counter to his ideological beliefs.

9. Bush will appoint the next Supreme Court justice. Whether they're values issues like abortion or gay marriage, or the next election dispute, the Supreme Court is balanced on the razor's edge between reason and right-wing fascism. Sandra Day O'Connor and William Rehnquist, who originally intended to step down during the last four years but evidently decided not to do so because of Bush's lunacy, are over 80 years old. They may not last another four years. We can't let Bush have the chance to appoint their successors.

10. We deserve a president who can speak English and doesn't look like a chimpanzee. John Kerry is a far from ideal prospect but he's a huge leap forward from an evolutionary standpoint.

[italia23]

The Case Against Bush

Ten Reasons America Needs a Change

by Ted Rall

George W. Bush has been a busy boy these past four years. Because his Administration's policies are so radical and his attempts to change our country so far-reaching, it is sometimes difficult to remember them all. Here's a summary of why Bush and his gang of bloodthirsty corporate goons must go; voters may take them along to the polls to help them cast their ballots.

1. He stole the 2000 election. Voting to "reelect" an illegitimate commander-in-chief who seized power by judicial coup d'état is a tacit endorsement of how he got into the White House in the first place. How the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Bush v. Gore is irrelevant. As a federal court, the five runaway Supreme Court justices had no right to agree to hear the case. Under our system of government, elections--and election disputes--fall under state jurisdiction. Their decision to take the case, the way they fixed the outcome in Bush's favor, and Bush's willingness to assume the presidency extraconstitutionally are outrages that no patriotic American, even if they agree with his policies, can forgive.

Wow, simply opening up with the 2000 election shows the author's partisanship and sour grapes befitting of left-wing champs.

2. He politicized 9/11. During the early days after the attacks on New York and Washington, a stunned nation came together to mourn, and to assess the motivations of the 19 men who despised us so much they were willing to commit suicide as mass murderers to drive home the point. Rather than channel our newfound solidarity into positive initiatives, however, Bush used 9/11 to push for the USA Patriot Act, fast-track signing authority on free trade, tax cuts for the wealthy, lax regulations for polluters and a multitude of items from the partisan Republican Party wish list. He portrayed Democrats and others who disagreed with him as un-American traitors.

After 9/11, the nation felt extremely vulnerable and began to embrace conservative values. I have yet to see how the Patriot Act DOESN'T make us a safer country. The tax cuts for the wealthy has a lot more to do with economics than politics, and could probably be better addressed in a separate thread. I see, a Democrat is an un-American traitor and a Republican is a Fascist. Somebody needs to relax. These labels come from the columns, not from Congress

3. He let the terrorists get away while giving them a payraise. The 9/11 hijackers were Egyptians and Saudis recruited by an Egyptian group, Islamic Jihad, with funding from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, some of whom received training at camps which were mostly in Pakistan, all of which were funded by Pakistani secret intelligence. Osama bin Laden, who may have funded all or part of the operation via Al Qaeda, was in Pakistan on 9/11. So who does Bush go after? Afghanistan, at best a back lot of Pakistani-backed Islamists and Iraq--which had nothing to do with 9/11. And what does he do about our real enemies in Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia? He sells them more weapons. Egypt becomes the second largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid after Israel, collecting over $2 billion annually. Pakistan, ruled by a pro-Taliban general who jailed and tortured his democratically elected predecessor, is encouraged to develop its nascent nuclear capabilities. The 3,000 victims of 9/11 remain unavenged--and the stage is set for future attacks.

Why attack Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, when they could be better used as allies? It's funny how this guy claims that "the 3,000 victims of 9/11 remain unavenged" then goes on to complian how "thousands of innocent people have been thrown into concentration camps". I see that the author is a "Kerryist" Democrat.

4. He murdered nearly 100,000 people. The war in Afghanistan killed at least 10,000 civilians and 20,000 Afghan soldiers (of which 10,000 were POWs allegedly massacred by Northern Alliance soldiers as U.S. Special Forces troops supervised the slaughter.) As of three weeks after the fall of Baghdad, General Tommy Franks estimated Iraqi dead at 30,000 civilians and 30,000 Iraqi soldiers, men who were fighting to defend their country from a hostile invasion army. At least 10,000 more civilians and 5,000 Iraqi resistance soldiers have died since then. Neither Afghanistan nor Iraq have anything to do with the war on terrorism, which has yet to start. Both wars were waged to expand American military and economic hegemony and Dick Cheney's policy of "total energy dominance" over oil and natural gas resources. The world would be safer if Charles Manson, a mere amateur killer by comparison, were released and Bush was sitting in prison.

