Remembering President Bush - His legacy. His quotes

"I'll be long gone before some smart person ever figures out what happened inside this Oval Office." --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., May 12, 2008 (wow.. might be quite true)

"This thaw -- took a while to thaw, it's going to take a while to unthaw." --George W. Bush, on liquidity in the markets, Alexandria, La., Oct. 20, 2008

"I think it was in the Rose Garden where I issued this brilliant statement: If I had a magic wand -- but the president doesn't have a magic wand. You just can't say, 'low gas.'" --George W. Bush, Washington D.C., July 15, 2008

"I've got God's shoulder to cry on. And I cry a lot. I do a lot of crying in this job. I'll bet I've shed more tears than you can count, as president." --George W. Bush, "as quoted by author Robert Draper in Dead Certain

I've heard he's been called Bush's poodle. He's bigger than that." --George W. Bush, on former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, as quoted by the Sun newspaper, June 27, 2007

"Bush goes to Hel. That's what a lot of people want." --George W. Bush, on his visit to the Hel Peninsula, Gdansk, Poland, Jun. 8, 2007 (quite funny and shows he has a sense of humor)

"And there is distrust in Washington. I am surprised, frankly, at the amount of distrust that exists in this town. And I'm sorry it's the case, and I'll work hard to try to elevate it." --George W. Bush, interview on National Public Radio, Jan. 29, 2007 (looks like John McCain & Sarah Palin is learning from the best)

"You know, when I campaigned here in 2000, I said, I want to be a war President. No President wants to be a war President, but I am one." --George W. Bush, Des Moines, Iowa, Oct. 26, 2006 (The American people got their wish. Don't do it again!)

"I will not withdraw, even if Laura and Barney are the only ones supporting me." --George W. Bush, talking to key Republicans about Iraq, as quoted by Bob Woodward (We wonder if he is talking about the big purple dinosaur)

"You know, one of the hardest parts of my job is to connect Iraq to the war on terror." --George W. Bush, interview with CBS News' Katie Couric, Sept. 6, 2006

"I think -- tide turning -- see, as I remember -- I was raised in the desert, but tides kind of -- it's easy to see a tide turn -- did I say those words?" --George W. Bush, asked if the tide was turning in Iraq, Washington, D.C., June 14, 2006 (One of the Best!)

President Bush: "Peter. Are you going to ask that question with shades on?"
Peter Wallsten of the Los Angeles Times: "I can take them off."
Bush: "I'm interested in the shade look, seriously."
Wallsten: "All right, I'll keep it, then."
Bush: "For the viewers, there's no sun."
Wallsten: "I guess it depends on your perspective."
Bush: "Touche.
--an exchange with legally blind reporter Peter Wallsten, to whom Bush later apologized, Washington, D.C., June 14, 2006 (Watch video clip)

"If the Iranians were to have a nuclear weapon they could proliferate." --George W. Bush, Washington D.C., March 21, 2006

"I like my buddies from west Texas. I liked them when I was young, I liked them then I was middle-age, I liked them before I was president, and I like them during president, and I like them after president." --George W. Bush, Nashville, Tenn., Feb. 1, 2006

"As you can possibly see, I have an injury myself -- not here at the hospital, but in combat with a cedar. I eventually won. The cedar gave me a little scratch. As a matter of fact, the Colonel asked if I needed first aid when she first saw me. I was able to avoid any major surgical operations here, but thanks for your compassion, Colonel." --George W. Bush, after visiting with wounded veterans from the Amputee Care Center of Brooke Army Medical Center, San Antonio, Texas, Jan. 1, 2006

"Listen, I want to thank leaders of the -- in the faith -- faith-based and community-based community for being here." --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Sept. 6, 2005

"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda." --George W. Bush, Greece, N.Y., May 24, 2005 (Listen to audio) (true words from a Republican. John McCain is listening)

"This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table." --George W. Bush, Brussels, Belgium, Feb. 22, 2005

"I always jest to people, the Oval Office is the kind of place where people stand outside, they're getting ready to come in and tell me what for, and they walk in and get overwhelmed in the atmosphere, and they say, man, you're looking pretty." --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Nov. 4, 2004

"The truth of that matter is, if you listen carefully, Saddam would still be in power if he were the president of the United States, and the world would be a lot better off." --George W. Bush, second presidential debate, St. Louis, Mo., Oct. 8, 2004 (Wow.. you really wonder if this quote would have been true)

"I own a timber company? That's news to me. Need some wood?" --George W. Bush, second presidential debate, St. Louis, Mo., Oct. 8, 2004

"Too many good docs are getting out of the business. Too many OB-GYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country." --George W. Bush, Poplar Bluff, Mo., Sept. 6, 2004 (Watch video clip or listen to audio)

"I hope you leave here and walk out and say, 'What did he say?'" --George W. Bush, Beaverton, Oregon, Aug. 13, 2004 (another winner!)

