- #36
WheelsRCool
IMO, Lyndon B. Johnson and Jimmy Carter were the worst Presidents. Bush IMO has been a fairly good President overall.
DrClapeyron said:I don't see anything bad about Bush's presidency. He has done an outstanding job reacting to 9/11, I don't think there is much more anyone could do, he certainly has not left the country strongly divided on his actions.
But, Americans have an odd way of judging presidents. Nixon ended the gold standard, the most unpopular war in US history and started trade relations with China! Yet he is the most hated president ever because a party conection related him to a rather childish crime.
Well, let's consider a few things:DeadWolfe said:In fact, what President in the past 50 years has shown any sign of respecting the notion that the government has no business legislating morality? Let's all admit it, the reason Bush gets a bad rap is because he is baffoonish, not because of any of his policies.
DrClapeyron said:I don'ot see anything bad about Bush's presidency. He has done an outstanding job reacting to 9/11, I don't think there is much more anyone could do, he certainly has not left the country strongly divided on his actions.
But, Americans have an odd way of judging presidents. Nixon ended the gold standard, the most unpopular war in US history and started trade relations with China! Yet he is the most hated president ever because a party conection related him to a rather childish crime.
denverdoc said:whem you're hovering at a 40 percent approval rating erm-i van see where he needed a shot in tst teirarly in a the arm. Too bad it has cost a trillion plus and created animosity everywhere. He needed that second term. Bush by far, not even a contest.
russ_watters said:As already pointed out, the UN gave tacit approval and congress gave specific approval, but even assuming you are correct about his motives, what law, exactly, was broken?
Was Vietnam a less unnecessary war?
IIRC, Bush's public opinion ratings were up around 70% following 9/11.pitot-tube said:I can't agree with this - I don't believe Bush went into Iraq because of poor opinion poll ratings - he wouldn't have received support from so many other people in the US government and senate - republican or otherwise for this.The question was always was saddam a nuclear or chemical threat - Bush may have lied about this or kidded himself saddam was a threat in this regard.Sanctions were killing lots of iraqis and something had to change - Bush tried to change the situation.You can call him naiive about how he tried to change the situation in iraq.I've no doubt that peole like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld thought they had a workable strategy for improving the sityuation in the middle east as a whole for the long term.The problem the Bush administration has had is that they didn't listen to iraqi exiles who were saying that invasion would lead to tribal chaos
and also they underestimated how bad European countries are at committing themselves
to war, which given how hard the mainland of europe suffered in world war 2 is not surprising. But guantanamo bay is undeniably a bad thing and if innocent people have been torured there ( using sleep deprivation loud noises and humiliation) then Bush should face charges.Even Colin Powell wants Guantanamo shut down so it must be awful.
By killing even more Iraqis?! Bombing the infrastructure such that the Iraqis had no electricity, no running water, while unprocessed sewage was flowing into the only available water ways is not the way to help them. And that was on top of the fact that Iraqis had limited food and very little medication because of the sanctions. There was no effective plan to aid the Iraqis, who have been grossly violated by the Bush administration.Sanctions were killing lots of iraqis and something had to change - Bush tried to change the situation.
Apparently you haven't seen this C-Span video of Dick Cheney explaining why Bush I's administration did not go after Saddam. They knew that toppling Iraq's government would result in chaos, factional conflict, and a quagmire for US troops. This time around, with military support functions increasingly farmed out to his company (Halliburton/KBR), Cheney figured the trade-off was worth it. There was only one reason to invade Iraq - money for big businesses and their neo-con enablers.pitot-tube said:I've no doubt that peole like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld thought they had a workable strategy for improving the sityuation in the middle east as a whole for the long term.The problem the Bush administration has had is that they didn't listen to iraqi exiles who were saying that invasion would lead to tribal chaos
and also they underestimated how bad European countries are at committing themselves
to war, which given how hard the mainland of europe suffered in world war 2 is not surprising.
Isn't congress supposed to be supreme in the united states? Shouldn't blame be spread to them as well?Integral said:You seem to have forgotten, Vietnam was not a war, it was a police action. There was never a declaration of war, it built slowly. The blame for that "police action" needs to be spread from Eisenhower to Johnson, maybe even a bit of Nixon, thought he did finally end it. And for that I will never forgive him.