Now he disagrees with the war in Afghanistan. Afghanistan has nothing to do with the war on terrorism? I never heard that one before. Total energy dominance over oil and natural gas? At the outset of the American bombing of Baghdad, the President stated that the oil belongs to the people of Iraq.

5. He bankrupted the treasury. When Bush took the oath of office in January 2001, the U.S. Congressional Budget Office projected a surplus of $5 trillion over the next ten years. Now, after two expensive wars of aggression and two series of extravagant tax cuts for the ultrarich--including the elimination of inheritance taxes on multimillionaires' estates--the federal budget is facing a $5 trillion shortfall. That's a $10 trillion net deficit--ten times more than the Reagan deficit that took Clinton his entire tenure to pay off--for giveaways to Bush-connected defense contractors like Halliburton and a fraction of one percent of wealthy individuals. Most Americans will get nothing out of this but the bill which, if history serves a guide, won't be repaid until our children are dead. Goodbye national healthcare, sayonara help with college tuition. Bush has stolen our future.

Oh, I'm sorry that Clinton was stuck paying off Reagan's debt (i.e., ending the Cold War) Maybe if the author did a little more research he would see that Clinton used the military more than any other President not in a time of war. All while dramatically cutting military funding.

6. He threw thousands of innocent people into concentration camps. Drawing from another of fascism's greatest hits, Bush used his fictional war on terrorism as a lame pretext to throw thousands of Muslims and Arabs into a new gulag archipelago spanning the globe from secret CIA-run prisons in Afghanistan and Iraq--including the infamous Abu Ghraib--to INS detention centers in Brooklyn to the naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Detainees caught in battle were denied their Geneva Convention rights as POWs, tortured and even murdered. Illegal immigrants who should have been deported were jailed indefinitely without access to attorneys, or visits from family. In the ultimate Orwellian twist, they were turned into "unpersons"; even their names were withheld from the media. Any president who endorses such atrocities, as Bush has repeatedly done in speeches, is against everything that America purports to stands for. Bush has even signed a secret directive authorizing himself with the right to assassinate anyone, anywhere--including American citizens--as "enemy combatants."

See #2 and 4.

7. We are more feared than Al Qaeda. Bush's radical new policy of "preemption"--a self-ascribed right to invade other countries based on a presumed hunch--has terrorized then international community. Even though they have never threatened us, nations like Iran and Syria wonder whether or not Bush will invade them next--and are racing to develop nuclear weapons to protect themselves from the U.S. threat. Our traditional allies, who still want to engage themselves with the rest of the world, have been forced to distance themselves from our bull-in-a-china-shop foreign policy. We, not Islamist terrorists, are the world's most feared power. We are feared, which is why we are hated. Because we are hated, we are in greater danger.

We should be feared. I'm happy we are feared. And I don't care that people hate us. Anyone that matters, has hated us and would continue to hate us, regardless of pre-emptivism.

8. Bush has done nothing to improve the economy. At one of the presidential debates, Bush was asked what he would tell someone who had lost their job to outsourcing overseas. He answered that the unemployed had received their $300 tax cuts, and that within five years his education policies would start to help children. The truth is, Bush did nothing to jumpstart the weak post-dot-com economy he inherited in 2000. Like most Republicans, he favors high unemployment as a way to keep labor week and salaries cheap. A Bush victory would ensure more of the same--fewer jobs, lower salaries, reduced unemployment benefits. A president can do a lot to stimulate the economy: jobs programs funded by the government, tax cuts for the working class. But Bush won't act because it would run counter to his ideological beliefs.

It's not simply the "post-dot-com economy". Does he realize that the Clinton economy was blessed by the Internet, a positive economic shock that hadn't been seen since the introduction of the automobile. The mid-90's bubble would eventually burst, right before Bush was settled into office. Republican or Democrat, any economist will agree with that. It has nothing to do with Bush or Clinton's economic policy, it is simply economics. Add to that a national disaster, as well as a global war on terror, and maybe he will begin to see the reasons for our deficit. Re: tax cuts -- see #2.

9. Bush will appoint the next Supreme Court justice. Whether they're values issues like abortion or gay marriage, or the next election dispute, the Supreme Court is balanced on the razor's edge between reason and right-wing fascism. Sandra Day O'Connor and William Rehnquist, who originally intended to step down during the last four years but evidently decided not to do so because of Bush's lunacy, are over 80 years old. They may not last another four years. We can't let Bush have the chance to appoint their successors.

Perhaps the author can explain this middle ground. When it comes to gay marriage and abortion, you are either labelled a left-wing lunatic or a right-wing fascist.

