| George
W. Bush's 2007 State of the Union Laff-Fest
Once again, W. tells the USA stuff he doesn't believe, stuff he
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Some bad timing: The morning of the speech, Scooter Libby's CIA leak trial started, with the blockbuster claim that Libby was sacrificed to save Karl Rove. Also that day and the day before, Republican Chuck Hagel and a whole bunch of Democrats proposed a resolution ripping Bush's idea of an Iraq troop surge. The day AFTER the speech, that vote indeed passed in committee.
The tone was low-key, the applause was muted, and that's the way it is with a president who's made himself a premature lame duck. As if it's not bad enough that he can't be elected again, Bush's entire agenda is dead on arrival. Here are the laughable lowlights.
Bush said he had a plan to "eliminate the deficit in five years." Yeah, that deficit that he created out of a huge surplus. Yeah, thanks for fixing the shit you broke, asshole. Here's another crock to this story. The deficit number that Bush often refers to, when he likes to say that he's cut it already, is an inflated number it never reached in the first place, so when he refers back to that amount, he can say that by percentage he's reduced it a whole lot more than he really has.
In his belated, hilarious attempt to cut spending, Bush said he wants to "expose earmarks to the light of day." Earmarks are those pork-filled little bits inserted into so many bills. This includes the ridiculously bloated highway spending bill, which contained literally thousands of these things, including the infamous "bridge to nowhere" and the "half-million dollar bus stop." Where the hell has Bush been for the previous six years of his presidency? He told Congress to trim that highway bill, they responded by making it bigger, then he signed it anyway, calling it "fiscally responsible."
Bush said he had originally planned to cut the deficit in half by 2009, but that this had been done three years early. This is crap for multiple reasons. First, he's still operating off an original number for the deficit that it never reached. So NO, it's not halved. Second, he keeps leaving money for the Iraq war out of the budget. This money never gets taken into consideration. It's always funded by "emergency appropriations." In addition, it's Bush's GOP and their ridiculous, runaway borrow-and-spend practices, and Bush's absolute refusal to use his veto powers to rein IN this practice, that created the deficit in the first place. If you subtractd the costs of 9/11 and the subsequent campaigns in Afghanistan (necessary) and Iraq (unnecessary), the USA still has a deficit.
Bush said the real problem is entitlements. Yeah, okay. So with all these years of majority rule, what have Bush and the GOP done about it? Nothing. Haven't attacked Medicare or Social Security. Like an idiot, Bush tried proposing once again, even after losing both houses of Congress, his Social Security privatization plan. Nobody on either side likes that plan. The public hates the plan. But it will make rich people richer, so HE likes it.
Bush wants to renew No Child Left Behind. He says kids should have the right to choose better schools. They should have tutoring available. But since he hasn't funded it, and hasn't even really made a MOVE to fund it, kids don't have those other schools to choose from, and tutoring is available only to a small minority of those who want it, less than 20%.
Bush wants new tax cuts for affordable healthcare. He's utterly ignored the middle class his entire reign. Suddenly he's rediscovered them? Everything has to involve a tax cut. Even when the GOP was finally looking at minimum wage, just before the midterm election massacre, they tied to it yet ANOTHER tax cut for the rich. Maybe a tax cut, a REAL one, for the rest of the population, would be a good thing. Of course, that's less money once again out of the Treasury. How to balance?
Medical liability reform. A worthy cause. What makes anything like this coming out of the Bush administration is the fact that his entire reign has been based on enriching the already rich. So even though he wants a good thing, it's still going to be suspect.
Temporary worker program. Bush says that legitimizing illegals will "take pressure off the border." No, guarding the border will take pressure off it. Stop supplying an open road for people who bring crime and drugs into the country, and take money and benefits back out of it.
Bush says he wants to "diversify our energy supply." One of the ways he wants to do this is with "clean coal technology." DUMBASS. Bush has ZERO credibility on this subject. One of his first acts as prez in 2001 was help kill off a variety of alternate energy initiatives, including an electric car. He's done nothing to stop oil companies from raping the public. Bush says he wants Americans to "reduce gasoline usage by 20% in the next 10 years." HOW? It's yet another "bold" initiative that's nothing more than hot air. Bush also called for mandatory new fuel standards. Ah, you mean like Gore wanted back in 2000? After which Bush pushed through tax credits for people buying SUVs? After Bush and Cheney did everything they could to INCREASE the USA's dependence on oil?
Bush finally made note of "global climate change." Again, he has no credibility. His administration commissioned a report on this back in 2001, then when it came back disagreeing with his position (that there IS no global warming), he had it buried. His cabinet have gone out of their way to actually discredit scientists who have gone public with their warnings. They've pulled loonies out of the woodwork to discredit the notion of global warming. FINALLY, the weight of opinion has brought this shithead to reality. Whether he's really a moron who doesn't understand science or, more likely, he simply won't promote any theory that reflects badly on the use of fossil fuels, he's WRONG.
Bush still thinks people need to vote his way, no matter what. He wants "up-or-down votes" on his judicial nominees. No debate, just vote. Well, quite throwing out rightwing nutjobs, and maybe he'll get those votes.
Bush claims that his forces have stopped all sorts of attacks. But his administration and intelligence-gathering also told us about weapons of mass destruction, mobile anthrax labs, Saddam's 9/11 links, Al Qaeda agents in Baghdad, Saddam's urnanium-shopping in Africa, and so on. Why should we believe him NOW?
Bush once again tied Iraq to 9/11. He said that failure to clean up over there will give terrorists a safe haven in Iraq to once again attack the USA. Well, SURE, now that his idiot invasion broke open Iraq and TURNED IT INTO A HAVEN for bad guys. There were NO foreign fighters there until the US military made that possible. If Iraq turns into a training ground for terrorists, it will have been Bush's doing.
Bush finally noticed Darfur. Maybe all those full-page ads begging him over the last couple of years finally sank in.
Bush trotted out some feel-good stories about Americans who've done
cool stuff for others, as if somehow this will rub off on him. But
the good works of ordinary mortals do not somehow validate all the stupidity
wrought by Bush and his party and his Congress.
In summary, this lame-ass lame duck has failed in every single aspect of his presidency. Diplomacy, the military, the economy, spending, civil rights, energy, law enforcement, and everything else have been a disaster. This has been THE worst presidency in the modern era. We can blame the evangelical, elitist moth-breathers who put him in office. Not that I'm bitter. Assholes.