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Some of the reasons that George Walker Bush frightens me.


Even though I'm aware of George's foibles, I never mention them when discussing the campaign with people in person, preferring to stick to policies and issues. Generally, I try to be nice to George, and use polite euphemisms. Thanks to the incessant prompting of certain Republicans however, I just have to face facts. From a Presidential standpoint. Dubbya is just plain frightening in some of the dumb comments that he makes. He might be smarter than me, but then, I'm not running for President. I take responsibility for all comments here regarding statements made by Mr. Bush that are not explicitly credited to another individual. There might be occasional instances where I have presented a verbatim quote from Paul Begala's Book, "Is Our Children Learning?", Simon & Schuster, ISBN 0-7432-1478-1 without crediting the comment to Mr. Begala. Most of the opinions were formed long before I read Mr. Begala's book, but it has proven to be an invaluable source for finding attributions, related statements, and and in a couple of cases, clarifications. If you are going to flame me in my guestbook, please try to keep it reasonable since my pages are rated, and other areas are visited by children. Thanks, Terry

Here are some examples, taken individually, none of them are particularly significant, but it all adds up.

That'll ensure the sympathy of the liberal media.
Want the sympathy of the press? How about calling one of them a "major league a**hole." Perhaps they are, but have the foresight to ensure that you're not in front of an open microphone when you do it - it tends to tarnish your desired image as a "good ole fella"
George, were you asleep for four years? Or perhaps it's simply afteraffects of your, um... "Youthful indiscretions"
"When we carry Iowa in November, it'll mean the end of four years of Clinton-Gore."
Sounds kind of familiar, doesn't it?
I mean, really people - he can't even think of his own blunders to make in a lot of cases. Stealing his "major league a**hole" in front of an open mike comment right from Ronald Reagan with his (paraphrased) "I've authorized Congress to outlaw the Soviet Union - We begin bombing in five minutes" in front of an open mike comment --- and his "four years of Clinton-Gore" comment straight from Dan Quayle's (paraphrased) "The Republican party will be able to field someone to defeat Clinton-Gore in 2000" comment - Well DUHHH - read your constitution Danny Boy, Clinton will have already served the two terms allowed by law by that time. Nice choice of things to emulate there Mr. Bush.
Go for the juvenile vote.
Admit to the national media that you spend three-and-a-half hours a day playing video games.
One word
"Subliminable" (said twice)
Hey, I'm slow too!
"The only thing I know about Slovakia is what I learned firsthand from your foreign minister that came to Texas and I had a great visit with him" (To a Slovak journalist; Bush really met with the prime minister of Slovenia, not the foreign minister of Slovakia - Knight-Ridder News Service, 6/22/99)
Didn't they have atlases at Yale? Or in the whole state of Texas?
"I do need somebody to tell me where Kosovo is. I know how to ask." (Manchester Guardian Weekly, 8/25/99)
  1. The really bad part about this is that it was a statement made by Bush five months after the United States and NATO started bombing.
  2. So you're running for President, knowing you were going to have to face the press, claiming how interested you are in improving the state of defense and the welfare of America's armed forces, and you do not know where Kosovo is? Telling people that you knew who to ask! You ask people when you need to know how to defuse a nuclear weapon. You ask people when you want to know the feasibility of using a solar sail to propel interstellar spacecraft. To find out where Kosovo is, you look at an atlas, you search the internet, you glance at the little maps that they show on the TV news and in the newsmagazine - if nothing else, then you ask somebody where it is during those five months before you meet the press on the subject.
Well yeah, but the bovine vote is integral to my campaign
"I'm honored. I appreciated ["Jean Poutine's"] strong statement. He understands our belief in free trade. He understands I want to ensure our relationship with our most important neighbor to the north of us, Canadians, is strong. We will work closely together." [The Prime Minister's name is Jean Chretien, not Poutine. Poutine is a popular Canadian snack treat of french fries, covered in cheese curd and gravy.]
  1. One question here, is what other neighbors do we have to the north of us? OK, maybe Native American nations, but I don't think that anyone could argue that George was thinking along those lines. Perhaps it was the country named "Canadians"?
  2. I mean, a trick from a Canadian comedian pretending to be part of the Canadian press corps? Telling Bush that his candidacy had been endorsed by a snack food? And Bush and his advisors couldn't spend fifteen seconds to three minutes to determine that it was fake? What's to keep him and his advisors from being tricked as President?