"Let me put it to you bluntly. In a changing world, we want more people to have control over your own life." --George W. Bush, Annandale, Va, Aug. 9, 2004 (Republicans talking about communism again!)

"The march to war hurt the economy. Laura reminded me a while ago that remember what was on the TV screens -- she calls me, 'George W.' -- 'George W.' I call her, 'First Lady.' No, anyway -- she said, we said, march to war on our TV screen." --George W. Bush, Bay Shore, New York, Mar. 11, 2004

"The recession started upon my arrival. It could have been -- some say February, some say March, some speculate maybe earlier it started -- but nevertheless, it happened as we showed up here. The attacks on our country affected our economy. Corporate scandals affected the confidence of people and therefore affected the economy. My decision on Iraq, this kind of march to war, affected the economy." --George W. Bush, Meet the Press, Feb. 8, 2004

"I'm the master of low expectations." -George W. Bush, aboard Air Force One, June 4, 2003

"I'm also not very analytical. You know I don't spend a lot of time thinking about myself, about why I do things." -George W. Bush, aboard Air Force One, June 4, 2003

"Haven't we already given money to rich people? Why are we going to do it again?" -George W. Bush, to economic advisers discussing a second round of tax cuts, as quoted by Paul O'Neil, Washington, D.C., Nov. 26, 2002

"I'm the commander - see, I don't need to explain - I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being president." -George W. Bush, as quoted in Bob Woodward's "Bush at War"

"We need an energy bill that encourages consumption." -George W. Bush, Trenton, N.J., Sept. 23, 2002 (that is why the oil companies love the Republicans!)

"The problem with the French is that they don't have a word for entrepreneur." -George W. Bush, discussing the decline of the French economy with British Prime Minister Tony Blair

"I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe and what I believe - I believe what I believe is right." -George W. Bush, in Rome, July 22, 2001 (sounds like a famous Jean Chretien quote "A proof is a proof")

"It is white." -George W. Bush, asked by a child in Britain what the White House was like, July 19, 2001

"It's amazing I won. I was running against peace, prosperity, and incumbency." -George W. Bush, June 14, 2001, speaking to Swedish Prime Minister Goran Perrson, unaware that a live television camera was still rolling. (how did he get elected?)

"There's no question that the minute I got elected, the storm clouds on the horizon were getting nearly directly overhead." -George W. Bush, May 11, 2001 (again why did he get elected?)

"I've coined new words, like, misunderstanding and Hispanically." -George W. Bush, speaking at the Radio & Television Correspondents dinner, March 29, 2001

"My plan reduces the national debt, and fast. So fast, in fact, that economists worry that we're going to run out of debt to retire." -George W. Bush, radio address, Feb. 24, 2001 (debt by end of 2008 will be over $10 trillion. It was approx. $3.5 trillion in 2001)

"There's no such thing as legacies. At least, there is a legacy, but I'll never see it." -George W. Bush, speaking to Catholic leaders at the White House, Jan. 31, 2001

"I want everybody to hear loud and clear that I'm going to be the president of everybody." -George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Jan. 18, 2001

"It'll be hard to articulate." -George W. Bush, anticipating how he'll feel upon assuming the presidency, Jan. 2001 (again I ask "why is he elected?")

"If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." --George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Dec. 19, 2000 (Listen to audio clip)

"They misunderestimated me." --George W. Bush, Bentonville, Ark., Nov. 6, 2000 (you're absolutely right. America was confused and your linguistic challenged cousin Sarah Palin is knocking at your door to the White House)

"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." --George W. Bush, Saginaw, Mich., Sept. 29, 2000 (Listen to audio clip)

Pentagon Panel: Biden Was Right, Prep for 'Crisis'

Pentagon Panel: Biden Was Right, Prep for 'Crisis'

The McCain campaign pounced the other day, when Joe Biden said that his running mate would be tested by an international crisis at the start of his White House tenure. But the chairman of a key Pentagon advisory panel is sounding a similar warning, telling the next administration to "prepare for a likely first-270-days crisis."

Veteran Pentagon consultant Michael Bayer, chairman of the Defense Business Board, told his fellow panelists that the new president's inner circle should "set aside time in transition to identify the planning, gravitas and interagency process necessary to respond to a likely first-270-day crisis."

From Kennedy (Bay of Pigs) to Johnson (Gulf of Tonkin) to Bush (9/11)," too many presidents were ill prepared for this," Bayer warns.