Congress is certainly complicit when an administration is allowed to start wars, overthrow governments, etc. This also reflects badly on the media, who should be investigating and digging and instead print press releases verbatim as if they were news. It's really easy to quote somebody and fluff it into a "story" - the real work comes in when you dig for background, biases, motivations, etc.Smurf said:Isn't congress supposed to be supreme in the united states? Shouldn't blame be spread to them as well?
pitot-tube said:I can't agree with this - I don't believe Bush went into Iraq because of poor opinion poll ratings - he wouldn't have received support from so many other people in the US government and senate - republican or otherwise for this.The question was always was saddam a nuclear or chemical threat - Bush may have lied about this or kidded himself saddam was a threat in this regard.Sanctions were killing lots of iraqis and something had to change - Bush tried to change the situation.You can call him naiive about how he tried to change the situation in iraq.I've no doubt that peole like Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld thought they had a workable strategy for improving the sityuation in the middle east as a whole for the long term.The problem the Bush administration has had is that they didn't listen to iraqi exiles who were saying that invasion would lead to tribal chaos
and also they underestimated how bad European countries are at committing themselves
to war, which given how hard the mainland of europe suffered in world war 2 is not surprising. But guantanamo bay is undeniably a bad thing and if innocent people have been torured there ( using sleep deprivation loud noises and humiliation) then Bush should face charges.Even Colin Powell wants Guantanamo shut down so it must be awful.
denverdoc said:Now that's about the most egregiously narrowminded remark I've even seen on PF for many moons. An outstanding job of reacting to 9/11? No terrorist, including OBL, could have dreamed of a better rxn. He has wasted more money, eroded civil liberties in a land we call free, and been a better recruit agent for terrorism than any misguided dozen individuals in power could have managed alone. He fell for it hook, line and sinker--course whem you're hovering at a 40 percent approval rating erm-i can see where he needed a shot in the arm. Too bad it has cost a trillion plus and created animosity everywhere. He needed that second term. Bush by far, not even a contest.
DrClapeyron said:Honestly, how many people felt the reason for sending troops to Iraq had anything to with WMDs at the time? Quite right, it was part of Bush's road map towards stablity in the region and Saddam simply was still his cranky self. Don't forget this man attacked Quwait and planned an attack against Saudi Arabia to avoid paying his war debts, this was a man who did not want to play by the rules and get along with others, why should the US not have sent troops?
Bush stood up and did what was right, whether anyone else agrees they would have done the same they are comparing apples and oranges. The security of the greater good was the issue at hand and still is such. Saddam was mad man and a very irrate, greedy murderer. It's funny that no one mentions the support Bush and his administration received from Iraq's neighboring countries such as Quwait, UAE, Bharain and Saudi Arabia.
WASHINGTON - A study by two nonprofit journalism organizations found that President Bush and top administration officials issued hundreds of false statements about the national security threat from Iraq in the two years following the 2001 terrorist attacks.
The study concluded that the statements "were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses."
The study was posted Tuesday on the Web site of the Center for Public Integrity, which worked with the Fund for Independence in Journalism.
White House spokesman Scott Stanzel did not comment on the merits of the study Tuesday night but reiterated the administration's position that the world community viewed Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein, as a threat.
. . . .
The study counted 935 false statements in the two-year period. It found that in speeches, briefings, interviews and other venues, Bush and administration officials stated unequivocally on at least 532 occasions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or was trying to produce or obtain them or had links to al-Qaida or both.
"It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possesses any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida," according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. "In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003."
Named in the study along with Bush were top officials of the administration during the period studied: Vice President Dick Cheney, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and White House press secretaries Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan.
. . . .
I've been trying to access the database referenced all day http://www.publicintegrity.org/WarCard/ but can't get through. Either it's very busy or the victim of a DOS attack.Astronuc said:935 false statements on Iraq
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080123/ap_on_go_pr_wh/misinformation_study
A study finds Bush and officials made hundreds of untrue statements about Iraq after September 11th.
Retired U.S. Army Gen. Tommy Franks, who led the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, was paid $100,000 to endorse a veterans charity that watchdog groups say is ripping off donors and wounded veterans by using only a small portion of the money raised for veterans services, according to testimony in Congress today.
Art said:I've been trying to access the database referenced all day http://www.publicintegrity.org/WarCard/ but can't get through. Either it's very busy or the victim of a DOS attack.
President George W. Bush and seven of his administration's top officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, made at least 935 false statements in the two years following September 11, 2001, about the national security threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Nearly five years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, an exhaustive examination of the record shows that the statements were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses.
Thanks Edward, it was the searchable database at that url I wanted to access and I have it now. Really interesting results if you search on 'Al Qaeda'. Right from the start Rumsfeld and co were falling over themselves to use this as an excuse to attack Iraq. Some of it is incredible. One would like to think there is some modicum of sanity in one's leaders but some of Rumsfeld's ideas are positively phychopathic such asedward said:It didn't work for me until late afternoon. The link is working now. It is the same information as in the yahoo link.
