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| One of the less honest things that Karl Rove and the rest of the sleazebag GOP P.R. machine did in the 2004 campaign was paint John Kerry as a "flip-flopper." See, nobody flip-flops worse than George W. Bush. Here's just a mere sampling of his notable revisions of decisions. |
| SECURE THE BORDERS |
Bush says he wants to secure our borders. But he condemns civilian border patrols, calling them vigilantes, before they even got started. And yeah, some of them are hot dogs, but they're already making a difference. In addition, Bush for years has been pushing amnesty for illegal workers, and has also pushed a "guest worker" program. Hey, what about securing the borders? And what about protecting American jobs? FLIP-FLOP. . |
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MEDICARE |
Bush said his Medicare bill would lower prescription drug costs. Then one of the guys in charge of the numbers came out and said the bill would cost three times more than Bush said it would. The guy got canned for it. Then guess what? He was right, and prescription drug costs are soaring. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION |
Bush said we were going into Iraq because Saddam Hussein had the worst weapons imaginable, even though all the inspections in the world couldn't find them. Then we went in there, and we still couldn't find them, but dammit, we were still looking, and they'd turn up. Then he said we'd found evidence of them, even though the evidence had already been debunked. THEN he said Hussein had weapons "programs." Even that turned out to be horseshit. Finally, he said we had to go in there and free the Iraqi people, even though he said as he ran for president the first time that we would NOT engage in nation building, and freeing the Iraqi people was NOT the reason he gave for invading Iraq. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| AMERICAN JOBS |
Bush says he wants American businesses to create jobs. Well, they ain't doin' that too fast under his administration. What they ARE doing, however, is claiming all sorts of funky tax breaks, and they're paying less taxes in general. For example, there are tax breaks for outsourcing jobs. Did you know that? Large corporations actually can get incentives for hiring people in other countries. In addition, Bush wants to make it easy for Mexicans to come here and fill American jobs. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| DIPLOMACY |
Bush largely rationalized the invasion of Iraq, and tried to get other countries to buy into it, by saying we were going to enforce the United Nations resolutions against Saddam Hussein. At the same time, he was denigrating the U.N.'s weapons inspectors, and he now says the U.N. is hopeless and needs reforming. So he likes them when he needs them, and the rest of the time, they can go to hell. FLIP-FLOP. Spring 2005, Bush sent Condi Rice on a never-ending
trip abroad, to mend fences he broke while pursuing a ridiculous Iraq war.
While she's overseas trying to fix stuff, he nominated John Bolton, noted
tough guy, as our ambassador to the United Nations. During confirmation
hearings, they showed a tape of him saying that if the top ten floors were
removed from the United Nations, it wouldn't hurt a bit. He was pulled
from an arms negotiation group a couple of years back at the insistence
of Europeans, because he kept getting in the way. Colin Powell was the
guy who pulled the plug on him Read more about the Bolton fiasco in CABINET
OF FOOLS. My point here is, Bush wants Rice to fix our relations
abroad, but then nominates a jerk to represent us to the U.N. FLIP-FLOP.
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| ASSAULT WEAPONS |
President Bush, who promised to support the renewal of the assault weapons ban, instead let it expire. When questioned about it at a campaign stop, he let a woman step between him and the press and say "That's enough, guys." He literally walked away from the question. He has said previously that it makes no sense for civilians to own military-style weapons, and supported law enforcement officials on this issue. Then he caved in to special interests. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| OIL PRICES |
During his first term, Bush promised to meet with the leaders of oil producing nations, to insure our steady supply of oil at reasonable prices. Well, he never did that. And gasoline has been through the roof. Europeans say we're whiny, since they've been paying twice as much as our highest prices for years. But the fact is, we get t hat price because of the sheer volume we buy. That's basic economics. Meanwhile, Bush doesn't really push the matter, because the sleazebags who run the oil companies are making obscene profits. WHY? Because while the price of oil might go up on a particular day, that won't affect the cost of the gas they make from it for at least six months, BUT they raise the prices NOW. The last time t hey pulled this shit and made obscene profits, they were threatened with a windfall profits tax, and backed off. But Bush, friend of the oil companies, would never think of doing such a thing, especially since his oil investments and Cheney's are what make them so much money. So, no meetings with oil countries about the supply and price until spring 2005, and it's too late. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| ENERGY POLICY |
One of the first things Bush did as president was wipe out the money that was going into research for alternatively-fueled cars. Forget this hybrid stuff. Forget fuel cells, hydrogen, solar power, all of it. Instead, he instituted tax breaks for SUV ownership (i.e. wasting as much fuel as possible). And he was all prepared to let expire the tax break for buying a hybrid vehicle. In 2006, he was going to keep the SUV ownership tax break, but kill off the hybrid ownership tax break. And what were people doing to get that SUV tax break? Claiming small business ownership, and claiming their SUV was a business expense. But in April 2005, he had another of those incredibly
painful press conferences, the type he hates because you can tell how uncomfortable
he is trying to answer questions, to say, among other things, that "we
need to get away from a fossil fuel economy." Well, duh. The rest of us
have known that since before you were a governor. So now he's talking about
tax breaks for owning hybrid vehicles. Finally. FLIP-FLOP.
