Bush & Cheney's 31 "Greatest Accomplishments"

Bush/Cheney's 31"Greatest Accomplishments"



VOTE THEM OUT!

The Bush/Cheney administration has moved aggressively to systematically dismantle many of our important social protections at home and international agreements abroad. In just over two years (1/2001-6/2003) they have amassed a remarkable list of "accomplishments".

1. "Won" 2000 presidential election aided by brother Jeb Bush, Florida’s governor, who illegally prevented over 90,000 registered voters—mainly low income African Americans and whites—from voting.
2. Reversed dramatic improvements in air and water quality brought by landmark Federal Clear Water (1977) and Clean Air (1970) Acts.
3. Replaced budget surplus with ocean of red ink. Projected debt: $4 trillion by 2013.
4. Signed tax cut giving average 2003 reduction of $93,500 to millionaires while middle class receives a cut of $217 per household. 36% of households receive no tax cut.
5. Used funds earmarked for health care programs for uninsured, like Medicaid, to pay for tax cuts.
6. Proposed changes in Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) that would deny more than 80 million workers overtime pay by reclassifying them.
7. Opposed equal opportunities for girls, women and people of color by attempting to rewrite Title IX and end affirmative action.
8. Requested massive cuts in funding for vocational education and after school programs in order to underwrite vouchers for private schools.
9. Implemented No Child Left Behind Act, focusing on high stakes standardized testing and downplaying arts and multicultural education. Used it to justify defunding struggling schools.
10. Supported cutting $25 billion in veterans’ benefits over next 10 years; proposed $172 million in cuts from education programs for soldiers’ children; ordered VA to stop publicizing health benefits available to veterans.
11. Has at best ignored and often vehemently opposed important gay and lesbian rights issues such as child adoption, equal benefits for couples, and marriages, while sponsoring "faith-based initiatives" in social services and education that would funnel funds to churches that teach homophobia.
12. Presided over faltering economy in which a million+ workers have lost their jobs since 2001, with unemployment over 6%, highest level since 1995.
13. Reversed years of nuclear caution by being willing to use nuclear weapons and by pushing plan funding new nuclear weapons.
14. Rejected germ warfare enforcement protocols... Pulled out of Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty...Rejected Biological Weapons Convention... Failed to sign Land Mine Ban Treaty... Continued to manufacture and stockpile nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.
15. Exploited grief and fear from 9-11 to enlist Americans’ support for war-making.
16. Subverted Bill of Rights with USA PATRIOT Act, most of which was written before 9-11.
17. Endorsed secret military tribunals and extrajudicial executions.
18. Encouraged Americans to inform on each other. Proposed Terrorism Information and Prevention System (TIPS).
19. Killed 3,500 Afghanis, then abandoned country to warlords, famine and chaos.
20. Dropped cluster bombs, designed to maim people, on Afghani civilians. Dropped food packets the same color as unexploded bomblets.
21. Achieved record sales of duct tape and plastic.
22. Lied about chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons in order to wage war on Iraq.
23. While sending American youth to die in foreign wars, covered up Bush’s draft dodger status during Viet Nam war. His rich father got him into National Guard where he served only 51 of his 72 month service pledge. For one year he was AWOL.
24. Undermined United Nations and International Criminal Court.
25. Waged war on victims of Saddam Hussein and called it "liberation." Occupied Iraq causing almost daily deaths of US soldiers and Iraqis.
26. Reneged on Kyoto Treaty to combat global warming.
27. Under cover of failed "war on drugs" (then, "war on terrorism") sent Colombia $2 billion in mostly military aid to protect US oil supplies.
28. Advocated gluttonous consumption as American entitlement and way of life.
29. Claiming to support liberation of women worldwide, pulled plug on family planning organizations overseas and caused increasing insecurity, pollution, and death for women in developing countries.
30. Awarded $948 million in no-bid contracts to repair and operate Iraqi oil fields to Halliburton, which still pays ex-ceo Cheney $180,000/year.
31. Proving once again that truth trumps fiction, was nominated for Nobel Peace Prize by right wing Norwegian politician Harald Tom Nesvik, who recognized US leader’s bold use of war-making to address world problems.

Footnotes

From Bush/Cheney’s 31 “Geatest Accomplishments”

1. Greg Palast (2003) The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, Plume

2. National Resources Defense Council (January 2003) Rewriting the Rules, Year-End Report 2002: The Bush Administration’s Assault on the Environment NRCD, New York

Changed the new—source—review program to allow the oldest and dirtiest power plants and refineries to expand and modernize without installing updated pollution controls.

Shielded corporate agriculture interests from liability for illegal spills with new rules on waterways contaminated with untreated animal waste.

Made it legal for coal companies to dump mining waste into rivers, lakes and wetlands, reversing a 25-year-old Clean Water Act rule.

