White House sends memo to Cabinet officials with talking points on Bush’s successful presidency.
White House sends memo to Cabinet officials with talking points on Bush’s successful presidency.
The White House is sending a two-page memo to Cabinet members “and other high-ranking officials” with official talking points meant to bolster President Bush’s legacy. The memo, obtained by the L.A. Times, is called “Speech Topper on the Bush Record” and looks at Bush’s presidency through distinctly rose-colored glasses:
Titled “Speech Topper on the Bush Record,” the talking points state that Bush “kept the American people safe” after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, lifted the economy after 2001 through tax cuts, curbed AIDS in Africa and maintained “the honor and the dignity of his office.”
The document presents the Bush record as an unalloyed success.
It mentions none of the episodes that detractors say have marred his presidency: the collapse of the housing market and major financial services companies, the flawed intelligence in the run-up to the Iraq war, the federal response to Hurricane Katrina or the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
Bush has been working diligently to create a picture of a successful presidency, from a Karl Rove-directed “Bush Legacy Project” to a series of farewell interviews in which Bush has been unable or unwilling to admit a single mistake. The Washington Post’s Dan Froomkin writes, “The public has rejected him. The nation is in crisis — and eager for the massive course corrections promised by an Obama presidency. But none of this appears to have penetrated President Bush’s well-defended brainpan.”
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The dignity of the office has been nearly destroyed by this administration, particularly by this fool. How ridiculous that his administration, and the republican party, feel they must continue to lie even now, trying to make us forget the failure of this man’s performance.
Let him go, the sooner the better, but don’t insult our intelligence, or fault our memories, of how disastrous this presidency has been. This man is a fraud.
December 9th, 2008 at 9:58 amBUSH™ is a loser & if Obama lets him, Rove & Cheney re-write history, he’s a loser too.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:00 amBut none of this appears to have penetrated President Bush’s well-defended brainpan.
Sociopaths feel no consequences for their actions. Bush actually believes he has been a good leader & President.
Take his ‘mistakes’ for example. It was well over a year ago he was asked that & was obviously unprepared or had never given it any thought.
A year or so later, he still can’t imagine himself making any mistakes.
Sociopath, druggie, liar and a thief…
December 9th, 2008 at 10:00 amBush’s successful presidency.
Oxymoron.
Similar to “Jumbo Shrimp”
(apologies to the late George Carlin)
December 9th, 2008 at 10:01 amThat entire commentary is a laughable canard. I’m a professional historian, and I can say with complete confidence that this incompetent fool will be counted among the worst presidents in the history of this country, if not THE worst–a status he has more than earned.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:01 amOf course Bush was a smashing success, at least in Babs eyes. His sorry Hurricane Katrina Lessons Learned report paved the way for brother Jeb to land a high dollar spot on Tenet Health’s board of directors.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:02 amcaption:
“You still wuv me Barney, don’t choo?”
December 9th, 2008 at 10:05 amToo late George, you really can’t put the Genie back in the bottle. All spouting these talking points will do is to make the cabinet members look as stupid as Bush. I’m betting not a lot of them participate in the “Bush Rehabilitation Project”. Most are probably really happy that they will soon have a life where they don’t have to tell lies every day.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:07 am#grover nerdkissed Says:
BUSH™ is a loser & if Obama lets him, Rove & Cheney re-write history, he’s a loser too.
So, exactly what can Obama do about the Republicans attempting to re-write history for Bush?
December 9th, 2008 at 10:08 amCaption Contest: Talk up my excellent presidency, or I’ll kill this cute dog.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:09 amThere they go again, insulting my intelligence. I’m not likely to forget the horrors that the 43rd Misadministration inflicted on not only the USofA, but the rest of the world as well.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:09 amToo bad he didn’t keep us safe between 1/20/01 and 9/11/01. Oh, well, learning curve and he’s a slow learner. See “strategy” for prosecuting the Iraq War.