"For months, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the service chiefs and the Joint Staff have been preparing for the first wartime transfer of Pentagon political authority in four decades," notes Inside Defense, which broke word of Bayer's presentation. "In addition to identifying defense policy issues for an incoming to understand, the military is also on high operational alert."

A key goal for the next administration, according to Bayer, must be to fill civilian posts requiring Senate confirmation as soon as possible.

The incoming administration “must not wait until June” to get assistant secretaries confirmed and October for deputy assistant secretaries to be Senate confirmed, his briefing states.

“Need a very concerted, well-defined process to have top 3 tiers ready to go to Senate confirmation in first 30 days,” Bayer recommends.

Chuck Hagel - Respected Republican says Palin is the weakest link. Goodbye!

Palin is arguably the thinnest-résumé candidate for VP.

In early June, Senators Chuck Hagel and John McCain met in Hagel's office on Capitol Hill. McCain, the presumptive Republican Presidential nominee, considered Hagel--a fellow-Republican and the senior senator from Nebraska--among his closest friends in Congress. Six months earlier, in December, 2007, McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, had asked Hagel to endorse McCain and campaign with him in the upcoming primaries. Hagel had demurred. ...

Hagel skipped the Republican Convention, choosing instead to go, with two aides, on a fact-finding trip to Latin America. He did hear McCain's speech, which, in its evocation of the need to bridge a disabling partisan divide, echoed the theme of his discussion with McCain in their meeting in June.

But, Hagel said, he's been "very disappointed" by McCain's campaign. "He gave one unifying speech and then has spent fifty million dollars to destroy his opponent." Hagel may be the only senior Republican elected official who has publicly criticized McCain's choice of Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. "I don't believe she's qualified to be President of the United States," Hagel told me. "The first judgment a potential President makes is who their running mate is--and I don't think John made a very good selection." He scoffed at McCain's attempts to portray her as an experienced politician. "To try to make the excuse that she looks out her window and sees Russia--and that she's commander of the Alaska National Guard." He added, "There is no question that this candidate is arguably the thinnest-résumé candidate for Vice-President in the history of America."

Financial Times : Obama is the Better Choice

Obama is the better choice

Published: October 26 2008 19:31 | Last updated: October 26 2008 19:31

US presidential elections involve a fabulous expense of time, effort and money. Doubtless it is all too much – but, by the end, nobody can complain that the candidates have been too little scrutinized. We have learned a lot about Barack Obama and John McCain during this campaign. In our view, it is enough to be confident that Mr Obama is the right choice.

At the outset, we were not so confident. Mr Obama is inexperienced. His policies are a blend of good, not so good and downright bad. Since the election will strengthen Democratic control of Congress, a case can be made for returning a Republican to the White House: divided government has a better record in the United States than government united under either party.

So this ought to have been a close call. With a week remaining before the election, we cannot feel that it is.

Mr Obama fought a much better campaign. Campaigning is not the same as governing, and the presidency should not be a prize for giving the best speeches, devising the best television advertisements, shaking the most hands and kissing the most babies.

Nonetheless, a campaign is a test of leadership. Mr Obama ran his superbly; Mr McCain’s has often looked a shambles. After eight years of George W. Bush, the steady competence of the Obama operation commands respect.

Nor should one disdain Mr Obama’s way with a crowd. Good presidents engage the country’s attention; great ones inspire. Mr McCain, on form, is an adequate speaker but no more. Mr Obama, on form, is as fine a political orator as the country has heard in decades. Put to the right purposes, this is no mere decoration but a priceless asset.

Mr Obama’s purposes do seem mostly right, though in saying this we give him the benefit of the doubt. Above all, he prizes consensus and genuinely seeks to unite the country, something it wants. His call for change struck a mighty chord in a tired and demoralised nation – and who could promise real change more credibly than Mr Obama, a black man, whose very nomination was a historic advance in US politics?

We applaud his main domestic proposal: comprehensive health-care reform. This plan would achieve nearly universal insurance without the mandates of rival schemes: characteristically, it combines a far-sighted goal with moderation in the method. Mr McCain’s plan, based on extending tax relief beyond employer-provided insurance, also has merit – it would contain costs better – but is too timid and would widen coverage much less.

Mr Obama is most disappointing on trade. He pandered to protectionists during the primaries, and has not rowed back. He may be sincere, which is troubling. Should he win the election, a Democratic Congress will expect him to keep those trade-thumping promises. Mr McCain has been bravely and consistently pro-trade, much to his credit.