Promulgated the Clear Skies initiative to delay emission cuts now required under the Clean Air Act by 10 years or more. Clear Skies would allow three times more toxic mercury emissions than current law; postpone forthcoming mercury limits; permit 50 % more sulfur emissions, pushing back cleanup standards from 2012 to 2018; and allow hundreds of thousands of tons of additional smog-forming nitrogen oxide pollution.

3. Congressional Budget Office (March 7, 2003) “An Analysis of the President’s Budgetary Proposals for Fiscal Year 2004"

4. Citizens for Tax Justice (May 23, 2003) “Final Tax Plan Tilts Even More Toward Richest House-Senate Agreement Scales Back Middle-Income Relief But Keeps Big Tax Breaks for Wealthy”

Robert Greenstein, Richard Kogan, and Joel Friedman (May 28, 2003) “New Tax Cut Law Uses Gimmicks to Mask Costs; Ultimate Price Tag Likely to be $800 Billion to $1 Trillion” Center on Budget Policy Priorities

5. Bill Press (April 6, 2001) “Bush cuts children’s health to pay for tax cut” CNN: Inside Politics

6. AFL-CIO (April 7, 2003) “Bush Proposal Could End Overtime Pay for Millions of Workers” News for Working Families

7. Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (Jan. 15, 2003) “Nation’s Largest Civil Rights Coalition Condemns President’s Stance on Diversity in Education”

Nicole Casta (Spring 2003) “Bush Administration Trying to Bench Female Athletes” National NOW Times, National Organization of Women

8. Committee on Education and the Workforce (Feb. 3, 2003) “Bush Administration Cuts Public School Funding to Pay for New Private School Voucher Scheme”

9. Bob Peterson (Fall 2002) “Leaving English Learners Behind” Rethinking Schools, Milwaukee, WI

Kathy Swope and Barbara Miner (ed.) (2000) “Failing Our Kids: Why the Testing Craze Won’t Fix Our Schools” Rethinking Schools

10. Stephen Shalom (March 26, 2003) “Iraq War Quiz” Z Net

11. Elizabeth Toledo (February 28, 2001) “What He Didn’t Say” National Gay and Lesbian Task Force

12. AFL-CIO (Jan. 27, 2003) “Time to Get Real About the Economy: A Check-Up on the Nation’s Economic Health at the Mid-Point of the Bush Presidency”

U.S. Dept. of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics; Labor Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey

13. David Krieger (2002) “The US Nuclear Posture Review: Putting the Promise of Disarmament on the Shelf” Nuclear Age Peace Foundation

Union of Concerned Scientists (May 23, 2003) “Congress Votes on New Nuclear Weapons”

14. Alexander G. Higgins (July 25, 2001) “ U.S. rejects U.N. germ warfare enforcement plan” The Associated Press

Barry Schweid (Dec. 13, 2001), “U.S. Withdraws From ABM Treaty” The Associated Press

Rebecca Whitehair and Seth Brugger (September 2001) “BWC Protocol Talks in Geneva Collapse Following U.S. Rejection” Arms Control Today

International Campaign to Ban Landmines (May 9, 2003) “1997 Mine Ban Treaty - NON SIGNATORIES”

George Monbiot (April 6, 2002) “America’s Bioterror,” The Guardian

15. no footnote.

16. The Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act (USA PATRIOT Act) was passed by Congress 45 days after 9/11 amidst the anthrax scare. It grants broad new powers to the executive branch, expands the government’s surveillance abilities, permits it to racially profile and detain people. It undermines the Bill of Rights, especially articles, I, IV, and VI, pertaining to free speech and association, unnecessary searches and seizures, and right to representation and a speedy trial respectively. More information at American Civil Liberties Union

Nancy Chang (2002) Silencing Political Dissent: How Post-September 11 Anti-Terrorism Measures Threaten Our Civil Liberties. Seven Stories Press

17. Barbara Olshansky (2002) Secret Trials and Executions: Military Tribunals and the Threat to Democracy, Seven Stories Press

18. Office of Homeland Security (July 2002) “The National Strategy for Homeland Security”

April 8, 2002 “President Promotes Citizen Corps for Safer Communities” Remarks by the President on Citizens Corps Knoxville Civic Center, Knoxville, Tennessee

Operation TIPS (Terrorism Information and Prevention System) was to be a nationwide program encouraging truck drivers, letter carriers, train conductors, ships captains, and utility workers to inform on those around them. The program was later taken out of the Homeland Security Bill.

19. Marc W. Harold, PhD. “A Dossier on Civilian Victims of the Aerial Bombing of Afghanistan: A Comprehensive Accounting.”

20. Human Rights Watch (October 2001) “Cluster Bombs in Afghanistan: Human Rights Watch Backgrounder”

Each cluster bomb contains hundreds of smaller bombs that disperse and explode into shrapnel. Cluster bombs cause high civilian casualties, because they cannot be targeted precisely, and have a high failure rate, leaving numerous “duds” that act as landmines.

