What's really destroying America?

Since when was lying considered responsible reporting? There's something very dangerous that's happening in America and it's been building steam since Clinton came into office. The Right decided, at some point, that they were losing the debate. Clinton and neo-liberalism was becoming the future of America. So instead of countering with thoughtful reproaches, it seems like they all got together, the pundits, the congressmen, the lobbiest, and just decided to start lying.

Plain and simple. In America, unfortunately you only have to be louder than your opponent to win a debate--Not more correct or more factual. We see it today with the debate on health care. Sarah Palin whining about "death panels." Mincing the words of a proposal she certainly never read, Palin failed to realize that the language that she was referring to, the language that (to her) sounded like subsidized euthenasia, was the same language used in Bush's 2002 prescription drug bill. She knows there's not death panels. But people believe her.

Rush tell his people, Obama is turning this country into a socialist haven. Then he calls him Hitler. He can't even get his insults consistent with themselves. Hitler wasn't a socialist!!! Lies, lies lies.

I know this isn't revelatory to any intelligent person. But what I'm trying to get at is that it's not taken a turn for the worse. People are being whipped into a frenzy fueled by blind ignorance and racism. Protesters are showing up to Obama's town hall meetings with LOADED WEAPONS! Holy shit people! What the fuck????

I remember people getting arrested for just wearing anti-Bush shirts to his town halls. People are showing up to Obama's speeches with LOADED FUCKING MACHINE GUNS. AMERICA!!! WHAT THE FUCK! And Obama isn't even arresting them! And you're calling Obama tyrannical, Rush/FOX?

I've had enough. You people are KILLING this country. And if, God forbid, anything happens to President Obama, it will be YOU to blame. There's only so much aggravation an ignorant, racist, gun-owning "patriot" is going take before he retaliates. And when you tell people like this that their first Black president is trying to kill their retarded babies, their grandparents, and turn this country into Stalinist Russia, you better believe that idiot is going to take action into his own hands. So please...stop.

This is sick. You people are vile scumbags. You're not even Republicans. Teddy and Eisenhower would fucking die at the hands of rabid dogs before buying into whatever Rush and FOX'a brand of Republicanism is.

These lies need to stop. America: you are being lied to. You are free to disagree with Obama. You are free to disagree with whoever you want. But don't believe the maggot-infested horse shit you're being fed.

Watch, now, as I deconstruct one of my favorite and most prestegious piles of lying dog shit.

Fred Barnes' article for the Weekly Standard: "10 Things Bush Got Right"

The postmortems on the presidency of George W. Bush are all wrong. The liberal line is that Bush dangerously weakened America's position in the world and rushed to the aid of the rich and powerful as income inequality worsened. That is twaddle. Conservatives--okay, not all of them--have only been a little bit kinder. They give Bush credit for the surge that saved Iraq, but not for much else.

He deserves better. His presidency was far more successful than not. And there's an aspect of his decision-making that merits special recognition: his courage. Time and time again, Bush did what other presidents, even Ronald Reagan, would not have done and for which he was vilified and abused. That--defiantly doing the right thing--is what distinguished his presidency.

Bush had ten great achievements (and maybe more) in his eight years in the White House, starting with his decision in 2001 to jettison the Kyoto global warming treaty so loved by Al Gore, the environmental lobby, elite opinion, and Europeans. The treaty was a disaster, with India and China exempted and economic decline the certain result. Everyone knew it. But only Bush said so and acted accordingly.

He stood athwart mounting global warming hysteria and yelled, "Stop!" He slowed the movement toward a policy blunder of worldwide impact, providing time for facts to catch up with the dubious claims of alarmists. Thanks in part to Bush, the supposed consensus of scientists on global warming has now collapsed. The skeptics, who point to global cooling over the past decade, are now heard loud and clear. And a rational approach to the theory of manmade global warming is possible.

LIE LIE LIE LIE LIE - This is not true in any way what so ever. The consensus on global warming is even more certain than EVER. This year is the hottest the oceans have EVER been on record. Antarctica is also the smallest it's ever been on record. A global scientific panel came to the conclusion 2 years ago, global warming is unequivocally man-made.

Additionally, even if this were true, how is it a success story? America gained nothing by being silent on global warming during the Bush years. If anything, we're now 8 years behind the rest of the world in modernizing our energy systems for the 21st century. This is a LIE.

