AP: (President) Bush Says Americans Expect Bipartisanship

AP via Yahoo ^ | 11/6/04 | AP - Washington

[NormsRevenge]

WASHINGTON - President Bush (news - web sites) is striking twin themes for a second term, vowing to fight hard for his political agenda while reaching across the aisle to Democrats.

"Americans are expecting bipartisan effort and results," Bush said Saturday in his weekly radio address. "My administration will work with both parties in Congress to achieve those results, and to meet the responsibility we share."

Offering some words of conciliation, he said Republicans and Democrats can agree to aggressively pursue the war on terror, with every citizen having a stake in the outcome.

The challenge to working together, Bush suggested, will come on the domestic front.

"We must confront the junk and frivolous lawsuits that are driving up the cost of health care and hurting doctors and patients," he said. "We must continue to work on education reform to bring high standards and accountability, not just to elementary schools, but to the high schools as well."

Democrats challenge Republican claims that frivolous lawsuits are on the rise and have successfully blocked reforms in Congress. Doctors say ballooning malpractice insurance rates are a problem nationwide, and physicians have staged protests or walkouts in several states.

Lawsuit reform was a major issue in the presidential campaign, with Bush bringing it up daily in his speeches, focusing on the fact that Kerry running mate John Edwards (news - web sites) was a trial lawyer who sued doctors.

Bush's proposed education reforms may meet the same criticism that he faced in his first term with the No Child Left Behind Act: a good idea that was insufficiently funded by the administration and Congress.

The president stressed another issue with skepticism at home and abroad, promoting freedom and democracy in the Middle East. Those goals are "the alternatives to tyranny and terror," he said.

Bush also promised to take on the special interest-clogged issue of reforming the tax code, a step he said the nation must take to get rid of needless paperwork and to make the economy more competitive.

He also committed his administration in its second term to altering the Social Security (news - web sites) system, which he has said must be addressed by allowing taxpayers to invest part of their Social Security contributions in private accounts if they wish.

[NormsRevenge]

President Bush (news - web sites) makes remarks at the Union Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church, in this Jan. 15, 2004 file photo in New Orleans. The United States is emerging from the 2004 presidential election with two very different portraits of itself sketched by two very different halves of its population. George Bush (news - web sites)'s voters go to church more often than John Kerry (news - web sites)'s and are more likely to oppose gay marriage and abortion. They are more likely to own guns and to feel better-off financially than they did four years ago. The profiles of Bush and Kerry voters were drawn in part from Associated Press exit polls of voters as they left polling places (AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson/ File)

[cripplecreek]

We expect bipartisanship but we also expect the majority to make itself known.

[anniegetyourgun]

We are bipartisans.

Bi - as in two of us - Bush and Cheney

Part - as in it's all our part

I - as in I

sans - We get it done without you

[BenLurkin]

If this means that the democrat hacks in Congress will join America in dismantling big government then sure, I'm all in faovr of that kind of bipartisanship.

[ml1954]

Gotta get try to get those extra 5 votes in the Senate somehow.

[cynicom]

Bi-partisanship????? Does Bush think we are idiots???? He asked for a second term and a republican congress, we gave him both, now we expect results, no whining and sniveling about the nasty democrats.

Perhaps Bush needs a little training from the likes of LBJ who knew how to keep the troops in order.

Bush gave us Specter, now he can live with him, dont expect democrats to pass your legislation.

[goldstategop]

President Bush's definition of "bipartisanship" is NOT surrendering to the Democrats. Its asking them to cooperate in implementing the President's agenda. When they obstruct, they'll be painted obstructionists. Hey, if they want to get Daschled in 2006, that's their affair.

[NormsRevenge]

I hear ya.

Just look to California if you want to see how far bipartisanship gets ya when you are dealing with entrenched socialism and then try coddling up to them.

[Bonaparte]

Exactly. We've got to get a 60-vote majority by January of 2007. Otherwise, we can forget about the judicial appointments -- the democrats will continue their scorched earth filibuster. They have no objection to an empty federal bench and a 10-year wait to get a case heard.

[pierrem15]

Not to worry-- what Bush means by "bipartisanship" is that he and the newly enlarged Rebublican majorities will bend the dems over and shove enough of the President's programs into them that they finally explode.

[NormsRevenge]

We can ill afford to keep playing this nice nice game and sticking obstructionist labels in the hope that someday the goods will get delivered.

Let's just do a 'Berlin airlift' and drop the goodies behind the enemy lines and get on with running this country with a mandate for doing the right thing, instead of worrying about all the whining obstructive idiots who have riddled this nation with their socialistic tendencies and, in so doing, are bankrupting us.

[cynicom]

Bush had a majority before the election...Frist was his man, what did we get, some squirt socialist from SD sidetracked Bush and congress. Something is wrong.

Daschle is gone, now what excuse will Frist have for doing NOTHING.

[dalereed]

Love not war was always a socialist chant.

Stick love where it will be burried for good and get on with the war.

Call a bastard and bastard and shove the be nice crap!