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

SOTU transcript ^ | 1/22/04

[Cultural Jihad]

Your only alternative is Kerry/Dean/Clark/Edwards.

Do you actually believe that you will get MORE CONSERVATIVE ACCOMPLISHMENTS with any of them??

You guys who threaten not to vote for Bush because he hasn't done enough for YOU need to start to think about the COUNTRY above your own egos!

Political pundits have a name for that kind of self-indulgent and self-absorbed action which makes one feeeeel good, but is ineffective and unproductive.

[mhking]

a new temporary worker program to match willing foreign workers with willing employers when no Americans can be found to fill the job. This reform will be good for our economy because employers will find needed workers in an honest and orderly system. A temporary worker program will help protect our homeland, allowing Border Patrol and law enforcement to focus on true threats to our national security.

Or in English, let's give illegals jobs so that more of them can come it.

Feh.

Bush has lost the faith of a lot of people with crap like this.

No matter how you sugar coat it, the "guest worker" program is nothing short of amnesty, pure and simple.

We have to deal with illegals and the threat posed by the porous Mexican border. Giving illegals free access to jobs is not the way to do it, period.

Just damn.

If you want on the list, FReepmail me. This IS a high-volume PING list...

[RiflemanSharpe]

You are of course entitled to your opinion. I however do not seee judges as the overwelming issue. They are important but only one of many components to this policies. And sadly those policies I now find to be more negative then possitive. Even though he is positive on judges.

[EdReform]

BTTT

read later...

[Richard Kimball]

I received the entire SOTU address from Bush-Cheney 04, and I'm kind of sitting here in awe. I understand that some people say, "this is a hill I will die on", but some people wake up every morning saying "where's a hill I can die on?" When PatB left the Republican party, he immediately went to Ross Perot's old party and blew it apart. At some point in time you have to wonder whether it's better to have somebody throwing rocks at you inside your house or outside your house.

I don't think Bush has ever represented himself as anything other than what he is, and I voted for him twice for governor and I'm going to vote for him twice for President. On the amnesty thing, we've got people saying they won't vote for Bush over it, but if a Democrat gets in, their only complaint is that the plan doesn't go far enough. Protest votes are a flawed strategy.

BTW, to those who call me a Bushbot, I agree with him on more issues than I agree with you.

[demlosers]

"If a Dem spent money like he did you would be SCREEEEEEEEMING."

A good portion of that spending is spent on security and the war effort.

[George W. Bush]

I think the most serious problem to getting out a GOP vote this year will be overcoming Bush's support for his don't-call-it-amnesty policy. And the tremendous expansion in spending and the money squandered on the Department of Education and other liberal moneywasters. The SOTU threw a bone to the religious right on banning sodomite marriage but it won't be enough unless Bush really pushes for a constitutional amendment.

But it's the amnesty that will hurt the most in '04. The big-spending grousing will disappear as the economy recovers more.

I don't think any of these issues will make any great number of conservatives or religious righters switch to voting Dim, Libertarian, Constitution Pary, etc.

They'll just stay home. Like 3 million evangelicals did in 2000. Rove is still wailing about it and has no solution, it seems. I expect even more stay-at-homes this time around.

Bush did very well to recess-appoint Pickering. He needs to follow up with the other two appointments the Dims blocked as well. We were promised conservative Scalia-style judges in 2000. He needs to appoint the other two and do it now.

[ohioWfan]

He signed the PBA ban, and has been more aggressively pro-Life than Reagan.

He will get us permanent tax cuts, which Reagan did not.

He is as, or more Conservative in supporting the military and on illegal immigration.

He has gotten accountability into school funding.

And both of them made compromises to reach the higher goal.

[Richard Kimball]

If you don't see judges as an overwhelming issue, you need glasses.

[BlackbirdSST]

In the case of George W. Bush, on a host of issues, this has been the most conservative president since Ronald Reagan. In some respects, more conservative.

I don't see Parody in the Keyword List, so you intend to stand by this as serious? Please. Blackbird.

[Wolfstar]

Precedent for guest worker programs goes back to August 4, 1942, when the U.S. and the Mexican governments instituted the Bracero program. Thousands of impoverished Mexicans abandoned their rural communities and headed north to work as braceros.

Over a decade later, on April 28, 1956, the El Paso Herald Post said, "More than 80,000 braceros pass through the El Paso Center annually. They're part of an army of 350,000 or more that marches across the border each year to help plant, cultivate and harvest cotton and other crops throughout the United States".

