LittleMsSunshine
07-11-2008, 08:16 PM
Someone said that people were focusing too much on all Bush's fuckups. Now, I'm not seriously narrowminded enough to believe that EVERYTHING he touches turns to shit..... so I decided to try and dig up some of the GOOD thing he has done during his presidency. It took me a while, but here are a few articles I found:
Top 10 Things President Bush Has Done Right
By Keith Porter
Passport, the blog of Foreign Policy magazine, used the occasion of George W. Bush's 61st birthday (7/6/07) to print a list of things his Administration has done right in U.S. foreign policy. As they wrote, "Passport is usually pretty critical of the Prez. So for a change of pace and out of respect for the man's special day, here are the top ten things Bush and his team have gotten right during his time in office. No wisecracks, I promise."
Here, I took their list and expanded on each item.
1. Boosting Aid to Africa Threefold
"American food aid delivered to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa"Photo: Stanley Foundation/Kristin McHugh
This story from the Washington Post says, "The president has tripled direct humanitarian and development aid to the world's most impoverished continent since taking office and recently vowed to double that increased amount by 2010 -- to nearly $9 billion."
2. Preventing a Nuclear War Between India and Pakistan
India and Pakistan have been arch rivals since independence in 1947. The addition of nuclear weapons into the dispute (India tested their first thermonuclear weapon in May of 1998. Pakistan got the bomb later that same month) could have meant global disaster. And it still could.
3. Taking Down the A.Q. Khan Nuclear Proliferation Network
A.Q. Kahn is considered the father of Pakistan's nuclear program. But several years ago, he confessed to leaking nuclear know-how and materials to Iran and Libya. Security experts suspect he also helped other countries including North Korea. Kahn is under house arrest in Pakistan. Critics say the Bush Administration should have acted faster on the Khan situation.
4. Getting Libya To Give Up Its WMD Programs And Renounce Terrorism
In late 2003, President Bush announced that "quiet diplomacy" had led to a breakthrough with Libya. Libya agreed to give up all weapons of mass destruction programs and allow international inspection of suspected weapons sites. The president has implied that Libya agreed to all this after seing how the United States reacted to Iraq's suspected weapons program. Critics paint a different picture.
5. Turning Independent-Minded India Into a Strategic Ally
"A worker in an Indian uranium mine."Photo: Stanley Foundation/FSN
The United States has engaged India on many topics. The most controversial is a plan to share nuclear technology with India in a way which critics say will do grave damage to the global Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
6. After a Rough Start, Sticking To a Pragmatic China Policy
There are no easy choices for the United States when it comes to China. Our interests in Chinese human rights, labor rights, and foreign involvement compete with the fact that China is a major American customer and big parts of America's foreign debt are held by China. The administration has done what it can to steer a middle course... which is often satisfying to no one.
7. Getting North Korea To Shut Down Its Nuclear Reactor (Eventually)
"U.S. envoy to North Korea Christopher Hill."Photo: Getty/Chung Sung-Jun
In what is considered a diplomatic "win" for U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice over the more aggressive policies of Vice President Dick Cheney, the United States has made slow but steady progress in dealing with North Korea.
8. Decapitating Al Qaeda's Top Leadership And Not Having a 2nd 9/11
Proving why something didn't happen is difficult, but we have to acknowledge that there has not been another 9/11 level attack on America. And many members of Al Qaeda are no longer with us.
9. Giving Immigration Reform The Old College Try
The president's immigration reform bill ran into a buzzsaw of criticism from the right and the left. The bill eventually failed (twice), and now we are left with the same old broken system. The About Guides to Immigration have full coverage.
10. Challenging His Party On Harmful Ag Subsidies While Pushing Free Trade
The United States has seriously reduced the subsidies it pays to farmers and pushed for worldwide reductions to level the playing field for international trade.
and this article:
What Bush Has Done Right
10 Things That President Bush Has Done Right on Civil Liberties
By Tom Head
President Bush has taken a well-deserved flogging on his civil liberties record, but he hasn't been all bad. Here are ten things the president has done to protect or advance American civil liberties.
Transformed the immigration reform debate.
In 2006, there was a debate within the Republican-dominated Congress over the future of America's 12 million undocumented immigrants. The response of the House was mass deportation; the response of the Senate was comprehensive reform with a citizenship path. President Bush strongly and openly favored the latter approach, to the point of essentially ending the debate within his party over deportation. It cost him dearly among his base, but it moved the immigration reform debate to the center and provided political cover for other Republicans willing to entertain humane immigration reform proposals. Thanks in part to President Bush's position on this issue, real bipartisan immigration reform may be possible in 2009.
