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How convincing is the ignore Bush strategy?

How convincing is the ignore Bush strategy?


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Slartibartfast

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In various threads, whenever the mistakes of Bush are brought up, some people always seem to want to bury the past and act like it never happened so they can blame everything on Obama instead.

So, in your opinion, how effective is this strategy?
 
In various threads, whenever the mistakes of Bush are brought up, some people always seem to want to bury the past and act like it never happened so they can blame everything on Obama instead.

So, in your opinion, how effective is this strategy?

Will the Left ever get tired of pushing this line? Yes, Bush was not the best President and he made mistakes, but attempting to justify Obama's mistakes by pointing to a Bush mistakes is idiotic in my opinion...

Perhaps it is some twisted logic that two mistakes make a right?
 
Will the Left ever get tired of pushing this line? Yes, Bush was not the best President and he made mistakes, but attempting to justify Obama's mistakes by pointing to a Bush mistakes is idiotic in my opinion...

Perhaps it is some twisted logic that two mistakes make a right?

Will the right ever get tired of griping about Carter? Bad presidents are bad presidents.
 
Will the Left ever get tired of pushing this line? Yes, Bush was not the best President and he made mistakes, but attempting to justify Obama's mistakes by pointing to a Bush mistakes is idiotic in my opinion...

Perhaps it is some twisted logic that two mistakes make a right?

Obama was placed in a very bad situation no doubt. Has he made mistakes, yes, no doubt. But are all of this country's problems Obama's fault, no. Bush did leave alot of baggage, and its hard to ignore that, even if the right would like too.
 
In various threads, whenever the mistakes of Bush are brought up, some people always seem to want to bury the past and act like it never happened so they can blame everything on Obama instead.

So, in your opinion, how effective is this strategy?

Quite franky, the only people they are fooling, is each other. Obama is far from perfect, but the plate full of crapola he has been left, is a direct result of the failure of not just Bush the Jr, but of the entire "conservative" philosophy.
 
In various threads, whenever the mistakes of Bush are brought up, some people always seem to want to bury the past and act like it never happened so they can blame everything on Obama instead.

So, in your opinion, how effective is this strategy?

About as effective as the "Just continually blame it on Bush and act like nothing that has occured in the past year and a half has any effect or any baring on anything at all except when its positive" strategy.
 
About as effective as the "Just continually blame it on Bush and act like nothing that has occured in the past year and a half has any effect or any baring on anything at all except when its positive" strategy.

i think most people on the left acknowledge obama mistakes. i also think reasonable people know 18 months is not nearly enought time to judge a presidency.
 
Will the Left ever get tired of pushing this line? Yes, Bush was not the best President and he made mistakes, but attempting to justify Obama's mistakes by pointing to a Bush mistakes is idiotic in my opinion...

Perhaps it is some twisted logic that two mistakes make a right?

Lets have some intellectual honesty here. It is a fact that Bush left the presidency with the US engaged in two wars (one arguably was completely elective), a very serious economic crisis (arguably the worst since the great depression) and one of our largest manufacturing industries (which arguably is defense mission critical) teetering on bankruptcy. One can argue the severity of the mess Bush left, how long it should take to fix it and the right course to fix it. But it is hardly idiotic to argue that Obama inherited mess. It is idiotic to say he did not.
 
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Its indisputable that Obama inherited a load of messes.

However, this is the case in some way shape or form for most Presidents. Is it perhaps worse for Obama than many? Absolutely, I'd put it around on par with Reagan. The issue however is that is part of the job. No one said the Presidency was supposed to be easy, and ultimately by taking the position it becomes your responsability.

Say you apply for a job at a company with the knowledge before hand that you're going to be heading up a project that has had a load of issues and problems. They're bringing you in to hopefully fix it, and while they're going to give you some lattitude and be understanding that you didn't create these issues, its still now going to be YOURS. So if you get in there and the actions you're taking to fix it aren't really working, or that fix isn't coming as quickly or efficiently as your employers like, or you're "fixing" it in a similar way that it got broke in the first place you're employer is not going to go "Well, its okay, you didn't cause this."

No, you took the job knowing there were issues and you took the job with the promise and the notion that it was going to be on you to fix it. You have claimed responsability for the issue.