  3. I don't think I'm being too critical. I'm a HS dropout. When that comment was made, I had just returned from living temporarily 15 miles from the nearest small town in Oklahoma, and I knew that the Canadian Prime Minister's name was Chretien. Why shouldn't I be expected to believe that someone with a Yale education - Governor of the state of Texas - who should have had the advantage of a culturally aware background with a father who had been Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Vice President and President of the United States, and was running for President himself should be expected to know that (not to mention that foreign leaders don't make a habit of endorsing Presidential candidates)? Alright, maybe if it had been Liechtenstein, it could be forgiven, but Canada?
I want my education tax-dollars back
Bush comment: "Rarely is the question asked, 'Is our children learning?'" (Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1/11/00) (or maybe he's just being too subtle for us, showing us how poor education was under Clinton/Gore - How long did it take him to get out of Yale?)
  1. Try to convince everyone of what a great job you're going to do in improving the state of education in the the United States by not taking half-a-second to ensure that you follow the simplest rules of grammar? "Is our children learning?" - Why not just go all the way.... "George Bush From President!"
And some other examples:
  • "I said, 'No, we're not going to take your Goals 2000 money. There are too many strings. I can't cite you the strings. I was just told that there were too many strings.' And so I said no." (Bush, recounting his answer to an offer from the Clinton administration to send a package of education funds to Texas, C-SPAN, 1/25/99)
  • "Laura and I sometimes don't realize how bright our children is until we get an objective analysis." (Meet The Press, 4/15/00)
  • "Reading is the basics for all learning." (Reston, Virginia, 3/28/00)
Well, I suppose consistency counts
"Higher education is not my priority." (San Antonio Express-News, 3/22/99)
  • It wasn't when he was a student, either. George W. Bush went to some of the finest schools in the world. Andover, Yale and Harvard. And yet he rarely went to class, was a poor student and he boasts of his anti-intellectual grievances. And he wants to improve our educational system?
  • Bush likes to stress his record on educational reform in Texas. However, almost all educational reform there occurred long before he became Governor.
    • In 1984, Democratic Governor Mark White made educational reform his top priority. He appointed Ross Perot to chair a special commission on educational reform. The most sweeping educational reforms in Texas history resulted. Some of the White-Perot reforms were a mandatory reduction of class size, to 22 students per class in grades kindergarten through four, testing teachers for competency, and "No-Pass, No-Play" which prevented failing students from participating in extracurricular activities.
    • Bush called for eliminating the limit on class size, calling it an infringement of local control. (Houston Post, 1/5/95)
    • Bush isn't responsible for accountability tests, which started a decade before him, Democratic Governor Ann Richards had them fully implemented in 1994 (Baltimore Sun, 3/28/00)
    • He's not responsible for "No-Pass, No-Play."
    • He did promise to raise the state's share of public school funding, from 45 percent to 60 percent, when he was running for Governor. The result now that he is Governor and is responsible for the state's budget? After five years, the state's share of public school funding is now lower than it was when he made his campaign promise: 44.3 percent.
Here ya go... Go git ya'llself a real education
OK, Bush wants to take money away from public schools and provide vouchers for private schools instead. The idea is that public schools will get worried at losing students and money and improve themselves. Sounds kind of like saying that you should take the municipal funds destined for local emergency services and give them to the local industry for their firefighting team. I can see it now, people will be so worried that they'll ensure that all of the buildings in the city are fireproof, and they'll never do anything hazardous again. Another problem with this, is just how actively are these private schools recruiting students in the inner cities? Then there is the fact that there is a $1,500 maximum per child, per year. Check the rates of some of your local private schools - in most cases, people would have to save their vouchers for many years, just to be able to send their child for one year.
George, put down the paintbrush and use a spoon
"I know how hard it is to put food on your family." (Greater Nashua, New Hampshire, Chamber of Commerce, 1/27/00)
You mean not everyone is an oil industry executive?
Bush tries to have it both ways on the issue of raising the mininum wage. He says that he supports an increase in the federal minimum wage, but only if if states could opt out, which would basically make the passage meaningless. The minimum wage in Texas? $3.35 an hour. Six bills have been introduced to increase the minimum wage since he has been in office, and Bush has actively opposed all of them.
I think it was the oil fumes
"It was inebriating what Midland, Texas, did"
Second childhood George, or just a continuation?