Declared the first federal ban on racial profiling
During his first State of the Union address in early 2001, President Bush vowed to end racial profiling. In 2003, he acted on his promise by issuing an order to 70 federal law enforcement agencies calling for an end to most forms of racial and ethnic profiling. The ban was not airtight, but it was the first ban of its kind.
Did not appoint justices in the mold of Scalia and Thomas.
While the jury is still out on the new jurists, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, neither are likely to be mistaken for Robert Bork. Roberts seems slightly less conservative than his predecessor, Chief Justice William Rehnquist, while Alito seems slightly more conservative than his, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. While this represents an incremental shift in the 5-4 calculus on some narrowly-constructed rulings, it does not represent the bold rightward trajectory that many had expected--or at least not yet.
Accepted record numbers of refugees and asylum-seekers.
During the second term of the Clinton administration, the United States accepted an average of 60,000 refugees per year and 7,000 asylum-seekers per year. From 2001 to 2006, under the leadership of President Bush, the United States accepted more than four times as many asylum-seekers--some 32,000 per year--and an average of 87,000 refugees per year.
Used the bully pulpit to protect American Muslims.
In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, anti-Muslim and anti-Arab sentiment was on the rise. Almost every other president in the history of the United States who had faced terrorist attacks from abroad ultimately gave in to xenophobia--President Woodrow Wilson being the most egregious example. President Bush did not, infuriating elements of his base by meeting with pro-Arab and pro-Muslim civil rights groups and holding Muslim events at the White House. When Democrats relied on anti-Arab sentiment while criticizing the transfer of several U.S. ports from British to UAE ownership, it became clear just how far this xenophobia had spread--and just how important it might have been that the president had made an effort to reject it.
Integrated the executive branch.
The top four positions in the executive branch are those of the president, the vice-president, the secretary of state, and the attorney general. Until President Bush came to power, none of these four offices had ever been occupied by a person of color. President Bush has appointed the first non-white attorney general (Alberto Gonzales), as well as both the first (Colin Powell) and second (Condoleezza Rice) non-white secretaries of state. There have been non-white legislators and two non-white Supreme Court justices, but prior to the Bush administration, the upper echelon of the executive branch had always been all-white. President Bush changed that.
Protected the right to bear arms.
When President Bush came into office, the Clinton-era "assault weapons" ban was still in effect. Even though he had supported the ban consistently during his 2000 campaign, President Bush made no serious effort to seek its renewal and it expired in 2004. Since that time, President Bush has also signed legislation preventing local law enforcement agencies from forcibly confiscating legally-owned firearms, as was done on a large scale in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Extended federal pension benefits to include same-sex couples.
Although President Bush's rhetoric has often been troubling, he has yet to change a single federal policy in a way that detrimentally affects LGBT Americans. Couple this with a 2006 bill he signed that gave non-spousal couples the same federal pension standards as married couples, his decision to appoint an openly gay man as U.S. ambassador to Romania, his refusal to turn lesbian and gay families away from the White House Easter egg hunt, his decision not to overturn President Clinton's executive order banning federal employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and his warm words about the vice-president's daughter and her family, and you have an administration that is not as homophobic as many had feared it would be.
Signed an executive order banning federal eminent domain seizures.
The Supreme Court's ruling in Kelo v. New London (2005) gave the government power to seize private property for commercial use if the local government deemed the commercial use helpful to the community as a whole, giving the government more power to seize private property than it had ever had before. While executive orders hold no legislative power, and the federal government has not historically made eminent domain claims, President Bush's executive order banning same would force any future president wishing to claim eminent domain powers to make the visible and unpopular move of rescinding the executive order. If the federal leadership wishes to claim broad Kelo eminent domain powers in the future, it will not be able to do so quietly.
Did not create "an America we won't recognize."
The greatest contribution President Bush has made to civil liberties has been his failure to live up to expectations. During the 2004 campaign, Senator Hillary Clinton warned us that re-electing Bush would radically transform our country, leaving us with what she called "an America we won't recognize." While President Bush has a horrible civil liberties record, it is only incrementally worse than that of his predecessor and certainly not so much worse as to pose a grave threat to the existence of our liberal democracy. His record on civil liberties has been, I am sad to say, quite normal for a president--perhaps better than I would have expected from a president responding to the worst terrorist attack in our country's history.
