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CBS continuing America's penchant for rehabilitating monsters, George W. Bush wants to tell you about compassionate conservatives
- Thread starter WrenchNinja
- Start date
Haha, so they are trying to bring this branding back? Back in the crack era I remember this being the counterpart to 'Tough on crime' Dems that the GOP feared would peel off their votes, so they pushed that 'Compassionate Conservatism' nonsense.
I mean, they sure stepped up and stopped our little four year flirtation with authoritarianism with a leader who couldn't even hand out medals of valor without being a fucking prick, so there goes that 'compassion' part
I mean, they sure stepped up and stopped our little four year flirtation with authoritarianism with a leader who couldn't even hand out medals of valor without being a fucking prick, so there goes that 'compassion' part
They STILL trying to sell the concept of Compassionate Conservatives™ all these years later, huh?
I mean, we can debate Afghanistan, but everyone knew Iraq was a nothing burger going in from his administration.
I suggest the first season of this podcast.
If you want to hear the nuts and bolts from behind the scenes that refute he was a 'useful idiot'.
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OnCloud shoes are becoming more popular the past year.
The best case scenario is GWB was AWOL when the terrible stuff was being planed and executed during his time.
The best case scenario is GWB was AWOL when the terrible stuff was being planed and executed during his time.
If you believe there's a difference in evil between George W. Bush and Donald Trump, and that W was essentially a decent man who was pushed into making difficult choices, you're basically admitting you're a mark who easily falls for whitewashing propaganda.
Conservatism inherently drives selfishness and callousness toward others. I seriously doubt that true conservative ideologues are capable of being compassionate.
What a fun and funny guy Dubya is for the media to whitewash.
www.theguardian.com
Less than a year after executing a false war and knowingly lying to the American public for years, he was cracking jokes. And he's been cracking jokes ever since. Fuck his paintings.
Way too many powerful personalities and orgs have been trying to rehab Bush since the Tea Party became a thing. And now we get to see them finish the job and solidify this monster as America's goofy uncle.
Bush jokes about search for WMD, but it's no laughing matter for critics
President George Bush sparked a political firestorm yesterday after making what many judged a tasteless and ill-judged joke about the failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
www.theguardian.com
Less than a year after executing a false war and knowingly lying to the American public for years, he was cracking jokes. And he's been cracking jokes ever since. Fuck his paintings.
Way too many powerful personalities and orgs have been trying to rehab Bush since the Tea Party became a thing. And now we get to see them finish the job and solidify this monster as America's goofy uncle.
He says compassionate, I see "polite."
They're still absolutely on board with a fascist dictatorship where women and minorities are repressed until the end of days. They just didn't like Trump very much.
They're still absolutely on board with a fascist dictatorship where women and minorities are repressed until the end of days. They just didn't like Trump very much.
This country's utter obsession with rehabilitating its worst leaders will be its downfall.
This shit will happen with Trump, give it 10+ years. Nothing but "lovable goof" bullshit, I guarantee it
This shit will happen with Trump, give it 10+ years. Nothing but "lovable goof" bullshit, I guarantee it
It's always been wild that conservatives feel the need to point out that there are some conservatives who aren't completely inhuman. And they do this believing it makes conservatism as a whole look better.
It's like the Brotherhood of Evil advertising they now have Nice Guy Tuesdays.
It's like the Brotherhood of Evil advertising they now have Nice Guy Tuesdays.
Time heals all wounds they say, even when it means becoming an apologist for this war criminal. Please fuck off.
You're doing some insane mental gymnastics and being charitable beyond measure to try and humanize war criminals. The pretense for war was a lie.
Our presidents aren't just out here doing their best to help people and making a mess of things. Imperialism is intentional and malicious and absolutely disregards the value of human life in pursuit of power.
Bush wasn't very popular when he was elected; he barely won on questionable margins. 9/11 flipped that entirely and people felt the need to support Bush during wartime. It wasn't until the Tea Party that the party started to shed its neocon tendencies.
I don't think Trump has ever realized anything – ever. Way too much credit.
This
Bush can come off more polite than trump but his politics basically boil down to "everyone that doesn't look like me or is from where I'm from is sub human"
He lied to enter Iraq and committed war crimes.
He wasn't a useful idiot. He was trying to finish what his father started.
I don't think its giving him too much credit to suggest that he realized that he could gain popularity by simply openly and blatantly pandering to white supremacists and white nationalists when that's exactly what he did.
User banned (permanent): rationalising war crimes
I met W once. I quite like the man, and I think his rational for invading Iraq was the right choice. (I'm saying this as a liberal interventionist) Bush is a good man, despite me having very different views than him on domestic issues.
Depends on how many people die because you were shitty at your job.
I can't tell if this is a joke or not.
Low post count probably indicates a troll. At least I hope so.
Those assholes knew what they were doing and they knew that it had no connection to 9/11 they just used it as an excuse.
And millions of people paid the price and are still paying.
p.s.
For those keep score at home -
Iraq - invaded
Syria - invaded
Lebanon - we let Israel fuck with them mostly
Libya - destroyed
Somalia - invaded
Sudan - cut in half
Iran - sanctioned and bombed
As much as Bush wants to believe that there are still compassionate conservatives in the party, they likely exist only in isolation in local politics, or are people who pay lip service to the idea but don't practice any part of the ideology.