21. (June 1, 2003) “Bush, Blair Face Heat on Iraq Weapons Pressure Mounting on Bush and Blair As Weapons Hunters Find No Unconventional Arms in Iraq” The Associated Press

22. Maria Tomchick (March 10, 2003) “Inspectors Disprove US Accusations” Z Net

23. Walter Robinson (May 23, 2002) “One-Year Gap in Bush’s National Guard Duty” Boston Globe

24. Human Rights Watch (May 6, 2002) United States “Unsigning” Treaty on War Crimes Court: White House Move Is “On the Wrong Side of History”

Saeed Shabazz (March 18, 2003) “U.S. challenges UN’s ‘relevance’” Final Call News

25. no footnote

26. Kenneth Betz (April 27, 2001) “Bush Nixes Kyoto Pact, Reverses Carbon Dioxide Emissions Stance” Energy User News

27. Steven Weisman (Dec. 4, 2002) “Powell Says U.S. Will Increase Military Aid for Colombia” The New York Times
William Baue (May 10, 2002) “Occidental Pipeline in Colombia Strikes It Rich in Washington”

Jason Vest (July 17, 2001) “US: Plan Colombia Broadens” The Nation
The Cano-Limon pipeline runs through sacred ancestral land of the U’wa, an indigenous people who have continuously opposed oil development in Colombia because of environmental damage.

28.Though Americans are only five percent of the world’s population, they consume a third of the world’s resources and produce almost half its waste.

Women’s Environment and Development Organization (WEDO) and The Rachel Carson Institute (August 2002) “A Small World After All: Women Assess The State of the Environment In the U.S. and Beyond”

29. (July 22, 2002) “Bush Administration’s International Family Planning Cut Will Put Millions at Risk” Center for Reproductive Rights

Betsy Hartmann (December 29, 2002) “Militarism and Reproductive Freedom” Population and Development Program, Hampshire College

30. (June 13, 2003) “A behind-the-scenes look at America’s controversial plan to rebuild Iraq” Alexander’s Gas & Oil Connecions Volume 8, issue #12
31. (February 5, 2002) “Nobel Nomination for Bush and Blair” BBC News

 

Hey Sam,

Have you ever seen this? http://www.dubyaspeak.com/

Peace,
Your friend,
poor_old_dad

 

Quite true, and well said....and then there are the wondrous achievements chronicled in FAHRENHEIT 9/11.

So I ask you, how can the polls have GWB ahead??? Is it something in the water? Even GWB's hometown Crawford newspaper has come out in support of Kerry......so what gives?

 

In answer:
If you didn't care what happened to me,
And I didn't care for you
We would zig zag our way
through the boredom and pain
Occasionally glancing up through the rain
Wondering which of the buggers to blame
And watching for pigs on the wing.
Pigs On The Wing (Part I) - from Animals by Pink Floyd

 

Very entertaing site.Thanks.

 

Excellent post Sam I am.Very disturbing to see how some people can still be a bush supporter *sigh*

 

Glad you liked this treatise, folks. Here's a good example of the way folks who will vote for Bush think...

A couple of Xmas' ago, we received gifts from my sister and brother-in-law. Their gift came in a wrapped mailing tube.

When I opened mine, there was a small, stuffed teddy bear at the top of the tube. I had to pull the teddy bear out of the package. The rest of the package held small, cutesie thingamagigs. You know the kind. The stuff that finds its way to the attic... never to be seen or heard from again....

Anyways. Two days later my sister-in-law calls us to find out how we liked their gifts.

"Did the Teddy Bear jump out of the box?" Asks Linda.

"No" I told her. "I had to take it out."

"Oh!" She says. "When I put it in the box, I wanted it to jump out when you opened the package and surprise you!"

So. No springs. No kind of help at all for that stuffed teddy bear to jump out of the tube he was shoved in to.

She merely "wanted" the teddy bear to jump out of the tube, therefore... it was going to happen.

Now, this is the kind of thinking that Dubya is counting on. I think He thinks this way also.

I think that Republicans are living in a dream world where what they say will automatically come to be.

SNAFU... Situation Normal... All Fucked Up. FUBAR... fucked up beyond all repair.

Vote the motherfuckers out, or..... Well, thinking people know "or what".

Sam

"Don't Follow Leaders, And Watch The Parking Meters."

 

I already mailed my vote in last monday.I voted for Kerry.Not that I'm all warm and fuzzy about him,but he stands the best chance of ousting shrub.I wanted to vote for someone else,but in reality,I can't "throw" my vote away.This whole election to me at any rate,is very disturbing.Locally,there were two items on the ballot which boiled down to "more pigs" in my area.Since I can't stand the sight of those filthy animals in 4X4's around here,they got the big NO vote.Signs,signs,everywhere a sign.............................*