Can we finally agree

[billydkid]

Uhh ok. And Harry Truman dropped two bombs and killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people. Margaret Thatcher decided a couple of islands off the coast of Argentina were worth the sacrifice of hundreds of British and Argentinian troops. John F Kennedy callously sent an Army of Cuban exiles to their deaths. Plus, there was that whole Vietnam thing that he kicked into gear.

Yes, world leaders make decisions about life and death. They do it all the time, and Bush isn't the first to do it, nor the first to make a bad decision and be a bad leader. And that's what I'll be happy to judge him on: how lousy of a President he is.

You commented that it must be obvious that he has no empathy and no compassion. You seem to be giving him the attributes of a sociopath.

I think Truman was a butcher and incinerated hundreds of thousands of people unnecessarily. Few Presidents have been so cavalier about the death and killing of other people as Dubya. I have no problem in conducting war in defense your country and your people. Many of our wars have had nothing to do with any of that. Yes, I believe Bush is a sociopath. I believe he would had occupied a comfortable place carrying out the agenda of the Nazis had he been in the right place at the right time. Certainly his jingoism earmarks him as that sort of a person.

 

[FarmallMTA]

Heck, no, we can't agree. Always silly to agree with a stupid proposition like you're coming across with.

George W. Bush is an excellent president and a courageous and intelligent man.
May we be so fortunate with our next president.

 

[FarmallMTA]

I think Truman was a butcher and incinerated hundreds of thousands of people unnecessarily. Few Presidents have been so cavalier about the death and killing of other people as Dubya. I have no problem in conducting war in defense your country and your people. Many of our wars have had nothing to do with any of that. Yes, I believe Bush is a sociopath. I believe he would had occupied a comfortable place carrying out the agenda of the Nazis had he been in the right place at the right time. Certainly his jingoism earmarks him as that sort of a person.

I see. And the Americans not incinerated in the Invasion of Japan were therefore saved unnecessarily. Please turn in your American Citizenship card and live elsewhere. And if you're not American, please stay home in whatever $h!thole country you currently live in.

 

[The Painter]

I think Truman was a butcher and incinerated hundreds of thousands of people unnecessarily.

See, now you lost me. It was a little something called WWII. The 2 bombs put an end to it, and saved millions. The Bush thing, just suck it up, it’s only another year and a half.

 

[FarmallMTA]

See, now you lost me. It was a little something called WWII. The 2 bombs put an end to it, and saved millions. The Bush thing, just suck it up, it’s only another year and a half.

These sick schmucks don't get it. Socialist anti-Americans just take from the country and refuse to acknowledge anything good about it or our history. Thank God they're aborting their own children or there would be more of them.

 

[Admiral]

Are you sure? I thought he went to Harvard Business, not Harvard Law.

My fault- of course you're right.

 

[davefoc]

For quite some time I've had a standard line about Bill Clinton which goes, "Bill Clinton is a sleazy, dishonest creep and I miss him more each day."

I miss the time when the worst thing that the political enemies of a president could come up with was some lies about a sexual encounter. I remember mulling over the various issues at the time concerning this. Little did I realize then how completely trivial Bushco would make Clinton's little transgressions seem.

As to Bush's intelligence: I don't know. I certainly don't think he's particularly bright. I think Cheney and Rove have essentially been able to implement their personal agendas by manipulating him by pandering to his ego. Bush's lack of introspection or for that matter curiosity about most things makes him particularly susceptible to being manipulated by people like Rove and Cheney who seek power for the sake of exercising power as opposed to somebody like Bush that seeks power to be gratified by it.

 

[Zep]

These sick schmucks don't get it. Socialist anti-Americans just take from the country and refuse to acknowledge anything good about it or our history. Thank God they're aborting their own children or there would be more of them.

I hate McDonalds and Paris Hilton! Arnold Schwarzeneger is a total pussy! Baseball is for wimps! Your beer is weak as p*ss! Neener neener! Bring it on!!

Or maybe you could contribute something useful to the conversation, instead of bringing your own hornet's nest and hitting it.

=========

GWB has always been beholden to his father and his father's business interests. He was the spoiled child from a rich background who liked to play with his blocks...in downtown Houston. They made sure he went to "the right schools", and bailed him out of numerous failed business escapades before he even went into politics. And once he took that up, they have been supporting and "guiding" him there as well. Given the current situation, I suspect he will be "golden parachuted" again in 2009.