This is what Obama, and all Presidents, face.

We must keep it in proper context. Obama did inherent this. There are issues with this that are the fault of the Bush Administration and the congresses (both the Republican ones from 2000-2006 and the Democrat one from 2006-2008) that were presiding over it. That should definitely temper things, especially very early on and it should keep anyone from stating that Obama caused these or invented these issues.

However, while it WAS Bush's War...they are not Obama's wars. Why? Because he's President, he took up the mantle, he said he had a plan, he has the job, and its now his responsability. Was this Bush's recession? Yes. Now it's Obama's, because he took up that responsability. If he didn't want the repsonsability he shouldn't have ran. If you don't want him to have the responsability, you shouldn't have voted for him.

And while Bush may've helped to cause these things, one can not simply keep pointing to him as the cure for all ills that go wrong...especially now a year and a half out. If someone says "Obama's [x] isn't helping/is hurting the economy" an answer of "Well he didn't ask for it!" or "Its bad because of Bush!" is not legitimate. He DID ask for it, by choosing to run for the Presidency knowing these issues and telling us he'd fix it. It doesn't matter if its bad because of Bush, he's the President now and he's elected to try and fix it and if he's unable to HE gets the blame.

There is not a job in this country where if you are unable to do what you're hired to do, or if you do the opposite of it, that you're free from criticism or reprimand because "Well the guy that had this job a year and a half ago had it in a crappy position".

Republicans need to stop acting like all these problems materialized under Obama. However Democrats need to stop acting like pointing back to Bush somehow excuses Obama for any of the continued problems a year and a half into his Presidency.

These are his now, as much as they are Bush, because he's the President and he ran knowing full well these issues were here and with the statement to the American people that he was the man to fix them.
 
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Lets have some intellectual honesty here. It is a fact that Bush left the presidency with the US engaged in two wars (one arguably was completely elective), a very serious economic crisis (arguably the worst since the great depression) and one of our largest manufacturing industries (which arguably is defense mission critical) teetering on bankruptcy. One can argue the severity of the mess Bush left, how long it should take to fix it and the right course to fix it. But it is hardly idiotic to argue that Obama inherited mess. It is idiotic to say he did not.

Every President inherits problems, it is how they deal with them that shows their true leadership capability... so far (in my opinion) Obama has shown to be a poor leader. Not to say everything is his fault, but he is the President, he is in charge, and ultimately that is just the way it is.
 
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About as effective as the "Just continually blame it on Bush and act like nothing that has occured in the past year and a half has any effect or any baring on anything at all except when its positive" strategy.

Oh I completely agree. I think we need to place blame and credit where it is due. My concern is that we should not be rewriting history.
 
In various threads, whenever the mistakes of Bush are brought up, some people always seem to want to bury the past and act like it never happened so they can blame everything on Obama instead.

So, in your opinion, how effective is this strategy?

can you point to examples of this phenomenon you describe? I for one have never ignored the problems of the past; only pointed out how PATHETIC it is for people to blame others when you applied for the job of FIXING things. How even MORE pathetic when you have made it WORSE and STILL blame others.

Hell...we have morons that want to go all the way back and blame this on Reagan (curiously, those dumbasses never extend that to Carter...probably because they are simple minded idealogues). Seriously...Reagan. Apparently even though the racist Bill Clinton managed to fix everything, somehow under Obama its all back to being screwed up and they bring up a dead president who was elected 30 years ago. Can you even ****ing IMAGINE that...
 
Will the right ever get tired of griping about Carter? Bad presidents are bad presidents.

Riiight. which is why it is ONLY appropriate to address THIS president and his current failings...on the INCREASES in unemployment, the continued stagnant economy, the increase in budget and deficit spending, the total failure of leadership in the gulf and in Afghnaistan, etc. Dude is well into his second year. Blaming Bush and crying racism anytime someone disagrees with him is a pathetic and impotent tactic.
 
can you point to examples of this phenomenon you describe? I for one have never ignored the problems of the past; only pointed out how PATHETIC it is for people to blame others when you applied for the job of FIXING things. How even MORE pathetic when you have made it WORSE and STILL blame others.

