Watchdog group: Depth of Bush failures surprised even us

[Poiuyt]

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The most comprehensive guide to these and other Bush administration failures is a new list compiled by the Center for Public Integrity (CPI), a non-profit investigative journalism group which recently "set out to document just how off-track things have gone," assigning thirteen reporters to document the worst failures of the last eight years.

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According to the CPI, "Some of these problems were in place well before George W. Bush’s inauguration, but were exacerbated by his policies or worsened by his administration’s actions (or inactions). Many of the failings are tied to Bush appointees who appear to have been selected primarily on the basis of ideology and loyalty, rather than competence."

Many of the numbers which leap out from the summary are dollar figures -- such as the $300 billion over budget for Defense Department weapons acquisitions or the $100 billion lost every year to corporate offshore tax shelters.

There are also examples of ineffective planning, such as the faulty National Security Administration computer system, which carries a price tag of $4 billion, or the complete failure of a $100 million attempt to create a new system of internal information-sharing for the FBI in the wake of 9/11.

Items which speak to the obsessions of the Bush administration appear in the list, as well, ranging from the record $9.91 billion spent on government secrecy in 2007 to the dismissal of all but 17 out of the 1273 whistleblower complaints filed from 2002 to 2008.

However, the most haunting entries may be those which document the toll taken on the American people over the last eight years, including pollution that causes 20,000 deaths a year and puts 60,000 newborns at risk of neurological problems., a two-thirds dropoff in the cleanup of toxic waste sites, and 2.5 million toxic toys recalled in the summer of 2007.

http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Watchdog_group_documents_Bushs_Broken_Government_1210.html

I think it would be a lot easier to make a list of what Bush did right. Shorter certainly. You could write it on the back of a napkin.

[ananda]

1. WATCHdog????

I well know the exact depth and horrors of the Bush failures,
and all I've done is pay attention.