The Verdict of History: Comparing The Bush and Obama Records by Gregory Hilton

April 29, 2007: The National Day of Impeachment was organized by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), Daniel Ellsberg and Cindy Sheehan.

The Bush Economic Record
President George W. Bush came into office with a recession and left with one, but his overall record is admirable. For 24 quarters we had steady growth, a record not matched by any other President. The Bush tax cuts rescued the economy and provided the nation with low unemployment and continued growth for 5½ straight years. The Dow Jones reached an all time high, and the tax cuts got America out of the dot com recession.

“Decision Points” By George W. Bush

Former President George W. Bush’s memoir Decision Points will be released tomorrow, and for the first time in two years he is returning to the public arena. The verdict of history is already pointing toward his vindication, and he is now ahead of President Obama in several opinion polls. There is a disappointing conversation now being held at Politico on the topic “Will Bush’s Memoir Change Any Minds? http://www.politico.com/arena/ The radical left and libertarians are repeating their usual lies, and several conservatives are doing a poor job of defending the Bush legacy. This is what they should be saying.

Was The Bush Administration Responsible for the 2008 Housing Crisis? by Gregory Hilton

A major theme of this year’s campaign is that housing caused the 2008 financial crisis, and the Bush administration is responsible for the economic problems we have today. The item below was posted by Bush’s Chairman of the Council on Economic Advisers, and emphasizes that in 2003 the administration was seriously concerned about what was happening at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Five Myths About TARP

The below article from the Washington Post is by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and it makes many observations about the effectiveness of TARP. The program worked and the financial security of all Americans is much stronger today because of it. As of now it will cost $50 billion and saved our economy, and in the end it may break even.

GOP Needs Only 8 Votes To Continue All Bush Tax Cuts by Gregory Hilton

The Congressional Blue Dog Coalition today released a letter signed by 31 House Democrat which advocates extension of all the Bush era tax cuts which are scheduled to expire in January. The letter says the nation is facing the worst economic decline since the 1930’s Depression, and it urges caution in raising taxes during a recession. The conservative and moderate Democrats believe keeping all the tax cuts will help stimulate the economy and help small businesses. Some of the Blue Dogs want a temporary tax cut while others are advocating a permanent extension.

Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair Says George W. Bush Was Very Smart

Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would have been liberal Democrat had he run for office in the United States, but has surprising praise for former President George W. Bush in his new memoir. In A Journey: My Political Life, which was published this week by Alfred A. Knopf, Blair says:

Bush is More Popular That Obama in Frontline Districts

A survey conducted by a Democratic pollster shows “George W. Bush is 6 points more popular than President Obama in ‘Frontline’ districts – seats held by Democrats that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sees as most vulnerable to Republican takeover. That Bush is more popular than Obama in Democratic-held seats is cause for outright fear.”
This poll was conducted because Obama still blames Bush for his administration’s failures. If Obama did not continue to compare his administration to the “failures of the past”, than you would not see these polls.

Were There Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq?

The following links were compiled by Torey Dawn Hughes of Las Vegas, Nevada:

The Iraq War authorization listed WMD as one factor in a list of reasons for invading Iraq. The war was never exclusively about WMDs; e.g., the humanitarian aspect (for one) was in the resolution. The House and Senate voted and authorized and funded the war. The justification is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_Resolution.

1988: When Al Gore Battled the Liberal Democrats by Gregory Hilton

Former Vice President Al Gore is now a liberal icon. He made global warming a prominent issue, is a hero to the environmental movement, and has been vigorous in his criticism of the Iraq war. Today the former Vice President’s endorsement is a highly sought after seal of approval by liberal candidates. Gore’s left wing views are far different from the moderate record he established during his four terms in the House and 8 years in the U.S. Senate.
Back then he had a pro-defense voting record on the Armed Services Committee, and criticized liberal Democrats who wanted to cut the Pentagon budget. Gore first came to national prominence during the 1988 presidential campaign.

