Bush: Bad president? Or WORST president EVER?

[dragonrider]

I may have possibly revealed my own bias in the title of this thread, but YOU get to decide, and to be fair, there are options other than Bad and Worst. You can even select Best if you are crazy (don't let me influence your vote -- select Best if you really want to, you crazy nutjob). Whatever you vote for, please post a reason. If you think he is bad, why? If you think he is good, what are his accomplishments and who do you think has done a worse job?

For example:

I think George W. Bush is among the worst of presidents. He is not the uniter he claimed to be and has been the most divisive president ever. He did not have an easy time considering the 9/11 terrorist attack, but that was one event nearly 7 years ago, and we should be beyond that by now. I feel he used that event to get us into an unnecessary war that has cost us dearly. I think he lied about the reasons for invading Iraq. And when the war started going poorly, he did not do what was necessary to get it back on track. Now it may be too late to salvage that situation. I think he has created more terrorists than he has eliminated. He wasn't willing to pay for the things he wanted --- his tax cuts and this war have driven us into dangerous levels of debt, and now our economy is under threat from the debt load. He worked to weaken important environmental acts such as Clean Air, Clean Water and the Endangered Species act. He worked to PREVENT individual states such as California from tryng to deal with some of these environmental problems. He has failed to act on some of our most important problems such as climate change and other environmental problems, Social Security, Medicare, healthcare costs, national debt, and fair trade issues. He appointed incompetent boobs to very important posts. He worked to weaken our civil rights. He ruined our national image abroad. Energy prices are now through the roof.

After this list of failures, I cannot think of one accomplishment. I must be overlooking something. Can anyone think of one accomplishment?

Please vote in the poll and state what you think are Bush's failures and accomplishments, why you rank him as you do, and who you think has done a better or worse job as president.

dragonrider Reviewed by dragonrider on 03-10-2008. Bush: Bad president? Or WORST president EVER? I may have possibly revealed my own bias in the title of this thread, but YOU get to decide, and to be fair, there are options other than Bad and Worst. You can even select Best if you are crazy (don't let me influence your vote -- select Best if you really want to, you crazy nutjob). Whatever you vote for, please post a reason. If you think he is bad, why? If you think he is good, what are his accomplishments and who do you think has done a worse job? For example: I think George W. Bush Rating: 5

[stinkyattic]

I agree Dragonrider, and feel that your points of WHY he is a failure as a president are valid:
-Manipulation of a national tragedy for the gain of his cartel
-Divisive
-Making misleading statements about the causes of high petroleum prices to make us ignore the record profits shown lately by the bog oil companies
-Horrible horrible failure to react appropriately to natural disaster [Katrina stands out]
-Out of touch with the needs of the People, when in a democracy it is the needs of the People that should be his main focus
-Putting the country at large at odds with the rest of the world
-Poor environmental record
-Wasting tax dollars on projects [war and associated] that are not wholly supported by the People
-Unnecessarily endangering the lives of members of our Armed Forces
-Creating and then denying the existence of a national economic crisis
-Allowing the DEA to interfere with the rights of States to define their own medical drug policy

I think it's telling that my neighbor, a pretty hardcore Republican/conservative, said recently, "I'm still a Republican. But my party has failed me and I'm voting independent until they get back in line with what I believe"

He (well, the people with their hand up the puppet's ass anyway) has been a genius at making us as a nation focus on what his handlers would like us to focus on, while ignoring evidence pointing to the true reason we're in a big economic and international-relations disaster right now.

Time to stop charging the red cape, and make a few runs at the Matador.

[dragonrider]

I agree Dragonrider, and feel that your points of WHY he is a failure as a president are valid:
-Manipulation of a national tragedy for the gain of his cartel
-Divisive
-Making misleading statements about the causes of high petroleum prices to make us ignore the record profits shown lately by the bog oil companies
-Horrible horrible failure to react appropriately to natural disaster [Katrina stands out]
-Out of touch with the needs of the People, when in a democracy it is the needs of the People that should be his main focus
-Putting the country at large at odds with the rest of the world
-Poor environmental record
-Wasting tax dollars on projects [war and associated] that are not wholly supported by the People
-Unnecessarily endangering the lives of members of our Armed Forces
-Creating and then denying the existence of a national economic crisis
-Allowing the DEA to interfere with the rights of States to define their own medical drug policy

I think it's telling that my neighbor, a pretty hardcore Republican/conservative, said recently, "I'm still a Republican. But my party has failed me and I'm voting independent until they get back in line with what I believe"

He (well, the people with their hand up the puppet's ass anyway) has been a genius at making us as a nation focus on what his handlers would like us to focus on, while ignoring evidence pointing to the true reason we're in a big economic and international-relations disaster right now.

