Posted on 11/20/2008 1:40:22 PM PST by jmikes20
Over the last 8 years, did George W. Bush help or hurt our party? We did see 2 electoral wins, and the first majority win since his dad trounced Dukakis. He helped keep a Democrat out of the White House for 8 years, and stave off out and out John Kerry liberalism, who is probably more liberal than Barack Hussein Obama. however, we got trounced pretty badly on November 4, all across the board, even in Governor's mansions, where Dems managed to do well in 2002. The Dems ranks grew over the '90's, going from 43% of the vote steadily up to 52% of the vote now. He kept us from losing Appalachia, which was starting to go for Clinton stronger than his predecessors. (With the matter of Ross Perot, while most agree he took from conservatives, I'm starting to believe Clinton might still have won 1992, given Bush I's poor approvals in 1992, and if enough Perot voters would have stayed home without him, Bush would still have lost. Clinton did solidify CA, IL, MI, NJ, CT, VT, ME, DE, and PA securely into the Democrat column, even after Perot was gone. Perot was also an abortionist, anti-family, and protectionist, but none the less, may have took from our demographics). Will conservatism survive, now that the brand his been so tarnished by incompetence? Will people see the achievements once the Messiah Hussein sees Iraq succeed, and us come back? One thing President Bush did was to put marriage on the table, which may well be the death knell for the Dems if Prop 8 managed to pass in the most liberal Democrat of Democrat states, California. Bush also kept Texas from even reverting Dem, as Gore, Kerry, and Obama won fewer counties there than Clinton, who won some in northern Texas. Do you think George Bush will have helped our party, or hurt it?
One of the worst Presidents ever, turned the GOP into a minority party, possibly for years to come.
It all depends on one thing - if we get attacked again under a Democrat Administration.
It's not writing in paragraphs that kills off political parties!
Just ask the Federalists and the Whigs!
Bush won by appealing to that 50% of the population that was disposed to vote for him.
He wasn't active or imaginative enough to try to build on his support. He thought if we just kept on pushing the same buttons we'd go on winning.
Some of those were very good and important buttons, but politics is an active sport. You can't just sit on a majority and expect to win every time.
In general, he didn't risk much. He didn't even risk vetoing bloated appropriations bills.
Bush had his good qualities and some fine principles, but when the country needed leadership on some issues he was a status quo president and didn't even aspire to be much more than that.
Yeah. “Compared to what?” is always a good question to ask. WE don’t know what the media and the Dims would have done to another president or how another president would have reacted to the Dim willingness to hold the country’s safety and security hostage to their agenda.
I don’t know what happened with W. But I know he’s a good guy. So it could be that the War on Terror just sucked up so much time and energy that he couldn’t do much else.
I mean, think about it: Would anybody give a crap about any of the issues that today seem so important— if 911s were happening once a year?
Of course not. It’s only because we believe we’re safe— that we can go around complaining about what we complain about.
He is a liberal BUSH ,,,,,,,,,,
I’m starting to think the only reason he ran was the allay his father’s loss in 1992, which I’m beginning to think less and less was Ross Perot’s doing, and I listed why above. all those states I said Clinton solidified went GOP in the elections before him, Perot or not, not to mention Perot wasn’t really one of us. Bush would have needed too many of his votes to get to 50% anyway. Bush Sr. wrecked us in the first place by not controlling spending with his Congresses or bringing marriage or immigration around in the first place, where we could have gotten willie. Willie was the most pro-gay candidate ever, before Hussein, who actually mentioned them in his acceptance speech. Bush Sr. made people stop believing in Reagan. He was no Reagan. he merely served him because Ford wouldn’t do as VP, and Bush had machine and connections to get on the ticket.
What’s a GOP?
Horrendous. The President is the de facto leader of his party. The last 8 years have seen a free-fall of Republican principles and ideals. If only he had stood against big government like he did against terrorism we might be a little better off.
He lanced the boil of the Middle East before it became terminal. Clinton took on nothing big and coasted to nice approval ratings based on the republican Congress that actually walked some of the conservative talk.
Bush? He inherits a housing bubble and loose money not of his making that was a disaster waiting to happen. Concurrently he had to wage war against jihadism with the headwinds of a fickle populace, a disgraceful media and the two faced scumbags on the left who were for the war before they were against it.
So where does that leave Bush? It leaves him abandoning fiscal sanity in an attempt to gather the votes required to put some steel in Congress' backbone while not having enough juice or communication skills to ram through some restraints on Fanny and Freddy that could have mitigated the current crisis in financial markets.
Washington DC is a cesspool.
The World Trade Center bombings happened in 1993.
Clinton was pres. from 1993 to 2001.
So, that flaming a$$h###, Clinton did the same thing.
Bush didn't do squat to protect us. He just lucked out.
He’s way better than Gore or Kerry. Of course, I would have taken Gore or Kerry over Obama.
Given the choises we had, I can not regret that I voted for W. His tax cuts were a positive and he did understand that national strenth equates to national security. His 2 choices for the Supreme Court were excellent (with only a little goading).
Do I disagree with him on other things? You betcha. But it very well could have been worse.
I would suggest that the congresscritters have to account for most of the blame. The Republicans in the House and Senate showed remarkable little spine during President Bush's administration. A pretty fair number of them got indicted too.
When you review the records, President Bush pretty much got everything he wanted usually without congressonal help and with a great deal of dim pissing and moaning.
Daddy Bush countered all of Reagans policies, Bubba destroyed the militia groups & GW bankrupted us all the while they pushed us toward One World Government. A pox on all 3 schmucks.
idk if this matters, but the deficit did go down in 1993-1994, when the Dems still ran Congress with Clinton. Nonetheless, spending cuts, not just tax hikes helped with the surplus. a President DOES have to help with Congress and political business. Clinton did manage to help increase Dems in the electoral college big time, which further shows why we hated him so. The Dems gained seats in 1996, 1998 even with Monica, and in 2000. With Bush, we lost more seats in 2006 and 2008 than the Dems in 1994 combined. We’ve been cursed with poor leaders. Newt fucked us over big time after such gains, and Bush let us become a southern party only. Bush could have worked fiscal sanity, but not signing so much pork.
Definitely hurt us. There were so many things that he’s done that go against our base.
“Did that iceberg help the Titanic or hurt the Titanic?”
Katrina sunk the Titanic(in this sense.) letting it get that bad really killed our image all over. He had 50%+ approvals until that happened. Conservatives are supposed to be prepared. Bush wasn’t.
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