Bush listed "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" as one of his favorite books as a child, even though it wasn't published until he'd been out of Yale for two years.
Precisely George, call us again in about twenty-six years
"It's a big world," Bush said, "and I've got a lot to learn."
Hey, who needs to know how to pronounce phonics?
"phoneetic awareness works."
Now we see...
A converstation between former Republican Arizona Governor Gary Johnson and Texas Governor George Bush:
At one of these governors' conferences, George turns to me and says, "What are they talking about?"
I said, "I don't know."
He said, "You don't know a thing, do you?"
I said, "Not a thing."
He said, "Neither do I." And we kind of high-fived.
Perhaps it was the Slovakians?
"When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and we knew exactly who the 'they' were. It was us versus them. And it was clear who 'them' was.... Today, we're not so sure who the 'they' are," he continued, pausing as giggles began emanating from the crowd. "But we know they're there." (Iowa Western Community College, 1/21/00)
Did he submit a chit?
GW Bush annoyed the very military veterans that he was trying to court by being fast and loose with the term "AWOL" while referring to the Clinton-Gore administration. Unfortunately, they were all aware that his own Commanding Officer of his Alabama Air National Guard unit stated that he never seen him once in the entire year he was supposed to have been there - and that he'd know if he had been. This information was backed up by his records, the administrative officer and even retired Colonel Albert Lloyd, who is otherwise full of praise for Bush and his service: "If he did, his drill attendance should have been certified and sent to Ellington, and there would have been a record. We cannot find the records to show he fulfilled the requirements in Alabama.".
[After completing flight training in 1970] "I continued flying with my unit for the next several years."
(George W. Bush in his autobiography, A Charge to Keep)
"Had he reported in, I would have had some recall, and I do not. I had been in Texas, done my flight training there, If we had a first lieutenant from Texas, I would have remembered"
(General William Turnipseed, commander of the Alabama National Guard unit to which Bush has beed assigned, Boston Globe, 5/23/00)
  1. Call me crazy, but I can't see people calling a General from Alabama a liberal tool.
  2. I spent 15 years in the military. I'm not denigrating Bush. It's a dangerous job, piloting aircraft, regardless of whether it is at home training or in a war zone, and from everything I've read, his records show that he was a pilot who took his job seriously.
  3. But then Bush asked to be transferred from the Texas National Guard to the Alabama National Guard, even though the comparable unit in Alabama was being phased out, and there appeared to be no real task for Bush to perform. The reason he wanted to be transferred to Alabama is because he wanted to work for the Senate campaign of Alabama Republican Winton Blount.
Children, put your head beween your legs and kiss - well, you get the idea
Bush has a bewildering faith in "Star Wars". He is calling for a large scale implementation of a program that has been proven to be unworkable, easily overcome, prohibitively expensive, and is almost guaranteed to reignite the arms race. The Clinton-Gore administration has continued feasibilty testing of the Reagan-Bush baby (known in those days as "Star Wars," or SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative)). This summer, yet another test failed, and another $100 million taxpayer dollars were lost when the interceptor missile failed to deploy (No George, not "inter-ballistic missile", there's no such thing). "Some fifty Nobel Prize winners, including twenty-one winners of the Nobel Prize in physics, have written an open letter asking our nation's leaders to abandon national missile defense. The Nobel Laureates say it won't work, but it will be destabilizing, as Russia and China will embark on an arms race to overwhelm our missile defense. I know Bush is smart, but is he really smarter than fifty Nobel Prize winners?" (Paul Begala, "Is Our Children Learning?"). A key problem is the issue of countermeasures. It has been shown that the system can not discriminate between live and decoy targets. Put the warhead inside of a mylar balloon and launch thousands of other mylar balloons and you've defeated the system (the local greeting card store would love you for that order, assuming they survived). And who says that rogue states are going to be using long range missiles? Why not just sail a yacht into New York Harbor? Most frightening is the fact that Bush seems to have such total faith in the system that he is willing to unilaterally disarm, doing away with a deterrent that has worked for decades, at the same time that China and the Russians would be rearming, to overwhelm our missile defense.
  • One last comment on this. This is one of the two issues that really concern me and make this more of a "defeat Bush" than "elect Gore" matter for me. If Bush is elected and we ignite the arms race again, what are we going to do? Tell potential adversaries that "Hmmmmm, We're sorry, that missile thing didn't work - and we accidently trashed all of our own missiles and warheads. Can you get rid of yours too, pretty please?"

