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Guest Post: George W. Bush’s “Growth” Strategy
Submitted by John Aziz of Azizonomics
George W. Bush’s “Growth” Strategy
George W. Bush is back. And he’s got a plan!
From the NYT:
Two months from now, he plans to publish a book outlining strategies for economic growth. And on Tuesday, he made a rare return to Washington to promote freedom overseas.
Freedom overseas? Yes — it would be nice to be free of George W. Bush’s destructive and costly neocon agenda (and I know many people overseas agree) but sadly the current White House occupant seems to be following the same authoritarian script; Bush hit Iraq and Afghanistan, and Obama seems intent to expand the wars into Pakistan and Yemen.
On the economy, let’s judge him on his record:
That doesn’t suggest that Bush has anything much to add to the conversation. But that doesn’t mean I think he should shut up and go away.
Here are a few prominent questions that George W. Bush might want to consider answering before slinking off back to Crawford:
- Why did you ignore the CIA’s warnings in the summer of 2001 that al-Qaeda could strike “imminently”?
- Why did you pledge in the 2000 election debates that you were against nation building, and then embark on not one but two nation-building programs in Iraq and Afghanistan?
- You increased the Federal debt by 86%; to what extent do you accept the blame for America’s debt troubles?
- You reappointed Alan Greenspan as the Fed Chairman; to what extent do you accept that his easy money policies caused the bubble that burst in 2008?
- Were the 2008 bailouts of well-connected banks and financial corporations engineered by your administration compatible with a supposedly “free-market” “capitalist” system? Doesn’t bailing out banks create dangerous moral hazard?
- How can a nation simultaneously claim to be a liberator while also practising torture?
- You swore to uphold the Constitution, yet passed the PATRIOT Act that authorised warrantless wiretapping, and mass surveillance in contravention of the Fourth Amendment. Do you realise that you violated your oath of office?
That would be a great start. There are, of course, swathes of other questions (including much, much darker ones) that many wish George W. Bush could be made to answer. But there is no real accountability in America today. He can go back to his ranch and his presidential library and act like a carpetbagging good old boy, while kids in the middle east continue to have their limbs blown off, and while the nation remains smothered under a mountain of debt and authoritarian creep.
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It's all Bush's fault!
How do you mean that?
... he was just doing his best Obama imitation ...
Yes, it doesn't matter if Dick Cheney said deficits don't matter. Deficits only matter if the president is a democrat.
Oh my.....
Timely.
Ever so fucking timely.
We said, she said,
Water under the bridge,
Everybody already knows.
WTF?
Somebody been taken over by the NWO types, spreading dissent and diversion amongst the troops with some New and Improved Hegelian Dialectic?
Take your eye off the ball game,
Take your main off the task,
Get diverted and fucked around,
You'll all be had,
With your pants on the ground
WARNING!
Political thread below.
Read at own risk
If he responds to this imminent threat 6 months into office that is wrong around here too.
Like FB-if the stock was higher they would be criminals just as they are now that the stock is lower.
Well done, the two headed coin is becoming a regular feature around here.
At Michael Scheuer's then-CIA office, under Clinton, they annually added to the many binders on a shelf, new Al Qaeda targets in Afghanistan. The few times they actually blew up these targets it was 02:00 hours local and they only killed the poor Muslim cleaning ladies, so as to avoid getting certain Arab countries mad at us.
But even Clinton's people like Sandy Berger were less criminally negligent than Bush's people. Their first week after Bush took office his people tossed the binders in the garbage.
Scheuer and Jon Krackhauer well document the days leading up to 9-11. About two weeks before, IIRC it was Richard Clark who stared down scum of the earth Condoleeza (Satan) Rice, asked her to her face what will she feel after thousands of Americans are dead in the street...also at one meeting a few weeks prior our well paid "security officials" told Bush to his face that we would be attacked any day and security needed to be ramped way up and public notified...Bush retorted something like, "Well, I guess you're happy that you've covered your ass now".
Oh, and the FBI guy who prevented the FBI from viewing Al Zarkawi's computer with the 9-11 plan? Mueller promoted him after 9-11. Cool, huh?
