How many years have I been saying this? This is beyond partisanship. The president is too important in the world, much less the US, to have incompetents elected to that office. And lest righties (many of whom are embarassed by the current office holder) think I’m just bashing Bush, I had no love for Kerry. The past few years hopefully have shown both parties that they need to nominate and elect people with at least a passing ability to do something. Anything.
But as Bush shuffles the deck chairs on his ship of state, I’m not optimistic.
The Worst President in History?
George W. Bush’s presidency appears headed for colossal historical disgrace. Barring a cataclysmic event on the order of the terrorist attacks of September 11th, after which the public might rally around the White House once again, there seems to be little the administration can do to avoid being ranked on the lowest tier of U.S. presidents. And that may be the best-case scenario. Many historians are now wondering whether Bush, in fact, will be remembered as the very worst president in all of American history.
In early 2004, an informal survey of 415 historians conducted by the nonpartisan History News Network found that eighty-one percent considered the Bush administration a “failure.” Among those who called Bush a success, many gave the president high marks only for his ability to mobilize public support and get Congress to go along with what one historian called the administration’s “pursuit of disastrous policies.” In fact, roughly one in ten of those who called Bush a success was being facetious, rating him only as the best president since Bill Clinton — a category in which Bush is the only contestant.
If you want to get someone else on the list in 2008 let’s see a ticket of Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton vs. Pat Robertson/Pat Buchanon. No matter what happened, we’d all have something to talk about in 2009.
joshua
I don’t think apprehending bin Laden is going to help Bush now. The credit will go to the forces who actually capture him, be they the Special Forces, NATO, or even Pakistani troops. People know that bin Laden got away the first time because the Pentagon wouldn’t commit the Army Rangers and left it up to the Northern Alliance to take Tora Bora.
Rumsfeld is under fire by the retired Generals and Democrats, that reflects on the President. It will be too late in the game and too many body bags to make up for the strategic mistakes. When Rice said the strategic plans were right on but there had been many tactical mistakes she made the mistake. That meant that Rumsfeld was right but the soldiers in the field were the ones who screwed up. Americans support the soldiers much more then they support the civilian leaders sending them off to a phony war.
The Republicans will have to start distancing themselves from Bush if they wish to retain control of the Congress. That will also mean they need a platform. As easy as it is to accuse the Democrats of not having a platform, that won’t wash when the electorate realizes that neither does the Republican Party.
Just my two cents
Mr. [insert silly name] Fusion
> A tax reduction that has helped our
> deficit soar to unprecedented heights;
> to be left for our children to pay off.
See, when liberals say something this stupid they completely lose my vote. Tax revenues have INCREASED since the tax rate cut. Read that five or ten more times…….Done? While you are at it, read a couple more times…..Done? And again: Tax revenues are UP…And once more for good measure: Tax revenues are HIGHER since the tax cut.
Now, read this statement very, very carefully: Increasing the tax rate does NOT necessarily increase tax revenue and can instead (and generally does) have the opposite effect.
The economy has been BOOMING even though we had a major disaster in New Orleans, have troops overseas fighting a war, have had a bird flu epidemic, high prices at the pump and oh yes, we were attacked. Notice how you don’t hear anything about the unemployment rate anymore? How we don’t heard liberals pining for the Clinton era unemployment rates?
The unprecedented deficit has to do with SPENDING not taxes.
Thomas,
You must be a Bill O’Reilly fan.
I love his “When Clinton was in office the unemployment rate was 10%, with Bush its 5%”
Truth – Clinton’s 10% unemployment was inherited from Bush I. Bush’s 5% was inherited from Clinton – and btw has gone up since, though tanks Bog not much.
#38 Thomas, so tax revenue has actually increased? Hmmm, since Bush took office, the national debt has gone up by well over 2 trillion dollars, and the money was pumped back into the economy (not all of it well spent), and you say that enough of that borrowed largesse has been converted to tax revenue to offset the losses specifically due to high-bracket tax cuts? Wow, that’s exactly what I would expect, so the only surprise would be if that DIDN’T happen. But borrowing 50 bucks and getting paid back 10 is not a solution, so your highly vaunted revenue increases mean nothing when compared to the much higher increases in expenditures.
The only silly thing is the suggestion that this compounding debt could possibly be paid off by our children. Perhaps J.K. Rowling can write a book where Harry Potter vanquishes the national debt, and we can all rest a bit easier about our future. The only word that adequately describes the hole we’re in is “unfathomable.”
truth is, most presidents don’t even have the chance to be great. It takes a great crisis – Civil War, WW1, Depression/WW2, Cuban Missile Crisis, 9/11etc – to make a great president. Luckily, those don’t come around too often. Presidents like Carter, Clinton, Bush 1 never really had the chance to be great since their crises (Iranian Hostages, Bosnia/Kosovo, Gulf War 1) were comparatively mild, at least as far as American security and prosperity went.
Perhaps the real tragedy for Bush is that 9/11 offered him the chance to be great, and he wound up being, well, terrible.
>But borrowing 50 bucks and getting paid back 10 is not a solution,
That’s a great solution. You’re getting a 20% return, at 5% interest rates.
The 2 trillion is a total over several years. The higher revenues are every year.
RE: # 40
> #38 Thomas, so tax revenue has actually increased? Hmmm,
> since Bush took office, the national debt has gone up by
> well over 2 trillion dollars, and the money was pumped back
> into the economy (not all of it well spent), and you say
> that enough of that borrowed largesse has been converted to
> tax revenue to offset the losses specifically due to
> high-bracket tax cuts?
No, I did not say that additional tax revenue has offset the increased spending. You are talking about two COMPLETELY different problems. What was done with the tax revenue is entirely different matter than whether lowering the tax rate increased tax revenue. I was specifically responding Mr. Fubar Fusion’s claim that the tax cut has somehow made our situation worse.
As I stated in all caps at the end of my post, the national debt is due to SPENDING not a lack of revenue.
> Wow, that’s exactly what I would
> expect, so the only surprise would be if that DIDN’T
> happen. But borrowing 50 bucks and getting paid back 10 is
> not a solution, so your highly vaunted revenue increases
> mean nothing when compared to the much higher increases in
> expenditures.
Agreed. If you make more money but increase spending far beyond the additional revenue your financial position is worse. No question. So, while we have more money because of lowering taxes, Congress has spent that and much more and has made things worse. Couldn’t agree with you more. But that doesn’t change the fact that the tax rate cut was beneficial and that increasing the tax rates would make things worse.
RE: # 39
>I love his “When Clinton was in office the
> unemployment rate was 10%, with Bush its 5%”
I’m assuming you are referring to O’Reilly since I never made such a statement. The fact of the matter is that unemployment is near the same levels as it was with Clinton and Bush II did not have the benefit of the Internet boom (or the guy that invented the Internet ;->) to do it.