Instead
Instead of standing for re-election GW Bush should be standing a courtroom to be tried for treason. Perhaps I will post the case against him. That should garner some spit on the right Wingdingies' monitors.
Pistoff,
I think, if you could limit yourself to facts, your idea would be interesting.
I've heard a lot of complaints about this and that about Bush--but nothing with any real proof of wrongdoing. Re: the Patriot Act--many complain bitterly, as if their lives have really been affected...but when asked, they haven't.
Most Bush bashing seems to be nothing more than politically motivated. But, if you have something more concrete than has been forwarded on A2K, I'd be interested to see.
Disagreement with Bush, even vehemently, doesn't produce spit from this quarter--but unfairness and extreme bias comes close.
How about this, Sofe?
Quote:On December 13, when U.S. forces captured Saddam Hussein, President George W. Bush not only celebrated with his national security team, but also pulled out his pen and signed into law a bill that grants the FBI sweeping new powers. A White House spokesperson explained the curious timing of the signing -- on a Saturday -- as "the President signs bills seven days a week." But the last time Bush signed a bill into law on a Saturday happened more than a year ago -- on a spending bill that the President needed to sign, to prevent shuttng down the federal government the following Monday.
By signing the bill on the day of Hussein's capture, Bush effectively consigned a dramatic expansion of the USA Patriot Act to a mere footnote. Consequently, while most Americans watched as Hussein was probed for head lice, few were aware that the FBI had just obtained the power to probe their financial records, even if the feds don't suspect their involvement in crime or terrorism.
Bush signs parts of Patriot Act II into law -- stealthily
Feel safer? Still think this admin is acting according to anyone's interests except their own (and that of their campaign contributors')?
If you do, then just go back to sleep...
An opinion about 'hatred' of political foes:
Robert Samuelson, in the WaPo, wrote:...This loathing of Bush from the left does not, as yet, seem any more vicious (and perhaps less so) than the loathing of Bill Clinton from the right. But what is different is the willingness to call it "hatred" and to have the label blessed by much of the press, which has concluded that Bush is different from other modern presidents...
But just because lots of people feel passionately about Bush doesn't mean the country is split into Bush lovers and haters. Many Americans are ambivalent, as they often are. Some like Bush and not his policies -- or the reverse. Consider a Los Angeles Times survey in November (before Saddam Hussein's capture improved Bush's ratings): 40 percent liked the president and his policies; 6 percent liked his policies and disliked him; 28 percent liked him and disliked his policies; and 20 percent disliked him and his policies. Almost three-quarters liked the president or his policies. Interestingly, at the end of their presidencies, both Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton enjoyed either personal or policy approval from about three-quarters of voters...
In the end, Bush hating says more about the haters than the hated -- and here, too, the parallels with Clinton are strong. This hatred embodies much fear and insecurity...They fear he's exiling them politically. On one level, their embrace of hatred aims to make others share their outrage; but on another level, it's a self-indulgent declaration of moral superiority -- something that makes them feel better about themselves.
Two observations, one question, one comment:
--where was all this hand-wringing about political hatred in the late '90s?
--I seem to recall Clinton-hating being termed something like "Angry White Male" syndrome. I always wondered what
that was about. Still do.
Could any self-defined AWM answer for me why you hated Clinton for lying about getting a blowjob but don't hate Bush for lying to start a war?
And in the words of my dawg Ice-T:
"Don't hate tha playah, hate tha game."
sofia
Goodness, that skips over rather a lot of activity designed precisely to denigrate and remove a president from office.
It's pretty common for folks to say that the problem was that Clinton lied, but that doesn't square with anything real. It was the sexuality. And Christianity has always had a big big problem with sexuality, clearly so in the American versions.
So, for many Americans, 'immorality' has to do with sexuality. For others, thank goodness, it has rather more to do with important issues.
Quote:So, for many Americans, 'immorality' has to do with sexuality. For others, thank goodness, it has rather more to do with important issues.
I suspect an awful lot of folks didn't much care that he screwed around, or who he screwed around with, as long as he screwed around with adults. Personally, I'd have thought a suave and dapper cad in the Office of The President of The United States should have been able to attract a more upscale sort of bimbo.
Happy new year, bernie ... and everyone else. Lets hope its a better year for everyone.
Everywhere.
<sigh>
Different
Aren't there different kind of lies?