After all, would the Republican Party of today pass something like the Americans with Disabilities Act, No Child Left Behind, increasing Medicare funding, any kind of immigration reform? I can't see that happening. Anything is not of corporate interest or owning the libs won't fly.
Though to be honest, even while Bush was the head of the party, compassionate conservatism wasn't really all that popular within the party, and had a fair bit of pushback from the far right elements. Likewise, while neo-conservativism isn't directly tied to compassionate conservatism, the two often went hand in hand and is almost as dead.
For a former living, two-term president, Bush has surprisingly little influence within his own party. Compare this to someone like Clinton who was still decently influential within the party (at least prior to 2016), or Trump who despite his losses holds major sway over voters and party officials.
So without even the influence to move the party in a particular direction, any chance for compassionate conservatism in any form to make a comeback is effectively null, and thinking there's sects within the party that crave a return to it is wishful thinking.
Especially as we've seen the remaining moderate Republicans abandon their registration with the party after the last election and capital riot, either becoming independent or flirting with other parties. The popularity of Biden's policies with those former compassionate conservatives no doubt helping to shift them further from the GOP, too, killing any last chance of that ideology gaining relevance in the party ever again.
After all, would the Republican Party of today pass something like the Americans with Disabilities Act, No Child Left Behind, increasing Medicare funding, any kind of immigration reform? I can't see that happening. Anything is not of corporate interest or owning the libs won't fly.
Though to be honest, even while Bush was the head of the party, compassionate conservatism wasn't really all that popular within the party, and had a fair bit of pushback from the far right elements. Likewise, while neo-conservativism isn't directly tied to compassionate conservatism, the two often went hand in hand and is almost as dead.
For a former living, two-term president, Bush has surprisingly little influence within his own party. Compare this to someone like Clinton who was still decently influential within the party (at least prior to 2016), or Trump who despite his losses holds major sway over voters and party officials.
So without even the influence to move the party in a particular direction, any chance for compassionate conservatism in any form to make a comeback is effectively null, and thinking there's sects within the party that crave a return to it is wishful thinking.
Especially as we've seen the remaining moderate Republicans abandon their registration with the party after the last election and capital riot, either becoming independent or flirting with other parties. The popularity of Biden's policies with those former compassionate conservatives no doubt helping to shift them further from the GOP, too, killing any last chance of that ideology gaining relevance in the party ever again.
Seeing the white washing of Bush happening in real time only tells me its going to happen to Trump in the next decade and I'll never be ready for that lol.
That only happens if the next GoP POTUS is even worse, which...has its own horrifying implications.
Also, why would ignorance be an excuse for doing bad deeds? If you're invading a foreign country without properly understanding the situation, you're just a weaker, stupider version of the same monsters who willing seek such mindless killing. Not understanding a situation properly should make a good person pull back until they have a better grasp; Bush is even more villainous if he went to war for no good reason at all.
The dumbass part is very important. I wonder how different his image would be currently with Will Ferrel's impression of him, although he was already known as a bumbling fool. A lot of people, maybe even most people?, have this image of him being a generally good guy just doing his best.
The idea of a "compassionate conservative" sounds worse to me than your regular sociopathic greedy conservative, I mean these guys have feelings but still manage to do all the shit they do?
As always, fuck Bush! He may not be the worst at being president (that goes to Trump), but he's still among the worst presidents alongside Reagan. Guy has loads of blood on his hands for his illegal war!
-Every- single former US president is a war criminal.
The sooner Americans realize that, the better.
The sooner Americans realize that, the better.
Bruh. Bush's administration tortured prisoners of war. Not as an accident but in the course of acting in-line with written policy that was signed by Bush himself.
Miss me with this. It's beyond naivety, it's dangerous.
I know you're banned, but I can appreciate the honesty of identifying yourself as a liberal interventionist. It lets people know right up front rather than us having to go through pages of discussion where you sidle up to it by defending drone strikes, advocate staying in Syria, attack whistleblowers, and run interference for the surveillance state and the military-industrial complex. We've been through that so many times on Era that I'm glad you just went ahead and outed yourself right away as having reprehensible beliefs.
If you vote for fascists, that makes you a fascist, and not by any stretch of the imagination a good person.
Anyway, Bush's public image-burnishing is one of the more disgusting results of Trump's reign. Fuck him.
This is the power of conservatism my entire life. A new disgusting standard gets into power and makes the previous one look like a success story. Every recent GOP POTUS makes the previous two or three look like ""decent"" human beings. All this does is expose us to new awful standards but makes what preceded it seem pleasant. There has been nothing pleasant about the conservative movement since the 1970s. Did the "compassion" really begin with going after welfare queens? That rhetoric has us with literal white nationalism now, thanks guys.
If Trump makes Dubya look like a compassionate person, a dude who literally argued on religious grounds that "God" was behind the US troops in Iraq, heaven forbid the out and about fascist that makes people think Trump was just a funny fat dude using his "media cultural understanding" to shitpost on Twitter. Someone is going to make his COVID inaction seem like a totally arguable position simply because they'll produce a new illness for the public to be exposed to politically.
Bush is lucky Trump came after him in the Republican order. The only reason his image is better today is because Trump was such a crisis.
Bush is also lucky he didn't have to deal with COVID. Hurricane Katrina sort of demonstrated the help you were gonna get from Bush if shit got bad, especially if you weren't white.