10. We deserve a president who can speak English and doesn't look like a chimpanzee. John Kerry is a far from ideal prospect but he's a huge leap forward from an evolutionary standpoint.

Oh I knew #10 was gonna be a good one.

[anotherway83]

Wow, simply opening up with the 2000 election shows the author's partisanship and sour grapes befitting of left-wing champs.

you forget our self-appointed role as the world's upholder of liberty and democracy for all given such a role, how can one ever forget that the commander-in-chief, the most powerful man on earth, got to that position by actually stealing an election, in the process disenfranchising a whole bunch of minority voters?

After 9/11, the nation felt extremely vulnerable and began to embrace conservative values. I have yet to see how the Patriot Act DOESN'T make us a safer country. The tax cuts for the wealthy has a lot more to do with economics than politics, and could probably be better addressed in a separate thread. I see, a Democrat is an un-American traitor and a Republican is a Fascist. Somebody needs to relax. These labels come from the columns, not from Congress

if you're willing to sacrifice your civil liberties to be safer from an enemy that's only getting stronger on account of this administrations actions, then by all means, support the Patriot Act.

Why attack Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, when they could be better used as allies? It's funny how this guy claims that "the 3,000 victims of 9/11 remain unavenged" then goes on to complian how "thousands of innocent people have been thrown into concentration camps". I see that the author is a "Kerryist" Democrat.

oh, i see. so we shouldn't attack pakistan and saudi arabia, which are known harboring grounds for terrorists, but instead we should go after iraq, which had absolutely no connection to 9-11? wow, that's a pretty impressive way of fighting the "war on terror", no?

Now he disagrees with the war in Afghanistan. Afghanistan has nothing to do with the war on terrorism? I never heard that one before. Total energy dominance over oil and natural gas? At the outset of the American bombing of Baghdad, the President stated that the oil belongs to the people of Iraq.

talk is cheap. most iraqis have yet to see any benefits of this war or of their own reserves of oil.

Oh, I'm sorry that Clinton was stuck paying off Reagan's debt (i.e., ending the Cold War) Maybe if the author did a little more research he would see that Clinton used the military more than any other President not in a time of war. All while dramatically cutting military funding.

maybe he was, but don't forget the economy was still booming, ppl. had jobs, and we had a surplus. can you say the same for bush? doubt it.

sure, he might not have used the military during a time of war...but that's the good thing. we didn't have a major war during clinton's 8 yrs! this guy took office and within 4 yrs. we were dragged into 2 major wars, losing world diplomatic status in the process and inciting hatred for americans all over the world.

See #2 and 4.

We should be feared. I'm happy we are feared. And I don't care that people hate us. Anyone that matters, has hated us and would continue to hate us, regardless of pre-emptivism.

i really don't understand how you expect to be feared and still be safe for long. don't forget that fear is often a precursor to hatred!

It's not simply the "post-dot-com economy". Does he realize that the Clinton economy was blessed by the Internet, a positive economic shock that hadn't been seen since the introduction of the automobile. The mid-90's bubble would eventually burst, right before Bush was settled into office. Republican or Democrat, any economist will agree with that. It has nothing to do with Bush or Clinton's economic policy, it is simply economics. Add to that a national disaster, as well as a global war on terror, and maybe he will begin to see the reasons for our deficit. Re: tax cuts -- see #2.

you're really missing the point here. anyone can tell you that launching 2 major wars half way around the world and still cutting taxes is a foolish move at best. besides, this "global war on terror" wouldn't cost us nearly as much if we had simply succeeded in getting a true global alliance going, instead of bush's go-it-alone attitude.

the deficit would've been much more manageable if it wasn't for bush's misguided foreign adventures...that's what the author is getting at.

[italia23]

Please explain to me how the 2000 election was stolen. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights conducted a six-moth investigation on the Florida vote. They found NO evidence of anyone being disenfranchised and in the small incidents where violations of the Voter's Rights Act were committed, NONE were in Republican-controlled counties.

I would 100% sacrifice some of my civil liberties in order to better protect the country. I have nothing to hide, and I have yet to be inconvenienced by the Patriot Act. What about you?

I am not denying that it was good thing that we avoided war during the Clinton Administration. They problem I have is the fact that Pres. Clinton utilized the military in an unprecendented 26 "operational events" all while cutting military funding at a faster rate than any President in the 20th century. And don't give me the post-Cold War argument b/c funding was already decreased in Bush 41's term.

"We should be feared. I'm happy we are feared. And I don't care that people hate us. Anyone that matters, has hated us and would continue to hate us, regardless of pre-emptivism."