George Walker Bush
From dKosopedia
Categories: George W. Bush | Texas Republicans | Presidents of the United States | Governors of Texas | Bush family
- Birthplace :
- New Haven, CT
- Siblings :
- Education:
- Phillips Academy (Andover, Massachusetts)
- Yale University (New Haven, Connecticut)
- Harvard University (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
- Religion :
- Career highlights
- Board Member, Tom Brown Inc.
- Founder/CEO, Bush Exploration (1975-1986)
- Candidate, United States House of Representatives (1978)
- General Partner, Texas Rangers (1989-1994)
- Worked on his father's 1988 presidential campaign.
- Governor of Texas (1995-2000)
- President of the United States (2001-)
- Miscellaneous Facts
- Favorite ice cream flavor: Pralines and Cream
- Favorite color: Blue
- Favorite song: "Wake Up, Little Susie" by the Everly Brothers
- Favorite children's book: The Very Hungry Caterpillar, by Eric Carle
- Favorite food: Mexican
- Favorite movie: Field of Dreams
- Favorite TV shows: "Biography" on the A&E channel, baseball.
- Favorite books: The Raven: A Biography of Sam Houston, by Marquis James; The Good Life and Its Discontents: The American Dream in the Age of Entitlement, by Robert J. Samuelson; The Dream and the Nightmare: The Sixties' Legacy
- Favorite newspaper: Not applicable. (Condoleezza Rice and other staff prepare newspaper summaries.)
- Favorite philosopher: Jesus Christ.
- Most Idiotic Comments:
- On July 15, 2006, Bush urged Russian President Vladimir Putin to copy the example of "Iraqi democracy" saying, "I talked about my desire to promote institutional change in parts of the world like Iraq where there's a free press and free religion, and I told him that a lot of people in our country would hope that Russia would do the same thing."
- On August 14, 2006, Bush stated that, "It's no coincidence that two nations that are building free societies in the heart of the Middle East--Lebanon and Iraq--are also the scenes of the most violent terrorist activity."
Contents |
Biographical
Born on July 6th, 1946 in New Haven Connecticut, Bush is the scion of an increasingly closed political class in which dynasticism determines who will assume the highest elective and appointed political offices. He is grandson of Prescott Bush and the son of former President George Bush. So in reality, George W. is actually an old money New England Yankee posturing as a Texas cowboy.
Bush attended Yale where he was a member of the Skull and Bones ruling class secret society graduated with a Bachelor's degree in 1968, avoided the draft by enlisting in the Texas Air National Guard, and received an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1975. His enrollment in Yale prevented a more deserving young man or woman from attending that elite university. After two years of learning how to fly jets in the Texas Ait National Guard, he was promoted to First Lieutenant on the November 1970 recommendation of his commander Lt. Col. Jerry B. Killian. He "served" as an F-102 pilot until 1972, although his absence without leave remains a mystery. Unlike decorated miltiary hero John Kerry, he did not serve in Vietnam. He did however support the war politically, as did many other wealthy elites who found ways to avoid risking their own lives. Letting working class Americans assume risks they themselves would not assume is the philosophical heart of conservatism.
After a career in business heavily dependent on elite personal contacts, favorable inside deals and government contracts, George Bush Jr. was elected Governor of Texas in 1994, defeating the popular incumbent Ann Richards, and he was re-elected in 1998. In 2000, he lost the popular vote of the Presidential Election to Albert Gore, but, through Republican Party control of the election apparatus in Florida, was able to force his slate of electors to be sent from that state (8 of 9 subsequent recounts showed Al Gore to have legitimately won Florida). On December 12th 2000, five Republican members of the Supreme Court issued an unsigned decision, Bush v. Gore, that installed him in power. Congress decided not to contest or investigate the election, and Bush was installed as Executive on January 20th 2001 in 1 5 to 4 party line vote by the Supreme Court of the United States.
While he campaigned as a moderate, his Executive had two set plans: the first, and most obvious, was to pass a series of massive tax breaks for the wealthy, under the guise of dealing with the economic crisis that resulted from the collapse of the stock market bubble in 2000. Even as the economy slipped into recession, the Bush Executive refused to countenance stimulus, and instead forced through a series of deficit-inducing tax reductions targeted at the top 2%.