And forget the intelligence that led up to the war, how about the management of the entire war? W’s war has been entirely mismanaged and the only real benefactors have been the Iranians and AQ. That’s W’s legacy, plain and simple. That, and how he let a VP become the de facto POTUS. Some day, they’ll rename it the Cheney Presidential Library.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:10 amI’m sure that, even as we speak, the Heritage Foundation is preparing a report proving the whole Bush Administration was Bill Clinton’s fault. The Right are as predictable as the sunrise.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSGLzStgujM
December 9th, 2008 at 10:12 amIt mentions none of the episodes that detractors say have marred his presidency…
I luv newspeak. “that detractors say”?? Heh…
“Your honor, I bought my wife flowers and chocolates every week. My detractors point out that all this while I was screwing my secretary, but the fact is they overlook the nuances of marriage”.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:15 amThat memo originated at The Onion right? It has to be a farce guys, they are just playin wit you.
The maintained “the honor and the dignity of his office.” part gives it away. This buffoon has disgraced the office and our country. We will be scrubbingg Bush shitstains out of the fabric of America for years to come.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:17 amWe will be scrubbingg Bush shitstains out of the fabric of America for years to come.
That bears repeating, nanlichi.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:19 amAdd to the list of smashing Bush successes:
$153 million in TARP money to a financial firm catering to the high net worth marketplace. Boston Private Financial Holdings was already “well capitalized” according to their CEO.
The Carlyle Group affiliate benefited from taxpayer money, yet again.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:20 amOh yeah,
Bush’s Katrina Lessons Learned report omitted the hospital with the highest patient death toll.
Memorial Medical Center 10 deaths
LifeCare Hospital (rented a floor) 24 deaths
Total 34 deaths
Fran Townsend’s robust investigation missed this obvious fact. LifeCare was acquired by The Carlyle Group just weeks before landfall. Tenet Health owned Memorial. Jeb landed on Tenet’s board just over a year after Bush’s omission.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:24 amFrom the 2002 State of the Union:
“Once we have funded our national security and our homeland security, the final great priority of my budget is economic security for the American people. (Applause.)
To achieve these great national objectives — to win the war, protect the homeland, and revitalize our economy — our budget will run a deficit that will be small and short-term, so long as Congress restrains spending and acts in a fiscally responsible manner. (Applause.)
We have clear priorities and we must act at home with the same purpose and resolve we have shown overseas: We’ll prevail in the war, and we will defeat this recession. (Applause.)
Americans who have lost their jobs need our help and I support extending unemployment benefits and direct assistance for health care coverage. (Applause.) Yet, American workers want more than unemployment checks — they want a steady paycheck. (Applause.) When America works, America prospers, so my economic security plan can be summed up in one word: jobs. (Applause.) ”
And we all lived happily ever after!
December 9th, 2008 at 10:31 amI am really tired of hearing this “he kept us safe after 9/11″ crap. He also utterly failed to keep us safe before 9/11. Why are they ignoring that?
December 9th, 2008 at 10:38 amWORST.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:42 amPRESIDENT.
EVER.
There’s your legacy, A-hole.
It’s also debatable whether we are any safer after 9/11.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:42 amAmericans are now targets overseas.
If you live in Kansas maybe you’re safe.
Comparing Bush to McCain was the subject of this bit, but this is priceless:
“George Bush’s record as a student, military man, businessman and leader of the free world is one of constant failure. And the part that troubles me most is he seems content with himself.
He will leave office with the country $10 trillion in debt, fighting two wars, our international reputation in shambles, our government cloaked in secrecy and suspicion that his entire presidency has been a litany of broken laws and promises, our citizens’ faith in our own country ripped to shreds. Yet Bush goes bumbling along, grinning and spewing moronic one-liners, as though nobody understands what a colossal failure he has been.
I fear to the depth of my being that John McCain is just like him.”
-Jack Cafferty
December 9th, 2008 at 10:43 am“lifted the economy through tax cuts”? Which economy? This one? He’s delusional, and so is the entire GOP. If the scenario from Independence Day were to be a threat, they’d shout, “Tax cuts!” That’s their main response to everything good or bad. They have, pardon the pun, become completely bankrupt.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:43 amPerhaps no one has captured the Bush Legacy better than the man himself, in his editorial in last week’s Onion:
I’m Really Gonna Miss Systematically Destroying This Place
December 9th, 2008 at 10:47 amAnd let’s not forget, Bush’s allowing Lehman Brothers to implode. The results:
1. A huge counterparty wind down of credit default swaps on Lehman debt and a stock market crash.
2. Bush cousin George Herbert Walker and brother Jeb work for Lehman. Their $2 billion bonus pool stayed safe under bankruptcy.
