Tag Archives: George W. Bush

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Senators …


By  ThinkProgress War Room

10 Terrible Amendments Offered Today by Senators

The Senate has been debating the Democratic budget for the past few days. One of the quirks of Senate rules means that the amendment process on the budget is completely open, allowing senators to file and request a vote on an unlimited number of amendments. They don’t even have to say what their amendments are in advance, but many still choose to file them in advance. Since the process is so open, a rarity in the gridlocked Senate, senators often use this opportunity to file highly political message amendments. We sifted through the more than 400 amendments filed and found dozens that are terrible, ridiculous,  nonsensical, damaging, or just plain crazy. Here’s a look at ten of those proposals.

  1. BOSS IN YOUR BEDROOM: Sens. Fischer (R-NE), Cruz (R-TX), Johanns (R-NE), and Enzi (R-WY) introduced an amendment to put your boss in your bedroom by allowing them to deny you birth control coverage based on their beliefs, not yours. This is just one of numerous anti-Obamacare amendments offered by Republicans. Incidentally, the law turns three tomorrow. 42 GOP senators and 2 Democrats voted for this amendment.
  2. NRA-FUELED CONSPIRACY THEORIES: Sen. Inhofe (R-OK) offered an amendment that would prevent the U.S. from signing on to the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty. The NRA and other right-wing groups falsely claim that this is some backdoor gun grab, which led the Senate to fail to ratify the treaty last year. The NRA is currently making a full court press to kill or at least gut the treaty. Sen. Vitter (R-LA) offered a similar amendment that would prohibit the U.N. from registering or taxing Americans’ guns, something the organization obviously has no plans to do.
  3. HOUSE GOP BUDGET: While Republicans found time to cook up hundreds of other amendments, it seems no Republican senator wanted to vote on the House GOP budget as a substitute for the Senate Democratic plan. When Democrats offered the draconian Ryan plan that ends Medicare and raises taxes on the middle class in order to slash them on the wealthy, a measly 40 GOP senators voted for the plan from their counterparts in the House. Three GOP senators, however, voted against it because it wasn’t extreme enough.
  4. GIVEAWAY TENS OF BILLIONS TO WALL STREET BANKS: In the same so-called “reconciliation” bill that was necessary to finish passing Obamacare was a provision that stopped routing federal student loans through the big banks. Previously, the banks acted as a middleman between the federal government and borrowers, reaping billions in fees each year even though they bore no risk because the government was the one guaranteeing the loans. The banks role was eliminated in 2010 and the money was shifted to Pell grants. Earlier today, Republicans put forward an  amendment to repeal all of the Obamacare bill, including the student loan reforms. This would literally take money away from students and hand it over to the Wall Street banks. 45 Republicans backed this proposal, which also was the third time this week that GOP senators forced a vote on repealing Obamacare.
  5. OBAMAPHONE: One of the more racially-charged moments in last year’s presidential campaign came when Republican groups promoted a video of an African-American woman proclaiming her support for Obama because, she said, the government was giving out free cell phones, among other things. The Drudge Report and other right-wing media immediately dubbed this the “Obamaphone” controversy. As it turned out, the FCC’s Lifeline program offering free cell phones to low-income Americans began under President George W. Bush and is based on a Reagan-era program to provide low-income Americans with subsidized telephone service. Sen. Coburn (R-OK) offered an amendment to “reform” or, more likely, eliminate, this otherwise obscure program that is important to low-income Americans.
  6. MITT ROMNEY’S TAX PLAN:  The Democratic plan raises close to $1 TRILLION in revenue just by closing loopholes that benefit the wealthy and corporate special interests like Big Oil. Republicans wanted to replace this with revenue-neutral tax reform that used the money to pay for huge new tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations instead of using it to reduce the deficit. This is almost identical to the Romney-Ryan tax plan that raised middle class taxes and which voters soundly rejected last year. All 45 GOP senators voted for this recycled Romney plan, which Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) also included in this year’s House GOP budget.
  7. KILL WIND JOBS, SEND CLEAN ENERGY INDUSTRY TO CHINA: Sen. Alexander (R-TN) wants to repeal the vital tax credits for wind power, just as Mitt Romney proposed last year. This would kill 37,000 jobs more or less immediately and effectively cede the clean energy industry to China and our other foreign competitors.
  8. LEAVE THE UN: Sen. Paul (R-KY) proposed one measure to save a very small amount of money: withdraw from the United Nations.
  9. RACE-BAITING WELFARE LIES: You may remember that Mitt Romney and other Republicans advanced the outright lie that President Obama “removed the work requirement from welfare.” This was categorically untrue, but that didn’t stop Republicans from airing millions of dollars in ads about it. In any case, the GOP campaign of distortion around the amendment has resulted in no states taking advantage of the flexibility requested by some Republican governors that the Obama administration offered to grant. Nevertheless, Sen. Inhofe (R-OK) is still so concerned that he offered an amendment to address the non-existent problem of the work requirement having been removed from welfare. For good measure, he offered a  second mean-spirited amendment that mandates drug testing for welfare recipients.
  10. CREATE A PERMANENT IMMIGRANT UNDERCLASS: Sen. Sessions (R-AR), who has faced charges of racial prejudice in the past and was once denied a seat on the federal bench as a result, put forward a proposal to bar even those immigrants who receive legal status from receiving numerous tax breaks directed at the working poor. This would even prevent immigrants from receiving tax breaks that they are claiming on behalf of their American citizen children.

