BUSH DEBT: $3 TRILLION + CLINTON'S SURPLUS
As the right-wing continues to move the goal posts everytime Obama does something correctly, let's be honest in how we got here...
George W. Bush lied and deceived and illegally invaded a sovereign nation, Iraq. There is no excuse for this, and certainly not just because we don't like the leader or we want their oil. Look around the globe and realize it is not difficult to find a horrible national leader. And there is oil in many nations whose leaders are reprehensible.
George W. Bush's administration inherited a huge budget surplus from the Clinton administration. Bush immediately started spending money like a drunken sailor and in an extremely undemocratic move, lowered taxes primarily for the rich. He told us that this would lead to more jobs and a stronger economy built upon the rich investing their money. Look around you, how do you like the Bush legacy?
Even before 9/11 there were spooks in the administration who wanted to invade Iraq. They lied to Congress and they lied to the American people. How wonderful it would be, they told us, to have a trusted democracy in the center of the Middle East. Look at today's headlines, do you really think Iraq is moving toward a true democracy?
The oil in Iraq would pay for the war they told us. It has now cost the U.S. almost $3 trillion dollars. Oil in Iraq dwindled to a trickle of its former output. And clean water and electricity, commonly provided throughout Iraq, became rare indeed for the average Iraqi citizen after we invaded. It still is.
We would be welcomed as heroic liberators in Iraq they told us. Iraq established a national holiday when we left the cities. Iraq cannot wait for us to leave completely. Liberators? We are seen as imperialists.
In the process, the Bush administration severely damaged the U.S. image in the world. We were seen not as a bastion of democracy but as an overly-ambitious pariah. Nobody wanted to cooperate finally with the U.S. [until Obama took office].
Thousands of Americans died in Iraq. And many more thousands were wounded, many severely. We will be paying for the horrible tragedy that has rendered these brave men and women physically and mentally disabled, many with scars that have not even yet appeared. The cost of all this is astronomical and cannot even be guessed at. This cost is ON TOP of the $3 trillion.
We were on the verge of capturing the man most responsible for 9/11, bin Laden. But the U.S. military, was led by such brave heros as Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld. What a marvelous military record those three brought to their military leadership! And they let bin Laden escape when surrounded.
The years 2001-2008 will go down as very dark days in American history. And we have been straddled with the legacy of the horrid Bush administration. We will be paying for the debts, not only financially but in ruined lives, for decades and decades. The damage done is terrible.
