Nixon pales: No recent president has a scandal sheet as lengthy as Bush's

[kpete]

V.B. Price: Nixon pales
No recent president has a scandal sheet as lengthy as Bush's

By V.B. Price
Tribune Columnist
April 15, 2006

Sometimes you have to say the obvious.

In the past 40 or so years, the United States presidency has had four major political scandals, and they involved Presidents Johnson, Nixon, Clinton and George W. Bush. Of the four, Bush's season of scandal could well go down as the most infamous.

...........
Imagine Nixon or Clinton engaging in massive, electronic, warrantless spying on Americans, in direct opposition to a law Congress passed to protect us from just that. Could they have lasted a moment longer than it takes to say "impeachment"? Absolutely not. And then Bush's attorney general says it isn't beyond possibility for the government to electronically spy on all Americans.

If it weren't for a GOP-controlled House and Senate, would this president still be in office?

No need to mention the administration's denial of global warming, nor the hideous proof of torture, the weakening of environmental health standards and the nasty little election tricks like phone-jamming by White House operatives in New Hampshire in 2002 to keep Democrats from the polls.

Just the CIA leak scandal and illegally spying on Americans are enough to make Bush our No. 1 nightmare president.


more at:
http://www.abqtrib.com/albq/op_columnists/article/0,2565,ALBQ_19865_4622215,00.html

[saltpoint]

1. True. And my god the way that man butchers English.

At least Harding and Nixon could TALK.

[PATRICK]

2. Name any president

even accounting for scale. "The nadir of national disgrace" was supposedly Grant. Teapot Dome, Polk's mexican War they all pale, blanche, turn death gray and wilt before the magnificence that is the Bush regime.

Stolen elections- twice. The lion of the lapdog yellow press- and the president is certifiably AWOL yellow too as is his cabinet. Conflicts of interest graft, corruption on every level protected by secrecy. Broken treaties at will. Pre-emptive war with no provocation, baldly for profit, but in a land we cannot annex. Divisive. Economically ruinous. Puts cronies in charge of departments to loot and do the exact opposite of what the civil offices were intended for. Stacks the SCOTUS. Has many indicted friends and administration officials leading to evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors that are fairly obvious anyway.

Is a few bottles shy of a six pack and probably drank those. cannot be reasoned with or bothered even with the slightest Constitutional formality, such as obeying the law and respecting Congress- even when he could.

Interprets laws before signing then ignores them anyway- hundreds of times more than any other president.
Elevates the rationale for dictatorship to the war on a man he can't now be bothered with- then goes off on an oil crusade counter to any such war logic and removes all civil liberties and constraints on his power to defend that madness.

Avoids the new real crises of environment health and population as the above crap continues.

Does not read or write except bathroom notes. Wears a wire when speaking in totally staged politically venal photo ops.

It goes on and on down and down. You could add the worst features of any president and still not create the measure of this guy. So why do they say "modern presidency"? Just because of scale or because they don't want to move from "worst ever" to "total betrayal of the office and nation" which are the real logical steps.

[YDogg]

5. But ... but ... but ... He has an MBA!

[YDogg]

3. About Clinton ...

... was his really political until it was made political? Seems it was personal until the spinmeisters made it political. He didn't help himself, but come on. What about Iran-Contra?

[NewJeffCT]

4. Iran-Contra was bigger than Watergate

That was also in direct opposition to a law Congress had passed.

[RaleighNCDUer]

6. What was the Reagan legacy?

Something like 138 criminal convictions connected to the Reagan administration over 8 years, including the Iran/Contra mess?

Are we ever going to be in a position of actually bringing criminal charges against Bushco? If we do, he will leave Stain, er, Saint Ronnie in the dust.