These are just a few of the dozens of terrible proposals put forward today by Republican senators.

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Wreckless


By  ThinkProgress War Room

The Heavy Toll of the Iraq War

Today is one anniversary that is definitely not cause for celebration. Ten years ago today, President George W. Bush made the fateful decision to launch the unnecessary Iraq War.

The consequences of this decision have been overwhelming. A new report estimates that the Iraq War will end up costing American taxpayers at least $2.2 TRILLION, but perhaps as much as $4 TRILLION with interest since Bush put the war on the national credit card at the same he slashed taxes on the wealthy.

(Incidentally, $4 TRILLION is the total amount of deficit reduction that President Obama is seeking, including about $2 TRILLION in the current round of negotiations in order to replace the sequester and stabilize our long-term debt.)

The bill for the war may be large, but the human cost of the Iraq War is even more staggering. It’s estimated that 200,000 people, civilians and soldiers alike, were killed as a result of the war. A million other Iraqis were displaced by the conflict.

These topline figures are just the beginning. Our ThinkProgress colleagues outline five ways the U.S. is worse off because of the Iraq War:

1. The debt

At the start of the war, the Bush administration predicted that it would cost around $50-60 billion in total. They were wrong by more than a factor of ten, sending the U.S.’ debt soaring, a condition that has yet to be rectified. According to a recent study, the war is set to have cost the U.S $2.2 trillion, though that number may reach up to $4 trillion thanks to interest payments on the loans taken out to finance the conflict. Of that staggering amount, at least $10 billion of it was completely wasted in rebuilding efforts.

2. The physical and psychological strain on U.S. troops.

The soldiers charged with fighting the war were stretched to their limits, put through multiple tours, with increasing length of time overseas as the war stretched on and shrinking downtime in between each. All-told, over 4,000 U.S. troops died during the country’s time in Iraq, with another 31,000 wounded in action. In the aftermath, the cost of providing medical care to veterans has doubled, adding to the difficulties faced by those who served. Up to 35 percent of Iraq War veterans will suffer from PTSD according to a 2009 study, while the suicide rate among veterans has jumped to 22 per day.