Second, enhanced interrogation of terrorists. Along with use of secret prisons and wireless eavesdropping, this saved American lives. How many thousands of lives? We'll never know. But, as Charles Krauthammer said recently, "Those are precisely the elements which kept us safe and which have prevented a second attack."

Crucial intelligence was obtained from captured al Qaeda leaders, including 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, with the help of waterboarding. Whether this tactic--it creates a drowning sensation--is torture is a matter of debate. John McCain and many Democrats say it is. Bush and Vice President Cheney insist it isn't. In any case, it was necessary. Lincoln once made a similar point in defending his suspension of habeas corpus in direct defiance of Chief Justice Roger Taney. "Are all the laws but one to go unexecuted, and the government itself go to pieces, lest that one be violated?" Lincoln asked. Bush understood the answer in wartime had to be no.

LIE! LIE! LIE! As CBS details here, waterboarding resulted in very little evidence that could be put to good use. And if anything, the fact that Bush sanctioned torture only served to help recruit MORE terrorists--a simple cause-and-effect that idiots like Fred don't seem to understand. Furthermore, waterboarding IS torture. Despite what Bush/Cheney has to say, the Geneva Convention call it torture. The Red Cross calls it torture. It's internationally regarded as torture. Just because Bush says it's super cool doesn't mean it is. Moron.

Furthermore, it's such a classic Republican rebuke to reference Lincoln when they're trying to defend Bush. Not gunna happen man. Lincoln read books. He used logic to get to his opinions. Bush famously uses his "gut."

Bush's third achievement was the rebuilding of presidential authority, badly degraded in the era of Vietnam, Watergate, and Bill Clinton. He didn't hesitate to conduct wireless surveillance of terrorists without getting a federal judge's okay. He decided on his own how to treat terrorists and where they should be imprisoned. Those were legitimate decisions for which the president, as commander in chief, should feel no need to apologize.

I'm really not sure what to say here. Not as much a lie, as a dangerous lack of respect for the rule of law. Apparently Fred thinks that the President should be able to act outside of the law, as long as it's a "legitimate decision." I'd like to see how he would feel if Obama flexed his "presidential authority" to by-pass congress and just give us universal health care. After all, it's a "legitimate decision" that he should feel no need to apologize for. Especially since the rest of the western world has universal health care. What Fred fails to understand is that laws exist specifically because they are not subject to subjective thought.

Defending, all the way to the Supreme Court, Cheney's refusal to disclose to Congress the names of people he'd consulted on energy policy was also enormously important. Democratic congressman Henry Waxman demanded the names, but the Court upheld Cheney, 7-2. Last week, Cheney defended his refusal, waspishly noting that Waxman "doesn't call me up and tell me who he's meeting with."

Again, this isn't a lie as much as it is a: how the fuck is this good for America??? The Bush administration was the ONLY administration in the history of America to not make public the energy policy meetings. Their supreme secrecy should only serve to question Cheney's motives...not encourage them. With no-bid contracts in Iraq for Cheney's old employer, Halliburton and his involvement in the ENRON scandal, how can you defend Cheney's decision to keep his meetings off of public record? Are you dense?

Achievement number four was Bush's unswerving support for Israel. Reagan was once deemed Israel's best friend in the White House. Now Bush can claim the title. He ostracized Yasser Arafat as an impediment to peace in the Middle East. This infuriated the anti-Israel forces in Europe, the Third World, and the United Nations, and was criticized by champions of the "peace process" here at home. Bush was right.

He was clever in his support. Bush announced that Ariel Sharon should withdraw the tanks he'd sent into the West Bank in 2002, then exerted zero pressure on Sharon to do so. And he backed the wall along Israel's eastern border without endorsing it as an official boundary, while knowing full well that it might eventually become exactly that. He was a loyal friend.

Why is this considered a success? It's not like he brokered a peace deal between Israel and Palestine. He just maintained our stupid, perilous relationship with Israel. It's like complementing the guy for getting up every morning. He maintained the status quo...great job Bush. Seriously Fred? This is your number four achievenemt? Fuck, your expectations are low.

His fifth success was No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the education reform bill cosponsored by America's most prominent liberal Democratic senator Edward Kennedy. The teachers' unions, school boards, the education establishment, conservatives adamant about local control of schools--they all loathed the measure and still do. It requires two things they ardently oppose, mandatory testing and accountability.