You triviliaze mass muderering scum like Bush with abandon and joy. I can only surmise you support such behaviour as Bush's.
Show me the original source where Cheney said "Deficits don't matter"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A26402-2004Jun8?language=printer
thanks...
I heard it from a guy who knows a guy who swears he heard cheney say dat shit.... I swear...
I always wondered about that statement. Kinda like all those times I heard other people say that Bush said Iraq/Saddam was involved in 9-11, even though I specifically heard Bush say At I believe Two(2) State of the Unions - that was TWO(2) - State of the Union addresses, that he knew Saddam had NOTHING to do with 9-11.
Bush and Cheney were statist tools, but I hate it when people state obvious bullshit as fact.
Oh, and about the article above-
Hindsight is 20/20. You lost me at torture. Please... fucking water sports. Waterboarding is part of the SERE curriculum. Many American troops have endured it.
I'll believe waterboarding isn't torture when Sean Hannity gets waterboarded, like he agreed.
Yes, but fuck that shit.
The only people who have any credibility to claim that waterboarding isn't torture are the folks who did it again for free. He has to do it at least TWICE and stick with the "it ain't torture" story for his word to mean anything at all.
There's only one guy in that category I've heard speak so far, and he seems to think it's torture.
Is there a big association of people getting waterboarded and then saying "it's not torture" I should know about? A web petition or something? I'd really like to see that. Ideally it should include video...
How much else do you base on sean hannity?
Yeah, the SERE training involves 182 waterboarding sessions or how ever many it takes for the subject to confess to being Jack the Ripper. That's why our troops are so tough they piss on their enemy's dead bodies. If they want to prove they are tough, let them try to piss on live enemies...
As all economists, you fail with easiest tasks and FACTS.
It was Jackass What's His Name when he was CLINTON's Fed Chief after the FEDERALIST Society made Bush CEO, But of course, Robespierre's name is CHENY, the REAL CEO, who would have been indicted for violating the Corrupt Practices Act if Gore had been sworn in, since everyone knows that GORE actually did win Florida.
Your Cheney-kissing ass just got owned.
"Are you sure it was a book? Are you sure it wasn't ... NOTHING?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kc7mS4N2r3U
Perhaps it was a coloring book.
Stay within the lines... and use only red or blue to color.
Preferably red.
Has he finished reading 'My Pet Goat' yet?
Is it a pop-up book? I love pop-up books! Turn the page and Osama pops-up out of a cave and launches 9/11. Turn another page and Saddam Hussein is brandishing a WMD. Turn the next page and Fallujah is in burning in a cloud of willy pete. Turn another page and ...
Sorry, Bush cant hear your questions from Uraguay!
Maybe we'll get lucky and congress won't let him back in the country due to the new Ex-PATRIOT law ...
Paraguay.
Bush Inc. is the mob, not a tribe.
I see what you did there.
Very nice.
i think the bush's ranchero is in paraguay. close by a U.S. air base, since they get free air travel with the air force.
He is in Uraguay fighting extradition for war crimes.
Paraguay I think you mean. Milestones
Mexico by any other name. Why do nazisonthelamb and bushes prefer SudAmerica?
Man, this guy can fool us once, and shame on us. But if he tries to shame us twice, then you just can't lead a horse to water without breaking some eggs.
He'll cross that bridge when it hatches...
When you're a neocon, an incipient war at hand is worth two started by Bush, and you can always count your legislative usurpations of the Constitution before they're officially hatched.
Aw c'mon, he is just trying to put food on his familiy!
Two in the Bush, is a porn series, probably.
George Bush wrote a book? ... I wasn't sure he had ever read a book (and no, I don't count 'The Pet Goat' -- those elementary kids read that to him on 9-11)
He had a co-writer. It's packaged with crayons to color in the pictures.
Plus you can order the audio book version if your lips get tired reading the cartoon captions.
Me George! Me Harvard MBA! Me real smart!
gawd, who woulda thought I'd be missing the 'decider' ...
"Strategery"!
"Evil-doers"!
"Mission Accomplished"!
"If you're not with us, you're against us"!
It took Obama to make all of that sound not quite so bad.