Here ya go. Obviously, they come from opinion columns....so I can't stand behind them 100%. I'm getting ready to go to San Diego in the morning, so I don't have time to sit down and research every single thing.
:dunno
Top 10 Things President Bush Has Done Right
By Keith Porter
Passport, the blog of Foreign Policy magazine, used the occasion of George W. Bush's 61st birthday (7/6/07) to print a list of things his Administration has done right in U.S. foreign policy. As they wrote, "Passport is usually pretty critical of the Prez. So for a change of pace and out of respect for the man's special day, here are the top ten things Bush and his team have gotten right during his time in office. No wisecracks, I promise."
Here, I took their list and expanded on each item.
1. Boosting Aid to Africa Threefold
"American food aid delivered to Djibouti in the Horn of Africa"Photo: Stanley Foundation/Kristin McHugh
This story from the Washington Post says, "The president has tripled direct humanitarian and development aid to the world's most impoverished continent since taking office and recently vowed to double that increased amount by 2010 -- to nearly $9 billion."
2. Preventing a Nuclear War Between India and Pakistan
India and Pakistan have been arch rivals since independence in 1947. The addition of nuclear weapons into the dispute (India tested their first thermonuclear weapon in May of 1998. Pakistan got the bomb later that same month) could have meant global disaster. And it still could.
3. Taking Down the A.Q. Khan Nuclear Proliferation Network
A.Q. Kahn is considered the father of Pakistan's nuclear program. But several years ago, he confessed to leaking nuclear know-how and materials to Iran and Libya. Security experts suspect he also helped other countries including North Korea. Kahn is under house arrest in Pakistan. Critics say the Bush Administration should have acted faster on the Khan situation.
4. Getting Libya To Give Up Its WMD Programs And Renounce Terrorism
In late 2003, President Bush announced that "quiet diplomacy" had led to a breakthrough with Libya. Libya agreed to give up all weapons of mass destruction programs and allow international inspection of suspected weapons sites. The president has implied that Libya agreed to all this after seing how the United States reacted to Iraq's suspected weapons program. Critics paint a different picture.
5. Turning Independent-Minded India Into a Strategic Ally
"A worker in an Indian uranium mine."Photo: Stanley Foundation/FSN
The United States has engaged India on many topics. The most controversial is a plan to share nuclear technology with India in a way which critics say will do grave damage to the global Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.
6. After a Rough Start, Sticking To a Pragmatic China Policy
There are no easy choices for the United States when it comes to China. Our interests in Chinese human rights, labor rights, and foreign involvement compete with the fact that China is a major American customer and big parts of America's foreign debt are held by China. The administration has done what it can to steer a middle course... which is often satisfying to no one.
7. Getting North Korea To Shut Down Its Nuclear Reactor (Eventually)
"U.S. envoy to North Korea Christopher Hill."Photo: Getty/Chung Sung-Jun
In what is considered a diplomatic "win" for U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice over the more aggressive policies of Vice President Dick Cheney, the United States has made slow but steady progress in dealing with North Korea.
8. Decapitating Al Qaeda's Top Leadership And Not Having a 2nd 9/11
Proving why something didn't happen is difficult, but we have to acknowledge that there has not been another 9/11 level attack on America. And many members of Al Qaeda are no longer with us.
9. Giving Immigration Reform The Old College Try
The president's immigration reform bill ran into a buzzsaw of criticism from the right and the left. The bill eventually failed (twice), and now we are left with the same old broken system. The About Guides to Immigration have full coverage.
10. Challenging His Party On Harmful Ag Subsidies While Pushing Free Trade
The United States has seriously reduced the subsidies it pays to farmers and pushed for worldwide reductions to level the playing field for international trade.
and this article:
What Bush Has Done Right
10 Things That President Bush Has Done Right on Civil Liberties
By Tom Head
President Bush has taken a well-deserved flogging on his civil liberties record, but he hasn't been all bad. Here are ten things the president has done to protect or advance American civil liberties.
Transformed the immigration reform debate.
In 2006, there was a debate within the Republican-dominated Congress over the future of America's 12 million undocumented immigrants. The response of the House was mass deportation; the response of the Senate was comprehensive reform with a citizenship path. President Bush strongly and openly favored the latter approach, to the point of essentially ending the debate within his party over deportation. It cost him dearly among his base, but it moved the immigration reform debate to the center and provided political cover for other Republicans willing to entertain humane immigration reform proposals. Thanks in part to President Bush's position on this issue, real bipartisan immigration reform may be possible in 2009.
