These people slept through the last 8 years of the squandered surplus that Pres. Clinton left for Pres. Bush 43, and never said a word, when he passed his Trillion, yes that is Trillion dollar tax cuts for the wealthiest in our country, then again when he passed the Medicare part D supplement which also added to the deficit and left us in debt to the tune of 1.3 Trillion, again that is TRILLION dollars..
Then we have the wars, of course, not very many and I do mean almost no one disagreed with the war in Afghanistan. However, Iraq was a very different story. Pres. Bush ginned up the intelligence, lied to the American people and to his own staff and administration and pushed Congress into a war with Iraq.
There were protests all over this country and the world against this, yet no one, the media, everyone ignored it. We were considered unpatriotic, treasonous and disloyal for speaking out against the President.
It was estimated there were 6 and 10 Million people in 60 countries around the world. From Wikipedia:
Some of the largest protests took place in Europe. The protest in Rome involved around 3 million people, and is listed in the 2004 Guinness Book of World Records as the largest anti-war rally in history. Opposition to the war was highest in the Middle East, although protests there were relatively small.Mainland China was the only major region not to see any protests, but small demonstrations attended mainly by foreign students were seen later.
Yet, now, since November 4, 2008 and most especially Jan. 20th, 2009 it has become almost popular to speak out against the President. The more hideous the better. Signs, posters, blogs dedicated to putting him down, preachers calling for his death, radio and talk show hosts calling him Hitler, a socialists, a Marxist, a Communist and every other thing or name under the sun. Some even saying he is the Devil, the Anti-Christ, the personification of evil.
All during the 8 years of the Bush Administration it was considered unpatriotic to speak out against the president, after 9-11-01, and especially after we went to war in Afghanistan. Almost all of the talking heads on Fox Noise, because I refuse to call it news.. said so..
Even the Dixie Chicks were basically run out of the country because they dared to criticize the President.
Music superstars the Dixie Chicks are finding out that criticizing President Bush's plans for war in Iraq can cost you air play, big time.
Country stations across the United States have pulled the Chicks from playlists following reports that lead singer Natalie Maines said in a concert in London earlier this week that she was "ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."
Station managers said their decisions were prompted by calls from irate listeners who thought criticism of the president was unpatriotic.
The group, which got its start in Texas, was one of the darlings of this year's Grammy Awards. The three-woman band that blends blue grass and pop hooks has spawned legions of fans who embrace the ideals of strong women celebrated in some of the trio's songs.
One station in Kansas City, Missouri held a Dixie "chicken toss" party Friday morning, where Chick critics were encouraged to dump the group's tapes, CDs and concert tickets into trash cans.
Houston country station KILT pulled the band's records from its playlist -- at least temporarily -- after 77 percent of people polled on its Web site said they supported the move.
"We've got them off the air for right now," said Jeff Garrison, program director at KILT, which is owned by Viacom's Infinity Broadcasting Corp.
"People are shocked. They cannot believe Texas' own have attacked the state and the president," Garrison said.
Lead singer Maines said in a statement she felt the president was ignoring the opinions of many in the United States and alienating the rest of the world by pushing for war with Iraq.
That's just a portion of the article from CNN.. but you get the picture. If you want to read the rest, click the link above.
As you see, you weren't allowed to criticize the President during the Bush Administration. Oh, there were random people who did, and they were promptly trashed, run out of the country, see above, or literally swept up and put in jail, to be never heard from again.
Yet, we never heard a word from these so called Tea Partiers then. They were perfectly fine with everything that went on. During the 8 years that George Bush was President, lets look at some things that might have gotten someone's attention and lead to a protest.
First lets start with ignoring the intelligence memo of Aug. 2001 which warned him of the impending attack on the United States by Bin Laden.
Then there is the Iraq War, which we have already discussed. Again, never budgeted, never paid for.
Then we have the Tax Cuts, for the wealthy, which put us into massive debt, especially when combined with the Medicare overhaul which gave us Part D, he didn't bother to pay for.
Then, we have the crimes of Torture and imprisonment of innocents from all over the world, even our own citizens. Wiretapping of our own citizens and military members speaking to their spouses.
I could go on but I think that is enough.
Now, we have elected Barack Obama, and he walked in the door with a HUGE deficit, 1.3 Trillion Dollars. An economy on the verge of and in collapse. Upon advise of economists he urged Congress to act and they did.. with very little support from republicans.
He didn't do this because he wanted to, but because he had to.
Pres. Bush, is the one who bailed out the banks with no oversight, Pres. Bush is the one who bailed out the Auto companies with no oversight, not Pres. Obama.
Pres. Obama then came in and cleaned up after this mess he was left, and tried to make it better. He is calling for oversight on the banks and on the stock markets, and he has forced the Auto companies into bankruptcy so they can restructure and stand on their own.
Since, these wingnuts think I lied about all the pictures and about the numbers I want to point out that Politifact rated the pictures as Pants On Fire wrong.. Matter of fact, the picture they are using to try to show it was 2 million at the wingnut rally, was from a rally in 2004.. maybe it was even a war protest.. that would be about how smart most of them are.
By the way.. Here are more pictures from the TeaParty WingNut Rally.. You can see them here. And then again more here.
Nowhere do I see a crowd near the size of what was in DC on January 20th, when the estimates were of 1.5 million people. Again, the DC Fire Department and the Park Police say the size was maybe 60 to 70,000, and that is a generous estimate.