His popularity drifted downwards until a small group of Arab terrorists funded and trained by Al Queda attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, on September 11th 2001. These [2] attacks redefined his place in the political universe, and gave him stratospheric poll ratings and a mandate to act with impunity. He signed into law a series of corporate bailouts, and the Patriot Act and ordered the invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001. By early 2002 the Taliban regime, which had sheltered Usama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda terrorist training camps had been driven from power in Kabul, and Afghanistan was turned over to a de-facto government of warlords and drug lords which held elections including women's suffrage. The most important Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan were allowed to escape in the Tora Bora Breakout and Osama bin Laden remains at large.
Bush's regime of tax breaks did little to stimulate hiring; in fact, they created an incentive to profitize revenues, and depressed hiring. The economy continued to shed jobs and manufacturing jobs, even as GDP turned upwards. In order to prevent the economy from completely collapsing, a Federal Reserve board headed by far right central banker Alan Greenspan and long time far right economist Ben Bernanke kept interest rates at generational lows. The result was a devaluation of the dollar against independent currencies, which lead to the Crash of 2002.
At this point the other fixed policy of the Bush Executive came into play: invading Iraq and Thatcherizing it, to place its key assets in foreign hands, or in the hands of a carefully selected oligarchy. Creating a series of nakedly false claims about the regime of Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq, the Bush Executive proceded to force through a UN Security Council resolution 1441, and in early 2003 invaded Iraq.
During this period there was an aggressive use of propaganda, associating political opponents with terrorists and traitors, and the institution of huge new federal bureaucracies for Homeland Security, as well as large corporate welfare programs such as the Medicare Drug Benefit. The economy continued to wallow in a protracted recession, causing the National Bureau of Economic Research to redefine "recession" so as to mark an official end to the recession. Under the old definition the recession would not have been declared over until August of 2003.
Under the stimulus of war-time spending, including an $89 billion dollar supplemental Iraq appropriation, U.S. GDP finally began growing again. Hiring however, continued at an anemic pace, creating only slightly over 100,000 jobs a month, and these were mainly in the construction industry, subsidized by low interest rates and a Treasury yield curve that favored mortgage lending. The resulting housing bubble kept hiring and spending afloat, even as it bloated consumer debt and the balance of trade deficit. The profligate spending packages added almost $1 million dollars a day to the National Debt.
This flood of money, and the risks associated with the Iraq war caused oil prices to spiral upwards to levels higher than all but 6 of the last 45 years, and the price of consumer gasoline to break through the long 16 year commodities depression levels of 1986-2002. George Bush's popularity fell to 42%, and the clear pattern of bleeding support between spikes of "surprise" news had been well established. Challenged by Democratic Senator John Kerry, Bush raised an unprecedented $175 million dollar war chest for the election of 2004, and unleashed his supporters in the press to accuse his political opponents of "treason" and "slander", and imply that they were supported by the Al Qaeda terrorist network.
By late spring of 2006, his popularity at a low ebb as reflected in approval ratings of only 29%, and the occupation of Iraq in a complete shambles, Bush has launched a counter-offensive, reasserting that opponents of the executive are disloyal and putting American military personnel at risk. This smirking privileged son of the ruling class will sacrifice anything for power, inlcuding the lives and liberties of working Americans.
Grandson of Prescott Bush. Son of George H. W. Bush and Barbara Bush. Brother of Florida Governor Jeb Bush. Husband to Laura Bush. Father of Jenna Bush and Barbara Pierce Bush.
