The Forgotten Promises of George Bush
If you can’t give me your word of honor, will you give me your promise?
–Samuel Goldwyn, The Great Goldwyn
The man can’t keep his word even though the words are always the same. Having mouthed them so often you’d think he could remember them. What’s surprising now is that the forgotten beneficiaries of his words are the people he sent to Iraq to get killed or wounded who now wish to be remembered by the man who sent them there to gratify his own ego. They shouldn’t be surprised. They should have learned from Katrina.
Mr. Bush visited New Orleans shortly after Katrina had paid its respects. Standing in the Rose Garden on September 3 of that sad year, Mr. Bush said: “I know that those of you who have been hit hard by Katrina are suffering. . . The tasks before us are enormous, but so is the heart of America. In America, we do not abandon our fellow citizens in their hour of need. And the federal government will do its part . . . . We have a responsibility to our brothers and sisters all along the Gulf Coast and we will not rest until we get this right and the job is done.” Mr. Bush is well rested. Anyone reading about New Orleans knows he didn’t get it right and the job isn’t done. Those living in New Orleans suffered because of nature’s tragedy and were forgotten by the man who promised them help. Now it’s the veterans’ turn.
In his recent State of the Union message, Mr. Bush received great applause when he said: “Our military families also sacrifice for America. . . . We have a responsibility to provide for them. So I ask you to join me in expanding their access to child care. . . and allowing our troops to transfer their unused education benefits to their spouses or children. Our military families serve our nation, they inspire our nation, and tonight our nation honors them.” One week later he submitted his 2009 budget and dissed the veterans. No funds were included for transferring education benefits.
In submitting his $1.3 trillion budget he forgot to include the benefit that would cost between $1 and $2 billion dollars. That was not the end of ignoring the needs of veterans. According to a release from the Brain Injury Association of America in a press release commenting on the budget, for the third year in a row, Mr. Bush has proposed the complete elimination of the Federal traumatic Brain Injury Program. The program “provides grants to state agencies and [other organizations] to improve access to health and other services for individuals with traumatic brain injury and their families.” Susan Connors, president and CEO of the Brain Injury Association of America described the omission as “deeply disappointing” and went on to say that “President Bush just doesn’t get it.” Those two examples are not the only ones in which veterans who have withstood the onslaught from the enemy in Iraq have to defend themselves from the onslaught of the wolf in the White House parading in sheep’s clothing.
According to a report on National Public Radio, during a visit by representatives of the Army Surgeon General’s staff at Fort Drum Army base, officials from the Department of Veterans’ Affairs were told they should stop helping injured soldiers complete paperwork related to their injuries. The forms completed forms determine what level of care and disability benefits the soldiers receive.
Rep. John McHugh who represents the area that includes Ft. Drum, the military base at which the instructions were given, responded that: “The Surgeon General of the Army told me very flatly that it was not the Army that told the VA to stop this help.” That would have been the end of the matter but for one thing. A summary of the meeting prepared by one of the attendees surfaced and it contradicted the Surgeon General who had contradicted NPR.
Kevin Esslinger, a legal administration specialist at Ft. Drum , prepared the memorandum. It says that Col. Becky Baker of the office of the Surgeon General said the “Veterans Benefits Administration should discontinue counseling Medical Evaluation Board (MED) soldiers on the appropriateness of the Department of Defense MEB/OEB (Physical evaluation board) ratings and findings. There exists a conflict of interest.” Responding to that comment Mr. Esslinger wrote in his summary that “a recent Department of the Army Inspector General inspection had noted the practice and had found it to be a useful service to the soldier.” He went on to say the practice would be discontinued.
NPR’s requests for interviews with Col. Baker and Surgeon General Eric Schoomaker were turned down. That’s too bad. You would think the Surgeon General would think that the only thing more important than reassuring the country that veterans are receiving the best assistance and care available is making sure they get the best assistance and care available. His silence suggests they are not.
Christopher Brauchli, brauchli.56@post.harvard.edu. For political commentary see http://humanraceandothersports.com
Bush on the 2000 campaign trail said that he would regulate CO2 as a pollutant. After elected, he ignored Kyoto and had his EPA refuse to allow states to regulate it.
The list goes on and on. This is a lying and corrupt person. The press should give his quotes back to him and ask him to explain his actions. The corporate owned media has not done this. If previous presidents had accumulated $4 trillion in debt, Congress and the press would be howling!
It is so difficult to believe that the Commander in Chief is so stupid and callous as to turn his back on the very people that did his calling. Obeying his orders blindly and obediently, they are tossed aside and ignored like an old car or pair of shoes. As an ex-serviceman, I’m furious!
If you read biographies on W, you see a spoiled, devious underachiever with sociopathic tendencies. People do not matter, only HE matters. The Compassionate Conservative label was one that he stole from his father’s earlier campaign for representative in Texas. I think that he adopted the label because it works and it is a bit of sarcastic irony. It was a little joke among himself and his campaign people like Rove. This is an evil little weasel and one that America needs to get out of office ASAP.
What can one expect when we have a legislator that allows such unprecedented destructive policies from such an abusive administration, which include manipulation of science to prevent essential environmental reforms, character assassinations against those who support policies that are contrary their interests, & the list goes on.
Responsibility lies mainly with the populace for tolerating this default of duties from our elected officials, and the constitutional violation by five Supreme Court justices who legally planted this unelected and reckless zealot in office.
WASHINGTON (FMLiveWire) — President George Bush and other Republican dignitaries unveiled a “Great Depression Survival Package” for American citizens on Friday to much fanfare.
Together with presidential candidate John McCain, the head of the FDIC Morton Minderbinder, Ben Bernanke, head of the Federal Reserve, and representatives of FEMA, Bush showed off the components of the package.
“When the Great Depression of 2008 hits later this year, just open your government-supplied “Great Depression package,” said Bush “and you will be ready to weather any storm. With this kit you will be well prepared as your job is outsourced to China under my Free Trade policies, your home is foreclosed and your SUV is repoed.”
The Great Depression Survival Package contains everything a penniless, homeless and out-of-work American family needs to cope with the ravages of economic depression just like in the 1930s.
“The package contains a high quality, made-in-China 55 gallon oil drum, perfect for burning newspapers to keep you, your family, and your neighbors warm even on the coldest nights,” said McCain.
Minderbinder displayed another feature of the package: a spacious heavy duty cardboard refrigerator carton “which will prove to be high end shelter for you and your family even on the coldest nights. The deluxe carton will keep your family dry and close together like in pioneer times.”
The Great Depression Survival Package also includes several pairs of workman’s gloves with the fingers already cut off to enable the entire family to beg and scrounge for food.
“Finally, the kit includes a refurbished shopping cart, a jug of cheap sweet wine, and a list of all the local soup kitchens and restaurants with dumpsters in your area,” said Bush to much applause.
–Copyright Felix Minderbinder Live Wire
george did keep his promise to be a uniter though
come November, about 70% of us are gonna unite and kick the repuglitards out of washington dc
when is the last time that 70% of the country voted for the Democrats ???
Obama might get 150,000,000 votes
I don’t think this is what george wanted to do, but when did that schmuck ever do anything right ???
I’VE GOT TO GET OUT THE DUCT TAPE AND GET READY FOR THE GREAT
DEPRESSION. YOU KNOW, HE REALLY DOESN’T BOTHER ME ANY MORE. IT’S THE MILLIONS OF FOOLS THAT VOTED FOR HIM IN 2004. THEY MAKE ME PUKE.
“You may talk of the tyranny of Nero and Tiberius; but the real tyranny is the tyranny of your next-door neighbor.”
- Walter Bagehot
Get ready for an act of utter desperation. These guys are not above getting Americans killed.
They’ve certainly proven that many times over.
IT’S THE MILLIONS OF FOOLS THAT VOTED FOR HIM IN 2004.
“fool me once . . .”
I’ve given up being surprised by anything that George does. I mean, a megalomaniac is not really responsible for anything he does. But his minders are responsible and it is them who should incur our wrath.
But, of course, we should incur our own wrath because we’ve allowed a megalomaniac to continue his reign of error for nearly eight years, yes we have, yes indeedy! May the world forgive us!
It should be plain by now that the sole purpose of the military-industrial complex is to transfer wealth from taxpayers to the corrupt wealthy corporate-investor class. Lesson over.
Dubya, Cheney, & Co. have perpetrated the greatest bait and switch in the history of the American body politic. Anyone who bothered to do any research knew this was coming.
Awaken - did you deliberately paraphrase Voltaire, “The art of government is to take money from one class of people and give to another.”?
In submitting his $1.3 trillion budget he forgot to include the needs of veterans. In the 2009 budget, for the third year in a row, Mr. Bush has proposed the complete elimination of the Federal traumatic Brain Injury Program. The program “provides grants to state agencies and [other organizations] to improve access to health and other services for individuals with traumatic brain injury and their families. President Bush just doesn’t get it.”
Of course not! His wealthy war profiteering family take care of his brain injury due to the overuse of coke and booze. And remember him looking for the missing WMD’s? at a press dinner? Bet the paraplegics loved that!
This would be funny if not so tragic. Satan & Dickwad are gonna love the reruns…
I’m very proud to be one of the many that chose the right side of history! We knew in summer 2000 that GWB was a GOP front & patsy and an empty suit. Why didn’t Hillary know?
WE would never vote for him (we are not blind sheep) or support him, believed this war wrong from the start and we have been vindicated.
But how come the so called press are just now calling him out in an election season where he does not matter?
We need to turn the page because of what Dr. King called “the fierce urgency of now”
Loyal Obamaian
C,mon. George is a product of America. Americans voted for Reagan and loved him. All he did was borrow money and give it to people. Now the debt is overwhelming. Well duh. America is the number one borrower in the world. Whose fault is this, the people, who always vote for whoever offers them money. The American vote is always bought with tax payer money. How stupid is that? Americans thought George was a regular guy. He isn’t. I knew he was a bad choice, but half of Americans disagreed. What can i say? Try to be more aware! Become educated. George is ugly, George is stupid, George is bad. Well yeah, an accurate reflection of the people.
“If you read biographies on W, you see a spoiled, devious underachiever with sociopathic tendencies. People do not matter, only HE matters. The Compassionate Conservative label was one that he stole from his father’s earlier campaign for representative in Texas.”
sj_c…you are correct about George being an under achiever, and yes, spoiled, but you only scratched the surface. He has never done anything in his life on his own, at least anything I am aware of, and has always used someone elses’ money to lose in business. His military “service” in the Texas Air Guard for example…he used this to keep his heiney out of Nam to begin with, but at the time he appied, there were hundreds in line before him to get a position in the guard and stay stateside. Along with his daddy, Ben Barnes and John Connley he managed to get in line ahead of everyone else. Then, once he had this cushy military position, he went AWOL anyway. His oil businesses were primarily financed by Salem Bin Laden (Osama’s bro) and went broke, he bought the Texas Rangers with OPM (other peoples’ money) and lost it. Did he graduate from Yale by doing lots of studing and hard work? I’ll leave that up to you to answer. I challenge anyone to find something this fratrat has done with his own hard work and money, anything. Dumbya is King Tut in reverse…everything he touches turns to sh*t. So…in a nutshell, we have a total failure of a person that has been given everything he has ever had and screwed it up running (rather ruining) this country. In spite of this, he is a sadistic criminal (he seems to love misery and death) that is badly in need of seeing the inside of a courtroom…as a defendant. Will it ever happen? I doubt it.
The total costs to the U.S. economy of the wars is now estimated at $3 trillion.
How can we ever recover from this catastrophy without Devine intervention?
It’s time to get some copal and start offering corporate hearts to the Gods on our Hibachis.
These Traitors need to be taken out in cuffs, extra-renditioned all the way to the Hague. They dont even deserve to be hung on this soil. They are’nt brave enough. It wouldnt be enough to do it secretly at a Black Site. If there were a global town square or maybe perhaps on an melting iceberg with penguins and polar bears looking on. With satellite cameras filming the entire event as the people of the world gather to watch. Oh to dream.
Somebody got som splaining to do
“Belts are coming off,
someone is going to the woodshed”
RichardNixon
When the national debt doubles to 8 plus
trillion where did that 4 T go? Dubai?
What about Hillary’s crocodile tears about the wounded Iraq veterans, whom she put in harm’s way with her vote to authorize the counterproductive, illegal war? She justified her vote spouting the same obvious lies as Bush, Cheney, Rice, Powell, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and the rest of this gang of war criminals.
I would like to correct the budget numbers by the writer, Christopher Brauchli. The budget, as submitted by the White House is 3.1 trillion, not 1.3 trillion; a huge difference. This doesn’t include off-budget items. They will be covered by a supplemental. The budget has increased by about 37 percent under this administration. The national debt under Mr. Bush and company has risen from about 5 trillion to over 9 trillion. This bunch of crazies have bankrupted this nation. Without a doubt our children and grandchildren will wonder what their parents were smoking. Where is our judgment? In 2000 the election was most likely stolen. What is the excuse for 2004? Impeachment should be on the table and on the Congressional Calendar.
What I want to know is what is everyone here at CD’s going to do when President Obama increases the size of the military, sits idly by as health companies extract even more blood money from Americans, ignores the crimes of his predecessor, refuses to join Kyoto, does nothing to remove our dependency on fossil fuels, continues the BS rhetoric about the so-called war on terror and fails miserably on reining in our national debt?
Will a million Americans march on DC? Or will 100 million Americans tune in to American Idol?
“Where is our judgment? In 2000 the election was most likely stolen. What is the excuse for 2004?”
Umm- that election was stolen as well.