Hell...we have morons that want to go all the way back and blame this on Reagan (curiously, those dumbasses never extend that to Carter...probably because they are simple minded idealogues). Seriously...Reagan. Apparently even though the racist Bill Clinton managed to fix everything, somehow under Obama its all back to being screwed up and they bring up a dead president who was elected 30 years ago. Can you even ****ing IMAGINE that...

When I started the thread I thought about citing them but decided not to. My theory is that if I cite specific examples than the thread would end up debating those examples instead of the topic. It was an attempt to keep the thread on track. I could dig some up and PM them to you if you wish I guess.
 
Well mega, until you cite examples, the only example this thread is of, is a strawman. ;)
 
Well mega, until you cite examples, the only example this thread is of, is a strawman. ;)

Want me to pm you some?

I will if you agree not to post them on this thread or we can start a new thread talking about them perhaps.
 
When I started the thread I thought about citing them but decided not to. My theory is that if I cite specific examples than the thread would end up debating those examples instead of the topic. It was an attempt to keep the thread on track. I could dig some up and PM them to you if you wish I guess.

I just wonder if you include those that accept Bush's failings (even have cited them as the reason for leaving the party in my case) but still am not willing to give the next 7 democrat presidents a free pass because George Bush did not maintain a healthy fiscal policy.

HONEST commentary would include the fact that although George Bush did indeed authorize all of that spending, the democrats have had control of the house AND senate since 2006. And honest commentary would ALSO point to who actually WRITES that legislation and submits those budgets. So yeah...at SOME point the pathetic practice of blaming Bush HAS to stop.
 
Want me to pm you some?

I will if you agree not to post them on this thread or we can start a new thread talking about them perhaps.



I don't think that would foward this conversation. I think if you want to make this claim, you also need to identify those who think Obama can do no wrong and that ALL his current issues are Bush's fault....
 
I don't think that would foward this conversation. I think if you want to make this claim, you also need to identify those who think Obama can do no wrong and that ALL his current issues are Bush's fault....

I think that would be against forum rules since it would be debating the posters and not the issues. But I agree that there are people who think Obama can do no wrong and you can generally identify those people by their signatures. Those people are foolish. However, as I stated before, my concern is that we place blame where it is due and not simply on one president vs another.
 
I don't think that would foward this conversation. I think if you want to make this claim, you also need to identify those who think Obama can do no wrong and that ALL his current issues are Bush's fault....

It IS after all the basis of the thread...
 
I think that would be against forum rules since it would be debating the posters and not the issues. But I agree that there are people who think Obama can do no wrong and you can generally identify those people by their signatures. Those people are foolish. However, as I stated before, my concern is that we place blame where it is due and not simply on one president vs another.

Take that one further then...place blame where it is due. who has passed every piece of legislation since January of 2007?
 
I think that would be against forum rules since it would be debating the posters and not the issues. But I agree that there are people who think Obama can do no wrong and you can generally identify those people by their signatures. Those people are foolish. However, as I stated before, my concern is that we place blame where it is due and not simply on one president vs another.




I think you can cite samples in ways that are not calling other posters out. I have done both. Got yelled at for one, not the other. Ask a mod. :shrug:




I agree we should place blame where it is due. Seems thought the current admin gets a pass for what the previous one did with some though in my observation.
 
It IS after all the basis of the thread...

You misunderstand than. For example, I think Obama's foreign policy continues to be wrong, we should be out of Iraq and Iran. I think he did not try hard enough to keep lobbiests out of government positions. I think he should have cleaned house at the MMS before the oil spill. I think he gave BP too much leeway in the oil spill and he should have better accepted foreign help. He should have done a better job with shutting down Gitmo. I don't think the stimulus was big enough, especially with deflationary pressure on the economy today. I think he should have done a better job cleaning out the banks and gm during the crisis. He should have been more aggressive with the public option.

There is lots of stuff I don't like about what Obama is doing. So again, I think you are missing the point. I am not attempting to absolve Obama from blame, but I also don't think Bush should be either.

Take that one further then...place blame where it is due. who has passed every piece of legislation since January of 2007?

You think all of today's problems started since 2007?

Either way, it looks like my attempt to stay on track is failing. Oh well.
 
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