So you think George W. Bush is not a conservative?

SOTU transcript ^ | 1/22/04

[Sabertooth]

It was an EO that Bush reinstated. That EO had nothing to do with domestic abortion Bush signing the PBA ban did. The 1988 abortion bill ONLY prohibited abortions at Military hospitals it did not prohibit military personnel from having an abortion. Both the Reagan EO and the 1988 bill were process measures NOT bills actually restricting abortion procedures. The only restrictions placed were the locations that could not perform abortions, Military facilities, and international restrictions concerning population control aid when abortion was an option.

This is all discraction. That Bush reinstated a Reagan EO doesn't mean that reagan didn't sign the EO.

Here are your statements in question, from #1474:

"Bush has actually signed anti-abortion measures, Reagan never did."

"Bush has stood up to the UN Reagan never did."

Your comments here, "Reagan never did," are false, and these are the subject of my challenge of fact to you.

As has been shown, Reagan signed anti-abortion measures, and stood up to the UN.

To say he "never did" is untrue.

What you said about Reagan, in the quotes above, is untrue.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Now Nanodik (proud of your shortcomings?), please post your candidate's name so that I may examine his or her record.

[Nanodik]

Which makes you a liberal. Nice to have outted you.

Liberal in the classic sense, yes. You don't think those programs Bushy is pushing through are socialist? Do you think we would have free drugs for geezers if Gore had been elected? You think the Rep congress would be at his beck and call?

[Sabertooth]

As I said, ALL he did was place a restriction on WHERE a service member could receive an abortion. He did NOT prohibit that service member having an abortion. That is NOT an anti-abortion bill. Reagan NEVER signed an actual anti-abortion bill.

You're just splitting hairs now.

Reagan prohibited abortions in US military hospitals, by EO. Reagan denied federal funds to international groups promoting abortions, by EO. Those are both "anti-abortion measures," that Reagan "signed," and that's the language you used at #1474.

I challenged you on that, and you were factually incorrect.

Nice try, though, shifting terms from "measures" to "bill."

[Texasforever]

Yep Reagan really stood up for Isreal in the UN

The Israeli justification, advanced by then Prime Minister Menachem Begin, claimed that the attack was vital to Israel's security because, he alleged, Iraq was building a nuclear bomb that will be used against Israeli targets.

After several days of debate and U.S.-Iraqi negotiations behind closed doors at the United Nations, Reagan's ambassador to the world body, Jeane Kirkpatrick, joined the other 14 members of the UN Security Council in a 15-0 vote on June 19 that "strongly condemned" the Israeli raid - a vote which Time magazine described then as "one of the harshest United Nations rebukes of Israel that the U.S. has supported."

[PSYCHO-FREEP]

There you go again with that Socialist Canadian logic.

If you wish to call yourself an American, learn your facts about our history first.

You are only flame-baiting and most all you have ever done is flame-bait.

[Texasforever]

I have shown that my assertions were both accurate. You on the otherhand have only helped me do it.

[Luis Gonzalez]

Not only do I believe that Gore would have enacted a prescription drug entitlement, but I know that the retiring baby boomers would have elected whichever candidate would have guranteed them the most benefits.

The issue is now off the table, and we don't have a wild race among Democrats as to who will pay out the most.

If you can't stop it, then control it as much as possible.

[MissAmericanPie]

The "don't listen to what he says, watch what he does", was flaunted around here by his apologists for months as you well know Mr See No Evil, Hear no Evil.

That "He's been right up front about himself from the begining" just goes over like a lead door stop. He's also up front about a free trade zone "From the north of Canada to the tip of Cape Horn". He just neglects to mention that means a Federation of the US, Mexico, and Canada, killing off the Constitution and placing us under international law. If detesting that idea makes me a "rigid ideologue", then hello there, that's me.

So if loving that idea is a trait of "moderate republicans" then you are as great a danger to the republic as any other socialist/communist/marxist liberal democrat. The only differnce between you would be that you infested the Republican party making it useless.

[skip2myloo]

Toward the end, I think he was too senile to have a rational political affiliation. Maybe his brain was just pickled ??

But, I concede his behavior was bizarre his last days in office.

I believe, but cannot attest factually, he WAS a true conservative when he ran for President as the GOP nominee.

Maybe I'm wrong - I was much younger then and not paying close attention to politics -- at least to the best of my recollection, I wasn't paying much attention to politics then. I think I remember being distracted by girls.