It's hard to say without clear evidence if GWB's mistakes are his own, or those of a cabal of which he is just a sockpuppet (personally, given above, I lean more towards the cabal side). He may be able to demonstrate fair intelligence, but not necessarily management skills, good leadership, common sense or, most importantly for the office he holds, sound judgement.

 

[davefoc]

It's hard to say without clear evidence if GWB's mistakes are his own, or those of a cabal of which he is just a sockpuppet (personally, given above, I lean more towards the cabal side). He may be able to demonstrate fair intelligence, but not necessarily management skills, good leadership, common sense or, most importantly for the office he holds, sound judgement.

This was my own view exactly.

I lean to the cabal idea because:
1. Comparing the speech of Bush and Cheney is a revelation. One might not agree with Cheney, but he speaks like a normal, educated person defending his point of view. Bush is prone to almost baby talk at times and rarely engages in something akin to an intellectual defense of his actions. The implication from that for me is that somebody else is making the decisions for him and he is incapable of explaining why the decision was made because he wasn't involved in the intellectual exercise of mulling over the alternatives.
2. Rove has been involved deeply in at least two major scandals and at the periphery of others. Under his leadership the fortunes of the Republican Party have suffered enormously. And yet he continues on as a major Bushco Player. There seems to be no clear cut reason why Rove should continue to have the power that he has unless he had enormous influence on Bush.
3. The actions of the administration with regard to the war in Iraq seem to be entirely (until recently) consistent with what Cheney has recommended. Once again it appears that Bush is just "deciding" what somebody else has decided he should decide.
4. Bush rarely does anything that looks like it was driven by his ideology or a desire to implement good governance. Most things that this administration does seem to be done with an eye towards maximizing political gain and suggests to me that these kinds of decisions involve Rove.

 

[SimonD]

Uhh ok. And Harry Truman dropped two bombs and killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people..

Didn't he do this to save American lives? Not to mention the saving millions of Japanese from death if the U.S. had invaded. Also, the fire bombings killed more people then the A-bomb did.

Margaret Thatcher decided a couple of islands off the coast of Argentina were worth the sacrifice of hundreds of British and Argentinian troops

Agreed

John F Kennedy callously sent an Army of Cuban exiles to their deaths.

JFK did learn from this experience. In this case he listened to his Generals. The next time (Cuba missile crisis) he did something different

Plus, there was that whole Vietnam thing that he kicked into gear..

If the Vietnam war was not fought, how far would have communism spread? Hard question to answer I admit.

Yes, world leaders make decisions about life and death. They do it all the time, and Bush isn't the first to do it, nor the first to make a bad decision and be a bad leader. And that's what I'll be happy to judge him on: how lousy of a President he is..

As outlined above.

Bush just doesn't seem to have the smarts, political or otherwise to make anything good come from the war. He seems to let other people drive the agenda and just doesn't seem to be there.

We all know that person at work that turns up, does as little as they can and goes home. When you ask why don't they get the sack, 9 times out of 10 you find out it's because they are buddies with the boss. This is how I see Bush. He just turns up for the pay cheque, then goes and plays golf, while the rest of us have to pick up the mess.

 

[ARubberChickenWithAPulley]

We all know that person at work that turns up, does as little as they can and goes home. When you ask why don't they get the sack, 9 times out of 10 you find out it's because they are buddies with the boss. This is how I see Bush. He just turns up for the pay cheque, then goes and plays golf, while the rest of us have to pick up the mess.

I agree with everything you wrote. The OP was arguing that it is without question that Bush has absolutely no empathy or compassion -- that he is, in effect, a sociopath (a point later stated directly by the writer of the OP). And the proof offered for this was that he made decisions which have led to thousands of deaths to implement "his vision" on the world. I was merely pointing out that world leaders by nature make decisions that result in life and death for people, and Bush's actions don't prove that he is literally a sociopath, or without compassion. They prove he is a crappy President and leader.

I'm trying to avoid the "this guy is the devil incarnate" vitriol that seems to come from Bush's most ardent opponents. Sometimes, being a horribly incompetent leader is disastrous enough. It doesn't take a sociopath to result in thousands of deaths. It just takes someone who is a very poor, unqualified leader.

