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| Rob's Soapbox | ||
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Congratulations!
You have finally landed on the one page on this entire site (and on the entire internet for that matter) that is purely without bullshit... my soapbox page. There are a lot of times during our show that, whether it's because of time constraints and other obligations, I don't always get to address some issues that I feel don't get the attention they deserve. There are even more times when I just don't feel like waiting until the show the next day to get some things off my chest. Thus, I have started the "Rob's Soapbox" page. If you have clicked on this page looking for someone to coddle your fragile sense of self-esteem, or tell you what you want to hear or to reinforce your outdated world view, then exit this page right now and go somewhere else. If you are in search of the last forum for reason and common sense left in the world, then sit back, relax, and enjoy. I make only one promise with this soapbox page... if you read long enough and often enough, you will eventually be offended. So here's my latest soapbox. Listen up, 'cause you just might learn something... |
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Monday, April 21st, 2008 RANK BUSH; WHY IT STINKS This is what we’ve come to in America; the complete, total, absolute inability of almost all people to separate themselves from their ideology, even if it means losing credibility. In other words, it has become more important to people to be seen as believing in something right rather than to be known as an objective thinker, able to analyze situations and admit errors occasionally. Imagine the desperation a soul must feel to be driven to dismiss his own professional ethics, just so that he can be “right,” rather than be correct. Last week, 61% of historians said in a survey that the current President of the United States, George W. Bush, is the worst president ever in the history of the country. 96% ranked it as one of the five worst presidencies ever. 98% of them say that the Bush presidency is a failure. (http://hnn.us/articles/48916.html) Here’s the problem; an historian, by definition, cannot, should not, and must not evaluate current events. The proper answer to the survey question would have been, “well, Mr. Survey Taker, as an accredited historian and professional who is committed to my craft, I cannot comment on historical impact and significance of any U.S. president beyond the Reagan administration. I may be able to begin to gauge the first Bush presidency, but even that would be slightly premature. Thanks for asking, though.” I am no fan of President Bush and there is much I have watched unfold that I thought was clumsy, at best. Having lived through 8 years of this president, I will always be able to intelligently comment on the effect in the here and now of stupid statements he made (“I am the decider,” and “bring it on,” to name a few), arrogant misjudgments he begat (ignoring the advice of General Shinseki amongst others who insisted that a quick, clean, victorious invasion of Iraq would take twice as many troops as Bush actually sent in http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/12/washington/12shinseki.html?_r=1&oref=slogin), and outright foolish decisions he came to (nominating Harriet Myers for the Supreme Court, declaring “mission accomplished” on an aircraft carrier flight deck, and allowing Donald Rumsfeld to remain as Defense Secretary for about 5 years and 9 months too long), but I am not so arrogant as to be able to confidently proclaim that I know, or can know, or understand what effect all of these and other things will have on the history of the country. We lack perspective in the present. Similarly, the laundry list of things I disagree with Bush on today may seem lest putrid to me 5, 10 or 25 years from now. I hate to quote Rumsfeld here but the truth of the matter is that we can’t know what we can’t know. While I may fervently believe now that the creation of the Homeland Security Department, the No Child Left Behind Act and the Farm subsidy bill of 2002 were three of the biggest failures of the past decade, how in the Hell am I actually supposed to know what their ultimate effect on the country’s history will be? While it may be true that I blanch when I see the man speak publicly, and I passionately think his approach in general is embarrassing, how am I to know that the results won’t later justify the approach? That is neither rationalization nor equivocation for I am not arguing in favor of Bush’s approach. If he does turn out to be successful, it would not then be an endorsement for his style of leadership. It would, however, prove a useful tool, objectively, to analyze how and why the man succeeded or failed. We can’t know yet what we can’t know. For example, when Ronald Regan failed to aggressively retaliate against the Beirut bombings of 1983 which killed 241 Marines, he was heralded at the time as “showing restraint,” and/or “keeping his eye on the ball of the true threat to America, those damn Soviet commies…” Today, we know that he unwittingly sent a message of weakness to Islamic fundamentalists that fueled the fires that had begun burning years earlier in Afghanistan. Similarly, when President Clinton sent a small force of soldiers into Mogadishu in 1993 and allowed 18 of them to be killed and 73 injured and not only didn’t retaliate, but actually ordered retreat, he was seen, at the time, by his supporters, as