Lack of right wing posting

[sexual_chocolate]

Clintron was impeached....

[archenemy]

free speach

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Worst. President. Evah.

 

Worse than Jackson?

 

I agree one of the biggest turds we have had ever but all time worst? Jackson was impeached...

 

A. Johnson was impeached.

 

Bush is not the worst president, just a mediocre one falling in the middle, a few places below Clinton.

[kix]

 

war mongers.

[mattp]

You sure are a great cheerleader for George Bush, KK.

 

It looks to me as if he has:

 

lied to take us into a war that virtually everyone agrees is one of our worst foreign policy disasters anywhere, while his own intelligence people and most of our allies were telling him this would be the result;

 

his actions have crippled our military and he has reduced support for military families at a time when he tells us we require a strong military and need to show more respect for the young men and women who defend us;

 

meanwhile he has undermined virtually every treaty there is on weapons control and resisted any cooperation with our “allies” on global warming and various other matters alienating most of the rest of the world;

 

he’s doing his best to bankrupt our government and increase our dependence on foreign investment at a time when he says we can't depend on anybody else in the world;

 

he has weakened support for public education while telling us we need a better educated workforce;

 

he's tried to take apart social security in response to a crisis most agree doesn't exist, while failing to address medicaid and medicare in any effective fashion;

 

he's worked to undo every environmental constraint on industry that he can;

 

his political machine has a huge segment of the American public focussing on abortion or gay rights, thinking it is moral to hold the line on these issues while it is not immoral to undermine world peace and reduce or block aid and support for the downtrodden;

 

he stole the first election for sure and who knows about the second;

 

and he continues to seek to concentrate power in his office while out and out lying about his goals.

 

Do you think he wants the line item veto so he can reduce wasteful government spending? Really?

 

Mediocre but not bad?

[cj001f]

Bush is not the worst president, just a mediocre one falling in the middle, a few places below Clinton.

Probably. Evaluating either of them in a broad historical context is a bit premature.

[chucK]

Jeez Matt what do you want? A complete and total admission that their guy is the worst ever?

 

KK just posted that Bush falls below Clinton. Now, considering the hyperbole these guys have been spewing about Clinton for years, I think this classifies as quite the admission. Don't you?

 

 

And BTW...I think the line-item veto they're talking about now would be a good idea. It's limited to budget and taxation legislation, and each veto can be overriden via a simple majority. No more blaming the other side, or the "process". Total accountability. A bit scary with all branches controlled by the same party though. They should change it so that it can be overriden by a simple majority in either branch of congress (or just the House, since they all need to be reelected every two years).

[mattp]

ChucK, it is indeed a big step for KK, and it is significant to see people from both ends of the spectrum starting to agree about that George Bush may not be our savior.

 

I don't think KK or anybody else on the "right" side of the fence is likely to admit GWB is the worst ever, you are right.

 

But we may well look back one day and conclude that in fact he was. Do you disagree with my points above?

[mattp]

And, as to the line item veto, do you think GWB would be for it if he thought it was going to promote accountability?

[cj001f]

And BTW...I think the line-item veto they're talking about now would be a good idea. It's limited to budget and taxation legislation, and each veto can be overriden via a simple majority. No more blaming the other side, or the "process". Total accountability. A bit scary with all branches controlled by the same party though. They should change it so that it can be overriden by a simple majority in either branch of congress (or just the House, since they all need to be reelected every two years).

This line-item veto proposal is just as bullshit as every other. They'll take it away as soon as they aren't in charge. Bush loves it because he doesn't have the sack to stand up to his own party on spending issues - he'd prefer to save political capital so it can be spent on social control programs, the hallmark of his type of conservativism.

[archenemy]

Bush bolts

[foraker]

Jeez Matt what do you want? A complete and total admission that their guy is the worst ever?

 

I don't think it was an admission. I think it was a brain fart.

Unless he's changed his tune, I think he meant it the other way around and got a little carried away in his Clinton-hating reverie.

[sexual_chocolate]

This line-item veto proposal is just as bullshit as every other. They'll take it away as soon as they aren't in charge. Bush loves it because he doesn't have the sack to stand up to his own party on spending issues - he'd prefer to save political capital so it can be spent on social control programs, the hallmark of his type of conservativism.

 

You don't think forcing through legislation in the form of riders impertinent to the bill itself is bs?

 

As long as there is some safety mechanism in place to avert presidential abuse, I think it's worthy of serious consideration.

 

But is it constitutional?

[foraker]

The supreme court already ruled that it isn't (and they did it while Clinton was in office)

Edited March 6, 2006 by foraker

[archenemy]

whew

[cj001f]

You don't think forcing through legislation in the form of riders impertinent to the bill itself is bs?

The Senate and House had rules against such things. They let them expire. That seems a much better solution than giving an executive carte blanch to pick and choose what he sees fit from legislation. Particularly an executive who has a pattern of seeing in legislation exactly what he wants, no matter the intent. See the White House's tortured redefining of torture.

[JackY]

Only 2 years left to suggest a plausible alternative.

 

What? Are you suggesting that it will be hard to do better???

[AlpineK]

Only 2 years left to suggest a plausible alternative.

 

What? Are you suggesting that it will be hard to do better???

 

I'd start with somebody who doesn't have a track record of running a couple businesses into the ground.

[foraker]

Not, 'hard to do better' but 'waiting to see how the DNC manages to blow it again'.

[chucK]

Though I could picture someone more evil (Cheney? Frist?) I doubt even the Republicans could put up someone that would come close to Bush's combined evil-incompetency score.

 

So, unless Bush declares himself dictator for life (or perhaps "leader until this latest horrible terrorist threat dies down") I think at least our deficits will decline in 2008 no matter what the DNC does. However, I'm hoping the forces of reasonableness and competency can make a good enough showing in Congress in 2006 to maybe force the criminals out early.

[mattp]

waiting to see how the DNC manages to blow it again'.

 

They are already working on it.

 

On Iraq, they say "the Bush administration blew it" but they pose no alternate vision of where we ought to go at this point just as they've presented no alternate vision all along. On morality, they continue to let the right define morality as fighting against abortion and gay marriage while invading countries with no excuse, arming various despotic governments all over the world, pushing around the less powerful at every turn, cutting aid to the poor, and lying to the American public every time they are confronted with a difficult question. And on domestic programs they are a mess, too. You wanna vote for Hilary?

[sexual_chocolate]

The Senate and House had rules against such things. They let them expire.

 

I didn't realize this. So the rules excluded riders altogether?

[sexual_chocolate]

Though I could picture someone more evil (Cheney? Frist?) I doubt even the Republicans could put up someone that would come close to Bush's combined evil-incompetency score.

 

Hey did you know that the first thing you want to do is make your opposition the very personification of evil, so that you no longer need to consider them as humans at all, much less listen to any points they might try to make.

[mattp]

I'd say CJF is probably on to something in that it would be better to have rules against such riders rather than to let a president pick and choose which ones to delete.

 

Not only might this open up the opportunity for games where they pass bits that they agree in advance or assume that the Pres will veto or where the pres will otherwise make a political ploy hay out of this or that line item veto when a similar or even worse provision is coming down the pipeline somewhere else, etc. but, if accountability is the goal, the legislators and any Joe blow citizen who is paying attention actually has to have a chance to look at what is being voted on and a line item veto does nothing to provide that opportunity.

[sexual_chocolate]

I'd like to see what the rules were; i can't find any info.

 

And if the rules were working, why did both parties(?) agree to give clinton the line item veto (which he used like 50 or 80 times before it was ruled unconstitutional by a 6-3 vote).