GWB

Off Topic
1

Bush’s last adress proved what I already feared all along.

Bush is an idiot. No - I don’t give a fuck how many Master’s you have from Yale, Harvard, what have you, I don’t care how much experience as a governor you have, or how good of a business man you are.

He’s an idiot.

His priorities are weird at the very least. Believe me, we have more serious and urgent metters right now than the moon. Besides, as John Stewart put it, he’s an ideas president. I don’t want an ideas President, I have a good imagination of my own thank you very much.

Some of his proposals - who am I kidding, MOST of his proposals are dumbfounding, astonishing, especially in the contest of TODAY.

Get this dummy out of the chair and send in Wesley Clarke is all I have to say.

I dont care to start an argument and I wont be here to argue my position. I’m not interested in doing so. I just had to release my thoughts.

2

You sure are a wishy-washy faithless bastard. I bet you jump on every fad diet that comes along too. Unfortunately there are a lot of Americans like yourself who can’t see beyond “what’s for lunch TODAY.”

3

I haven’t visited here in quite a few months, so forgive me if this is a stupid question.
Are you the same diesel that was going to become a marine so you could fight in Iraq?

4

vredstein, you have it wrong.

First it was an airman, then the marines, then a personal trainer, then an actor and now he is obviously a political correspondant.

5

“feared all along”

Whatever dude, you were ultra pro-Bush when you were getting ready for boot camp.

It’s ok to change your opinion about someone or even an entire administration, but please don’t sit there and state that you always “feared” GWB was an idiot.

6

The State of the Union address was a big flop, by many accounts. Bush spent most of the time defending his actions in Iraq and talking about foreign policy in a “defense” mode.

Since when is banning steroids in pro sports a priority issue for America? WTF?

Bush came off like a 12 year old giving a social studies report to a room full of grown ups, half of whom were his relatives so they clapped.

No mention of Osama Bin Laden. No mention of a plan for post-war Iraq. No mention of preventing jobs from going overseas. At least he had the good sense not to mention his plan to send missions to Mars. WTF!!!

7

And no mention of terminating the Lumpster!

8

Lumpy, a “defense” mode? I would hope so, since that seems to be the major thing people are criticizing him for (U.S. actions in Iraq). It’s like your year-end review at work. If everybody you worked with said that you were the one leaving the porn in the copier, I would assume you would want to vindicate (or at least try to) yourself.

Also, considering that our nation is still essentially at war, I would assume the combat situation in which Americans are dying would receive more attention than the shitty economy.

I agree that the steroid thing really didn’t deserve to be there, but that was definitely just posturing. There are unfortunately a lot of Americans that feel steroids in sports and with our youth is a serious issue. He was just playing up to that, as this is his first real re-election speech.

The speech was not a great one by any stretch of the imagination, but your account of it reeks of a bias that you held coming into the speech. You imply that you are not a big fan of the media, yet you put your own spin on the issues here. While that’s your right, I hope you see how similar you are to the ones you are criticizing.

9

“He was just playing up to that, as this is his first real re-election speech.”

It’s not a re-election speech, it’s a State of the Union speech. It’s the most important speech the president gives.

The fact that it came off like electioneering is dissapointing. And I stand by my comment that the prez came off being defensive about his actions… seemed like a lot of 'splaining was done, and attempting to justify the last year.

Forget about my bias, I heard that it didn’t score any points with “average” Americans as being inspirational or visionary or unifying or any of the things someone might hope a speech of this nature could be.

But maybe I heard wrong, because it seems like some of you guys think there was something special there.

(You really think the average American cares -or even knows- that players use steroids in the NFL? Enough to include it in a major speech? )

10

Watching diesel grow into each new stage of his life is one of the most entertaining things this board has to offer.

Lumpy, is there any thing that the President could have said that you wouldn’t have made you responded negatively?

Sometimes the hardliners of this site need to ease up on their own propaganda machines.

11

Hey, it wasn’t a shot at diesel. I’m glad he changed is mind. I’d hate to watch The News Hour with Jim Leiher and see diesel’s name in the roll call for dead soldiers. Many of us, including me, got caught up in war fever to some extent.

Everybody has the right to change their minds. If they change their minds based on intelligent information, they’re far better off than people who stubbornly hold on to old, false beliefs.

12

Anderson
Yes there was a whole lot of things that the president “could” have said that I would have applauded.

For example, that he had reconsidered giving a tax break for anybody making a million dollars a year or more, because we are in a time of war. In fact this is the only war where a president has also cut taxes, to my knowledge.

He could have said that he was going to clamp down on runaway spending. The president has not vetoed a single spending bill yet, which is a first in our history. Discretionary spending is up, “pork” spending has quadrupled.

He could have said that he would try to fulfill his campaign promise to be a “uniter and not a divider”. Instead, the president uses his slim advantage with a Republican-controlled Congress, to ram-rod through a radical right wing agenda. The president and congress do not attempt to find middle ground, instead they try to “pick off” a few stray Democrats which is all they need to accomplish their claim of “bi-partisanship”. A perfect example is the judicial nominees that Bush is trying to appoint. Democrats do not want extremist judges appointed, they want centrists. Instead of trying to find mutually agreeable choices, the Republicans are trying to ramrod their appointees through. Bottom line is that because republicans control the White House AND Congress there are no more “checks and balances” that our system needs to work fairly. Democrats have controlled congress before but usually work in a true bipartisan spirit, and not strictly along party lines as we see now with the Republicans.

Bush could have said a whole bunch of other things, but I will leave it at that.

One thing I DID like is having a re-orientation program for convicts leaving prison. These people need to have some assistance returning to society, in order to avoid going back to a criminal life. It’s good for us as a society (cuts down on recidivism) and more than that it is the right thing to do.

My question is “where are we going to get the money to pay for all of this?” Are we just going to add it to the federal debt we are racking up? It seems like the president is just promising the world in order to get re-elected. (giving tax cuts during a time of war, as well as allowing runaway spending).

Why can’t the president ask the American people to actually DO something, tighten their belts a little, like the wealthiest Americans sacrifice their tax break, in order to fund the war and reduce the deficit? I think he is just trying to buy votes with taxpayers, at the expense of long-term common sense goals.

The sad thing is that I think buying votes with tax breaks is going to work for Bush, because Americans love to think they can get something for nothing.

13

WEll, and I know this will be biases and some people will hate me for it, but did anyone watch the Daily Show with John Stewart when they interviewed McCain and talked about the State of the Union Address?? If you missed it some interesting points were brought up, we’ll start off with GWB’s speech 3 years ago when he said that we would have a “small and shortlived deficit” or something to the like, cut to 2 years later and the deficit is colossal and will probable be around 5 years from now. Then there was McCain, I thought his commetns were damn funny… “this administration has crazier ideas than a drunken sailor, and I haven’t known a sailor drunk or sober with an imagination like that”, or close to that. Just something to think about when a well known republican is willing criticize the current administration.

14

I love when people make blanket statements and never support them. “Most of his policies…”
Care to name any?

WTF, why am I debating a guy, who as a Trainer to the Stars, once came up with the earth shattering theory of, hold on to your hats, eating some meat and eggs before a workout. Then argued with CT and just about everyone else that his theory of doing high reps when dieting, while not backed by science, was, of course correct.

15

“Bush came off like a 12 year old giving a social studies report to a room full of grown ups.”

You do know he was addressing congress right? The ability to speak at the level of you audience is very underrated these days!

16

Make up your freaking mind, diesel.

And if you’re for Wesley Clark, then you’ve really lost it. Just read what those who have worked closely with him say. The guy’s a fruitcake, and even worse than that “Primal Scream” retard Dean.

Pull your head out of your ass, buddy.

And get to Iraq like you promised us you were going to…

17

I will concede, the steroids remark was asinine, in my opinion.

18

Lumpy said, “Democrats have controlled congress before but usually work in a true bipartisan spirit, and not strictly along party lines as we see now with the Republicans.”

And the credibility of your argument just left the building.

Lumpy there is not a single thing that he could have said that you wouldn’t have put a negative spin on. You are a hardliner liberal who has lost perspective outside of your agenda, end of story. He could have read your very post as a State of the Union and you would write something negative.

I don’t agree with everything he said in his speech and I don’t agree with everything he has done this year. I am, however, calling it like I see it; you have lost perspective and are fully consumed by the liberal propaganda machine.

Your homework is to find one nice thing to say about the President and post it on this board. If you can’t say one nice thing, you are fully consumed by the hate machine.

19

I already said that Bush’s anti-rscidivism program for convicts is a good idea. Maybe you don’t read my posts, or maybe you don’t know what recidivism is.

Let me ask you then.

Why did John McCain say that Congress is spending like a “drunken sailor”? Why hasn’t the president vetoed a single spending bill? Why has “pork” spending quadrupled under Bush?

I thought Repugs prided themselves on fiscal conservatism. What the hell happened?

Didn’t the GOP shut down the Federal government during Clinton’t term because they insisted on balancing the budget? Clinton DID balance the budget. So what happened to Repug “principles” regarding spending? Less than 10 years later they have done the biggest flip-flop of all time, on the deficit issue. A 180 degree turnaround on a little trivial issue like fiscal reponsibilty and the size of the government? I thought those were CORE Republican values.

What we have now is a government dominated by the fiscally irresponsible and the socially intolerant. That is a shitty combination, in my opinion.

Now instead of talking about ME, how about addressing some of the legitimate points I made in the 3 posts in this thread… FACTS PLEASE.

20

Actually I don’t know what recidivism is and I’m not too proud to learn something new, do you care to explain it to me?

I don’t object to the issues you brought up, they are good ones to discuss. I object to the politics as usual attitude that you post with; it is the same outlandish rhetoric that politicians, on both sides of the aisle, use on the public all the time. That’s what I’m calling you on. The picture of Bush you posted and saying that Democrats always worked with Republicans are just two examples of your Democrat Propaganda Machine humming along. Maybe it is sub conscience and you don’t even know you do it?

Politics is the only profession where the more outrageous a half-truth can be spinned to smear someone, the better. It’s ridiculous. Perfect example, Nancy Pawlowski, after the tech market crash and the loss of jobs, particularly in California, blames the state of the economy on the president. Uh, Nancy, Silicon Valley was filled with companies that didn’t make any money, that’s why the market crashed and that’s why there is unemployment. And what’s sad, is she knows this, she’s a smart person, but in the politics as usual blame game, any excuse to take a shot at the opposition, in this case, President Bush who despite having nothing to do with the fall of the NASDAQ, is her target for the political smear game.

In any other profession people would be held libel for saying things that aren’t true, or at least lose credibility. Can you imagine if the rest of our society conducted business the same way politicians do?

You said Democrats worked in a true bipartisan spirit? Come on, do you believe that? Both sides have played politics for decades. You gave great examples of Republicans playing politics and shutting down the congress yet increasing spending now. Now dig deep and find examples of Democrats playing politics as well. Come on, I bet if you dig deep into history you might be able to find one example where it just might have happened. You might even find more than one!

My point is that until both sides realize their shit stinks, as a nation we are going to collapse under the weight of our own bullshit. So let’s make some progress right here, one post at a time, and drop the politics as usual attitude and the spin game rhetoric and propaganda machine.