The Treatment of Bush Has Been a Disgrac

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-20-2008
The Treatment of Bush Has Been a Disgrac
152
Thu, 11-06-2008 - 5:20pm

The time when I have been ashamed of modern America...

Earlier this year, 12,000 people in San Francisco signed a petition in support of a proposition on a local ballot to rename an Oceanside sewage plant after George W. Bush. The proposition is only one example of the classless disrespect many Americans have shown the president.

According to recent Gallup polls, the president's average approval rating is below 30% -- down from his 90% approval in the wake of 9/11. Mr. Bush has endured relentless attacks from the left while facing abandonment from the right.

This is the price Mr. Bush is paying for trying to work with both Democrats and Republicans. During his 2004 victory speech, the president reached out to voters who supported his opponent, John Kerry, and said, "Today, I want to speak to every person who voted for my opponent. To make this nation stronger and better, I will need your support, and I will work to earn it. I will do all I can do to deserve your trust."

Those bipartisan efforts have been met with crushing resistance from both political parties.

The president's original Supreme Court choice of Harriet Miers alarmed Republicans, while his final nomination of Samuel Alito angered Democrats. His solutions to reform the immigration system alienated traditional conservatives, while his refusal to retreat in Iraq has enraged liberals who have unrealistic expectations about the challenges we face there.

It seems that no matter what Mr. Bush does, he is blamed for everything. He remains despised by the left while continuously disappointing the right.

Yet it should seem obvious that many of our country's current problems either existed long before Mr. Bush ever came to office, or are beyond his control. Perhaps if Americans stopped being so divisive, and congressional leaders came together to work with the president on some of these problems, he would actually have had a fighting chance of solving them.

Like the president said in his 2004 victory speech, "We have one country, one Constitution and one future that binds us. And when we come together and work together, there is no limit to the greatness of America."

To be sure, Mr. Bush is not completely alone. His low approval ratings put him in the good company of former Democratic President Harry S. Truman, whose own approval rating sank to 22% shortly before he left office. Despite Mr. Truman's low numbers, a 2005 Wall Street Journal poll found that he was ranked the seventh most popular president in history.

Just as Americans have gained perspective on how challenging Truman's presidency was in the wake of World War II, our country will recognize the hardship President Bush faced these past eight years— and how extraordinary it was that he accomplished what he did in the wake of the September 11 attacks.

The treatment President Bush has received from this country is nothing less than a disgrace. The attacks launched against him have been cruel and slanderous, proving to the world what little character and resolve we have. The president is not to blame for all these problems. He never lost faith in America or her people, and has tried his hardest to continue leading our nation during a very difficult time.

Our failure to stand by the one person who continued to stand by us has not gone unnoticed by our enemies. It has shown to the world how disloyal we can be when our president needed loyalty—a shameful display of arrogance and weakness that will haunt this nation long after Mr. Bush has left the White House.

By JEFFREY SCOTT SHAPIRO

Source:

Wednesday, November 5, 2008
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL | OPINION
The Treatment of Bush Has Been a Disgrace
What must our enemies be thinking?

Mr. Shapiro is an investigative reporter and lawyer who previously interned with John F. Kerry's legal team during the presidential election in 2004.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122584386627599251.html

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iVillage Member
Registered: 02-07-2007
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:14pm

Also highly irritating is his perhaps nervous habit of chuckling when talking about gravely serious issues:

"War is hell." heh heh heh

~Ghostwriter, M.A.







“If, by a ‘liberal,’ they mean someone who looks ahead and not behind, someone who welcomes new ideas without rigid reactions, someone who cares about the welfare of the people – their health, their housing, their schools, their jobs, their civil rights, and their civil liberties – someone who believes we can break through the stalemate and suspicions that grip us in our policies abroad, if that is what they mean by a ‘liberal,’ then I’m proud to say I’m a ‘liberal.’”


~Ghostwriter, M.A.


iVillage Member
Registered: 08-29-2008
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:27pm
FYI: That guy on Saturday Night Live is not the real Bush.
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-29-2008
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:28pm
I don't understand what you are trying to say. Please explain.
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-25-2008
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:37pm

This is a thread titled "the treatment of Bush has been a disgrace"

In your post you said Bush makes BIG mistakes and that he is not capable of learning -- I wondered if you considered your own treatment of Bush to be "a disgrace".

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-29-2008
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:41pm
That is incorrect. Bush kept the Democrat attorneys from the previous administration on and then two years later fired 8 of them. Clinton fired ALL of them when he came into office and replaced them ALL, but nobody objected to that. The fact that Bush tried to be a nice guy at first ended up backfiring on him.
Avatar for jujubee8411
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:42pm
Tremendous post -- well said!
iVillage Member
Registered: 02-07-2007
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:51pm

FYI:

~Ghostwriter, M.A.


iVillage Member
Registered: 08-29-2008
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 3:53pm
Nope.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 4:11pm

>Bush also took the man Clinton chose as his Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff, Colin Powell, and made him Secretary of State.<


Correction on that. Clinton chose to keep Powell as Chairman of the JCS. George H.W. Bush appointed him to that position after he served as the National Security Advisor to Ronald Reagan. He only remained in that position for 4 years, 1989-1993.


And I'd hardly look at Powell as having been a bad Secretary of State.


Sandy
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-29-2008
Fri, 11-07-2008 - 4:11pm
No he doesn't. How ridiculous.

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