Yeah, it made me angry that B. Clinton pointed his finger and outright lied to the American people and actually the world community but it really disturbs me more when a Pres. lies about more important matters that involve lives and deaths.
Everybody lies.
Clinton was indignant and insulting with his.
Some people did think his lies were worth a trip out of office--some didn't.
But he wasn't hated the way Bush is portrayed to be hated by the opposing party.
timber
One summer, while driving cab in my home town, I delivered an attractive fare up to her home in what clearly was a bimbo-rich trailer park. Though I received no invitation to stay, it has since occured to me that I likely would have had more fun there than at a phi beta cappa party I attended the following semester. Of course, sometimes, one can be blessed by the heavens with a female companion who is equally agreeable company either sipping Chardonnay and discussing the political influences of American evangelism or up against the door of a mobile home. Happy New Year to you too, chum.
sofia
I'm not buying your claim. For one thing, it is too ill-defined and general. But mostly, it seems founded on bias.
I don't know that there is anything particularly wrong (or pathological) with hating, so long as one hates in the right direction. I hate (detest, feel intense animosity towards) neo-nazis, rapists, tobacco executives, torturers, and Abba's second album.
But I'll guess that you hold that hatred towards Bush is more ill-directed (irrational, biased) than such a response towards Clinton. I certainly hold the converse to be true.
So, how do we establish what acts or personality traits are worthy of our detestation? You suggest above that Clinton's lies are particularly egregious because he was indignant and insulting when he made them (it). I'd argue that that isn't much of a criterion.
just plunking a suggested new year's resolution onto the table (from away, of course);
why don't you people stop talking about it, and do something about it?!! (think of it as your gift to the world for 2004!)
Bo
New Years Resolutions are only contractually legal when made with one's self.
damn, i'll have to resolve to stop making suggestions...........
Clearly, such a resolution would be legally permissable, though not so if I were to have advanced it. Yet, it is logically problemmatical, for if you should choose to renew it next year, you will now be unable to.
My strategy is to just forget the whole 'resolve' thing. In any case, it's possible that all the potential resolving available in the universe has already been used up by George Bush.
great idea Blath;
i resolve to forget about 'resolve'!
Might as well, it's all pretty confusing.
I'm not afraid to make resolutions for the new year. Here are mine:
1. discuss more politics on A2K with my friends
2. wash my car more often
3. be more polite to the neighbors
4. buy a case of chardonnay and fix hinges on broken door.
Happy New Year to all!
my, my; with those legs, and a case of Chardonnay, you will become even more popular!
I've never understood, and maybe I never will, why everyone got so worked up about Clinton and Monica. They were two adults having fun in a complicated world. It was no one else's business.
And as far as the "lie" goes.......really, have none of them or you never lied to get out of a tight spot?...............especially when it's caused by some sexually unrequited busy bodies obsessively exercising their reaction formations? And his simple "version of the truth," would have been fine too, had it not been for a massive effort on the part of Richard Mellon Scaife, the neo-cons and the fundamentalists to find a scandal, any scandal, in order to over turn the vote of the people.
It can be said that he should have been more careful. I agree with this. But I don't see it as such a grave sin. The really disgusting behavior was on the part of the mean spirited and hung up people who spent millions of their own and tax payer's money trying to trap a president.
Bush is an entirely different matter. If any of you actually met him or had a chance to observe his behavior when he was not performing for the cameras, you would all know that this man does not provide the safety and security he pretends to. He's an immature brat, never disciplined, with an out of control temper and dependency on drugs, alcohol and/or simplistic "value" systems.
If he were less dangerous and was not causing me and all of us so much trouble, I would be able to be more sympathetic. He is pathetic, really. But he is dangerous in his present position and must be voted out of office.
Now if we can get on with the business of normal sparring for the Democratic nomination, discover our best candidate who can beat Bush in this election, I'll feel more relieved.
Personally, I think Wes Clark has the best chance. And if he has Clinton's strategic help and support, I think he might be able to do it. However, I don't really know him well enough yet. The others should get behind him as soon as it's determined who will prevail, through the primaries. I fear Dean, while I like him a lot and Kucinich can never hope to win. Idealism is an enemy when used to avoid reality.
If Wes Clark were elected, all non-fanatical Republicans and all others in the world would be better off. We'd be rid of Bush, the neo-cons and the fanatical crazies all at once. Once we're rid them, we can then procede toward each of our own versions of a better world.
why, thank you, Bo. Happy New Year to you.
