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"This is not going to be a popular thing to say on this thread, but consider the fact that Bush appears to be a RINO."

Consider these facts that follow, and then ask if you are knowledgeable on what makes a Republican or not.

Presidency of George W. Bush -- the first 35 months

Banned Partial Birth Abortion
Reversed Clinton's move to strike Reagan's anti-abortion Mexico Policy

Killed the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty

Killed U.S. involvement in the International Criminal Court

Killed Clinton's CO2 rules that were choking off all of the electricity surplus to California.

Killed Clinton's "ergonomic" rules that OSHA was about to implement; rules that would have shut down every home business in America.

Killed the U.S. - CCCP ABM Treaty that was preventing the U.S. from deploying our ABM defenses

Has CONSTRUCTION in process on the first ten ABM silos in Alaska so that America has a defense against North Korean nukes

Pushed through THREE raises for our military.

Increased Defense Dept funding which had deteriorated during the previous 8 years

Stopped foreign aid that would be used to fund abortions.

Supported and upheld the ban on abortions at military hospitals

Signed E.O. reversing Clinton's policy of not requiring parental consent for abortions under the Medical Privacy Act

Signed TWO bills into law that arm our pilots with handguns in the cockpit

Currently pushing for full immunity from lawsuits for our national gun manufacturers

Ordered Attorney-General Ashcroft to formally notify the Supreme Court that the OFFICIAL U.S. government position on the 2nd Amendment is that it supports INDIVIDUAL rights to own firearms, NOT a leftist-imagined *collective* right

Told the United Nations we weren't interested in their plans for gun control (i.e. the International Ban on Small Arms Trafficking Treaty)

Disarmed Libya of its Chemical, Nuclear, and biological WMD's without bribes or bloodshed
Successfully executed 2 wars: Afghanistan and Iraq. 50 million people who had lived under tyrannical regimes now live in freedom

Executed a WAR ON TERROR by getting world-wide cooperation to track funds/terrorists (has cut off much of the terrorist's funding and captured or killed many key leaders of the al Qaeda network)

Brought back our EP-3 intel plane and crew from China without any bribes or bloodshed

Started withdrawing our troops from Bosnia and has announced withdrawal of our troops from Germany and the Korean DMZ.

Signed the LARGEST nuclear arms reduction in world history with Russia

Initiated comprehensive review of our military, which was completed just prior to 9/11/01, accurately reported that ASYMMETRICAL WARFARE was critical.

Changed the tone in the White House, restoring HONOR and DIGNITY to the Presidency

Reorganized bureaucracy...after 9/11, condensed 20+ overlapping agencies and their intelligence sectors into one agency: the Department of Homeland Security.

Initiated discussion on privatizing Social Security and individual investment accounts.

Improving govt. efficiency with .8 million jobs put up for bid...weakening unions and cutting undeserved pay raises. Wants merit based promotions/raises only.

Orchestrated Republican control of the White House, the House AND the Senate.

Killed the liberal ABA's role in vetting federal judges for Congress.

GWB signed an executive order enforcing the Supreme Court's Beck decision (re: union dues being used for political campaigns against individual's wishes)

Turned around an inherited economy that was in recession.

Passed tough new laws to hold corporate criminals to account as a result of corporate scandals.

Signed 2 income tax cuts ---- 1 of which was the largest Dollar value tax cut in world history

Reduced taxes on dividends and capital gains

In process of eliminating IRS marriage penalty.

Increased small business incentives to expand and to hire new people

Signed into law the No Child Left Behind legislation delivering the most dramatic education reforms in a generation (challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations)

Reorganized the INS in an attempt to safeguard the borders and ports of America and to eliminate bureaucratic redundancies and lack of accountability.

Signed trade promotion authority

Committed US funds to purchase medicine for millions of men and women and children now suffering with AIDS in Africa

Passed Medicare Reform (authorized $39.5 Billion per year for preventive medicine such as drugs and doctor visits as well as included a ten year Privatization option)

Urging federal liability reform to eliminate frivolous lawsuits

Supports class action reform bill which limits lawyer fees so that more settlement money goes to victims

Submitted comprehensive Energy Plan--awaits Congressional action (works to develop cleaner technology, produce more natural gas here at home, make America less dependent on foreign sources of energy, improve national grid, etc.)

Endorses and promotes The Responsibility Era ("In a compassionate society, people respect one another and take responsibility for the decisions they make in life. My hope is to change the culture from one that has said, if it feels good, do it; if you've got a problem, blame somebody else -- to one in which every single American understands that he or she are responsible for the decisions that you make; you're responsible for loving your children with all your heart and all your soul; you're responsible for being involved with the quality of the education of your children; you're responsible for making sure the community in which you live is safe; you're responsible for loving your neighbor, just like you would like to be loved yourself. " -----this quote was too good to leave out)

Started the USA Freedom Corps

Initiated review of all federal agencies with a goal to eliminate federal jobs (completed September 2003) in an effort to reduce the size of federal gov while increasing private sector jobs.

Part of coalition (Russia, Israel, EU, Palestine, USA) for Israeli/Palestinian "Roadmap to Peace"

Challenged the United Nations to live up to their responsibilities and not become The League of Nations ( in other words, completely irrelevant)

Nominated strong, conservative judges to the judiciary.

Changed parts of the Forestry Management Act to allow necessary clean-up of the national forests in order to reduce fire danger.

As part of the national forests clean-up, the President restricted judicial challenges (based on the Endangered Species Act and other challenges) and removed the need for an EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) before removing fuels/logging to reduce fire danger.