Vice President: Dick Cheney
Political
Unlike his Texas governorship which was marked by notable bipartisanship, George Bush's Presidency easily became the most divisive Presidency in recent memory. His divisiveness affected not only the citizens of the country, but those in Congress and his own administration. There were deep and widely known divisions between members of his Cabinet and entire departments in the government. Moderate Republican members of Congress began to air their concerns to the media because they did not have a voice at the White House. Person after person resigned from within the administration, and some high profile ones wrote tell-all books about their experience with the Bush Administration. As the end of Bush's first term came nearer, the irony of Bush's 2000 campaign phrase, "I'm a uniter, not a divider" became even clearer. He did, in fact, prove a uniter of Democrats in their effort to defeat him, and even a uniter of factions of Iraq not used to working together as they joined together to drive the U.S. out of their country and vote multiple times in democratic elections made possible by the downfall of the Hussein totalitarian regime.
Bush inspired a range of political jokes on the Mishaps of George W. Bush and his mangling of the English Language which came to be known as Bushisms. His defenders elevated him to a messianic status, claiming that god had chosen him to do as he did, an that he, and only he, could save the country from the evils of Bill Clinton.
He was widely caricatured as a chimpanzee, and the use of "chimp" for Bush in political humor became widespread.
During his Presidential campaigns, Bush actively sought out contributions from wealthy individuals; the most sucessful fundraisers were called Pioneers and Rangers.
Domestic PolicyAgenda
Foreign Policy |
Major Accomplishments
None that are positive but plenty that are negative. Bush has rolled back enviromental protection, ordering the censoring of government scientific reports, run-up the largest deficit in U.S. and world history, larded the Federal judiciary with social conservatives contemptous of individual liberty, approved secret and unconstitutional surveillance of American citizens, lied to take America into a war that it cannot win in Iraq, bungled the war in Afghanistan, tried but failed to overthrow a democratically elected government of Venezuela, and squandered the reputation of the U.S. around the world. Bush has also provided a horrific role model for young Americans, encouraging elitism, irresponsibility, materialism and anti-intellectualism. Bush is an embarrassment to any real American patriot.
Political Appointees
In late August, 2005, Hurricane Katrina ravaged the United States' gulf coast and is expected to result in a death toll in the thousands. The gross federal failure to respond to this crisis led to close scrutiny of the US Department of Homeland Security and the US Federal Emergency Management Agency. DailyKos diarists and commenters discovered that the director of FEMA during this time period, Michael Brown, had little to no emergency management experience. His appointment was the result of the cronyism and nepotism which has infested the federal government via George W. Bush.
Bush on DeLay
In a December 15, 2005 interview on the Fox News Channel Pres. George W. Bush stated that he thinks DeLay is innocent of ethics violations. Defending Bush's baseless conclusion, embattled White House press secretary Scott McClellan said, "We don't typically tend to get into discussing legal matters of that nature. But in this instance, the president chose to respond to it. Call it presidential prerogative." Or call it pathetic. Source: Jennifer Loven. "White House Defends Bush Comments on DeLay." Associated Press. December 15, 2005.
Quotations
Audio
Producer Sly Ciccone, (website) mixed audio of Bush & Blair making various misleading statements with Madonna's hit "Live to Tell", which contains the chorus "A man can tell a thousand lies."
- Easy Download (Save As)
- Alt. Download (Visit Site, Click Link)
Derogatory Nicknames
Few Presidents have spawned as wide an array of derogatory nicknames as George W. Bush has, an indication both of his divisiveness, and the seemingly impervious media wall which, for years, protected him from the consequences of missteps and scandals.
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Affiliations
- Skull and Bones (Yale University "secret society")
See also
- Biographies
- dynasty
- Accountability Project
- The Political Spectrum
- Republican Party
- Elections
- The Record of George W. Bush
- Vetoes of George W. Bush
- Mission Accomplished
- Ian Williams. "Why George W. Bush is Really Our King." The Washington Spectator. November 15, 2005.
- Bush Pioneers and Rangers
- Dissimilarities Between George Bush Sr. and Jr.
- George Bush finds men attractive
Speeches
External Links
- Amusing Short
- Bush or Chimp? and
- more here.
- Rotten.com Biography
- Ties that Blind-2
- Mark his Words-3
- More Pricks than Kicks
- Bush's Disdainful Presidency
- Bush's Ironically Racist Visit to Goree Island
- Dear Mr. President
Books
- The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception (David Corn)
- Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right (Al Franken)
- The Price of Loyalty (Ron Suskind)