3. The forgotten war in Afghanistan.

Even worse, the war in Iraq caused the U.S. to take its eye off the ball in Afghanistan. Rather than following through, the Bush administration allowed the country to stagnate, prompting a Taliban resurgence beginning in 2004. As the West focused almost exclusively on Iraq, Taliban fighters imported tactics seen in Iraq to great effect, keeping the Afghan government weak and U.S.-led NATO forces on their heels. The result: the United States is still attempting to tamp down on Taliban momentum today.

4. The opportunity costs.

Aside from missed opportunities in Afghanistan, the Iraq War-effort was all-consuming, pulling resources from all other areas of U.S. defense policy. Relationships with key allies were allowed to grow stale and U.S. prestige around the world plummeted. Fighting in Iraq was realized to be a diversion from combating al Qaeda, drawing funding that could have gone towards a litany of other efforts to effectively counter terrorism.

5. The strengthening of Iran and al Qaeda.

The power vacuum left after the fall of Saddam and the lack of adequate U.S. forces left room for U.S. adversaries to fill the void. Counter to what some still believe, Al Qaeda had no presence in Iraq prior to 2003. Instead, it was only in the post-Saddam climate that they gained a foothold in the form of Al Qaeda in Iraq. The group continues to carry out attacks against civilians to this day, keeping the Iraqi government on edge.

In the end, it was not the United States that gained the most strategically from invading Iraq, but the Shiite-dominated Islamic Republic of Iran. In removing Saddam Hussein’s predominantly Sunni regime from power, the U.S. opened the door to a greater Iranian influence in the region. That influence has been seen playing out counter to U.S. interests in situations such as allowing Iranian planes bearing weapons for Syria to cross Iraqi airspace.

Given that we know now that the war was launched on false premises and have witnessed what has happened since, you’d think the architects of the war would at least admit they wrong or express some regret. You’d be wrong.

Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld took to Twitter today to pat himself on back:

“10 yrs ago began the long, difficult work of liberating 25 mil Iraqis. All who played a role in history deserve our respect & appreciation.”

Richard Perle argued in an opinion piece earlier this week that it was still right to have removed Saddam Hussein, even though he had no Weapons of Mass Destruction. Top war architect Paul Wolfowitz acknowledged that things  “spiraled out of control,” but blamed others and argued that things would’ve been different if the war had been prosecuted his way (it was, incidentally).

Astonishingly, the American Enterprise Institute’s Danielle Pletka even went so far this week as to argue that the mess in Iraq is really President Obama’s fault. This view was echoed yesterday by Fouad Ajami, a conservative intellectual close to Wolfowitz and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who also criticized Obama for ending “an honorable war.”

It appears that the American people are smarter, or at least more honest, than the neocons who led us into perhaps the worst foreign policy blunder in American history. Polls out this week show that a majority of Americans believe the Iraq War was not worth fighting.

Check out our complete timeline of the Iraq War. For more on the true costs of the Iraq War, please see our updated Iraq War Ledger.

Evening Brief: Important Stories That You Might’ve Missed

How the Iraq War changed everything: the rise of soldiers in popular culture.

How the NRA secretly protects people who commit crimes with guns.

Chipotle pulls out of Boy Scouts of America event due to conflict with its non-discrimination policy.

Four ways the Supreme Court could knock out the Defense of Marriage Act and Proposition 8.

Cypus rejects punitive EU bank bailout.

CEOs kick off campaign to lobby for corporate tax breaks, reforms to make offshoring profits easier.

Paul Ryan rules out any compromise in fiscal standoff.

Bush speechwriter describes the run-up to the Iraq War.

The GOP dilemma on immigration.

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Iraq …


Wethepeople

On March 19, 2003 then President Bush announces that America has invaded Iraq.

Over nine years have passed and Saddam gone.