Kennedy later turned against NCLB, saying Bush is shortchanging the program. In truth, federal education spending is at record levels. Another complaint is that it forces teachers to "teach to the test." The tests are on math and reading. They are tests worth teaching to.

No Child Left Behind was an abject FAILURE. Fred, your complete lack of understanding about the dynamics of the program are obvious. Teachers were furious not because they had to teach for the test, but because the test was fucking stupid. And NCLB essentially incentivised teachers to scrap traditional lesson plans for test cramming sessions. It would be like going to cooking school and only learning how to make chocolate cake and tomato sauce and then calling yourself a chef at the end of it.

Kids weren't learning a god damn thing under NCLB. Test scores went up because schools encouraged students they know couldn't pass the tests to drop out of school and get their GEDs in order to fluff their national scores. That's not an education program worth touting. That's turning a blind eye to a serious problem. Way to go. Just google "no child left behind failure" and you'll see hundreds of articles from newspapers around the country explaining, for a variety of reasons, why the program failed in their community. LIE!

Sixth, Bush declared in his second inaugural address in 2005 that American foreign policy (at least his) would henceforth focus on promoting democracy
around the world. This put him squarely in the Reagan camp, but he was lambasted as unrealistic, impractical, and a tool of wily neoconservatives. The new policy gave Bush credibility in pressing for democracy in the former Soviet republics and Middle East and in zinging various dictators and kleptocrats. It will do the same for President Obama, if he's wise enough to hang onto it.

Again, what kind of low-brow achievements are you shooting for here? This is like Special Olympic level shit, Fred. You can "promote democracy around the world," it doesn't mean it's happening. Oh! I declare that everyone will be happy and depression-free from now on. That's my new policy. So congratulate me for my achievement. Fred, can you look up what achievement actually means in the dictionary? I think you'll find that achievement means "a thing done successfully, typically by effort, courage, or skill." What effort, courage, or skill did Bush employ here. The world is not better democratized because of him. People called him unrealistic...and they were RIGHT! LIE! You're a complete moron.

The seventh achievement is the Medicare prescription drug benefit, enacted in 2003. It's not only wildly popular; it has cost less than expected by triggering competition among drug companies. Conservatives have deep reservations about the program. But they shouldn't have been surprised. Bush advocated the drug benefit in the 2000 campaign. And if he hadn't acted, Democrats would have, with a much less attractive result.

LIE. The lie here is not whether or not the program is a success. It's that this is the EXACT legislation I referenced earlier that contained the EXACT same language Obama's health care plan has regarding government payment for doctor consultation regarding end-of-life planning...now famously called "death panels." I would like to hear Fred's take on "Death panels" now--since he's such a big fan of Bush's prescription drug benefit. LIE. Here's a fun one on Palin. Turns out, much like the bridge to nowhere, she supported her own "death panels" before the attacked Obama's.

Then there were John Roberts and Sam Alito. In putting them on the Supreme Court and naming Roberts chief justice, Bush achieved what had eluded Richard Nixon, Reagan, and his own father. Roberts and Alito made the Court indisputably more conservative. And the good news is Roberts, 53, and Alito, 58, should be justices for decades to come.

LIE. Fred and the rest of the loon pundits all decried Obama's nomination of Sotomayor because they said she'd legislate from the bench. They insisted that judges shouldn't be political, that they should not impose their personal beliefs from the bench, that she was overtly liberal and not impartial. Well...Fred seems awfully happy about making the supreme court "indisputably more conservative." Couldn't have said it better myself, Fred. You're a fucking liar.

Bush's ninth achievement has been widely ignored. He strengthened relations with east Asian democracies (Japan, South Korea, Australia) without causing a rift with China. On top of that, he forged strong ties with India. An important factor was their common enemy, Islamic jihadists. After 9/11, Bush made the most of this, and Indian leaders were receptive. His state dinner for Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh in 2006 was a lovefest.

Again, this is an achievement? Why would strengthening relations with Japan, South Korea and Australia possibly cause a rift with China? China is our largest trading partner. The other relationships have little to do with our relationship with China. It's like congratulating him for improving our relationship with Canada while not pissing off Great Britain. One has nothing to do with the other. Congrats, President Bush! LIE!