These pictures are not random, these pictures are all through the crowds.. anyone who says they are not all over is a liar.. they are the ones who aren't being honest. Not me.
Something else for your viewing pleasure.. a video presentation..
6 comments:
You are no better than the wingnuts you so criticize.
1) Clinton did not leave a surplus. Look it up. We were facing a dot-com bubble and government revenues were decreasing.
2) Clinton also claimed that Saddam was trying to get WMDs and used military force against Saddam, remember? Did Clinton lie too?
3) Bush blew a big ass hole in the budget (the $1.3T figure).
Obama increased that to $9T and that's supposedly OK?
4) I saw plenty of *left-wing* nuts during the Bush years. They were just as bad as the "wingnuts" you criticize. Did you criticize your own?
So here's some "old" and "new" rules you should go by:
Old: Bushco *stole* the elections!
New: Obama is not a native born citizen!
Old: Bush is Hitler!
New: Obama is Hitler!
Old: Plenty of earmark pork in the Federal budget when Bush/Republicans controlled the government.
New: Plenty of earmark pork when Obama/Democrats control the government.
Old: Bush shouted down by Democrats in speech to Congress, 2005.
New: Obama called liar by Wilson, 2009
Old: It's unpatriotic to criticize Bush!
New: You're a racist if you criticize Obama!
Old: Bush sends billions to Wall Street without adequate supervision
New: Obama sends billions to Wall Street without adequate supervision
Old: Bush elected by a very divided electorage
New: Obama elected by a very divided electorate {not a mandate as he claims}
Old: Liberals scare elderly to stop Social Security reform
New: Conservatives scare elderly to stop health care reform
Old: Bush promises new era of bipartisanship in DC after he gets elected.
New: Obama promises a new era of "postpartisanship" when he gets elected. {BS to both}
Wow, that wingnut comment is one gigantic wad of false equivalency and deliberate misinformation.
As always, great work Annette!
wow Annette this wingnut is NUTS!! You did right to not accept anon!!
Maybe Anonymous is a Nazi...heh? :)
In 2007, Pearl Jam was censored by AT&T during their live webcast for saying: "...George Bush, leave this world alone" and "George Bush find yourself another home..."
Anti Bush speech was censored by the corporate media or people like the Dixie Chicks were threatened with death as an example of what happens when you criticize Republican presidents.
In respone to anonymous coward's comments:
The Bush family dynasty was built to a fair extent doing business with Nazi Germany and had to have their assests seized as a result.
President Obama has no such family history. There is no elitist "Obama family dynasty."
The Bush dynasty expounded upon Prescott's activities by G.H.W Bush's years as a CIA spook and his subsequent ties to the Carlyle Group engaging in international arms deals using his position as an American government official to enrich his private dealings blurring the line between public and private representation. In other words, when 41' was brokering deals for Carlyle, he was using what I like to call "America's integrity capital" as a bargaining chip in business negotitations.
Hitler rose to power through an odd parliamentary procedure after losing the popular vote handily.
Bush was appointed president through an unprecedented decision by the Supreme Court, after Bush lost the popular vote handily. Scalia and Cheney are, and have been, good friends and hunting buddies in an obvious conflict of interest to everyone but wingnuts.
Clinton left a surplus. To argue this is typical revisionist history. Clinton also upheld the successful policy of containment and no fly zones in the 90s. Information recently revealed that Saddam was bluffing and tried to communicate as much through intermediaries to offset the threat of increasing Iranian influence. A threat that Reagan and Bush41' compounded with a shady proxy war in the 80's.
I disagreed with sanctions responsible for the deaths of over 200,000 women and children and oil for food, but to claim Clinton's approach was more harmful than Bush's pre-emptive Shock and Awe campaign is idiocy.
We actually count the efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan in the budget now. Bushco tried to hide the costs through emergency funding that was used for no-bid contracts and plastic wrapped billions unloaded off a flying warehouse on a Baghdad tarmac. Waste, fraud, abuse, and no accountability were Bushco norms.
Only republicans hypocritically complain about pork. That "pork" funds all kinds projects and does more good than harm in the grand scheme of things.
This is republicans holding democrats to a standard they ignored. Reagan took America from the world's foremost creditor nation to the world's foremost debtor nation. Bush's watch resulted in the near collapse of the global economy.
President Obama received more votes than any elected president in history.
That's a mandate. Deal with it.
And while you're dealing with it by calling the president a liar/communist/fascist/marxist and an illegal alien, remember that nobody is censoring your speech like they did with Pearl Jam and and all the "free speech zones," and nobody is threatening your lives.
And when Mark Kirk(R-IL) tells Chinese officials that President Obama's budget(a budget that cuts taxes for over 95% of tax-paying Americans)is "not to be believed", directly undermining American interests, he's practically a traitor.
And in case the wingnuts don't know. The president consults with MANY Capitalists and Philanthropists and independent thinkers in trying to clean up the Bush Republican pile of shit they so recklessly, perhaps methodically, left behind.
Conservative Republicans failed America over the past 30 years and did so without shame or apology using hypocrisy and false equivalency as tools of deciet and revisionist history.
Thanks all of you for the back up on everything. You have all been great at helping me with clearing up the wing nuts lies and misinformation. I appreciate so much the support.
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