Time to stop charging the red cape, and make a few runs at the Matador.

Good points, Stinky!

I didn't even get into the whole puppet show issue, but I think you are absolutely correct about that. He's been manipulated by much smarter people most of the time. He'll have to bear the blame for where those masters have led him and us.

[THClord]

I hope he will be on trial for all of the following sometime in his life:
- war crimes
- treason
- manslaughter

[Innominate]

President or criminal?

[Gandalf_The_Grey]

I voted for "Bad". It's not logical to vote him the "Worst President of All Time" unless you actually study all the presidents and their doings. All too easy to make a judgement on the president of your lifetime.

[FlyGuyOU]

I voted for bush the first time, I voted for him the second time. If you judge him on his first term I think he was a great prez, looking at his second term, I would say he lost his swagger and let other people dictate his term too much. he lost his decisive attitude, and then decided to eliminate the notion of NOT SPENDING. bush is suppose to be a republican, yet he created the largest budget in history....sheesh

However, its much too soon to judge bush on his overall effictiveness. 10 years from now I think people will look more favorably on bush. right now there is too much venom in the water for people to think objectively.

[Psycho4Bud]

How will history remember him? Remember Reagan? Considered at the time of being the worst ever but now is considered one of the greatest by both parties.

Bush has had to contend with another attack on our country but unlike Clinton he reacted like a Commander-in-Chief is suppose to:

Then in February 1993, the first major terrorist attack on American soil took place at the World Trade Centre in New York.

Six people were killed and more than 1,000 - mainly civilians - injured in the blast. The US implicated Egyptian terrorists in the plot to attack targets in the country.

After the New York bomb, terrorist activity against the US returned to Middle East targets.

Seven people were injured - including five Americans - in an explosion in 1995 near a US-run military training centre in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia.

A year later, a huge explosion killed 19, and injured many others at a military complex housing US troops at Khobar in the east of the country.

The US responded by moving their remaining troops in the region in fear of reprisals.
BBC News | Americas | History of attacks on US personnel

And then acknowledging that Iraq had to be dealt with
Russian President Vladimir Putin said yesterday that his intelligence service had warned the Bush administration before the U.S. invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein's government was planning attacks against U.S. targets both inside and outside the country.
Russia Warned U.S. About Iraq, Putin Says (washingtonpost.com)

instead of just a random bombing like Clinton done:
Bombs, Ahoy...Iraq: From Clinton to Bush
Bombs, Ahoy...Iraq: From Clinton to Bush

Then lets not forget about Katrina.......not to many recent Presidents that have had a major city wiped out.

If we're rating Bush....why not congress? Overall performance.......I'll give him a "Good".

Have a good one!:s4:

[DaBudhaStank]

Aw man, I was hoping for an option more like "Everyone in a political position of power needs to be dropped to their knees and executed in a timely and effiecient manner." but no such luck. I agree with Gandalf too, I've only known three presidents in my short life, one of which I didn't actually know, another....well, I actually didn't know ANYTHING about Bush Sr. or Clinton, but that's neither here nor there. From what I've seen, whether or not Bush has actually done ANYTHING right (and so far I'm at a loss to think of something) he has not made America a better place to live. That in and of itself marks one as a failure as a president. Which basically means 90% of presidents are terrible.

[Mr. Clandestine]

I'll be the first to admit that I've flat-out disagreed with a lot of the policies created and enforced by the Bush Admin. And I wasn't too thrilled with the "reconstruction" phase of Iraq, although I've always thought that Saddam was someone who needed to be removed from power. Still, I can't say that I'm one of the nit-pickers who tears every aspect of his life apart just to exploit his flaws. (Unless we're talking about Bushisms. I do get a kick out of lots of those.)

But I totally agree with the other posters that if anyone was to rate his presidency, they should also do the same for our former presidents. They've all had pros and cons, good policies and bad policies, etc. Some just had more of one side, and less of the other. And right now, Bush is doing a good job staying off my shit-list and on my good side... I just got finished figuring out my taxes. My wife and I will be in pretty good shape this year, and I might actually get to use that tax relief check to use in the growroom. I can't complain at all about that!

He gets an 'OK' from me. :thumbsup: