Bush, Cheney did things ‘their way’
(AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it.
— Winston Churchill
In fact, he wrote 74 books. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney may wind up writing a couple themselves, but the president and the vice president have approval ratings in the high 20s, and neither is known for Churchhillian prose, much less candor and publishers aren’t lining up.
Still, they’ve been busy in recent days trying to put the best spin possible on the last eight years in a series of exit interviews and speeches. Think of Frank Sinatra singing “My Way”: It always was about protecting and promoting freedom, and while mistakes might have been made, if they had it to do over again, they would.
They see an America that has been free of terrorist attacks since 9/11, an America that leads a 90-nation coalition against terrorism, a nation protected by a swifter, more tech-savvy military. They achieved this by restoring the rightful constitutional prerogatives of the president, by cutting taxes to reinvigorate an economy brought to its knees by two wars against terrorists, an economy that has buckled, albeit temporarily, under the strain of trying to provide freedom for too many people at home and abroad.
In the charitable spirit of the season, we will say only that that’s one way to look at it.
“Any regrets?” ABC’s Charles Gibson asked Mr. Bush.
“I don’t know — the biggest regret of all the presidency has to have been the intelligence failure in Iraq. . . . And, you know, that’s not a do-over, but I wish the intelligence had been different, I guess.”
Not a word there about tailoring intelligence to order within the Pentagon. Not a word about ignoring Richard Clarke, the White House anti-terorrism adviser, when he said — three times — that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.
Those pesky intelligence problems have been addressed, Mr. Bush told an audience at the Army War College on Dec. 17. “We’ll leave behind a revamped intelligence community that has new tools for staying one step ahead of our enemies,” he said, citing programs to “interrogate key terrorist leaders” and “monitor terrorist communications around the world.”
Plus, the president said, the U.S. military is now “more mobile and more agile, and better positioned now to deploy to trouble spots around the world.”
Not a word about illegal eavesdropping, torture, Guantanamo, denial of habeas corpus or the fact that the men and materiel of the newly-mobile military are so burned out from six years of fighting in
Afghanistan and Iraq that it will take years to bring them back to full combat readiness.
Nothing there about having ceded the moral high ground, the loss of U.S. prestige overseas or the fact that one of our key allies — Pakistan — may be impeding the fight against al-Qaida and the still-fruitless search for Osama bin Laden.
Appropriately, it was Mr. Cheney who identified the administration’s signal achievement. In an interview with Chris Wallace on (of course) Fox News last Sunday, Mr. Cheney said, “We have exercised, I think, the legitimate authority of the president under Article 2 of the Constitution as commander in chief in order to put in place policies and programs that have successfully defended the nation.”
This means “you’re fully justified in setting up a terror surveillance program” and installing “a robust interrogation program with respect to high-value detainees.”
You can call it “torture”; they call it a “robust interrogation program.” You can call it “warrantless eavesdropping”; they call it “terrorist surveillance.”
The question is what history will call it.
Mr. Bush is fond of the Harry Truman precedent: a president who was deeply unpopular when he left office, but whose reputation has been burnished by history. As Mr. Bush put it, characteristically, in an interview with a reporter for the German newspaper Bild in May 2006: “You never know what your history is going to be until long after you’re gone.”
Bush and Cheney are blind in their own ambition. Cheney appointed himself as VP after being asked to search for one. He saw himself as the real president with GW as a saw dust brained puppet so he could do things undercover. He is a “Rumsfield man” as he said so he was solely responsible for all of the mistakes in the Iraq war. He said we would be greeted as liberators and that “several hundred soldiers needed after overtaking Iraq was way off the mark” was all Cheney’s belief and policies. Cheney was the most powerful force in the “Bush” administration and all Americans were the “fall guys” in blood, money and economically while Cheney fattened his pocket book. Cheney rationalizes everything and has the arrogance of Benito Musolini. Cheney’s character is reflected in his demeanor and his health problems…his crooked side-glancing smile, his heart problems for his conscience eating away at his heart for all the wrong he has done in his political life. The problem is that we, the American people and the people of the world have suffered because of this fiend.