Declared the first federal ban on racial profiling
During his first State of the Union address in early 2001, President Bush vowed to end racial profiling. In 2003, he acted on his promise by issuing an order to 70 federal law enforcement agencies calling for an end to most forms of racial and ethnic profiling. The ban was not airtight, but it was the first ban of its kind.
Did not appoint justices in the mold of Scalia and Thomas.
While the jury is still out on the new jurists, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, neither are likely to be mistaken for Robert Bork. Roberts seems slightly less conservative than his predecessor, Chief Justice William Rehnquist, while Alito seems slightly more conservative than his, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. While this represents an incremental shift in the 5-4 calculus on some narrowly-constructed rulings, it does not represent the bold rightward trajectory that many had expected--or at least not yet.
Accepted record numbers of refugees and asylum-seekers.
During the second term of the Clinton administration, the United States accepted an average of 60,000 refugees per year and 7,000 asylum-seekers per year. From 2001 to 2006, under the leadership of President Bush, the United States accepted more than four times as many asylum-seekers--some 32,000 per year--and an average of 87,000 refugees per year.
Used the bully pulpit to protect American Muslims.
In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, anti-Muslim and anti-Arab sentiment was on the rise. Almost every other president in the history of the United States who had faced terrorist attacks from abroad ultimately gave in to xenophobia--President Woodrow Wilson being the most egregious example. President Bush did not, infuriating elements of his base by meeting with pro-Arab and pro-Muslim civil rights groups and holding Muslim events at the White House. When Democrats relied on anti-Arab sentiment while criticizing the transfer of several U.S. ports from British to UAE ownership, it became clear just how far this xenophobia had spread--and just how important it might have been that the president had made an effort to reject it.
Integrated the executive branch.
The top four positions in the executive branch are those of the president, the vice-president, the secretary of state, and the attorney general. Until President Bush came to power, none of these four offices had ever been occupied by a person of color. President Bush has appointed the first non-white attorney general (Alberto Gonzales), as well as both the first (Colin Powell) and second (Condoleezza Rice) non-white secretaries of state. There have been non-white legislators and two non-white Supreme Court justices, but prior to the Bush administration, the upper echelon of the executive branch had always been all-white. President Bush changed that.
Protected the right to bear arms.
When President Bush came into office, the Clinton-era "assault weapons" ban was still in effect. Even though he had supported the ban consistently during his 2000 campaign, President Bush made no serious effort to seek its renewal and it expired in 2004. Since that time, President Bush has also signed legislation preventing local law enforcement agencies from forcibly confiscating legally-owned firearms, as was done on a large scale in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Extended federal pension benefits to include same-sex couples.
Although President Bush's rhetoric has often been troubling, he has yet to change a single federal policy in a way that detrimentally affects LGBT Americans. Couple this with a 2006 bill he signed that gave non-spousal couples the same federal pension standards as married couples, his decision to appoint an openly gay man as U.S. ambassador to Romania, his refusal to turn lesbian and gay families away from the White House Easter egg hunt, his decision not to overturn President Clinton's executive order banning federal employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, and his warm words about the vice-president's daughter and her family, and you have an administration that is not as homophobic as many had feared it would be.
Signed an executive order banning federal eminent domain seizures.
The Supreme Court's ruling in Kelo v. New London (2005) gave the government power to seize private property for commercial use if the local government deemed the commercial use helpful to the community as a whole, giving the government more power to seize private property than it had ever had before. While executive orders hold no legislative power, and the federal government has not historically made eminent domain claims, President Bush's executive order banning same would force any future president wishing to claim eminent domain powers to make the visible and unpopular move of rescinding the executive order. If the federal leadership wishes to claim broad Kelo eminent domain powers in the future, it will not be able to do so quietly.
Did not create "an America we won't recognize."
The greatest contribution President Bush has made to civil liberties has been his failure to live up to expectations. During the 2004 campaign, Senator Hillary Clinton warned us that re-electing Bush would radically transform our country, leaving us with what she called "an America we won't recognize." While President Bush has a horrible civil liberties record, it is only incrementally worse than that of his predecessor and certainly not so much worse as to pose a grave threat to the existence of our liberal democracy. His record on civil liberties has been, I am sad to say, quite normal for a president--perhaps better than I would have expected from a president responding to the worst terrorist attack in our country's history.
Here ya go. Obviously, they come from opinion columns....so I can't stand behind them 100%. I'm getting ready to go to San Diego in the morning, so I don't have time to sit down and research every single thing.
:dunno