Actually he had a higher GPA then that guy who ran against him in 04. The one who looks like Obama's mother... Kerry, thats him. "Reporting for duty", Swiftboat Kerry. The guy in office now doesn't even have any school records. Of any kind. At all...
Yes, that list of bullet points IS Bush's fault. You could have a similar, remarkably similar in fact, list of bullet points about Obama that in turn would be HIS fault. Can't dump blam on just Clinton and Obama. Just like Obama bots can't dump blame just on Bush for Obama continuing the failed and anti-constitutional, anti-free market policies of the Bush admin. Sorry, but your little talking point bumper sticker quote isn't going to work here.
They are all a part of the same NWO gang. The USA must be brought down to par with the rest of the world so that the global enslavement and kill off can begin. This was once a country admired for it's freedoms, now it is a fuckin' corrupt police/nanny state like everywhere else.
They are all traitors now.
Indeed. All part of the same club.
Anyone who still feels the need to defend one "side" over the other still hasn't gotten it yet.
My point exactly. I see one administration from Reagan on. He got capped, became a zombie, you got 12 years of GHWB, then Clinton, then Bush, then Obama.
Really the last honest president (although still problematic) was Kennedy and he got a bullet in the dome. Eisenhower realized too late that people behind the scenes were making the real decisions, but at least he gave his MIC speech. Almost every other Pres before Eisenhower that was on the side of the republic magically died in office. Fancy that.
Obama - Carter II, Nixon II or Bush II, or all of the above.
Obama - Carter II, Nixon II or Bush II, or all of the above.
You may be right, but at least Biden won't dust you with shotgun pellets.
Ellie's Law-As an online discussion about the failures of the Obama Administration continues, the probability someone shouting "It's Bush's Fault" approaches 1
I don't see many dumb articles on this site, but this is one.
Seriously....I wonder if they know he has not been the prez in over 3 years??? Who cares???
No one really cares, per se.....but he is coming out with a book. With his suggestions on economic growth. Which is why one might want to know the answers to the questions above. Considering he might actually believe he has answers.
So it makes sense. But it would appear some people here haven't yet let go of the party affiliations.
Wonder how many crayons he went through when "writing" his book...
Will there be pitchers in it?
I believe Nolan Ryan makes an appearance. ;)
Hmm, but from which team. Rangers, no doubt.
America's real problems the fatal flaws are SS,,Medicare medcaid and now Obamacare none of which are of the Repubs idology
The real problems started with Reagan and his morning in america ... convincing people that because this was america, a land loved by god, they could have their cake and eat it too, and not have to pay for it either. It all traces back to Reagan. Remember Carter was the one talking about living within ones means (and he got thrown out).
Yes, the "entitlements". Until they are gone the problems will not go away. And to you Bill- you gotta be kidding?! Reagan?! How 'bout Wilson, FDR then Johnson? Thats where the biggest problems came from.
Whats next, ZH series on Jimmy Carter? Seriously we're in the here and now 4 years later get over it!
Bush 2 was the most liberal president fiscally and economically since LBJ..There is the damage.
One must assume that is what the author wants to say but in a subtle way.
Can we forget about the last jerk and deal with the present jerk as we move hopefully to a better (microscopically measured) jerk in November. Unfortunately the changing of the jerks is getting old.
Pathetic Head in sand fat and disguisting sheeple will not elect the real man for the job. RON PAUL!!!!
If this all falls apart (most likely being lead by jerks), the sheeple are not welcome at my place and will be freely eliminated if they show up. I will not feed the idiots.
Thanks for posting this Tyler, I was afraid I was going to lose my beloved ZH to a wave of right wing evanglists. I've always valued ZH for seeing above the clouds of left/right politics, when it's really the oligarchy vs the rest of us. The bullshit comes from both sides, and its good to expose the hypocrisy and lies on both sides of the proverbial isle.
Bush is Obama is Nixon is Reagan is Clinton is...
You voted for him,right?
George who?
I think he's talking about George-W-Johnson-Nixon-Ford-Carter-Regan-Bush-Clinton Obama.
I posted basically the same thing before I read this malikai. Amen brother!