In the mid-1980's, President Ronald Wilson Reagan signed the first bona fide blanket amnesty for illegal aliens in American history. Unfortunately, rather than reduce the flow of illegal aliens, it encouraged a flood of new illegal immigration.

So, as history shows, this is a problem with a long history and precedents set by other presidents. It is a problem inherited by this president. In a post-9/11 world, the question is: What do we do with the millions of illegals already here? President Bush's proposal of a guest worker program most defintely is NOT an amnesty. Rather, it is a modernized form of the old Bracero program. It will be debated in Congress — and can be defeated there if its opponents work vigorously enough.

To reiterate, the title is President of the United States, not president of any particular political party or ideology. Any president will call each issue like he sees it. It is a sign of character and courage in a president if he calls an issue in a way he knows is unpopular. Our system of government provides plenty of opportunity to defeat unpopular proposals by any president. It doesn't require a break with the president, either. All the people have to do is stop whining on forums like this, get off their duffs, and work to defeat it.

[looscnnn]

"You guys who threaten not to vote for Bush because he hasn't done enough for YOU need to start to think about the COUNTRY above your own egos!"

So it is our own egos that we are thinking about when we oppose increasing the size of governement, amnesty for illegals, protecting the Constitution, etc. I thought we were doing it because we were thinking about the country. I think you need to take off the blinders and see the big picture. Use some common sense, how does being against these things relate to egos?

[PhiKapMom]

Question:

Why do you keep the screen name Bikers4Bush? Makes no sense to me since you are going around the threads trashing Pres Bush about his not being conservative and you are not voting for him.

This is an excellent article about President Bush and his Conservatism along with the fact that we have a President who is also compassionate and believes that EVERY American deserves an opportunity for success.

My first amendment rights have not been trampled on because I can still post on Free Republic and challenge posters who declare that President Bush is not conservative and will not be voting for him unless he changes. He is not going to change because when he proposes something, he does it from his heart not by sticking a finger in the wind to see which way the wind is blowing.

Maybe it wouldn't hurt if there were a little more compassion around here towards our fellow man who just may need a helping hand. Someday you or someone you know may be on the receiving end of some of these programs that Pres Bush has proposed to make America a better place to live for all of us.

I feel very privileged to have been born in America and have the rights of being an American citizen. Many people around the world would give anything to be living in this great Country. That is one reason we have the problems we have today with number of people wanting to come here legally and those that come illegally. If we didn't have such a great Country, people wouldn't be flocking to America.

My Dad's Family came to this Country before the Revolutionary War and settled in Virginia because they wanted a better life. Guess if you were an Indian, you would say that my Family came here illegally!

[carton253]

All the people have to do is stop whining on forums like this, get off their duffs, and work to defeat it.

Bump...

[Happy2BMe]

BUMP - PING

Bush acts like a conservative most of the time.

[ohioWfan]

If evangelical Christians stay home, they are not being true to their faith, and they are being lousy Americans on top of it.

Bush has well over 90% of the support of Republicans.....his BASE.....and he has NOT lost them (us) because of immigration.

He may have lost the fringes of the right, but he never 'had' them to begin with. The rest of us are bright enough to understand that we will disagree on issues with ANY President, and don't threaten to abandon him if he goes 'astray' from our litmus list.

Most of this "I won't vote for him NOW" stuff going on here is BUNK.

[Bikers4Bush]

Damn, I always forget to add that part!

[thoughtomator]

Not a word about either cutting the size of the government, nor about aborticide, nor a word about the courts' usurpation of legislative powers. Conservative? In your dreams!

[bray]

Excuse him, he didn't know the rules here that you can't EVER say anything positive about W on Free Republic. You "Conservatives" know everybody here goose steps in unison over W's liberal ways. He overspends just like Reagan did, mostly on the military.

He has an illegal worker program which everyone here misnames/lies amnesty like the Rats. Please explain how we can get migrant workers to pick our crops without Mexicans?? You ready to sacrifice our farmers??? If you can really answer that to me I will vote for YAAAWN Spend & Kerry too!

Pray for W and The Truth

[ohioWfan]

He's a whole lot more conservative than ANY libertarian, Blackbird.

The only thing that party stands for that's conservative is limited government. The rest is just plain leftist.