November 08, 2007


IMPEACH BUSH


IMPEACH CHENEY

BUSH'S INFAMOUS LEGACY

A few days ago The Fresno Bee had a letter from a guy who used to write a lot. I would call this guy the Sycophant. He loves rich people. He'll give you all those glorious statistics about how the rich pay most of the income taxes, suggesting that they're the real movers and shakers of our society and pay more than their fair share in taxes. He conveniently ignores the big picture, of course, the way right-wingers are prone to do.

Sycophant was offering a defense of the Bush administration and the war in Iraq. According to Mr. S., we're protecting our "sovereignty." The attacks on 9/11, as far as I can tell, had nothing whatever to do with sovereignty. They were conducted by religious fanatics against a civilian target. They were criminal, not military, acts. But 9/11 is the only thing that ever gave George W. Bush any kind of posture as a world and national leader.

As we approach the end of this administration, we can only begin to comprehend the vast damage it has done. This article by Joseph E. Stiglitz is at www.vanityfair.com:

When we look back someday at the catastrophe that was the Bush administration, we will think of many things: the tragedy of the Iraq war, the shame of Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, the erosion of civil liberties. The damage done to the American economy does not make front-page headlines every day, but the repercussions will be felt beyond the lifetime of anyone reading this page.

I can hear an irritated counterthrust already. The president has not driven the United States into a recession during his almost seven years in office. Unemployment stands at a respectable 4.6 percent. Well, fine. But the other side of the ledger groans with distress: a tax code that has become hideously biased in favor of the rich; a national debt that will probably have grown 70 percent by the time this president leaves Washington; a swelling cascade of mortgage defaults; a record near-$850 billion trade deficit; oil prices that are higher than they have ever been; and a dollar so weak that for an American to buy a cup of coffee in London or Paris—or even the Yukon—becomes a venture in high finance.