Finally, a no-brainer: the surge. Bush prompted nearly unanimous disapproval in January 2007 when he announced he was sending more troops to Iraq and adopting a new counterinsurgency strategy. His opponents initially included the State Department, the Pentagon, most of Congress, the media, the foreign policy establishment, indeed the whole world. This makes his decision a profile in courage. Best of all, the surge worked. Iraq is now a fragile but functioning democracy.

This is my favorite because the surge, itself, had little to do with Bush or his planning. Furthermore, it's success had less to do with the actual surge and much more to do with coincidence (most notably the Sunni Awakening and the secret death squads that were being carried out at the same time, assassinating heads of militia groups).

How does Bush rank as a president? We won't know until he's judged from the perspective of two or three decades. Hindsight forced a sharp upgrading of the presidencies of Harry Truman and Dwight Eisenhower. Given his achievements, it may have the same effect for Bush.

-------------------------------------

Bush ranks last. Fred, you and the rest of your right-wing, nut-job pundits need to shut the fuck up and let America be. We've had enough. Seriously. We've had enough.

Dear Miss Cali

Just because you say, "no offense to the gay community" doesn't remove you from culpability from your statements, in fact, it really just further paints you as a bigot--because you obviously recognize that your words at the Miss USA pageant were, in fact, quite offensive.

It's slightly excusable, or at least begrudgingly understandable, that people over the age of 50 can think so backwardly about same-sex marriage, but you're 22 bitch! You're an embarrassment to your generation.

I give it one week before this disgusting representation of our generation is on FOX news. She has everything they want. Dumb blond looks, dumb blond attitude, and a 6 year-old's understanding. You sadden America. You are on the wrong side of history AND on the wrong side of your fucking bible. If we followed the Bible as closely as you seem to want, we'd be stoning you for all the man you've probably serviced to get to where you got.

No offense to black people, but I don't think that black men should be marrying white women. But seriously, no offense.

You probably could have said that about 40 years ago with no public outcry. Try saying that today. It's called social progress. And you, Miss California, are painfully and permanently cemented into the WRONG side of history.

Note to Conservatives: Your president sucked...hard. Deal with it.

You would think that finally, at the end of eight years of complete misery, conservatives would finally concede that, indeed, their hero, George W Bush, was perhaps not the greatest president on Earth. Yet I found myself yesterday listening to the lunatic Dan Savage on the radio spewing some vile garbage about how "privileged" democrats are and how George Bush was never helped by his name to get where he got (Savage sited Georgie's acceptance to Yale, his governorship of Texas, and of course the US presidency all as things NOT attained through the aid of the Bush name). Now I read this on Slate.com of all places.

"Bush Derangement Syndrome" Are you serious? At the risk of resorting to a useless battle of childish name calling, what the hell is wrong with you people? I have a much better syndrome for you guys...its called delusional schizophrenia.

Bush was an awful president. In arguably miserable. Oh, but he "kept us safe for the last seven years." Sure, I guess that depends on your definition of safe.

Your lame attempt at minimizing people's attacks on GWB as some partisan triviality, some "Bush Derangement Syndrome," falls on the deaf ears of the 70% of Americans who think Bush is a terrible president--and after today, WAS a terrible president.

Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you people? You act as if there's no legitimate reason to have a deep dislike and distrust of the single most unpopular president in the history of the US. You speak of our mockery of Bush, our unbridled hatred for him, as if it were akin to a sports rivalry. This isn't a Boston Red Soxs fan bitter about how the Yankees always win the pennant. This isn't the musings of a bitter copy boy in the office who always gets passed over for promotion because of his dick head boss.

This is an American citizen who developed a legitimate hatred for a president who continually showed utter contempt for knowledge, responsibility, communication, and reason. I developed hatred for a president who when a hurricane leveled one of this country's most important and historic cities, sat at his ranch for a bit before he "decided" it was time for him to pay attention to the atrocity. I developed a hatred for this president when he "decided" to launch us into an unnecessary war killing tens of thousands of innocent people and thousands of our soldiers. I developed a hatred for this president when he "decided" to dishonor the basic principles that this country stands for by suspending habeas corpus, using unlawful wire taps to spy on US citizens, and approve torture as an appropriate mechanism for gaining counter intelligence. I have a million legitimate reasons for why I dislike this moron...this "decider." So don't dismiss my opinions and the opinions of the MAJORITY of Americans by lumping our disapproval of George W Bush as "Bush Derangement Syndrome." You dolt.