a wise statesman who was resisting the opportunity to use America’s overwhelming military power in a bully-like fashion. Today, we know that Osama Bin Laden himself viewed the retreat from Somalia as the signal that America was no longer a force to be reckoned with and that we would run at the first sign of blood. While on the subject of Bill Clinton, what about all of the things that we don’t know about the current President Bush? When Clinton left office, historians and citizens alike heralded the man as a great diplomat, communicator and leader. He had presided over 8 years of peace and prosperity, we were told, and he would go down in history as one of the top 10 presidents ever. What none of us knew at that moment was that the reason for the peace was Clinton’s inability and lack of desire to confront actual threats in the world, most notably the opportunity to have detained and arrested Osama Bin Laden; an offer Clinton turned down from the country of Sudan so he wouldn’t “anger” anyone. The more we learn about this and other facets of the Clinton presidency, the worse his legacy becomes. Only now are we beginning to get a handle on how worthless the first President Bush was. 16 years after he left office, the George H.W. Bush is beginning to look as though it will be one of the most insignificant, unsuccessful, and inconsequential administrations in history. What was once seen as a great international war effort, the first Iraq war, is now known to be a basic waste. The Iraqi population felt we had betrayed them for the way we left Saddam in charge, a sentiment that made the current Iraqi war much harder than it had to be. Bush senior also signed the Americans with Disabilities Act, a law that that at the time was heralded as a great breakthrough moment, but has now been revealed to be one of the most abused and detrimental to business and the economy laws ever signed. History is a bitch, isn’t it? Ronald Reagan was hated while in office by many. His hard choices and tough stances hurt many people directly and felt wrong to a lot of Americans. His approach, like the current president’s, was viewed as arrogant and “cowboy-esque.” Today, Reagan is hailed as one of the 5 greatest presidents ever, much to the chagrin of those who lived through his 8 years; mainly because they insist on being “right,” not on being correct. Franklin Delano Roosevelt led America out of the great depression and into World War Two. FDR signed the “New Deal” and has always been viewed as one of the top 5 as well. But even this great man is feeling the ravages of history, 70 years later. 70 years! FDR’s internment of Japanese Americans is the most glaring blight on his record, but as time drags on, and the New Deal is continued to be viewed by many as an abject failure of monumental proportions, FDR becomes, at best, the second or third best president of the 20th century. These examples go on and on and on and all prove the absurdity of an historian claiming to have the ability to comment intelligently on the current president. Go back in time and see how American historians felt about Abraham Lincoln in 1864. The common popular view then was that he would be the man responsible for destroying the country. History shows he was the greatest of them all. When George Washington led the revolution against the British, before we were America, less than 1 out of every 3 colonists agreed with him and his army. By all accounts, 66% of what would become America was against General Washington. 10 years later, a grateful nation literally begged the man to become our first president. History proved Washington to be one of the greatest leaders of them all. George W Bush, in my opinion, in the here and now, is pretty damn close to being a swashbuckling buffoon. He has done little correct, it would seem to me now. However, I am also able to objectively acknowledge that I can’t know what I can’t know. There are many “ifs” that could swing his way in the next two decades, and evaluating future history today is nothing more than playing the “what if” game. For example, in the survey the alleged historians listed the following reasons as why Bush is a failure: -- Torture of terror suspects (What if it later is revealed that such actions literally stopped a devastating imminent attack on America?) -- The faulty basis for the invasion of Iraq (What if we later find out Saddam had nukes that he hid in Syria?) -- The rest of the world hates us (What if, for starters, that’s not even true? Secondly, they said the same thing when Reagan was in office.) -- The botched handling of hurricane Katrina (What if historians stop distorting the truth and recognize that state and local officials in Louisiana are to blame for this? What if America finally wakes up and realizes that New Orleans sucked before the hurricane? -- The failing economy. Please, what a canard. This one proves more than any other how ideologically skewered this survey is. History will record the post 9/11 economy as one of the greatest, most resilient economic periods in history. As for the rest of the overall Bush economy, we can’t know for decades how or if the devaluation of the dollar, his trade policies and deficits and such will or won’t effect the overall record. The answers to all of these and other “what ifs” will help us determine his rightful place in history. When I say “us,” by the way, I mean those of us who are ready, willing and capable of not being “right,” but rather, being correct. -----
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