Significantly eased field-testing controls of genetically engineered crops.
President Bush signed the workplace verification bill to prevent hiring of illegal Aliens
S. 1685, the Basic Pilot Extension Act of 2003, was signed by President Bush on December 3, 2003.
It extends for five years the workplace employment eligibility authorization pilot programs created in 1996. It expands the pilot programs from the original five states to all 50 states.

Each of you have made some valid points. The biggest thing in Bush's favor is that he's not Clinton or Gore or Dean (yet). However, Bush has conscripted leftist ideas and pushed them through to ensure that he gets the credit for them, not the left.

Southack, you sent me a list in 100 point type that takes 3 hours and 200 computer pages to get to the end of that contains a lot of good points (I'm getting older, but I'm neither blind nor stupid). However, consider my list, if you will.

In Bush's first 35 months he also:
1) Created the TSA based on Tom Daschle's challenge that to "professionalize, you must federalize". So far, TSA's only accomplishment is to put a bloated federal agency in place of the private security screeners who did the same job with less than half of the TSA's headcount and less budget.
2) Created the Department of Homeland Security that merged 22 agencies, including all of their redundant functions without the loss of a single job and with an increase in the overall budget. To date, the biggest accomplishment of the DHS has been to develop a color coding system that most Americans don't understand and could care less about. In conjunction with creating DHS, he appointed Tom Ridge to lead it; the same Tom Ridge who is as soft on illegal immigration as Bush is.
3) Enacted steel tariffs that were so ill-advised they brought us to the brink of a devastating trade war that would have wrecked the economic recovery.
4) Selected Teddy Chappaquiddick to develop the Education Bill. This bill, which includes unfunded mandates, is not having any measurable positive effects in the public schools so far.
5) Pushed for and passed the largest, most expensive Agriculture spending bill in US history. You do understand that the Agriculture Dept is unable to account for millions of dollars that it spends each year. They aren't producing any food or agriculture products, the just have a HUGE budget that they can't account for every dollar they spend.
6) Has done nothing to reduce the size of government. Our government is now larger than it was under Clinton.
7) Has nominated several high profile conservative judges but has refused to fight to get a single one of them confirmed.
8) Has failed to hold the Dems' feet to the fire for blocking the Constitutionally defined function of the Senate to give advice and consent on judicial nominations. So far, Bush has refused to intervene to end the "filibusters".
9) Passed CFR knowing that it contained clear violations of the Constitution in violation of the oath of office he took.
10) Proposed drilling in ANWR but has yet to commission a single oil exploration company to go there and start drilling.
11) Proposed privatizing a tiny fraction of Social Security but has failed to actively fight to get it passed.
12) Favors legalizing millions of illegal aliens currently in the US and will likely push to do that with the immigration reform currently being developed by John McCain.
13) Fought for and pushed through the unfunded Medicare Prescription Drug Bill that has no government requirement in the Constitution and places the prescription drug needs of old farts on the backs of our kids. Medicare and Social Security alone, if Congress meets the requirements to pay them out, will bankrupt the US in the next 30 years as the nation's baby boomers reach retirement age and begin drawing on these services. This leaves two choices to meet the requirements of both of these entitlements: a) raise taxes dramtically to cover their costs or, b) cut the benefits.
14) Has yet to eliminate or outsource a single federal job, although he has given lip service toward doing that.
15) Has failed to take any action or to direct Tom Ridge to take any action to secure our borders.

Yes, those are all negative points and, no, that's not my sole focus about Bush. I agree that Southack's list contain some great things that I also like about Bush. And, yes, I understand that we will probably never get the perfect conservative in the WH. But we got one who supported the erosion of our rights under the Constitution and that is simply unthinkable.

To answer directly another question about illegal immigration, yes, I was dismayed that Reagan legalized the ones that were here at the time. I wasn't as upset at the time because I bought the story about cutting off future illegal immigration. Well, that didn't work. When Reagn legalized the illegals, they were estimated to be about 6 million at the time. Today, we are talking about double that number and STILL nothing in the works to stem the tide of illegals. Neither Bush nor Ridge are interested in securing our borders. With borders as porous as ours, how are we getting any homeland security? In another 20 years, will the president confer citizenship on 100 million illegals? If we give away the rights of citizenship to people whose first act as potential citizens was to break our laws, how does that strengthen our commit to be a nation of laws, not men? And, if ignoring the law is good for one segment of our country, does that suggest that ignoring the law will yield spectacular results if we all do it? Ethically and morally, our leaders can't say on the one hand it's ok for THESE people to break our laws, we're going to make them citizens for that and then, on the other hand, say it's not ok for the rest of you to break the law because, if you do, we're not going to make English our national language and, instead, we're going to make you learn the language of the illegals just to keep you from thinking about breaking the law.

My decision about Bush is not final; he could still win me back. The election is still a long time away and lots of things can happen. The wheels are coming off of Dean's campaign and Hillary could end up as the candidate. In that case, Bush could commit rape, murder and mayhem and I would probably end up voting FOR him as a means of voting AGAINST her. All I'm saying is that, as a compassionate conservative, Bush is doing more to promote the left's agenda than the right's. Maybe that makes him a true centrist, maybe that makes him someone that the left has figured out how to manipulate by getting him to do something so that they can't claim the credit for it; I don't know. What I do know is that, IMO, he could be doing a lot better. Cut the size of government, close the borders, actually use the office of the president to VETO something - ANYTHING, just to prove that he knows what the veto is for. So far, both Houses of Congress know that whatever they send to the WH, no matter how crappy it is, will get signed because, apparently, Clinton stole the VETO stamp and W can't figure out how to order another one.

But, above all, he needs to dance occasionally with the ones who brung him. He has invested too much effort dancing with the left to tunes they have played. He is forgetting those of us who invited him to the dance.