 

[SimonD]

I was merely pointing out that world leaders by nature make decisions that result in life and death for people, and Bush's actions don't prove that he is literally a sociopath, or without compassion. They prove he is a crappy President and leader.

S'ok - I was trying to make the same point!

 

[ARubberChickenWithAPulley]

S'ok - I was trying to make the same point!

Ah. My bad

So uhhh.... yeah. Good stuff

 

[Beerina]

I hate McDonalds and Paris Hilton! Arnold Schwarzeneger is a total pussy! Baseball is for wimps! Your beer is weak as p*ss!

Hey!

Whose hamburgers are bad?

 

[Molinaro]

For the longest time when people have accused Bush of being stupid the counter argument has been that he is really smart, just very inarticulate and something to the effect that if he was stupid he wouldn't have gone to Harvard or have become a governor or become President. I think the fallaciousness of the latter arguments is completely obvious so I have no comment about those. However, can most of us finally agree that Bush's incompetence lies very much deeper than just his inability with language.

I have heard it argued that Bush may seem stupid, but he has that rare commodity common sense. I think we can all agree at the point that this myth has been well and truly dispelled. If you can look someone in the eye and argue that Bush has common sense or any kind of real native intelligence, then there is really no reasoning with you. Also, this idea that Bush is a decent but flawed human being and that he has any capacity at all for empathy or compassion, if you still hold onto that notion, again, any attempt at reasoning with you is pointless.

This is a man who is not fit to hold any kind of authority at all over other human beings. He is not only incompetent by any reasonable definition, but he also lacks any legitimate claim to any kind of moral authority. Bush is stupid and he is corrupt in his character. Just the sort of person that Americans would see fit to elect to the highest office in the land and the most powerful position on earth - twice. Incidentally, Bill Clinton is a tremendous, self-serving weasel also, so this has nothing to do with partisanship. I'm not a Democrat anyway.

Any attempt at reasoning with you would seem to be pointless.

 

[Darth Rotor]

For this forum, I think Upchurch is right--no, we'll never agree.

I agree.

DR

 

[Darth Rotor]

Bush is a legacy. I believe he got rejected from a UofT law school, yet Harvard accepted him into their MBA program. He's a Conn. born east coast elite pretending to be a Texan cowboy.

Yep.

DR

 

[FarmallMTA]

Lessee here...

Graduate of Phillips Academy,
Graduate of Yale
Member of Skull and Bones
Honorable discharge from National Guard
Licensed pilot
Graduate of Harvard Business School
Successful businessman whose $800K investment results in $15M sale
Assistant campaign chairman for successful Presidential campaign 1988
Defeated incumbent for Governorship of only state that matters, 1994
Handily re-elected Governor of only state that matters, 1998
Easily won Presidency of USA, handily trouncing idiotic Fat Albert
Oversees death of psycho Islamists worldwide 2001-on
Handily re-elected President against the best Democrat existent, 2004
Confirmed new Supreme Court Chief Justice and new Justice
Gives liberals, socialists, utopians worldwide total fits

Yep, sounds like a consistent winner to me. I'd say he's done way more with his life than any single person who participates in this forum. Period.

 

[Darth Rotor]

Easily won Presidency of USA, handily trouncing idiotic Fat Albert

Nope.

By the way, I'm a better pilot than he is, but I wasn't born rich. I had to earn it.

That he gives libs fits is no great accomplishment. Anyone with a pair can do that.

DR

 

[FarmallMTA]

Nope.

By the way, I'm a better pilot than he is, but I wasn't born rich. I had to earn it.

That he gives libs fits is no great accomplishment. Anyone with a pair can do that.

DR

Better pilots and worse pilots both exist. The fact is, learning to fly and flying is an accomplishment of intelligence, skill, determination, and forethought. The results of successful piloting cannot be denied, except by those who's envy of our President and his hatred of him for having stopped the socialist/liberal train dead in it's tracks blind them to his achievements.

And he did handily defeat Fat Albert. Voter corruption in FL and MO (amply documented at the time) created the disgusting spectacle of Fat Albert attempting to steal the Presidency through Electoral College shenanigans in FL. Fortunately, he failed and W didn't! As usual.