Sort of wish that were the case tonight :-)

[Texasforever]

Another example of Reagan's support of Isreal against the UN

“The Reagan Plan states that ‘the United States will not support the use of any additional land for the purpose of settlements during the transition period (5 years after Palestinian election for a self-governing authority). Indeed, the immediate adoption of a settlements freeze by Israel, more than any other action, could create the confidence needed for wider participation in these talks. Further settlement activity is in no way necessary for the security of Israel and only diminishes the confidence of the Arabs that a final outcome can be fee and fairly negotiated.” Reagan Plan –September 1982

[Luis Gonzalez]

"Liberal in the classic sense, yes."

You just stated that a Democrat in the White House is your preference, that makes you a liberal in the Pelosi/Clinton sense.

[Nanodik]

Now Nanodik (proud of your shortcomings?), please post your candidate's name so that I may examine his or her record.

Just making a statement about how most guys on this board like to fancy themselves big, macho and intellectual, say like a famous baseball player, when in reality they are probably a 98lb pencil necked geek would couldn't hit a underhand pitch tossed by the 3rd string pitcher on a girl's highschool softball team... but I digress. Your premise is like saying, go to the whore-house and find me your choice of gals so I can check into her past. Most politicians who have been elected are there because they are whores. The "two-party" system keeps politics to it's lowest common denominator. I guess you like Bushy's record so vote for him. Just keep in mind that I am not the first to point out that there is not a dimes bit of difference between the Reps and the Dems these days. People who want to restrain govt can at best hope for gridlock and we won't get that with Bushy in the WH>

[Luis Gonzalez]

Who is your candidate of choice?

[George W. Bush]

Now, Reagan and Bush I outspent Clinton by a wide margin.

Did they amend the constitution when I wasn't looking?

Bush has had a far more powerful position with his congress than these others did. Given 9/11, he has enjoyed a lot more support, has been given a pass even by many liberal voters on both spending and as commander-in-chief.

I think that Reagan proposed huge budgets to get the Dims to pass his defense increases. In other words, he offered the Dims a huge expansion of all spending in order to get his defense spending. His advisers believed it was important enough to make this trade and let the Dims take us into deficit. Even economically, you can defend their judgment in this. The alternative was a much higher level of defense spending forever.

Bush I was simply weak and caved to the Dims on a tax increase, breaking his only campaign promise "Read My Lips...". And the voters didn't like the higher taxes and they didn't like the lie. They liked kicking Saddam out of Kuwait but didn't forgive the broken promise. And Clinton had the Arousal Factor with the female vote.

Clinton's first two years were big-spending liberalism, actually spending more than he probably was comfortable with. He listened to the big-government liberals in Congress. They were wrong. And Gingrich led the GOP to take the House for the first time in, what, 42 years. So Clinton spent big in '92-93, then had to deal with the Gingrich House who then impeached his sorry ass (An' we he'ped!).

It's pretty hard to say that Bush II faces the same problems with proposing a budget to an opposition congress as compared to his immediate predecessors. Or the problems he has had with strong judicial nominees for that matter.

Of his predecessors, only Clinton had a two-year run with both houses of Congress in his own party's hands.

No president is king. The veto has its limits. But some presidents have a better excuse for failing to rein in Congress than others. And the conservative criticism of Bush is that he proposes and campaigns for expanded funding and the intrusion of the federal government into areas like education where it has no constitutional mandate whatsoever.

But the president and the federal government do have a responsibility to protect our borders. It is the original purpose of the federal government. No one seems very serious about it though.

[Luis Gonzalez]

My choice is simple...we need to elect a President in the very near future...who is your candidate?

[Nanodik]

If you wish to call yourself an American, learn your facts about our history first.

Sorry, but all they offered when I came here was English as a second language. I learned how to spell labor and color without a "u".

[Nanodik]

My choice is simple...we need to elect a President in the very near future...who is your candidate?

Anybody but Bush. As I have said, gridlock is the key until we can get someone who is fiscally responsible and knows how to play the game. If we accept your premise that all roads lead to the same place, we might as well stay home and lube up the ol' backside for what is to come.

[Luis Gonzalez]

"Bush I was simply weak and caved to the Dims on a tax increase, breaking his only campaign promise "Read My Lips...".

Let's start there.

Bush I broke his tax pledge in order to get some much needed budgetary concessions from congressional Democrats. His broken pledge helped balance the budget, and helped fully realize the Reagan economic recovery.

Thinking challenged right wingers failed to understand what was happening, and allowed themselves to be led away from the GOP by the Democrats, and in fact, handed the bragging rights to the combined efforts of Reagan and Bush I, plus the greatest economic boom in recent history, to William Jefferson Clinton.

[Pelham]

On Tuesday evening, January 20, 2004, the President of the United States gave one of the most conservative State of the Union addresses in at least a generation

Only because the term "conservative" has ceased to have any meaning other than "not uttered by a Democrat politician".