[Timber Loftis]

Hey, Desuma, Long time no talk. I generally liked this article/rant a lot. However, the list is fine without misrepresenting things. Let's take a few.

· Bought the Texas Rangers baseball team in a sweetheart deal that took land using taxpayer money. Biggest move: Traded Sammy Sosa to the Chicago White Sox.

Finicky inaccuracy? I'm not baseball buff, but did Sosa go to the Sox before the Cubs or did he come straight from the Rangers to the Cubs?

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS GOVERNOR: · Changed pollution laws for power and oil companies and made Texas the most polluted state in the Union.

Texas has always been in the top 5 for pollution.

· Became President after losing the popular vote by over 500,000 votes, with the help of my father's appointments to the Supreme Court.

[img]graemlins/biglaugh.gif[/img] Yep.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS PRESIDENT: · Spent the surplus and bankrupted the Treasury. · Shattered record for biggest annual deficit in history. · Set economic record for most private bankruptcies filed in any 12 month period. · Set all-time record for biggest drop in the history of the stock market.

My biggest problems with him. Very nice list.

· After taking the entire month of August off for vacation, I presided over the worst security failure in US history.

Yes, PRESIDED. Presided over something lingering from other presidencies or altogether unimaginable anyway. Like Gulliani, he "presided" -- and well, for a while.

· Cut unemployment benefits for more out of work Americans than any President in US history.

Actually, Clinton did this. By limiting unemployment benefits to 6mos./1yr. Hey -- it is supposed to be a *temporary* thing, you know? Anyway, Bush actually backtracked and, because he screwed the economy, had to undo Clinton's changes and extend these benefits back out. So, the Democrat Clinton reformed wellfare in the needed hardass way, and the Republican bleeding heart Bush spent to much taxes and had to undo it all. [img]graemlins/biglaugh.gif[/img] I feel like I'm living in Opposites Land. [img]graemlins/biglaugh.gif[/img]

Anyway, this statement is a misrepresentation. And, as such, it detracts from the witiness of the overall piece.

· Signed more laws and executive orders amending the Constitution than any President in US history.

Laws and executive orders don't and can't amend the constitution. They may violate it or ignore it, but they can't amend it. *Bzzzzzt* Wrong again.

· Presided over the highest gasoline prices in US history and refused to use the national reserves as past Presidents have.

BS. If you adjust for inflation, gas has steadily decreased in price for 20 years or more. And, keep those national reserves. Let's burn other people's natural resources before we use ours.

· Set the all-time record for most people worldwide to simultaneously take to the streets to protest me (15 million people), shattering the record for protest against any person in the history of mankind.

I can't believe the person who wrote this would compare the world-wide war protests -- about which very few of us even gave a damn -- with Alabama Civil Rights marches, Kent State, or marches on Washington during Vietnam. Don't insult my intelligence.

· Dissolved more international treaties than any President in US history.

Disolved? Pfffft. Again, ignored maybe, but not dissolved.

· Members of my cabinet are the richest of any administration in US history. (The 'poorest' multimillionaire, Condoleeza Rice has a Chevron oil tanker named after her).

Yeah, Condi just reeks of old money. This chick worked her butt off to become a success, even during the days when the deck was stacked against her (rather than *for* her, as they now would be) as a woman and a black American. What poor taste to make this comment.

· First President in US history to order a US attack and military occupation of a sovereign nation, and I did so against the will of the United Nations and the world community.

I get the point the author is trying to make, but it's poorly stated. Japan was a sovereign nation and we attacked it. So was Germany.

· Created the largest government department bureaucracy in the history of the United States.

Not really worth comment. DHS is likely more of a good thing than a bad thing, and didn't *create* much new, but rather reorganized things. It's where the Coast Guard belongs, as a for instance.

RECORD AND REFERENCES: · Have at least one conviction for drunk driving in Maine (Texas driving record has been erased and is not available). · Was AWOL from National Guard and deserted the military during a time of war. · Refused to take drug test or even answer any questions about drug use. · All records of my tenure as Governor of Texas have been spirited away to my father's library, sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view. · All records of any SEC investigations into my insider trading or bankrupt companies are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view. · All minutes of meetings for any public corporation I served on the board are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view. · Any records or minutes from meetings I (or my VP) attended regarding public energy policy are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public review.

Well, yeah, he does sound kinda like Lenin and Stalin and Kruchev in that way. Perhaps Russia should send us a copy of Perestroika so we can see that the whole thing Gorby was imitating about the US was its openness of information. Bush is certainly taking that away.

But, all in all, these liberal sputterings could be more even-tempered and garner more respect. From me, at least.