Remember when he got drunk at the olympics? I have to say I enjoyed watching him make a fool of himself.
He made an equal fool of himself while sober too.
Was he ever sober?
These are excellent questions..........that will never be answered.
"Good fer bidness, y'all. Ain't that obvious. You hate freedom or sumpin'?"
GWB
"This sucker could go down."
GWB
Actually, the best questions do not reveal the answer you hope to receive...
some things, for some people, actually are rocket science.
Whiskey tango foxtrot
Who cares?
You forgot one...
Why did you promote putting social security into the hands of Wall Street?
But, I guess there is no need to ask the obvious.
Is it really any worse than letting the gov't spend it and write IOU's against it...
Its just as bad as there really isn't any difference is there?
The old drink piss or eat shit option. I love that one.
Golden showers or Durty Sanchez? Nolo contendre.
You do understand that each and every FRN in your wallet is an IOU, right? Unless the U.S. Government collapses, those IOUs are money good. Putting your retirement money into Wall Street - you could, in fact, lose it all. Yes - there is a difference.
Privatization will be necessary to save the program. Probably the only good idea he had. Who can manage your retirement better, Boiler? Barney Frank or you? Barack Obama or you? Nancy Pelosi or you? GEORGE BUSH...or you?
JP Morgan, or you?
BoA, or you?
Lehman Brothers, or you?
you made my point. If we could control our own retirement we would be better off.
In the end what he help start to diminish our freedoms is what he will be remembered by.
Neither a Republican nor Democrat be.
Dubya has a PLAN?
Bullshit. Dubya has a BOOK for sale.
He don't DO plans.
Yeah, I was being sarcastic.
No rebuke to you, sir, but for sure he's fooled a whole lotta folks.
He had a plan. It was just a lot different than what most people expected. Same as Obama. He has a plan. Just a lot different that what most people expected. Not all, but most.
blunderdog:
He can't be needing $$$. Can he? Or...the price of oil's down, so maybe he does. If not, what's he up to? Really, he's out; no need to be writing books; too late for the legacy -- he's chained forever to those please for bailouts.
way to be so relevant. lol.
I can't wait for Obama's Carteresque books after his "Presidency." Bush was so bad that now we have this clown. A country of 300+ million people can't do better than these assholes? Unfuckingbelievable...
as this place goes to hell, labels aside, each president, like the debt, will get progressively and exponentially worse ...until it blows
That's the way geometric progressions work.
It is inherent in the self nomination process. We can only get people who have convinced themselves that they know what's best for others. This, among other reasons, is how the size and scope of the government grows.
We can do better, we just choose terrible incentive systems... although, I agree, potential is no different than imagination.
MachoMan: I doubt it's "people who have convinced themselves that they know what's best for others". That is peculiar to leftism. I think they all seek power and control; they're sociopaths, not helpers but totalitarians, every single one. I think they have absolutely no interesting the well-being of anyone but themselves. Not even their own families, which would explain quite a lot. Thinking about those who've run and their wives...
Would it be safe to conclude you'd call St. Paul a "leftist"?
Right, but the sociopath needs an internal justification for his deeds... in this case, it's "helping." The conviction and zealotry present for defending the justification as well as entrenching the justification can often times appear the same as sincerity.
There fixed it for you. The answer of course would be that it would be DAMN hard for a group to do a better job turning a 1st rate democratic republic super power into a third world banana republic faster than these guys have.
You seem to be saying that TPTB and/or the NWO crowd is very competent and has done a bang-up job. The puppets may be idiots, but the puppet masters do seem to have their acts together.
My point exactly. Many mistake the current crisis for an accident as an example. When you see the proposed solutions, the problem is seen for what it is...a created crisis. Problem, reaction solution. Control all three (heck even the last two are enough, take a real problem and provide the right "context" to usher in your unrelated solutions voila!) and you control society.
Normalcy Bias:
That's why no one should vote...so NOT to put our imprimatur on the process, which is simply a stupid dog-and-pony show that ends with the like-minded getting elected -- and things out here in the world getting worse and worse -- after each subsequent administration and its backwash, AKA 'CRAP'. And if we keep salivating at each subsequent election, it is NOT "Unfuckingbelievable" but INEVITABLE.