In responding to the economic emergency, Mr Obama has again impressed – not by advancing solutions of his own, but in displaying a calm and methodical disposition, and in seeking the best advice. Mr McCain’s hasty half-baked interventions were unnerving when they were not beside the point.

On foreign policy, where the candidates have often conspired to exaggerate their differences, this contrast in temperaments seems crucial. For all his experience, Mr McCain has seemed too much guided by an instinct for peremptory action, an exaggerated sense of certainty, and a reluctance to see shades of grey.

He has offered risk-taking almost as his chief qualification, but gambles do not always pay off. His choice of Sarah Palin as running mate, widely acknowledged to have been a mistake, is an obtrusive case in point. Rashness is not a virtue in a president. The cautious and deliberate Mr Obama is altogether a less alarming prospect.

Rest assured that, should he win, Mr Obama is bound to disappoint. How could he not? He is expected to heal the country’s racial divisions, reverse the trend of rising inequality, improve middle-class living standards, cut almost everybody’s taxes, transform the image of the United States abroad, end the losses in Iraq, deal with the mess in Afghanistan and much more besides.

Succeeding in those endeavours would require more than uplifting oratory and presidential deportment even if the economy were growing rapidly, which it will not be.

The challenges facing the next president will be extraordinary. We hesitate to wish it on anyone, but we hope that Mr Obama gets the job.

Declaration of Support by 330 Former Diplomats of USA

We know that if someone is given a Foreign Service appointment; their qualifications for the job must be in considerably high order. This kind of endorsement speaks highly of Obama and his campaign.

Declaration of Support by 330 Former Diplomats of USA

Dear Friends and Relations,

A friend and former colleague of mine in the Foreign Service, Kevin McGuire, some time ago drafted a short statement of support for Obama and began to ask retired Foreign Service officers if they would sign it. So far 334 of us have done so, including by my count 66 former American ambassadors.

If you would like to know why we have done so and who we are, you can find our reasons and our signatures at Foreign Policy for Obama.Com: Declaration of Support by Over 280 Former Diplomats. (Ed. note: the number is now over 330.)

You can go to ForeignPolicyforObama.com and click on the link in the left hand column.

I will remind you that the Foreign Service of the United States is our country's career diplomatic and consular service. We staff both the State Department in Washington and our embassies and consulates abroad. Usually two-thirds or more of our ambassadors are Foreign Service officers, although both Democratic and Republican administrations have made a number of ambassadorial appointments for political reasons. Some of these Republican appointees and, by my count, two former career officers, have come out for McCain.

Our Service has sometimes been criticized by Republicans who label us a bunch of liberals. I cannot speak for my former colleagues, but as I said in a recent essay, if we must use labels I want to be considered a liberal conservative. I am a conservative because, among other reasons, I believe in a prudent course for the country, including a conservative fiscal policy and conservation -- two old Republican virtues that present-day Republicans have forgotten.

In the Foreign Service we serve the President and the Constitution faithfully -- I served under seven Presidents, finally as ambassador to Somalia under President Reagan -- and we do our best by our country. We do not speak lightly about national security. Five of my friends and colleagues were killed by terrorists. More American ambassadors have died violent deaths since World War II than our admirals and generals combined. Two other friends and colleagues were kidnapped by terrorists, but survived.

I have backed Obama since I wrote, in early 2007, the review of his second book that I hope you will read at The Cal Review. He is a prudent manager, a professor of constitutional law, and a moral and upright man with sound judgment. I agree with Colin Powell that Obama is fully qualified to be commander in chief. He understands the problems that we face at home and abroad, and he will begin -- though it will take years -- to resolve them. He has a sturdy and experienced running mate, Joe Biden, whom I have admired greatly since I first met him in 1981.

Obama is running against a man whose chief virtue seems to be that he withstood five years of arduous imprisonment and torture and, since he could not equal the Navy record of his father and grandfather, went into politics after he married a rich wife. McCain has changed his positions as the years have progressed, but he has always supported the super-rich through the years as our society has divided.

He is the candidate of a party whose last candidates for President and Vice President were George W. Bush and Richard Cheney -- who inherited a budgetary surplus, sent us to war under false pretenses, and ran the country into the ground. McCain has chosen as his running mate and possible successor a woman who backed hundreds of Federal millions for the "bridge to nowhere" before she opposed it (and then kept the money) -- whom an independent investigator in Alaska finds guilty of ethics laws in the Troopergate scandal--and who knows so little about our Constitution that she says the Vice President is in charge of the Senate. I will leave it to the Republicans to explain the new report that she spent $150,000 of party funds on clothing and cosmetics.

Barack Obama did not approve this message. It's all mine.

Regards to all--
Peter