Everyone Who Dislikes/Likes George W. Bush, Tell Us Why In Your Own Words

Ok, now that I’m home from work I can give this a go, no links, I promise.

Dislikes about the Bush Administration Policies:
1. Spending. Fiscal responsibility has different meanings for different people. Some feel that large budgets are fiscally irresponsible. In my opinion, budget deficits are not proxies for budgetary responsibility. One can be perfectly responsible and run fiscal deficits. My view of fiscal responsibility is more toward reigning in social spending. In this area of social spending, W has spent more on social programs, and more importantly, increased the rate of spending on these programs more than any President since Nixon. In terms of social spending, Bush resembles Nixon. He uses social spending as a political tool, not necessarily by buying votes, but by neutralizing his liberal critics. During Reagan’s tenure, it was routine for the media to trot out a fellow by the name of Mitch (I can’t remember his last name) who organized the homeless across the street from the White House. W remembers this and figures, ok, they ain’t going to trot out Mitch on my watch because I’m going to spend more on this than Clinton ever dream. I haven’t seen Mitch, or any homeless advocates showing up on the CBS Evening News during Bush’s watch. Lot’s of critics, but no Mitch. Same thing for the old gummers. Bush puts out the idiotic prescription drug plan, spends tons of money on a really wasteful program. But guess what, the old gummers weren’t a problem when it came to the 1984 re-election. Bush has his economic advisors devising his tax plan, which is costing the wealthy much more than is ever admitted to on this board, and Karl Rove devising his spending policy.

2. Communication. The Administration is terrible at explaining itself. Just awful. The most recent example is the recent Attorney firings. Gonzalez should come right out, explain why they were fired, and tell Shumer to have a coke and a smile and that’s the end of it. Instead, he’s hemming and hawing, looking guilty. But much more important than the recent firings, the Administration has done a horrible job of explaining, in detail, the Iraq war. Terrible job. The internet age is no time to attempt to parse words and hide behind vague slogans/sayings. The internet age is, more than at any time in the history of mankind, a time where leadership is more transparent than ever. It is the age of truth. CBS News has felt the sting. And political leaders are finding out that the old way of delivering information is outmoded. The Iraq war overshadows everything else in politics today; and the Administration is downright inept at explaining their strategy to the American people. To use a boxing analogy, the Administration is terrible at counter-punching with their political opponents. Their opponents will say something that is easily taken apart, any high school sophomore debater could dissemble many of the Murtha arguments, for example, but the Bush Administration typically stays silent. Not that they have to answer each and every argument their opponents bring up, but on the big issue of the day, you simply cannot allow the argument to be ceded in the minds of the American people through silence. This silence is a tremendous injustice to the country.

Likes:
1. Big picture on terrorism. W is the first President in my lifetime to treat terrorism with a military response to mesh with covert operations versus dealing with terrorism through the prism of a criminalized/prosecutorial approach. Some would say it is inevitable after 9/11; I do not believe that to be true. For example, if Al Gore were to win the 2000 election, I do not believe he would have taken nearly as militaristic of an approach. This is a huge shift in our attitudes. I also believes that with regards to civil liberties, the civil liberties lost are relatively minor up to this point. And by taking this military approach relatively early in the game, it reduces the probability that the country takes a much more totalitarian lurch in the future.

Many of the most interesting issues regarding Bush, I honestly cannot make judgment. For example, the overhaul of the military as far as internal structure, as well as the way we conduct military operations appears to have changed significantly. The coordination between the branches of military have improved significantly. This is merely observational, I’ve got no military experience to back that up. Also, this is hardly the doing of Bush, it is a part of a coordinated policy shift that goes back long before Bush took office, from my understanding. Often times a President gets credit or blame for things that are really none of his doing. They are natural extensions of policies which have been in place, or are evolving. There are times that it’s tough to separate institutional policies from Administration policies.

Also interesting, what I’d like to know after the Administration leaves office is why the sudden shift with regards to Iran. The Iranians essentially put up the Army For Rent for the Afghanistan invasion that we paid for; it’s also obvious that we turned on the Iranians. The question is: why did we turn on the Iranians. What happened with that relationship.