Eugene Robinson: Bush and Cheney remind us how we got into this mess

[Faygo Kid]

Truer words were never written. It was indeed and always "Bush's fault." Worst President Ever. And worst vice president, with Andrew Johnson, Spiro Agnew and Aaron Burr right up there. But Bush-Cheney decimated this nation, and I for one will never forget. Or forgive.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bush-and-cheney-remind-us-how-we-got-into-this-mess/2011/09/01/gIQAboXFvJ_story.html?hpid=z2

Thank you, George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, for emerging from your secure, undisclosed locations to remind us how we got into this mess: It didn’t happen by accident.

The important thing isn’t what Bush says in his interview with National Geographic or what scores Cheney tries to settle in his memoir. What matters is that as they return to the public eye, they highlight their record of wrongheaded policy choices that helped bring the nation to a sour, penurious state.

Questions about whether President Obama has been combative enough in dealing with the Republican opposition — or sufficiently ambitious in framing his progressive agenda — seem trivial when viewed in this larger context. Obama is tackling enormous problems that took many years to create. His presidential style is important insofar as it boosts or lessens his effectiveness, but its importance pales beside the generally righteous substance of what he’s trying to accomplish.

It was the Bush administration, you will recall, that sent the national debt into the stratosphere and choked off federal revenue to the point of asphyxiation. Bush and Cheney decided to fight two wars without even accounting — let alone paying — for them. Rather than raise taxes to cover the cost of military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, Bush opted to maintain unreasonable and unnecessary tax cuts.

So far, the wars and the tax cuts have cost the Treasury between $4 trillion and $5 trillion. If Bush had just left income tax rates alone, nobody except Ron Paul would be talking about the debt. . .

[patrice]

1. Uh ... some of us had deep problems with those wars whether they had been charged or not. nt

[BlueMTexpat]

4. Very true, and I have always been one of them ... but your point is?

Now the costs incurred by those wars - still not paid for - are being used as a major excuse to destroy what is left of our public sector, which will literally mean the end of the great American experiment with democracy. We could all see it in our lifetimes, sooner rather than later.

There is certainly nothing wrong with repeating that - over and over and over again - as long as it takes.

[awoke_in_2003]

2. and Obama reminds us of why...

we are still in it.

[Bluenorthwest]

3. Eugene is getting redundant.

His writing simply denies the fact that Obama does not point out that Bush and Cheney fucked us over, that the Republican Party fucked us over as a nation, Obama keeps demanding that we forget the past, look forward and call the Republicans 'honest partners'. As with many who seem to have a driving need to rationalize Obama's mediocrity, Robinson falls quickly to the truth and the verbiage that Obama absolutely refuses to employ. That is a bit dishonest. It is 'supporting the President' using language the President rejects, would deny, language which the President constantly shouts down. Robinson acts like Obama says 'Well Bush and Cheney were criminals who did grave harm to the nation' instead of 'turn that page, stop seeking revenge, don't look back'.
It gets old hearing the apologists apologize using the exact language that, if employed by the President, would void the need for apologies at all.
So, Mr Robinson, why does the President not speak of the Republicans as you do? And why do you pretend that he does?