OK, that's enough for now. And I haven't even gotten into the fact that the next President will be appointing up to four new Supreme Court Justices; All of the failed businesses that Bush has run; His positions on gun control; His environmental record; His almost unbelieveable record of not being aware of the details of national and international policies, affairs, and legislation; how he took Texas from a record surplus to impending deficits with his tax cuts there; and the fact that despite all of his posturing about being the Governor of Texas, that position is almost totally ceremonial. Bush is the least qualified person that the GOP has put up for election to the Presidency of the US in more than half a century.

Bush seems to take pride in the fact that he is not a "detail man" - preferring to leave the details to other people. However, that is precisely what a President is. All good Presidents need and acknowledge the advice of trusted members of their Administration and Cabinet - but they are the ones that ultimately have to make the decisions, and to make the decisions, you have to have a firm grasp of the details. If George is elected President, then who, precisely, is really going to be running the country?.

Some people might claim that these errors are simply due to George being tired, that campaigning is hard work. To them I say: What's your point? The Chief Executive is going to get tired, especially in the midst of a crisis. Is he going to be making these mistakes at times like that, while dealing with foreign heads-of-state? Is this the man we want to place in charge of our nuclear arsenal?

Now, let's take at look at George's first major decision, his choice as vice-president of the US (can you say "Bush-Quayle"? - I knew you could....):

And then there's Dick

Note: Most of these are taken directly, with my modifications, from Paul Begala's book, "Is Our Children Learning?"

Dick Cheney has a long and distinguished career. Dick Cheney gave an Oscar-worthy performance as a moderate Democrat during the Vice Presidential debates. Dick Cheney, however has shown his true beliefs in the course of his career, with his votes.

Against outlawing cop-killer Teflon® coated bullets which are able to pierce KevlarTM body armor. He opposed the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988, which outlawed guns made with so little metal that they escape metal detectors. He voted against funding programs to prevent family violence and to provide shelter for the victims of family violence. He voted against Head Start. He voted against a health bill that allowed the National Health Service Corps and the federal immunization program to continue operating. He Voted against school lunches and child nutrition programs at least ten times. He voted to kill the college student aid programs, both in 1985 and 1986. He opposed the creation of the Department of Education, twice. He voted against Adult Education. He voted against bilingual education.

He voted against a 1986 House resolution that the president should urge the South African government to negotiate with the country's black majority, grant immediate and unconditional release to Nelson Mandela and other political prisoners, and recognise the African National Congress as a legitimate representative of the black majority. He repeatedly voted against civil rights programs in the 1980's. He opposed even allowing a floor vote on a bill that sought to ensure application of four major civil rights laws.

He voted against overriding President Reagan's veto of the Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987. He voted against even collecting data on hate crimes. He voted against the Equal Rights Amendment.

He voted against restoring minimum Social Security benefits. He backed raising the normal Social Security retirement aget from sixty-five to sixty-seven. In 1985 he backed a budget that limited cost-of-living increases for Social Security to 2 percent annually. He voted against the Older Americans Act Amendments of 1984, which provided nutrition and support services for elderly people. He also voted against funding it for three years after that.

He opposed the Endangered Species Act. He voted five times against measures to continue, expand, or strengthen the Superfund hazardous waste cleanup program. He voted seven times against authorizing clean water programs, like the Safe Drinking Water Act and the Clean Water Act.

Pardon me, your hypocrisy is showing
Dick Cheney is really an honest man. However, reports state that he himself has some issues from when he was at the Pentagon. The Associated Press, citing "documents gathered by congressional fund-raising investigators," has reported that "long before there were White House coffees for Democratic donors, Dick Cheney entertained major Republican contributors at private meetings at the Pentagon...Cheney was host for at least two GOP donor gatherings inside the Defense Department in 1991 and 1992, the records show."
Show your civic mindedness.
Select as your Vice Presidential running mate someone that didn't vote for you in the primaries - or, for that matter, hasn't voted in 14 of the last 16 elections since registering to vote in Dallas County, Texas.
That's "tithe" Dick - as in one-tenth....
Advocate doing away with federal aid programs on the assumption that churches and individuals will make up the difference, except Mr. Cheney, who gives less than 1% to charity.

Bush favors sacrificing our military personnel!
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