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| MARS |
When the general public was bitching about the economy and how badly the Iraq war was going, suddenly Bush told everybody we needed to go to Mars. We needed to send a manned mission to Mars. Huh? What's that got to do with the price of tea in China, buddy? We don't need to go to Mars, we need to get our troops out of Iraq. We don't need to go to Mars, we need the economy fixed. We don't need to go to mars. We can't AFFORD to go to Mars, you ninny. But as soon as righteously minded people poked all the holes in the world in his goofy Mars idea, the whole thing died. All it was, was sleight of hand anyway. Don't look at the war, don't look at the jobless rate, look at this here Mars thingy. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| THE CONSTITUTION |
George Bush says he is "a strict Constitutional constructionist." First of all, he has no idea what that means. It's another term that Karl Rove stuck in his pointy little head. But what he means is, he believes in strictly interpreting the Constitution. But nobody has tried to CHANGE the Constitution more than Bush. Gay marriage, for one thing. And when a whoooooooooole string of federal judges, INCLUDING guys he himself put there, ruled against Terri Schiavo's parents, he said they were not following the Constitution. Huh? Yeah, they were following the letter of the law. ALL OF THEM, one after another. What, they're all wrong? They went to SCHOOL for this shit, George. Remember school? Oh, yeah, that's right, you probably don't. Bush has even said that he believes STATES should
govern the definition of marriage, but then pushed for an amendment anyway.
He's actually proposed several Constitutional amendments, despite being
a "strict constructionist."
FLIP-FLOP.
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| STATES' RIGHTS, AND GUMMINT GROWTH |
George W. says he's big on less government, and less government intrusion. Yet with his educational, environmental, religious, medical, and other policies, he's the most intrusive-minded president we've ever had. AND he's grown government far larger than even Reagan did, and Reagan made the federal government HUGE, despite campaigning on the notion that government was too big to begin with. That's right, W. outdid Reagan. In 2000, Bush said Gore would “grow the federal government in the largest increase since Lyndon Baines Johnson.” In 2005, the Cato Institute reports that
“Bush has presided over the largest overall increase in inflation-adjusted
federal
Bush is also supporting new abortion consent laws
that would dog teenagers across state lines. So no matter where you stand
on the abortion issue, it's another infringement on states' rights to regulate
their own laws. FLIP-FLOP.
