Bush and Kennedy - friends at last

President Bush had had enough. His last chance at another legacy legislative achievement, immigration reform, was in peril, and from his own people, conservative Republicans. He wasn't going to take it any more. At a training school for border agents, the president ripped into his own people for opposing his bill. Bush did so indirectly, so a guided tour through the speech may be in order.

The opponents, he said, "haven't read the bill," a polite way of saying their ignorant.

They call it an amnesty bill. "That's empty political rhetoric, trying to frighten our fellow citizens." And they lie.

They "need the courage to go back to their districts" and fully explain the bill and then they need "the courage necessary" to enact it. They're more than likely cowards as well.

OK, vote against it then "if you don't want to do what's right for America." They want al Qaeda to win.

He accused opponents of immigration reform of using distortion and scare tactics "to frighten our citizens." That's exactly what the Democrats accused Bush of doing in 2004 and 2006 but, hey, it worked for him then and it might work for him now.

Just as the campaign used to do, after Bush accused his opponents of being unpatriotic and un-American, a senior official approached reporters to say, "In no way was he questioning anyone's patriotism or desire to do what's right."

To paraphrase an old expression, who are you going to believe? Me or your lying ears? After all, it's not President Bush's fault if the opponents of this measure are ignorant, selfish and dishonest, even if they are members of his own party and were once his most fervent supporters.

You can't blame Bush for wondering about his choice of friends. Take some of the landmarks of his presidency.

The Republicans never got around to making his tax cuts permanent when they had control of Congress and now the Democrats aren't going to.

The Republicans are wavering on the Iraq war and 11 of them came down to the White House to tell him so. "Cut and run" is beginning to sound like a sensible strategy, maybe, rather than something to pound the Democrats with.

The No Child Left Behind Act is up for renewal and suddenly the president's party is sounding like Republicans of old, grumbling about the federalization of a state responsibility and saddling the states with costly and cumbersome mandates.

So who is on the president's side? On immigration, it's that arch liberal that GOP conservatives love to hate, Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass.

Kennedy sprang to the president's defense on immigration - "the president is right" - and spoke out against "bumper sticker slogans that aim to divide us further."

There you have it, fellow Americans, George Bush and Ted Kennedy, uniters not dividers.

In an especially unkind cut from the president's own side, Newt Gingrich, the architect of the "Republican Revolution" before that became a term of derision, said the Republican Party was in collapse because Bush political adviser Karl Rove, and, by extension, the president himself, had run a "maniacally dumb" campaign in 2006.

Gingrich said this in an interview with The New Yorker, not generally thought of as a Republican house organ, in which he also suggested that to win the White House the Republican candidate will have to run against Bush.

Thus, the most interesting contest of the campaign may be President Bush versus his fellow Republicans. Don't worry, Mr. President. Ted will always be there for you.

Bush ain’t really changed. After all, he started his presidency by doubling the size of the Dept of Education. What’s changed is that conservatives have stopped fooling themselves and inventing reasons to make it acceptable for Bush to act like a liberal.

I woke up when I saw him immediately freeze the Pentagon's request increases for the defense budget in 2001...stalling those necessary increases ...which if he was acting in good faith, to make good on his campaign promises, he would have made a serious effort to fund. Then after the fictitious "review" that he has Rumsfeld do to stall things...he provided a late, and merely inflation-compensatory "increase" in the budget... No cure for the decade-long Defense Holiday, and Xlinton balanced-budget-on-the-back of American military readiness, capability and strategic preparedness. Instead he continued on down that path.

And yet he managed to convey the impression he was backing our military, with some snappy photo ops, and his withdrawal from the ABM treaty...which implied he was deploying a real NMD. Which in fact, he wasn't about to. He had already promised Russia and the CHi-Coms he wouldn't. "Limited" NMD is all he actually promised. Limited to useslessness. To wit: He actually is using the Xlinton architecture. And he never did undo the Xlinton-damage to the Aegis missile system...which lamed it up, producing a smaller, slower and lower-ceiling third stage. He persistently refused Navy requests to fix the damage.