Far More Progress Is Needed In Iraq But Democracy Is Working by Gregg Hilton

The election in Iraq is a very important vindication of George W. Bush’s vision that the way to correct a lot of the instability in the Middle East is to bring democracy to countries that haven’t experienced it. American policy before that was set in effect by FDR in World War II—the view that we had a greater interest in stability in the Arab world than in change. Bush’s understanding was that this was NOT the best way to secure U.S. interests in the long run.
It’s amazing! There was an election in the Arab world in which no one knew what the outcome would be. This has never happened before. And next, they have to negotiate to form a coalition. Representative government is possible in the Arab world.
Also note that Iraq’s Shiites have taken to democracy in a vibrant way. People need to focus on what this means for a Shiite democracy across the border in Iran.
President Obama is a bit of a mix. He’s cut back on the democracy-building budget in the region. And I’ve been disappointed, to be honest, that the administration has not been as outspoken about promoting democracy in the region as Bush was. – Ambassador Paul Bremer, Chief Administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, 2003 and 2004.

Iraq has now completed its fifth election since 2005 and there will once again be a peaceful transfer of power to the opposition. Over 13 million people went to the polls and the turnout was 62%, which is better than the 52% average of Americans who participated in presidential elections over the past century.

• The lead editorial in today’s Washington Post notes “Iraq held a competitive election that puts most of its neighbors to shame. On Iraq’s borders are, among others, a despotic theocracy in Iran, a despotic monarchy in Saudia Arabia and a despotic hereditary fiefdom in Syria. In Iraq, more than 6,000 candidates vied for 325 legislative seats. They represented parties of wide ideological range. Turnout was higher, proportionately, than for U.S. presidential elections. The voting and counting, according to international observers, were generally free and fair.”
• From a U.S. viewpoint, the election was a huge success because Americans want a broadly based Iraqi government. The outcome is still not certain, but Iraqi’s are showing a willingness to compromise and the new government will be secular and it will not be based on sectarian or geographical considerations. It could well be a coalition which includes Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds.
• The top two vote-getters were coalitions which rejected ethnic and sectarian politics in favor of a national, multi-sectarian vision.
• A significant difference between the 2005 and 2010 election is that this time there was no Sunni boycott. In 2010, there was a very high turnout in the Sunni provinces (Anbar, Nineveh and Salahuddin). The Sunni’s ran Iraq under Saddam Hussein by now they have adapted to the new system.
• Iran was the big loser. As the Washington Post notes, the “results are a defeat for Iran’s efforts to unify Iraq’s Shiites into one bloc and then control Iraq through that bloc. The vote is at least potentially a victory for an Iraq in which members of all sects believe their voices can be heard.” The Iraqi National Alliance (which included Muqtada al-Sadr) and the Islamic Supreme Council in Iraq both did poorly in the election. They lost many seats and their dream of a monolithic Shiite bloc has fragmented.
• Newsweek said the election “most certainly is a watershed event that could come to represent a whole new era in the history of the massively undemocratic Middle East.”
• Thomas Friedman of the New York Times says “Former President George W. Bush’s gut instinct that this region craved and needed democracy was always right.”
• Many liberal politicians in both 2004 and 2006 claimed the United States was “imposing democracy on Iraq.” The results of this fifth election demonstrate that Iraqi’s are enthusiastic participants in the democratic process.
• Vice President Joe Biden is now saying Iraq “could be one of the great achievements of this administration.” However, the credit clearly belongs to the Iraqi people and the Bush Administration.
• Peter Wehner of Politics Daily noted: “We might be able to agree, too, that the new counterinsurgency strategy announced by President Bush in January 2007 — a strategy that was fiercely opposed by Messrs. Biden and Obama, by virtually the entire Democratic Party, the political class, and almost all of the foreign policy establishment — was a wise and politically courageous decision. . . But it’s clear, I think, that the commonly held view that Iraq was ‘probably the biggest foreign policy mistake in American history’ (Joe Klein) was wrong and foolish.”