3. With no money down (in the midst of a credit crisis), George Herbert Walker and other Neuberger execs win the bid for Lehman’s prize assets. The new Neuberger Investment Management stays under Bush leadership.
Guess who made out like a bandit? The Bush clan.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:01 amCrap. Put this Bush ‘legacy’ bullsh*t out as a fiction book – and watch it hit the top of the NYT Best Seller list.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:08 amOh, and Barney…?
Do America a favor and bite that SOB’s nose off, won’t you?
December 9th, 2008 at 11:09 amRegarding keeping us safe… The only thing that has kept us safe here at home for the last 6 years is the fact that OBL say Bush doing his job for him. Two of the top things OBL wanted to do to the US was to destroy our economy and our influence abroad. Bush did that for him. Our enemy is within and he has prevailed.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:11 amYou forgot -
- totally ignoring the “Bin Laden is gonna attack with planes” memo
- the anthorax attacks on Senators and reporters who were against the Partiot Act
- the weakening of air quality with the Clean Air Act
- the weakening of water quality
- and the telling of staff and past associates to ignore suppenas
- the kidnapping, rendition of people to black ops sites
cripes this list could just take too long to post, but you get the drift…too bad the MSM doesn’t.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:11 amThe Mythbusters television program recently proved that you can in fact polish a turd. The end result however remains a turd. May KKKarl and his minions wear out every belt sander on the planet. Their product will remain the smelliest, filthiest specimen of failure in the history of the presidency of the United States, a fact that no rational human who lived through the first decade of the 21st century will ever forget.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:12 amI’m sure all the people who lost their sons or daughters in Iraq and lost their house and lost their job are SO GLAD George didn’t get a a blowjob in the oval office..
December 9th, 2008 at 11:17 amSaying you kept America safe *after* 9/11 is like saying a hospital provided excellent care after the patient already died. Bush’s national security record started in January, not in September.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:20 amA memo listing Shrub’s successes ? Must be awful short.
When we look at it, from President Pierce to his descendant Bush, the worst presidents in history. Add Daddy Bush who didn’t get re-elected as the economy was bad.
Add the nefarious activities of the Bush clan around the 1930s.
Yep, a proud bloodline.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:20 ammona charen’s latest lecture in my local daily is titled “where’s the credit?”… she touts the AIDS help to africa…
what she doesn’t mention is the refusal of bushco to help with contraception and sex ed which makes the problem worse…
December 9th, 2008 at 11:34 amAn opportunity to remind everyone you know who voted for George W. Bush that they should have listened to you the first time…and the second time as well.
We all bear responsibility for this debacle, for allowing this sociopath to remain in office. And especially the main stream media, particularly television media, for refusing to announce early on that the emperor had no clothes. Every news director in every major TV newsroom and every executive editor should take a long hard look at him/herself in the mirror.
We had the chance to stop this and we failed utterly for six years. And countless unnecessary deaths are our legacy as well as his.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:39 amAgain, after 31 years in the Federal government this is not really news. Every administration does this in the last month or so in town. The first time I had to contribute information for a presidential legacy effort was when Jimmy Carter unfortunately had to leave office in 1981. Then it was Raygun, then Daddy, then Clinton, now the resident idiot. Each administration (or in the case of Dubya, “Abomination”) puts a positive spin on what they accomplished. Most administrations have a pretty extensive list of things accomplished.
The last news conference that then-Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt conducted was for the unveiling of the Congressionally required wetland status and trends report that we worked on and submitted in early 2001 http://wetlandsfws.er.usgs.gov/status_trends/national_reports/1997_Status_Report.pdf When asked by a reporter how much of the decline in wetland loss could be attributed to the actions of the Clinton administration, Babbitt got a big smile on his face and boomed out “ALL OF IT!” Not quite Mr Secretary but it looked good on the Clinton legacy report.
The real determinant of the legacy of the Bush residency will be written by historians not by Dana Perino and the rest of the flacks. I’d suggest not getting too bent out of shape by what they are now concocting. This will all be over in 43 more days !!!!!!