I care -GWB F'ed the USA
Name one living president who hasn't. Name one losing presidential candidate (live ones only) who would have done any better.
Ralph Nader
SpongeBob could have done better.
Ron Paul -- he ran in 2000 against GWB and the gored guy.
Pat Buchanan
Ron Paul
Ralph Nader
Alan Keyes
Ross Perot
Hell, even Dennis Kucinich would have meant it when he said he'd defend the Constitution!
when one can't accept to look forward one looks back; when a lucid but determined human looks back its to better understand whats up forward, not just to live in the past. We only really live in the future.
Understanding that the Corpocratic age now defies republic and democracy is a lesson worth understanding; by visiting deeply the past! To define/refine the antidotes of tomorrow.
Yes, GWB's presidency was a defining moment in US history; one that brought it to its lowest level, maybe barring one; but that has still to be written.
"I have abandoned free market principals to save the free market system " - GW
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1G2Jyvpje8
Quadruple face palm
hmmmm I don't know let's ask the communist race hustler and chief OBOWMAO.....and his ATTORNEY GENERAL ERIC"NOT MY PEOPLE"HOLDER AND his small mexiican army he built shall we....
A revolution every now and then can be a very good thing.
The tree of Liberty needs a good root feeding or it will become the lumber for the slaughterhouse of the formerly free.
I think this ship has sailed.
And Obama scores even worse in every category covered here.
But debating the two is like trying to determine which cartridge you would rather be hit center mass by, a 7.62x39 or 7.62x51.
Then someone else will always say they are both better than the 7.62x54r.
The result on our end really doesn't change.
pods
Yes. The point of this post was not "who is worse Bush or Obama??".
They are the same thing, deploying the same political program, supported by the same thinktanks, corporations and financiers.
The point of this post was that Bush should answer up to his own failings before running his mouth about anything much else.
Aziz: I don't think it's possible for Bush to really see himself. Most people are not able to. I think politicians are driven to run by sociopathy, which if so explains a lot.
Kissinger said power is the greatest aphrodisiac. I buy that, but I can't really relate to it.
True but these days, given the puppet masters, it's more like a eunuch chewing on an oyster
If Bush does face the music and answer the questions he'll be doing so while holding Obama on his shoulders.
Unwind all of Bush’s executive overreach, centrally planed vision quests, extra-constitutional power grabs and abrogations of individual liberty and Obama deflates like the fantasy blow-up doll that he really is.
Bush via NYT: “I actually found my freedom by leaving Washington.”
If only we could too GW.
You should know better than to play the lefty-righty game when you know there's no difference. You can state whatever "points" that you want, however, they in no way negate the fact that you're playing the partisan game.
If you believe that Bush should "do" anything... well, you're just engaging in attributing lifelike features to puppets.
This article (and any like it) are merely political fodder. By writing about them, you only aid them, as you are lending credibilty to the idea (in this case) that there is anything that Bush should do. Simply put, there is nothing that any of them should do, as they are fictional characters.
We might as well be talking about Santa, the Tooth Fairy, or any other non-existent entity. Or better yet, settle the age old question of just how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?
If you hate my writeup of Bush's presidency, you'll love my writeup of Obama's, because I'll say pretty much the same thing just even more angrily as Obama promised to be different.
What?
You don't mean being a closet socialist AND total sellout to the banking cartel is considered "different"?
I agree. I wasn't trying to argue against your point. Just making a statement in general.
pods
At 1,000 yards, I'd pick the 7.62X39 to be hit with. Energy is lower, and less likely to hit target, a bit like the comparison of a .30-30 with a .30-06.
Its relevent because a large section of the country seems to think that handing over the reins to an extremely similar Romney administration, with in some cases identical advisors to GWB, would somehow improve things. I'm certainly not suggesting voting for Obama, I'm also saying don't vote for Romney. Vote 3rd party or write in or embrace your new overlords (same as the old overlords).
Obama's the worst at the moment, because he's currently in-office.
Obama would not have been so bad, if he would have sticked to at least couple of pre-election promises. Like reducing deficit.
But then again, politicians are not known for their eagerness of holding their promises.
