Weekly Analysis – 8/11/03

Bush As Leader

By Kirt R. Poovey

Where do we start?  The Bush administration continues to give us so much material for the grist mill on a daily basis that it is very hard to limit what a person writes to only one subject and cover all of the various debacles of this administration.

Former President Clinton was known for his long list of continual scandals while he was in office (and before) because of his faulty character.  Lacking any morals or strength of character, Clinton floundered in the presidency while Hillary dictated policy and micromanaged from behind the scenes.

President George W. Bush has strength of character and morals, but continues to further the Clinton agendas almost without fail.  It’s as if there was virtually no change in the White House.  It’s almost as if someone else is pulling the chains and setting the direction of the presidency.  Hmm, Hillary is in the Senate, so it can’t be her – can you guess who?

Interesting that even though we now have a “conservative, God-fearing, born-again Christian Republican” in the White House and a fully Republican Congress nothing seems to have essentially changed.  Sure, there are some minor differences in policy, but nothing that has made any significant difference.

Come on you conservatives that whole-heartedly back Mr. Bush, what of significance for conservatives has changed?  Is the budget less?  Is spending down?  We have tax cuts you say – minor and of little consequence considering the massive budget increases of this president (even when the defense aspect is removed). 

We have a new, massively intrusive federal education plan that makes Teddy Kennedy happy (and Hillary).  We are implementing Hillary’s health care system that conservatives raged against when Clinton was in office.  Now, though, because Republicans are pushing it, conservatives have bought into it.  We have an extremely dangerous Homeland Security system that Bill Clinton only dreamed about.  John Ashcroft has become the new Janet Reno, but may actually be scarier.  Conservatives trust him while they feared Reno.  I always respected Mr. Ashcroft and thought highly of him, but his draconian measures as U.S. Attorney General are frightful and will set precedents for future AG’s that will build on his destruction of fundamental freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution in the Bill of Rights.

Where was the administration in the Michigan affirmative action case before the Supremes? – Quietly hoping for a ruling like what was handed down.  And where were they on the recent Texas case before the Black Robes? – Quietly hoping for a ruling like what was handed down.  Where is the administration in the recall of Gov. Gray Davis of California? – Quietly hoping that he stays in office – it will benefit them politically in the next election.  Where is the administration in the obstruction of judicial nominees in the Senate? – Quietly enjoying the obstruction of the Democrats – it will benefit them politically in the next election.  The Republicans could actually force a true filibuster, but they might actually get the conservative judges approved by the Senate and that would not gain them politically, so they merely pretend to have a filibuster.

When Bill Clinton lied (when didn’t he?) conservatives were up in arms and decrying his failure to be honest, but when their hero George W. isn’t honest with the Congress and the American public in his State of the Union speech, the conservatives excuse him because “it was only one sentence”, “it was only sixteen words”, etc.  Perhaps the conservatives think it depends on your definition of a lie, just as Bill Clinton said it depended on the definition of “is”.

My dictionary says that a lie is “an untrue statement made with intent to deceive”.  The Bush administration knew it to be untrue (CIA Tenet admitted such); but the Bushies had to have another forceful reason to invade Iraq so they claimed that it was British intelligence even though they knew it was false. 

As more freedoms disappear and the all-protective federal system fails in the “War on Terrorism” we may actually remember the “good-ole days of the Clinton administration” when conservatives actually opposed an all powerful government and usurpation of freedoms. 

"We will stand, fight, and die to defend our country; but we will not blindly trust it.  Even our Founding Fathers distrusted a large, centralized, all-powerful federal government -- so should we.  Always be on guard to discern the truth and defend it at all costs."