Yet, Americans are still asking; where are the WMD , why weren’t our soldiers given state of the art equipment ,was there a real plan, why are Iraqis’ still having trouble with electricity, water, the military spoke little English, some say were improperly trained if at all and while we all know their leadership was difficult to communicate with. There are and will always be questions because the truth has yet to be uncovered and since we are now a full Administration ahead questions like:  why did they build such a humongous building(embassy) only to abandon it will probably go unanswered

As we honor and reflect upon the sacrifices that millions of Men and Women as well as their family’s made for this war, but bringing this war to a responsible end was a cause that sparked many Americans to get involved in the political process for the first time. Upon reflection of just what transpired before and since the Iraqis War, it is an important reminder that we all have a stake in our country’s future, and a say in the direction we choose

Early Sunday morning, the last of our troops left Iraq. 12/20/11

Thank you

President Barack Obama

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From the Middle Class Out


ThinkProgress War Room

Creating an Economy That Works for Everyone

For the last thirty years, we’ve been experiencing one long, failed experiment in so-called trickle-down economics. In practice, this means that the rich have gotten richer (exponentially so) while the middle class has fallen further and further behind. Trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans and corporations, the one goal that binds the GOP together, utterly failed to trickle down, stifled economic growth, and contributed to the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

We need a different model — an economy that grows from the middle class out. What does this mean? How does that work? One of our colleagues, Senior Economist Heather Boushey, lays it all out in a new video:

BOTTOM LINE: The wealthy and corporations simply aren’t paying their fair share so in order to reduce our deficit in a smart way and still make investments in the middle class, we need to get rid of hundreds of billions of dollars in wasteful loopholes and giveaways in our tax code.

Evening Brief: Important Stories That You Might’ve Missed

57 terrible consequences of the sequester cuts that the GOP is allowing to kick in next week.

Bitter pill: why medical bills are killing us.

Oops: GOP senator accidentally gets behind Roe v. Wade.

Laura Bush supports marriage equality, she just doesn’t want anyone to know.

One top senator’s latest racist excuse for opposing the Violence Against Women Act.

The public takes President Obama’s side on major issues we need to deal with.

Anti-spending GOP reps wants taxpayer funds to turn George W. Bush’s boyhood home into a national park.

GOP rep won’t support pathway to citizenship because he wants to keep immigrants in “the dirtiest jobs.”

Austerity: still failing.

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Medicare Advantage …


Medicare Advantage is George Bush’s plan to “privatize” Medicare and it FAILED.

Posted by Steven Bradley:

Paul Ryan‘s plan doubles down on this failed plan to “privatize Medicare” giving millions to insurance companies.

In contrast President Obama gives savings back to seniors by filling the prescription “donut hole.”

Ryan proposes giving all the donuts ($) to the insurance companies.

“Medicare Advantage” failed to reduce costs through competition in the marketplace. Costs under these “Advantage” plans skyrocketed as expenditures for things like “health club memberships” were incurred to entice membership.

The Republican plan is real “crony capitalism.” It feeds profits and waste back into an already bloated insurance industry.

Don’t let Republican ads fool you into thinking that “Medicare Advantage” and “Medicare” are the same thing.

The privatization of Medicare through Medicare Advantage is a bad idea.

It’s an idea that has already been proven a failure.

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Further information below

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The Affordable Care Act — The law makes significant reductions to Medicare Advantage, a subset of Medicare plans run by private insurers. Medicare Advantage was started under President George W. Bush, and the idea was that competition among the private insurers would reduce costs. But in recent years the plans have actually cost more than traditional Medicare. So the health care law scales back the payments to private insurers.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/sep/06/bill-clinton/clinton-says-ryan-attacked-obama-medicare-cuts-ref/

Note:

This article shared on the Daily Kos under pen name “Jack Ryan”.  Share it with others on Facebook, twitter, and in e-mail.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/10/24/1149298/-Medicare-Advantage-is-George-Bush-s-plan-to-privatize-Medicare-and-it-FAILED

Let people know “Medicare Advantage” is no advantage at all.  It depletes Medicare funds for all.  Republican political candidates are presenting the “reining in of exorbitant costs of this private insurance plan (Medicare Advantage) as cuts to Medicare.

REPUBLICAN MEDICARE LIE EXPOSED