What's a stretch? Certainly it's all negative, and not detailed, but I don't hear anything in here that hasn't been reported elsewhere.

I suppose the perspective is a little unusual, since it takes the view that Bush should be held accountable for 9/11 itself, that not catching Osama bin Laden is a Bush failure, and that most of the actions he's taken have done little to weaken Al Qaeda, but have weakened us in ways we're only just beginning to collectively realize.

But I doubt those will seem "unusual" as more time passes, and the Bush spin machine cycles down.

Regardless of his religious preconditions, PEPFAR was both an extremely generous foreign aid investment and highly effective at providing antiretroviral treatment against AIDS, although yes some of the funding did go to abstinence education. If anything Bush's still high favourability ratings in Africa are testament to that.

How was the election of a Muslim theocracy in Lebanon Bush's doing? He supported Israel's invasion post-occurance, but unless he exacted any direct control over Israel's foreign policy there I can't see the connection.

Olbermann infers connections to the Mumbai bombings, the killing of Benazir Bhutto, again where is the link? The US was never proposed to be the sole global guardian against terrorism.

Preventing Kim Jong-il from acquiring nuclear weapons again is a global failing. Applying more stringent sanctions, whether they would have had any effect or not was vetoed by China. You could argue more effective diplomacy was required, but as it stands it is not a failing specifically of his administration but more of an unrealised success.

As for the rest, there's little I can argue on. I'm no apologist, but I take offence to Olbermann and for that matter, much of MSNBC providing factually correct, but one sided news.

As for why I sifted it, I want to raise my star rating and no one likes my music >.<

"Don't sell it on ebay"???

C'mon, surely not. Not even Bush could be that stupidly inconsiderate???

Source?

His few successes will not out weigh his many failures.

>> ^RedSky:


I have to agree on your first point, PEPFAR did a lot of good, and it's probably the most common thing people put forward when asked "what did Bush do right?" Still, the point Olbermann makes about not funding groups who promote condom use goes to show how petty Bush can be, even when he's doing something that's working out well.

The Muslim theocracy in Lebanon is referring to the elections Bush pushed for that resulted in a big, legitimizing win for Hezbollah -- something Bush's own advisers had predicted. You can argue that maybe other courses of action might have had the same outcome or worse, but you can't argue that giving Hezbollah legitimate influence over a country's government is anything but a lost battle in this "war on terror" he's so fond of.

As for the Mumbai bombings, and Benazir Bhutto's assasination, they're outgrowths of a policy towards Pakistan that involved simply trusting Musharraf, and giving him buckets of aid with little to no accountability. Instead, all we ever hear is "Pakistan is on our side, Iraq is the main battlefront on the War on Terror." Looking for bin Laden in Waziristan is off the table.

You have a point about North Korea being a global failing, but they were trending towards dismantling their nuclear program during Clinton's diplomatic efforts. Bush stormed in with his "we don't talk to bad guys" policy, dismantled the talks, and North Korea responded by reverting to their old ways. They were left unchecked (again, Iraq was to be our main/only focus) until they were able to build a nuclear weapon.

As for the one-sided nature of Olbermann, there's not much to argue there other than to say "they started it first." Are Hannity, Glenn Beck, and Bill O'Reilly some sort of multifaceted objective political commentary? I don't want MSNBC to become the left's Fox News, but I think the media environment can tolerate one Olbermann, and many Maddow-like personalities, for there to at least be two sides doing the whole spin-as-news shtick.

If it were me, I'd love for the media to give believably objective reporting of current events, facts, and history, but all of the outlets that try to do so are either a) struggling to "prove" their objectivity by trying to show that both parties have equal responsibility for all failures or b) are flagged by people as being left-leaning because objectively speaking, Republicans haven't gotten anything right in quite a while.

We'll see how long people keep accusing, say, PBS or the NYT of being "liberal" now that Democrats are in power. I suspect even HuffPo and TPM will get credit for doing fact-based reporting, now that Democrats are in the driver's seat. After all, the "liberal" press loves to attack authority, no matter who they are. "Conservative" press will keep doing what it's been doing; smear Democrats at all times, praise conservative Republicans at all times, and frame all failures as a direct outgrowth of failure to adhere to conservative principles, or failure to pursue them drastically enough.

You're my hero, NetRunner.

Bush criticisms:

* Spending money and expanding government like a liberal

* Failing to enforce immigration laws while trying to sneak in amnesty

* The bailouts

That said, the guy never had a chance with the mainstream media, from the moment he "stole" the 2000 election from a C student/former VP/proven liar with no respect for the rule of law.

It will be interesting to observe what happens to the Olbyloon after The One begins his Reign of Error.

>> ^NetRunner:


I Admit I don't know much about what happened in Lebanon post-bombing, but going on that it's a defendable position, although the consequences as can be seen in allowing Hamas to participate and win the Gaza elections can be devastating.

Untied foreign aid to Pakistan was irresponsible but I still can't really see the connection to Bhutto's assassination. I can imagine what you're implying but it sounds tenuous at best to me.

I've always thought of North Korea's nuclear belligerence as a means towards extorting foreign aid, dumping them in the axis of evil and essentially ignoring them certainly didn't help, but their behaviour almost seems inevitable anyway.

I guess I can't really rail against TV personalities rather than supposed unbiased media reporting having biased or selective opinions from ideological standpoints. I guess I'm more annoyed at that there doesn't seem to be a thirst for investigative reporting. People watch the straight out news to learn the facts, but they go to these personalities to grab an actual opinion on the events transpiring. Perhaps it's because people feel they are too pressed for time or lack enough interest to become involved, while modern culture dictates they ought to have a presentable opinion on a variety of world events leaving them with the only seemingly plausible decision of stealing someone else's. Investigative reporting ought to be there so you can make up your opinion based upon the facts at hand, and yes I know I live in my own utopian world, but it damn well doesn't hurt to dream!

Plus television the main source of news nowadays was never made and isn't really plausibly capable of conveying large amounts of facts, so yeah I guess it's basically a pipe dream. Considering that, I can't really argue with Olbermann/Maddow being an inevitable counterweight to the Bill'O's of the world, a 'they started it first' approach isn't exactly ideal but then nobody really wins elections or consensus on culturally divisive issues based upon superior policy or logic. I equally have no doubt that there are plenty of people in positions of power who have no interest in an actual debate and are entirely content funnelling points of view through their television personalities, and would very much like to keep it that way so I agree with much of what you say.

The Republicans have been wrong on most things I agree, but the divide is not just political, it's ideological. I mean you're not going to see the benefits of the free market/invisible hand being argued on Olbermann/Maddow for example.

>> ^misterwight:

Sycophant!

>> ^RedSky:

>> ^misterwight:
Sycophant!


Augh! My vicarious pride!

*dead yet still breathing, Olbermann: complicit in the dumbing-down of N. America

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