Tyler WTF with this article? Bush was a progressive one worlder, as was Clinton before him, it understood....... Lets get over it. Romney is even more a Progressive than Bush, does that make him worse than Barry?
You have a US president lecturing the Europeans on how to be a good socialist and you publish this?
gatorengineer: they ALL have been, not just for decades for far longer, and will continue into the future unless we use guillotines.
Guillotines only aid them by replacing comforting status quo puppets with radical ones that can get away with breaking and/or stealing even more shit.
Why does everyone insist we need to seek revenge against the puppets?
Can no one else see all of these strings?
8. Why did you decline every in house hunting trip offer
9. You did know that Vice President means only when the president is unavailable?
10. Was your grandfather you sole source of inspiration or just the people he funded?
11. Why do goats and Saudis take security priority?
Wow how odd is it that I could ask those same questions to Obama and they would all be vey relevant, only change the time line.
I can only imagine that this book is three pages double spaced.
... with lots of pictures, made up words, and a two page dedication to the Saudi Royal Family ...
Obama certainly found a much better writer to fashion his autobiography. Ayers is even better at writing than he is/was at bomb-making.
DREAMS OF MY COMMUNIST RACIST FATHER now that's a book!
John Aziz
Do you really think it's Obama who wants to expand the war, or might it be the military/industrial complex that Ike warned about (i.e. the cartel bankers who profit from serving both sides, and the war industries around the world)?
Consider that every president bows and scrapes to banksters and MIC. Otherwise....they get killed....
if W was President today we would have troops on the ground in Mexico City.( counting Blackwaters, Spec Ops, etc)
But would he have allowed drones to fly over the Homeland? (I absolutely HATE that term, Homeland.)
At least if we had troops in Mexico they would be closer to home, and probably more of the troops speak Spanish than speak whatever it is they speak in Afghanistan or Iraq. So there would be an up side to invading Mexico. It's not like we haven't tried that in the past.
To be honest I thought it was fairly obvious that Obama is a figurehead. He is their chosen son.
Yet despite this obvious view of yours, you've created an entire thread of people engaging in the lefty-right battle.
Please stop writing political articles, as they obviously do not work as you've intended.
It's not my fault if people — even here on ZH — are invested in a stupid left-right system. I hit the left just as hard as I hit the right, — when I go after Obama I get accused of being an apologist for Bush, and when I go after Bush I get accused of being an apologist for Jimmy Carter. Sorry folks — the whole shebang has been progressively corrupted, and it started with Alexander Hamilton.
My point is that it IS your fault. Intentionally or not, you've fully engaged the polarity with your HuffPo worthy article.
I say in the damn article Obama is following the same script. How is blaming both equally engaging the polarity?
Bush will do two weeks promoting his book and he will disappear again. Let sleeping dogs lie. The only question he needs to answer is whether he will take barack with him to go help jimma carta build houses for deadbeats.
Thank you Aziz for bringing up Alexander Hamilton, our 1st Central Banker and Federalist. His ideas were initially defeated and America prospered for a while until 1913 when the 2 coffin nails of The Federal Reserve Act and the Federal Income Tax doomed us all. The Federal Reserve Act allowed Congress to borrow and spend (thus allowing for [mainly] wars without financial consequences) and a tax that would eventually engulf and enslave every working citizen.
The history of America is so brief (from when the "Pilgrims" 1st starting to arrive in the early 1600's until today 2012) (and compared to say China's history of 5,000 years) it's amazing that we learn nothing about it in public school. I would venture to say that a History major in college knows next to nothing about the real American history.
Magna Carta (Englands 1st written contract allowing for liberties and rights) was corrupted shortly after signatures' ink dried. The battle between the "state" and liberty for mankind is forever and ongoing, and is only temporarily favored for mankinds liberty; and then always, the state continues to battle for its' greater rights against mans liberties. Unfortunately the next battle will be "they" with drones, microwave projecting heaters and 450,000,000 .40 caliber rounds against "us" with 10 round magazined rifles - seems a losing proposition but I still favor us; the American birth right is freedom. 'Teach, your children well' (CSN&Y) because the public schools will not.