He didn’t lie, ever — this Government _is_ “doing it’s part”…which was to break the most powerful Producing-Nation and Economy the world has ever seen.
[”Depends upon what your meaning of ‘is’ is.”-America’s First first-gentleman]
“Great-job, Bushie!”
Dear Wired, Reads like a plan to destroy America and leave the children of privilege holding everything. My question to you is: what will they do when all the toys are in their playrooms and the kids across the street have none left to steal?
Send only loyal Americans to Congress. Vote.
What’s the matter, doesn’t anybody speak Texan anymore? That’s “logic” to people like Bush: I want what I want when I want it, and if you notice any of the consequences I don’t want to see, you’re a terrorist. He’s our #1 representative around the world, bringing the true American Conqueror of other people’s wealth for “freedom”—his own. Fuck Y’all anyhoo.
We can all bash George Bush…I’m to the point where I can’t even look at him anymore,much less listen to him…BUT, the fact that the majority of congress (Republicans and Democrats) have let him get away with his escapades, and in fact seem to enable him…points to something more sinister afoot….
As I recall it, US Armed Services voted something like 60% for Bush, 40% for Kerry in 2004, so my sympathy for them now is limited.
That appears to be all Bush is good at. Making promises and terrific speeches that are soon forgotten by him. The publics memory also appears to be very short. They always conveniently forget what this man hasn’t done. The pathetic job he has done when helping Katrina victims and servicemen alike. I am like the person who commented before me. These servicemen voted the pathetic twit into office. So my sympathy of them is limited now. They got what they asked for. Maybe one of these days they will learn Republican’s aren’t for anyone but the very rich! And act accordingly.
wiredwilly is no fool. Folks, Bush might be insane but he is not stupid and he is just a puppet that is like Cheney and the rest who have flushed our Constitution down the toilet for greed,money and power. If we do not put love of country first we are in for some very dark times ahead.
Who is to blame?
The inept voters who helped him steal two elections;
The five Supreme court justices who betrayed their trust by planting him in office; A defaulting legislator that has stood by while his reckless zealot and his corrupt administration have inflected more damage to our republic and the world than any American in history; and A populace that has tolerateed these unprecedented abuses.
I know…I Know…..GWBush and Gang “Will Not Recall”
It’s GWBush’s Mom Fault
jmartin 9:47 Your US debt stat may be low, if I read the CIA World Factbook correctly. It says external debt was $12.25 trillion at the end of June. Did we pay back 3 trillion dollars since then?
Bush’s degeneracy is astonishing both in degree and in the level of “fit” it has to the sickness of our system. Our species has begun its decline, and we seem unable to right the balance (”We can’t help ourselves!” Duh!).
Devices like cluster bombs exploded or not are of no more use to the military. That is why they are left to damage any thing unlucky enough to come in contact with the ones that are still dangerous. Veterans are treated the same way. The physically wounded are used as recruiting posters if that works to get more cannon fodder, otherwise they are expected to shut their mouths and die homeless, helpless, and hopeless.
The mentally damaged - well - they get dishonorable discharges, diagnosed as pre-existing mental defect and used as an element of the fear politics if they are noticed at all.
This is one reason why mercenaries are so popular with this breed of fascists in Bu$h the inferior and Shotgun Dick’s administration. They pay them, collect the corporate cut, and forget them.
While the country is busy watching the Presidential candidates debating tiddily crap, Bush, this poor excuse for a human being, is busy selling away America, devastating our environment, and slashing all funds for his “promised” help to Americans. He should be tarred and feathered along with his cohorts like Cheney, Rove, and the entire Supreme Court. And while they (the protestors) are at it, let them disembowel all the right-wing wackos that are posing as leaders of our policies and institutions. As for Bush, he doesn’t have an ounce of human charity, and if I too were a right-wing wacko or religious nut, then I would say BeHold! The Anti-Christ!
S
If you stop to consider who the strategic benefit of leaving New Orleans high and dry without much help will benefit you’ll realize that it was a tremendously useful social experiment. By letting New Orleans feel the hammer blow of an environmental catastrophe of such magnitude, it opened the door to a good look at how a city subjected to a major storm might manage. Rather than endeavor to minimize the damage, just let it get hammered. Now why would you do that? What’s the gain? Who gains? How? With catastrophic climate change imminent it’s useful to test the response and see how a city and people may cope. What will the American people do? Now the Elite know. So they can prepare. I don’t see any other advantage in it. Would they be that callous? That deceptive? Of course, we know that. Stealing elections, making promises that will never be kept, saying you’ll fix a city, yellow cake, no such thing as global warming, catastrophic climate change…democracy for sale (at the point of a gun and the price of a $100 barrel of oil)…Pfft!