Gosh, imagine that, another hate Bush attack piece from (OF COURSE) the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Here is another view from the UK:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/3965454/George-W-Bush-winning-the-war-on-terror.html
Only three weeks left for you guys to find some new material that is if the PD is still in business.
From posted link–”Director of the Margaret Thatcher Centre for Freedom at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC.”
Real objective source. I was once told that opinions, by their nature, can not be wrong. They can however be stupid and blind…like this one.
These two–Cheney especially–can “spin” and try to re-write history until their little black hearts are content, but facts are facts:
1) Their “bad intel” led us into a costly and unjust war that has cost us BILLIONS of dollars and more importantly the loss of human lives.
2) Their policies dealing with terrorism have been over-reaching and have created MORE hatred towards the US than at any other time in history. Our “bullying” has caused others countries-including some allies–to distrust and lose respect for us.
3) They contributed significantly to the divisions within this country by demonstrating contempt for a) journalists who had the “audacity” to hold them accountable and ask them pertinent questions and b) US citizens who are opposed to their tyranny with respect to the Iraq War and their domestic warrantless wiretaps and other civil liberty violations.
4) They were so consumed with their insane war that they dropped the ball on our economy–and while they personally are not responsible for it, again, their incompetence and apathy towards REAL problems made matters worse. Cheney is a war profiteer and Bush is the dark side of Forrest Gump…intellectually retarded and emotionally stunted (unlike Gump, he lacks decency and the ability to empathize).
In short, they will surely be viewed as one of the worst administrations in history-and their cast of thugs, lackeys, and idealogues are just as hideous: Gonzales, Rumsfeld, Monica Godling, Harriet Miers, ad nauseum.
What a smorgasboard of douchbags all around.
Gosh, imagine that, another hate Bush attack piece from (OF COURSE) the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Here is another view from the UK:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/3965454/George-W-Bush-winning-the-war-on-terror.html
Only three weeks left for you guys to find some new material that is if the PD is still in business.
— A CENTRIST
WOW–you must be part of the 14% that think the country was headed in the right direction under Bush–gosh–I never believed that stat and thought it was too high…but you certainly do embody the worldview behind it.
Why is it that ANY piece that questions Bush’s actions is a “smear?” Could it be that YOU are also an idealogue who doesn’t let facts and overwhelming public opinion color your reasoning?
Crawl back in your spider-hole and keep drinking the Bush Kool-Aid.
Once again the PD steps up and peddles govt misinformation and propaganda. Typical. Bush and Cheney are NWO, CFO, AIPAC and every other negative group. They ruined the United States by design. The last four Presidencies have been for the benefit of the rich in order to completely wipe out the middle class and it’s almost complete. Freedom is a crock of sh$@. There is no freedom fighting from the military/industrial complex. Only a series of enrichment opportunities by killing civilans in far flung parts of the globe. Since Bush and Cheney won’t be tried, convicted and executed as they deserve, we Christians have to hope that there is a hell so they can spend eternity there!
I don’t know what is more insulting, the article itself or the fact the entire editorial staff can’t seem refer to “Mr. Busch” as President Bush and “MR. Cheney” as Vice President Cheney. What would any of you done differently that President Bush after 911? As far as this comment:
“YOU are also an idealogue who doesn’t let facts and overwhelming public opinion color your reasoning” You just described the entire congress.
Happy New Year!!!
Edie, you hit it on the head. Cheney being the sneaky money monger and Bush being the silly little puppet of cheney and his father.
I deeply regret voting for these self-centered elitist, and their bosses - the owners of the federal reserve.
“What a smorgasboard of douchbags all around.”
Is there no end to this unimaginative ax grinding?
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> the president and the vice president have approval ratings in the high 20s
President Bush has done a lousy job in many ways, and a low approval rating is to be expected. But let’s consider the latest numbers from pollingreport.com:
Presidential job approval: 27%
Congress job approval: 20%
Bush is leaving in a few weeks. All the leaders who earned that 20% approval rating will be there for the next two years. Perhaps you could take a few minutes away from scrutinizing Blunt’s emails to figure out why America hates Reid, Pelosi, & Co. even more than Bush.