From the point of view of an investigative reporter and lawyer who previously interned with John F. Kerry's legal team during the presidential election in 2004.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122584386627599251.htmlThe Treatment of Bush Has Been a Disgrace
What must our enemies be thinking?
By JEFFREY SCOTT SHAPIROEarlier this year, 12,000 people in San Francisco signed a petition in support of a proposition on a local ballot to rename an Oceanside sewage plant after George W. Bush. The proposition is only one example of the classless disrespect many Americans have shown the president.
According to recent Gallup polls, the president's average approval rating is below 30% -- down from his 90% approval in the wake of 9/11. Mr. Bush has endured relentless attacks from the left while facing abandonment from the right.
This is the price Mr. Bush is paying for trying to work with both Democrats and Republicans. During his 2004 victory speech, the president reached out to voters who supported his opponent, John Kerry, and said, "Today, I want to speak to every person who voted for my opponent. To make this nation stronger and better, I will need your support, and I will work to earn it. I will do all I can do to deserve your trust."
Those bipartisan efforts have been met with crushing resistance from both political parties.
The president's original Supreme Court choice of Harriet Miers alarmed Republicans, while his final nomination of Samuel Alito angered Democrats. His solutions to reform the immigration system alienated traditional conservatives, while his refusal to retreat in Iraq has enraged liberals who have unrealistic expectations about the challenges we face there.
It seems that no matter what Mr. Bush does, he is blamed for everything. He remains despised by the left while continuously disappointing the right.Yet it should seem obvious that many of our country's current problems either existed long before Mr. Bush ever came to office, or are beyond his control. Perhaps if Americans stopped being so divisive, and congressional leaders came together to work with the president on some of these problems, he would actually have had a fighting chance of solving them.Like the president said in his 2004 victory speech, "We have one country, one Constitution and one future that binds us. And when we come together and work together, there is no limit to the greatness of America."
To be sure, Mr. Bush is not completely alone. His low approval ratings put him in the good company of former Democratic President Harry S. Truman, whose own approval rating sank to 22% shortly before he left office. Despite Mr. Truman's low numbers, a 2005 Wall Street Journal poll found that he was ranked the seventh most popular president in history.
Just as Americans have gained perspective on how challenging Truman's presidency was in the wake of World War II, our country will recognize the hardship President Bush faced these past eight years -- and how extraordinary it was that he accomplished what he did in the wake of the September 11 attacks.
The treatment President Bush has received from this country is nothing less than a disgrace. The attacks launched against him have been cruel and slanderous, proving to the world what little character and resolve we have. The president is not to blame for all these problems. He never lost faith in America or her people, and has tried his hardest to continue leading our nation during a very difficult time.
Our failure to stand by the one person who continued to stand by us has not gone unnoticed by our enemies. It has shown to the world how disloyal we can be when our president needed loyalty -- a shameful display of arrogance and weakness that will haunt this nation long after Mr. Bush has left the White House.
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And also, some great quotes from Glenn Beck:
(I got this first one from Mike&Joelle's blog)
"Do you believe that Barack Obama is a centrist? No. The fact is he is the farthest left of anyone in congress. He is the most liberal in congress. But that's not the center. Al, that's not the center. You are right. America is the center and I said Barack Obama people are saying that he's going to govern from the center. And if that is true, that's great. Great. And I will support him. Without betraying my own values, I will support him. I will support him as the President, I will support every policy that he forwards that doesn't force me to betray my values. You can label it any way you want. I do label it Marxism when you are talking about the redistribution of wealth. Now, you may say that's hate mongering, you may say, well, how are you going to unite. I cannot unite around Marxism. And redistribution of wealth is Marxism. Look it up. Anyone who is saying we're going to redistribute the wealth and anyone who says they want the Constitution changed to take those blocks away is a Marxist. I don't believe that's where America is.
We're not the country of Jerry Falwell and we're not the country of Barack Obama, or I should say Nancy Pelosi because Barack Obama appears to be somebody who he's never been before. Let's take him at his face value that he's going to be a uniter, that he's going to rule from the center. Great. That's fantastic. I hope it's true. We're not Nancy Pelosi, we're not, you know, Jimmy Swaggart or anybody like that. We're in the center. We're center-right. Right now we're afraid. And when people are afraid, they panic. We have also raised a generation of people who have given trophies to their kids who came in 18th place. We have told them that there's nothing to strive for. You get it anyway, just by showing up, kid. "Look at you, you're special." No, you're not. No, you're not. Everybody is the same. It's what you do with your life. It's the choices that you make. We're all given the same kind of opportunity. We don't have the same skills. We don't have the same work ethic. We don't get the same results, but we have the same opportunity. That we can all agree on."