And the very day after he withdrew from the ABM, he had his just-appointed Deputy Sec. of DOD, Gordon Englund CANCEL the Navy Theater Missile Defense missile program...on cost grounds. Note: That missile would have helped plug the gap caused by the Xlinton missile lobotomies. And Those grounds were manifestly feeble...because they didn't address the Navy's pinpointing a BATTLE REQUIREMENT FOR THE SYSTEM'S CAPABILITIES. Guess what hasn't been replaced by an alternate system, or competing design, or anything of the sort since the TMD was canceled for "cost inflation" grounds. You got it. No TMD replacement in 6 full years of dithering. Nothing. Nada. And the Navy patiently has reminded el Presidente that it is NEEDED. The Aegis can't stop the threats as currently lobotomized.

This should tell everyone all they really need to know about this Administration's seriousness on Defense.

I would add as an additional caveat that confusing people on his defense committment is "The War On Terror" which is something W only begrudgingly pursued (note how lame he has been with NK, Iran, and Syria) which he has tried to do on the cheap...and quite likely for ulterior motives than pure national interest. Meanwhile, the logistics and force capabilities that make this kind of campaign possible...he has shortchanged. He has slashed the Navy down to 276 ships...and the Bush budgets indicate that he will take us down to 210 ships at the current rate.

And he has cancelled production of the Globemaster III, the transport plane ordered by Reagan and Weinberger...200 planes short of what we need...and with all the currently-deployed logisitics planes being maxed-out, and over-used and wearing out.

No reversals are in sight of this unilateralist "peacenik" megalomaniac.

Note the following most-recent commentary from Accuracy In Media on Bush:

President Bush's New World Order Legacy
AIM REPORT
By Cliff Kincaid | June 1, 2007
With this speech, Bush has capitulated to the alarmists who blame man-made greenhouse gases for perceived changes in climate.
With his record of defending American borders and national sovereignty in ruins, President Bush has decided to conclude his second term in office by making common cause with those who think America's future lies in appeasing the "international community." He apparently wants his "legacy" to be that he cared for the rest of the world. Watch your wallets―and your freedom.
The latest phase of this "legacy building" campaign began with a plea on Wednesday for more money to fight AIDS. This provided a photo opportunity for the President to pose with a black child. So far, about $200 billion has been spent by the federal government on AIDS, without any cure or vaccine being developed. But it looks "compassionate" to throw money at the problem. Tens of billions are now being spent, some of it provided by agreements brokered through Bill Clinton's foundation, to fight AIDS with potentially toxic and lethal drugs.
On the eve of the G-8 meeting of major industrialized nations in Germany, Bush gave a global warming speech on Thursday at an event hosted by the U.S. Global Leadership Campaign. This is a coalition of business and non-government organizations that includes the pro-world government Citizens for Global Solutions, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Ted Turner's U.N. Foundation, Planned Parenthood, the American Friends Service Committee, the Alliance for a Global Community, and the United Nations Association.
It looks like Bush is abandoning what's left of his conservative base before they abandon him.
Bush told the group, "This is a fine organization and it's an important organization. It's rallying businesses and non-governmental organizations and faith-based and community and civic organizations across our country to advance a noble cause, ensuring that the United States leads the world in spreading hope and opportunity."
Another part of this "legacy building" is his decision to seek ratification of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), a dangerous document that transfers control of the oceans and much of the land area of the world as well to a U.N. bureaucracy. It finances its activities with a global tax. The pact is endorsed by some of the same groups and individuals involved in the Global Leadership Campaign.
UNCLOS charges American corporations a "fee" for exploiting ocean resources for the benefit of America and threatens these same corporations with global climate change litigation before an international court if they "pollute" the oceans from anywhere on the face of the earth.
U.S. Navy support for UNCLOS masks the sharp decline in U.S. Naval forces. The number of U.S. ships has declined under Bush to 276, from a high of 594 under President Reagan, who rejected UNCLOS. The Bush budget projects their further decline to 210. The American Shipbuilding Association says that, if present trends continue, the U.S. Naval Fleet will decline to 180 ships by 2024.
Those who haven't been paying attention think that Bush's policy for the last six years has been "unilateralist" and anti-U.N. He did keep us out of the global warming and International Criminal Court treaties. He also withdrew the U.S. from the ABM treaty so the nation could pursue national missile defense. But generally speaking, he has been pouring huge amounts of money into the U.N. and associated institutions. Office of Management and Budget figures show that U.S. financial contributions to the U.N. System under Bush have gone from $3.1 billion in fiscal year 2001 to $5.3 billion in fiscal year 2005.
The office of Senator Tom Coburn, who requested and released the information, commented in a press release that "According to the report, in 2005, the United States gave $5.3 billion to the U.N—a 30% increase from 2004 funding level of $4.1 billion. Almost every Department of the U.S. government plus several independent agencies fund the U.N. Although the U.N. does not track this information or at least does not make such information public, most experts say the total U.N. budget is between $15-20 billion. The U.S. funded portion is between 25% and 30%."
But that's not good enough for the Global Leadership Campaign. It thinks too little has been spent on international affairs.
In his speech to the group, Bush seemed to be proposing another and much-tougher global warming treaty. "By the end of next year, America and other nations will set a long-term global goal for reducing greenhouse gases," he said. "To help develop this goal, the United States will convene a series of meetings of nations that produce most greenhouse gas emissions, including nations with rapidly growing economies like India and China." He said each nation would develop a "national target" of reducing greenhouse gases.
With this speech, Bush has capitulated to the alarmists who blame man-made greenhouse gases for perceived changes in climate.
In the past, at the G-8 meetings, the Bush Administration has been opposed to measures by France and Britain to endorse global taxation schemes. One of them, an international tax on airline travel, was sold as a "solidarity contribution" to fight AIDS. A new bureaucracy, UNITAID, has been created to receive and spend the global tax revenue.
The U.N. has been pushing a global tax to fight global warming that amounts to a 35-cents-per-gallon gasoline tax hike.
This time, it can be anticipated that Bush Administration opposition to global taxes will completely collapse. After all, the White House has already endorsed a global tax scheme through the Law of the Sea Treaty.
All of this opens the door for Congress to promote and pass a carbon tax of some kind, perhaps as part of the new global warming treaty that Bush apparently envisions. It will be difficult for Bush to resist such a tax, in light of his recent rhetoric on the subject.
Bush is putting in place the New World Order his father talked about.
__________________________________________________________________
Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report and can be reached at cliff.kincaid@aim.org

“Fratboys from elite wealthy families have a lot in common.”

I got baned for writing the same thing about three years ago under the name “THE AMERICAN MAN”

ON 01/05/2007 — reincarnated as “siznartuf” — I got baned for writing this, as follows:

Key words: El President Bush

Unfortunately, our leaders, whom we have untrusted with power — who swore to “preserve and protect the Constitution” — have betrayed their Country.

Our leaders serve not “The People”(as embodied in the constitution) but rather the Royal’s, the elite — whom serve only themselves.

Now I understand that “The people” is a somewhat nebulous term, but even so, they (the leaders referred to above) should at the least try to do what’s best for the Country as a whole; whilst keeping in mind the parameter’s of the Constitution, they have — at least putatively — sworn to uphold.

One can only conclude(as I have said in other posts)that either:

(1) They are simply unfit for office(incompetent to be kind).

(2) They are corrupt.

(3) They are traitors.

More and more the evidence points to conclusions two or three.

END POST

I saw the writing on the wall but got baned for pointing it out.

Four years ago — after WAKING UP! — I distained Bush for being the traitor that he is.

I don’t hate Bush for being Bush. He never met an Illegal immigrant that he did not love more than a legal American citizen.

As much as I am adverse to liberals, at least they are true to their own strange ideology.

... And who or what is Bush “true” to?

I have more respect for an enemy that is true to his own; than one who is a traitor to his country... A pox on his house!

Go ahead, quislings, make my day!

THE AMERICAN MAN!

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