December 9th, 2008 at 11:43 amPhoto caption: Bush sucks all the blood out of the puppy in under a minute, beating cheney’s long-standing record.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:59 amJust wait until God lays his finger on the idiot. He’s just letting him run, giving him some leg room. It will all catch up to the idiot, just like it caught up to Hitler. His fall will be so abrupt and hard, even those who hate him most will feel sorry for him! No one escapes the wrath of God, no one! No matter how many memos, flyers, brochures they print!
December 9th, 2008 at 12:18 pmLet me just add this:
9/11 happened on George W Bush’s watch.
December 9th, 2008 at 12:56 pmHow flipping stupid does Rove, Karen Hughes and the rest of the criminal cheerleading squad think the american people are? Everywhere we look is a big steaming pile of disaster under these horrid, horrid people. Bush and company is the worst president and administration in history.
December 9th, 2008 at 1:06 pmI didn’t get the memo!
George W. Bush is the worse President in the history of the United States of America.
December 9th, 2008 at 1:10 pm43. Jackie,
Yes you did. Don’t you remember the reams of blank paper sitting by the photocopy machine ?
;-)
December 9th, 2008 at 1:24 pmDelusional till the last minute… must be the alchohool or the cocaine he has been importing from his friend Uribe in Colombia!
December 9th, 2008 at 1:35 pmI can write fiction, too, only I would make it more believable. Can I get a bailout now?
December 9th, 2008 at 2:02 pmThey’re saying the quarterback hasn’t thrown an interception in 50 games, but not mentioning that he hasn’t played a game in four years.
Too many FEMA trailers were given to families that were unsafe to say that Americans have been safe since 9/11, and that’s only one example. In another 40-odd days we can start saying that we’ve been safe since bush left office and that we haven’t been attacked since bush was prez.
December 9th, 2008 at 2:23 pm“the talking points state that Bush “kept the American people safe” after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks”
For the Record, George W. Bush failed to keep America safe from the attacks of 9/11 after having been repeatedly warned.
Richard Clarke and others from the outgoing Clinton administration warned the incoming Bush administration that Osama bin Laden was the number 1 threat for America.
The Bush administration waited to have their first meeting on the threat to early September 2001, days before the terrorist attack that killed nearly 3000 people.
president Bushalso received the August 6th Presidential Daily Briefing titled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US“.
What part of that August 6th PDB title did Bush not understand?
On National Security matters, you do not get Mulligans, no do-overs, if you fail to keep the nation safe, you’re a failure.
December 9th, 2008 at 2:23 pmThis is a reality disconnect I have noticed from the rightwing. They think things will become magically true if they just SAY them. They will toss out the most ludicrous talking points that no one in their right mind could take seriously and they expect them to be taken as gospel because they SAID they were so. Its a really disturbing species of insanity when they just look out at the American people and tell lies that they KNOW the American people will know are lies and just tell them anyway.
December 9th, 2008 at 4:29 pmSNICKER
December 9th, 2008 at 4:32 pmnuff said
And his poop smells like violets.
December 9th, 2008 at 4:36 pmThis will all be over in 43 more days !!!!!!
December 9th, 2008 at 11:43 am
Ummmm, beg to differ…
It won’t be over for 20 years.
They’re leaving behind a ‘legacy’ of shit it would require a unanimous Congress, a totally loyal bureacuracy, and a farouking Saint in the WhiteHouse to even make a tiny dent in, over a four-year term.
Obama’s 1) no saint, and he won’t have 2) a unanimous Congress or anything even remotely close to it. He cannot even count on all the Dim votes in the Senate on any given measure. and 3) the bureaucracy is already shot through with little cells of Bushevik loyalists who will work sassiduously witht eh GOPukes in Congress to abstruct and interfere with everything and anything the Obamanauts att empt to do to reverse the Bushevik order.
There will NEVER be a time when the residues of this feculent, foetid clusterfukcing regime will not be evident, like a bad taste in the water…
December 9th, 2008 at 4:52 pmCome on gentlemen, you can’t seriously “lambast” a President without critical thinking. The Bush Doctrine has flaws, but actually not many more if as many as most Presidents and their flaws. George Washington committed genocide against Native Americans in the North-West; for instance. Andrew Jackson and his policy of genocide in Georgia and Albama; for instance. How about Abraham Lincoln’s blatant violation of international laws where he dared Britain to go to war with him…
Bush did do great things for AIDS in Africa, “Sexual Education” isn’t the answer…what is the answer is abstinence and monogamy, which are Christian values not native values. And in Africa the Christian populations have the lowest rates of AIDS or HIV.