More good quotes from Glenn Beck:
CALLER: You are sending some real mixed signals and I'm kind of wondering -- listen, I've been listening to you for weeks now.
GLENN: For weeks.
CALLER: And I've been listening to you tear down Barack Obama and vent him and state all the reasons why we should not vote for him. GLENN: Yes.
CALLER: Now you are saying that we need to make nice and accept him as our President.
GLENN: Yes.
CALLER: Until he does something wrong.
GLENN: Until what?
CALLER: Until he does something wrong, so to speak, or gives us a good reason, you know, not to stand behind him.
GLENN: Yes.
CALLER: I'm on the other side. He is not my President and I will not accept him as my President until he proves to me that the platform and all the issues and stuff that he has stated so far that he will not do those things.
GLENN: Well, how very un-American of you, Joe. Congratulations.
CALLER: No, I am an American and --
GLENN: No, no. No, Joe, how does America work? How does the election work? Explain that to me.
CALLER: Okay, well, let me -- okay. The election works by people electing who they want as their President.
GLENN: Yes. And when it is done, who is elected? The Democratic President or the Republican President? Or is it the American President?
CALLER: The one that gets elected.
GLENN: And what is he? Is he the Republican President or the Democratic President or is he the American President?
CALLER: I can't accept him as the American President.
GLENN: Well, Joe, then you're un-American because this is the way our system works, and this is -- you are exactly the kind of person that caused so much trouble with George W. Bush. When the Supreme Court decided the way our system works, when the Supreme Court decided you count the way you are supposed to count the votes, you guys set this up, the Democrats were the ones who set it up. So you've got to play by those rules. When they counted the votes the way they were supposed to be counted and even when they counted them the way that they were trying to get them to count, you know, and change the rules, George Bush still won, they still said, "Well, he's not my President; he was selected, not elected. No, the facts are he was elected the President of the United States through the Supreme Court and then the New York Times -- that crazy -- I mean, it might as well be reading the National Review. That crazy newspaper went back and counted them again and Al Gore still lost. And yet people said he's not my President. Well, that was the problem. And Joe, you are now the person that you most likely railed against in 2000. Barack Obama won. He is now our President. We do not sacrifice our values. We are not required to now become a socialist. We're now not required to stand up and fight for the things that he believes in if we disagree, but we understand that he is the President of the United States.
Glenn Beck: No Pity Party?
November 5, 2008 - 12:47 ET
GLENN: Stop the music because we're not going to have a pity party today. That's not where we're going. Today is not a day to have a pity party. Today is a day to look at this in perspective. Today is a day to turn the page, start all over again. Representative John Lewis said this yesterday, last night. Listen carefully to what he said.
REPRESENTATIVE LEWIS: When you really think about it, we have witnessed tonight in America again what I like to call a revolution of values, a revolution of ideas. There's been a transformation of American politics and it will have unbelievable influence on the politics of the world.
GLENN: Okay. He's exactly right. There was a revolution last night. It is the way America has revolutions. We don't have them with guns. We don't have them with violence. We have them at the voting booth, and it was a revolution last night.
How many people voted for Obama that were like, "You know what, I mean, let's just go for it. He's really going to do it." McCain was not a conservative on illegal immigration. McCain was not a conservative on small government, the bailout, capitalism. The only thing he had a record on was earmarks. And America now knows earmarks are ridiculous. Earmarks are a drop in the bucket compared to everything else that's piling up. It was John McCain that lost last night, the values and the principles of Ronald Reagan's Republican party were not rejected because there was no candidate representing them. This election was not about values or social issues. Look at gay adoption. Look at gay marriage. Look at abortion. For the most part the traditional values, anything that was on a ballot that had traditional values at stake, the traditional values stood. Traditional marriage was upheld. Arizona rejected the weakening of its illegal immigration law.
We are not that different. We are not the country of Nancy Pelosi. We are not the country of Jerry Falwell. We're the country of Ronald Reagan. Remember the Ronald Reagan Democrats. That's who we are.
