Clinton Turns on Bush
Posted on 09/18/2005 2:48:44 PM PDT by wallcrawlr
Former US president Bill Clinton sharply criticised George W. Bush for the Iraq War and the handling of Hurricane Katrina, and voiced alarm at the swelling US budget deficit.
Breaking with tradition under which US presidents mute criticisms of their successors, Clinton said the Bush administration had decided to invade Iraq "virtually alone and before UN inspections were completed, with no real urgency, no evidence that there were weapons of mass destruction."
The Iraq war diverted US attention from the war on terrorism "and undermined the support that we might have had," Bush said in an interview with an ABC's "This Week" programme.
Clinton said there had been a "heroic but so far unsuccessful" effort to put together an constitution that would be universally supported in Iraq.
The US strategy of trying to develop the Iraqi military and police so that they can cope without US support "I think is the best strategy. The problem is we may not have, in the short run, enough troops to do that," said Clinton.
On Hurricane Katrina, Clinton faulted the authorities' failure to evacuate New Orleans ahead of the storm's strike on August 29.
People with cars were able to heed the evacuation order, but many of those who were poor, disabled or elderly were left behind.
"If we really wanted to do it right, we would have had lots of buses lined up to take them out," Clinton.
He agreed that some responsibility for this lay with the local and state authorities, but pointed the finger, without naming him, at the former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
FEMA boss Michael Brown quit in response to criticism of his handling of the Katrina disaster. He was viewed as a political appointee with no experience of disaster management or dealing with government officials.
"When James Lee Witt ran FEMA, because he had been both a local official and a federal official, he was always there early, and we always thought about that," Clinton said, referring to FEMA's head during his 1993-2001 presidency.
"But both of us came out of environments with a disproportionate number of poor people."
On the US budget, Clinton warned that the federal deficit may be coming untenable, driven by foreign wars, the post-hurricane recovery programme and tax cuts that benefitted just the richest one percent of the US population, himself included.
"What Americans need to understand is that ... every single day of the year, our government goes into the market and borrows money from other countries to finance Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, and our tax cuts," he said.
"We have never done this before. Never in the history of our republic have we ever financed a conflict, military conflict, by borrowing money from somewhere else."
Clinton added: "We depend on Japan, China, the United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, and Korea primarily to basically loan us money every day of the year to cover my tax cut and these conflicts and Katrina. I don't think it makes any sense."
The are not enamored, they are simply to kind and polite and mindful of history and ... his ability to raise money.
So far I have seen them alluded to, but I have not seen any evidence of federal ineptness.........only waiting to move in because the stupid Governor dropped the ball.
sgtbono obviously didn't listen to the President's speech and hear what he actually said.....
Also RE: People magazine . . . didn't they also cover Ben and Jen, Jen and whoever, and Renee' Zellweiger and Clint Black, who were married just FOUR MONTHS AGO and are now getting an anullment for "fraud"?
IOW, I don't think People covering it means it's a "marriage"!
:-)
Most politicians get along with each other when out of the building, they pretty much all party together after hours. A lot of posturing and hot air floats around the congress, each pol trying to keep his/her constituents happy and a nice size paycheck paid by US citizens filling his/her bank account. Don't forget that nice pension plan too. The old saw applies = Believe nothing that you hear, and only half of what you see............. ;)
GWB has the philosophy of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer. He should nominate Clinton to be Ambassador to Iraq. The Dims are getting frantic and Hillary is proding BJ Clinton to start trashing everything Republican and fabricating a stellar performance of his second term by hiding the giving pardons to terrorists from Puerto Rica, his criminal brother and assorted other crooks and criminals. The Republican Party should start hammering away on his crooked politics NOW.
Clinton Turns on Bush
Obviously any well-informed, self-respecting Freeper knows better than to believe the Clinton publicity machine. :)
The "sheeple" may be another story... we'll find out in 2008.
The least thing W needs is advice from Bill Clinton. W gets it...
In reference to your last post, it wouldn't be the first time someone jumped on the lame-stream media's Bush-bashing bandwagon rather than read/hear the words from the speech. Same goes with the speech from New Orleans last Thursday. Some DUmmies hear what they want and ignore the rest.
What a great series of photos for a Caption this Photo thread!
1st) "I was sitting in the Oval Office talking on the phone about boring stuff, like troop movements. I needed a diversion."
2nd)"In walked that woman, miss lewenski"
3rd) "her head was right about..."
4th) "I was excited, like this."
Yes, 2008 could be bad. But, IMHO of course, the things President Bush is doing will have long-lasting very positive results in our country and around the world. I hate to think of his time as President coming to an end, because it would be hard for ANYONE to achieve what he has, but like I said, his accomplishments will be with us for a long time.
How can you say GW is unimpressive?!
Just think of all that he has gone through and tell us that you could still be holding up!
Could you have stood - just 6 mos. after being elected - Before you had time to find your way around the Washington politics and who your allies are, getting hit with 9/11?
Then soon after and until now, the big compny scandals, the fall of Enron, the repercussions from all those people who lost their jobs from these companies, the war, the missing WMDs, the Isreal- Palestinian talks, Iran, No. Korea threats, the forest fires in California, and now the hurricanes. That is part of what GWB has gone through!
And between all that were the personal attacks on him and his family and the media daily questioning (trashing) him on every decision he made/makes.
Plus running in a campaign against an opponent who lied about George and his military record, while trying to look calm, collected, and inspiring.
And now there is going to begin the attacks against his choices for The Supreme Court nominations.
It is only God's grace that GWB is still hanging in there! He is himself a war hero and a true gentleman to not reciprocate to these low attacks!
Clinton should be head of the UN right after it moves from NYC to Tikrit. If theres a vote, I am all for it.
I haven't either, and yet even on Fox, you keep hearing that the Federal response was 'slow.' I'm getting pretty sick of it, because, unless I've missed something big, there's no evidence that it was.
There was no need to fire Brown, but I think that has more to do with his honesty regarding his resume than with anything on the part of the disaster aftermath of Katrina.
I had the thought that Brown got moved to get him out of the line of fire. He was clearly the scapegoat, and being ruthlessly attacked by the left.
As for his resume, I haven't seen verification that he falsified it since the original (Time?) accusation. Has anything been proven, or was it just another leftist media lie?
Cinton's criticisms were preceeded by another presidential embarrassment Jimmy Peanut Carter.
Oh, how she would love the sympathy vote. It would also give her the opportunity to say "I don't want to talk about my dear departed. It's too painful."
Thanks, that helps me keep things in perspective a little better. I was starting to get pretty discouraged. He's got the toughest job on the planet and very few reprieves, it's been one thing after another.
Did it ever occur to you that the entire base is not your brand of conservatism.
That would be great, but how could it be done? Any ideas?
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