Bush didn’t kill millions in Iraq and though the war was mismanaged that wasn’t the President’s fault. Had the war been won in 1 year you’d not have complained at all. Just a few days ago Iraq has signed into law the framework for victory, US troops will withdraw in 3 years. Iraq is now the first successful Democracy in the Arab middle east.
And the President was acting within his powers as President the entire time, he never took more power than belongs to that office…just so you guys know.
December 9th, 2008 at 5:32 pmWhen the truth of what happened 9-11 is finally forced, hopefully the United States will still exist. Unfortunately truth and justice is not a high priority for either of the Democrat or the GOPleadership.
December 9th, 2008 at 5:49 pmDid the talking points come from Conrad Black?
Naaa, I guess Conrad was just sucking up to try to get a pardon…
December 9th, 2008 at 6:17 pm“…the flawed intelligence in the run-up to the Iraq war…”
This is misleading. You must say “the use of knowingly false intelligence”. There is a huge, significant difference between the two. The intelligence was not thought to be true at the time and later found to be flawed—-it was known to be false at the time it was said by the administration.
935 recorded lies!
December 9th, 2008 at 7:30 pmActually, President Bush’s presidency has been “successful”…for crooked, corrupt, crony Republicans and for Big Bizness (as Molly Ivins used to say).
Of course, for all other American citizens, who aren’t crooked, corrupt, crony Republicans, those of us who aren’t white-collar Big Bizness CEOs, or members of crony boards of directors, as well as for the rest of the world, the Bush presidency has been a disaster of biblical proportions.
Just like beauty, “success” is in the eye of the beholder, and from the Bush/crony Republican perspective, his eight years in office has been a gigantic Cash Cow for no-bid-contract-awarded Republicans, for the religious fundamentalists who’ve had billions in taxpayer money thrown their way, and for the oil companies who’ve seen world-record-breaking profits and for whom Bush invaded Iraq so these western oil companies could regain control over Iraq’s oil reserves.
All the rest of us, though, have been left holding the bag…or a shredded Constitution…or a $10 Trillion+ federal debt…or a plunging economy…or all of the above…just so the Bush birds could feather their own nest, just before they leave the nest, burning it behind them.
I just wonder when the Bush family will flee to their ranch in Paraguay in South America, just like so many Nazis fled Europe for South America after World War II…both after leaving a trail of devastation, dead children and destroyed families behind them?
December 9th, 2008 at 9:44 pmRight after the 9/11 attacks, which intelligence agencies had anticipated but Bush refused to take action to prevent, he told us that we were attacked because of our prosperity, freedom and moral rectitude. He and the Republican Party have taken unprecedented, aggressive and highly successful actions to radically decrease all three. By co-opting al Qaeda’s agenda and destroying the country from within, he has deterred terrorism by outsiders. It’s utterly logical and brilliant. It’s a pity that only the good church-going base of the Republican Party understands the great service Bush and his associates have done us, because it involved a full implementation of their true moral and ethical precepts.
December 9th, 2008 at 10:06 pmGeorgie has to make sh*t up in order to try to get a more favorable opinion. How desperate.
December 9th, 2008 at 11:10 pmand Bush also
cured AIDS…
CURED Cancer…
fought the terrorists with one hand tied around the fist…
fought Genghis Khan one-on-one and killed him
put a chicken in every pot of every American household…
stopped a meteor from hitting the earth…
why am I reminded of the Brian Boitano song in the South Park movie?
December 10th, 2008 at 1:08 amGeorge W. got his close relations an investment company for no money down and nearly 50% off.
George Herbert Walker, cousin
Jeb Bush, brother
They’re now part owner of 51% of Neuberger Investment Management. The bankruptcy court accepted a $1.2 billion stock bid over a prior $2.15 billion Bain Capital offer.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a8sENDj49u_o&refer=home
December 10th, 2008 at 6:00 pm