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| HEALTH CARE |
While debating opponents on the campaign trail about healthcare, Bush liked to say that "in Texas, we passed a patients' Bill of Rights." Yeah, well, kinda. Bush opposed the bill from the beginning, and all through its lifecycle, because it was potentially injurious to Big Business, meaning HMO's. Remember, if Business wants it, Bush likes it. And in fact, Bush never signed that Bill of Rights. FLIP-FLOP. . |
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IRAQI WAR COSTS |
Bush said that Iraqi oil reveue would opay for rebuilding Iraq. No, the AMERICAN TAXPAYERS are footing the entire damned bill. FLIP-FLOP. . |
| STEM CELL RESEARCH |
Bush sorta kinda almost maybe supported stem cell research. hard to ignore the subject, considering Nancy Reagan is a big fan of it. Arlen Specter fo the GOP supports it as well, as do a majority of Republicans in Congress. Bush allowed some stem cells to be used in research during his first term, but those lines are no longer useful. He supports it, he says, as long as no federal money is used, because that just ain't ethical. Well, ,W., either it's ethical or it ain't, regardless of who's paying for it. And the majority of Americans, like the majority of Congress, including the GOP, likes stem cell research. And so did Bush, until he didn't. FLIP-FLOP. . |
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THE CULTURE OF LIFE |
Bush has stated many times (as have his press secretaries FOR him) that the death penalty is okay, because "in the end, it saves lives." But with regard to cloning (which I'm not big on) and stem cell research (which I and the public ARE big on), Bush and his cronies say "it's not okay to destroy one life for another." Okay, so it's okay to give folks the needle, to take their lives to save lives, but it's not okay to sacrifice a surplus embryo that will be destroyed anyway, in order to help find cures for cancer, paralysis, Parkinson's, and countless other diseases? FLIP-FLOP.
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OSAMA BIN LADEN |
Shortly after 9/11, Bush said he wanted Bin Laden
"Dead or alive." Only the following March, Bush said, "I don't know where
he is. You know, I just don't spend that much time on him. I truly am not
that concerned about him."
When Kerry pointed out this discrepancy during
one of t heir debates, Bush said of that second quote that he didn't remember
saying it, and that "it must be one of those exaggerations." And then he
gave that stupid little laugh of his.
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SADDAM HUSSEIN AND AL QAEADA |
September 2002, Bush, said, "You can't distinguish
between al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror." And
it was this alleged link between Hussein and 9/11 that helped justify the
war, in speech after speech by Bush and Cheney.
Eventually, Bush and Cheney both had to admit
there was eveidence of this link, and in fact there was evidence that Hussein
had worked hard to keep Bin Laden and his cronies OUT of Iraq. One year
after the above quote came out, Bush said, "We've had no evidence that
Saddam Hussein was involved in Sept. 11." Cheney admitted the same. But
only two days after Cheney admitted the lack of evidence once again, during
a televised debate with John Edwards, Cheney told a crowd of the faithful
in Orlando FL that 9/11 was one of the reasons we invaded Iraq. So this
is a flip-flop-flip.
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| PLAME-GATE & LEAKS IN GENERAL | When CIA agent Valeria Plame was outed by Karl
Rove and Lewis Libby (Cheney's aide), Bush, not knowing who the culprits
were at the time (or at least not admitting it), said that he would fire
anybody involved. Later, he amended that to say anybody who'd "committed
a crime." In other words, if they could prove Rove and Lewis had violated
federal law. Well, they may or may not have done so, but what they did
was morally reprehensible. They exposed a CIA agent. And now Bush is trying
to weasel out of wacking the guy who has put together his successfully
sleazy record, instead of doing the right thing.
It just gets better. When it turned out that Bush himself had told Cheney to put the secret info out there, to discredit the CIA agent's husband about the faulty intelligence on Iraq and uranium, the info turned officially from a "leak" to "declassified information." So to make it seem like less of a transgression, the story is now that Bush declassified the information, before publishing it. Or wait, they didn't publish it, they had a White House crony slip it anonymously to a reporter. If this stuff was declassified, why did that reporter spend months in jail for not revealing her source? So of course Karl Rove was identified as one of two people in the administration who specifically leaked Plame's name. And despite what Brit Hume and John Gibson of Fox "News" say, Plame was (as the CIA and a couple of judges have verified) definitely covert up to the moment she was betrayed. So did Bush do anything about these leakers as promised? Of course not. When he was asked at the tail end of Libby's shameful pardon episode if he would finally take that promised action, Bush merely said that the matter was over with, and that was that. FLIP-FLOP.
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| CHENEY'S BIG FLIP-FLOP: SADDAM HUSSEIN | .
Cheney was asked in 1992 why the US military only kicked the Iraqi army out of Kuwait and didn't bother taking our Saddam Hussein. His reply? "Once we had rounded him up and gotten rid of his government, then the question is what do you put in its place. You know, you then have accepted the responsibillity for governing Iraq. How many additional American casualties is Saddam worth? And the answer is, not very damn many." . |