Richard Clarke, Against All Enemies: Targeting Iraq and Changing the Government
By the afternoon on Wednesday [September 12], Secretary [Donald] Rumsfeld was talking about broadening the objectives of our response and "getting Iraq." Secretary [Colin] Powell pushed back, urging a focus on Al Qaeda. Relieved to have some support, I thanked Colin Powell and his deputy, Rich Armitage. "I thought I was missing something here," I vented. "Having been attacked by Al Qaeda, for us now to go bombing Iraq in response would be like our invading Mexico after the Japanese attacked us at Pearl Harbor." Powell shook his head. "It's not over yet."
[text omitted]
Indeed, it was not. Later in the day, Secretary Rumsfeld complained that there were no decent targets for bombing in Afghanistan and that we should consider bombing Iraq, which, he said, had better targets. At first I thought Rumsfeld was joking. But he was serious and the president did not reject out of hand the idea of attacking Iraq. Instead, he noted that what we needed to do with Iraq was to change the government, not just hit it with more cruise missiles, as Rumsfeld has implied.
SOURCE: Richard A. Clarke, Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror (New York: Free Press, 2004), pages 30–31.
Not true!pitot-tube said:In my opinion Bill Clinton and George Bush senior are the bad presidents the US has had in the last thirty years.Bush senior could have sorted saddam out 17 years ago and Clinton's sanctions made Iraqi's suffer to the extent that more of them were dying because of sanctions than because of the current war in Iraq.
Any source/method on that? Death rate figures have been notoriously inaccurate for Iraq. Nothing on the graph and there's no help following the link backwards. Since the graph starts at ~ the beginning of the war, how can one make a comparison to the Clinton era? Certainly not back to the Bush I era. And last, the level of violence has declined in the last 5 months down to that of 2-3 years ago, its fair to extrapolate that curve out to present and back down accordingly.Gokul43201 said:Not true!
http://www.indymedia.ie/attachments/oct2006/apiis0140673606694919.gr2.lrg.gif
Death rates have gone up, life expectancy has gone down, non-violent death rate hasn't changed much.
What's the point of posting this Soros front stuff? I look forward to a follow on 'study' on the hundreds of statements made by these collaborators: Madeline Albright in '98; Pres. Clinton, Gov. Dean, Sandy Berger, Sen Clinton, ...Astronuc said:935 false statements on Iraq
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080123/ap_on_go_pr_wh/misinformation_study
A study finds Bush and officials made hundreds of untrue statements about Iraq after September 11th.
kach22i said:Bush/Cheney lies, lies, lies and a pardon they gave themselves already.
CNN Video
President BUSH Pardons HIMSELF against POTENTIAL WARCRIMES
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHQ7Prwh7Gc&feature=bz302
The data is from a Lancet study. I can not source the original data - it requires special access.jim mcnamara said:It's a cute graph there, gokul. But what does it show - what population - the US? or Iraq? I'm guessing it's part of a discussion, and minus that discussion it is kinda less than meaningful... to me anyway. Can you provide the parent link?
I can't seem to find the data now, but I'm pretty sure I recall that mortality rates in Iraq were on a continuous decline through the 80s, shot up in 90, after the first war, and then continued climbing up slowly under sanctions till the second war. The figure I linked showed data from various studies over a period starting a year before the second war began.mheslep said:Since the graph starts at ~ the beginning of the war, how can one make a comparison to the Clinton era? Certainly not back to the Bush I era.
Gokul43201 said:I can't seem to find the data now, but I'm pretty sure I recall that mortality rates in Iraq were on a continuous decline through the 80s, shot up in 90, after the first war, and then continued climbing up slowly under sanctions till the second war. The figure I linked showed data from various studies over a period starting a year before the second war began.
Gokul43201 said:The data is from a Lancet study. I can not source the original data - it requires special access.
This is where I found it: http://www.indymedia.ie/article/78999
I think I Googled for "Iraq death rate lancet" or "Iraq mortality lancet" and looked at images. I remembered this being in the news a couple years ago.
No quarrel with the trends, but Lancet is bogus.Gokul43201 said:I can't seem to find the data now, but I'm pretty sure I recall that mortality rates in Iraq were on a continuous decline through the 80s, shot up in 90, after the first war, and then continued climbing up slowly under sanctions till the second war. The figure I linked showed data from various studies over a period starting a year before the second war began.