pretty indefensible for his role in iran-contra -- including (especially) pardoning the main players. i'm kind of amazed at how completely that's been forgotten (along with everything else about iran-contra,).
i'm not so keen on the gulf war either, tbh.
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:29 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.topchinatravel.com/pic/about-us/world-vip-travel/-US-ex-president-George-Bush-and-his-wife.jpg
― your damn bass clarinet (Eazy), Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:30 (eleven years ago) link
He seems like maybe a less terrible person than his older son or his wife, but that's a low bar. The least-awful Republican president of the past 50 years is not high praise either. Can't think of any grounds on which he's actually somehow defensible.
― something of an astrological coup (tipsy mothra), Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:36 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.corbisimages.com/stock-photo/rights-managed/WL010925/george-bush-and-jennifer-fitzgerald
― buzza, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:36 (eleven years ago) link
Barbara hasn't aged a day since 1975. Of course, she already looked about 100.
― Johnny Fever, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:38 (eleven years ago) link
Image keywords
Caucasian ethnicity
― buzza, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:39 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.corbisimages.com/images/Corbis-IH055332.jpg?size=67&uid=588acb60-23e7-4932-b50f-2e7583ee76b8http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/01384/Bush_Snr_and_Pups_1384851i.jpg
― pplains, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:46 (eleven years ago) link
rather symbolic donchathink
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:47 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.eyerocketbooks.com/images/Bush_Guitar.jpg
― pplains, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:47 (eleven years ago) link
I love the line in The Final Days about how Al Haig told RNC Chairman Bush that the smoking gun had been found in the Watergate tapes and the president would likely have to resign.
When asked what Bush's reaction had been, Haig said that "he opened himself into assholes and shit himself to death."
― pplains, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:49 (eleven years ago) link
First president since Truman? LBJ? to wear glasses in public on a regular basis.
Last one too.
― pplains, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:50 (eleven years ago) link
Bwah ha! xp
― Johnny Fever, Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:50 (eleven years ago) link
I really miss the days when you didn't have to include the "H.W." when referring to this guy.
don't we all.
― packt like phoebe cates's dad in a chimney (strongo hulkington's ghost dad), Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:51 (eleven years ago) link
i kinda feel like no one can be director of the c.i.a., even for a year, and not be a complete asshole.
― packt like phoebe cates's dad in a chimney (strongo hulkington's ghost dad), Thursday, 27 December 2012 21:53 (eleven years ago) link
don't forget we have him to thank for Clarence Thomas
― (REAL NAME) (m coleman), Thursday, 27 December 2012 22:11 (eleven years ago) link
Oh shit, that's right.
― Johnny Fever, Thursday, 27 December 2012 22:12 (eleven years ago) link
don't forget: we have him to thank for loathing broccoli.
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 27 December 2012 22:20 (eleven years ago) link
never forget:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ervjj_qRXXQ
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Thursday, 27 December 2012 22:35 (eleven years ago) link
2 Bad Neighbors
― billstevejim, Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:01 (eleven years ago) link
"It's your sons, Jeb Bush and George Bush Jr.!"
http://www.hwdyk.com/q/images/twobadneighbors_12.jpg
― Gollum: "Hot, Ready and Smeagol!" (Phil D.), Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:03 (eleven years ago) link
http://youtu.be/GkyBfJfcIoM?t=23s
― pplains, Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:06 (eleven years ago) link
ebruceii 9 months ago
This video makes me want to punch that old man Bush in his effing face. HE was the person running the CIA when THEY brought that shit into our cities to pay for wars in Central America under President Reagan. Glad that old scumbag is dead.
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:07 (eleven years ago) link
ebruceii is clairvoyant.
― Johnny Fever, Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:08 (eleven years ago) link
Poppy Bush never had an Alec Baldwin tell him "Nice guy? I don't give a shit. Good father? Fuck you. Go home and play with your kids!
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:14 (eleven years ago) link
Being the father of George W., Neil & Jeb is probable cosmic blowback for being the son of a Nazi financier.
Also ironic for him being the son of the first national treasurer of Planned Parenthood.
― Canaille help you (Michael White), Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:19 (eleven years ago) link
'never understood lemonade myself...not my forte.'
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Thursday, 27 December 2012 23:19 (eleven years ago) link
morbs' favorite president!
he's loathsome... just less so than the 3 who've followed.
― saltwater incursion (Dr Morbius), Friday, 28 December 2012 00:40 (eleven years ago) link
(weighing everything, that is)
― saltwater incursion (Dr Morbius), Friday, 28 December 2012 00:41 (eleven years ago) link
On one of the modern rock chart polls we tossed around the idea of the 1988-1992 musical interzone when certain ideas about presentation and arrangements reached their apex then started to slowly wilt until the next set of jolts. Poppy's presidency was a perfect match: a purported continuation of Reagan, only not so; a sense of sitting in a waiting room for the Next Big Thing. Reagan of course is still with us, the corpse that keeps getting exhumed; so is the Lobster of Hope. Bush will never be reexamined though...except when Obama refers to his foreign policy as a model of excellence.
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 28 December 2012 00:59 (eleven years ago) link
― packt like phoebe cates's dad in a chimney (strongo hulkington's ghost dad)
sums it up for me, there's plenty we'll never know about.
― sleeve, Friday, 28 December 2012 01:08 (eleven years ago) link
So he's the unplugged "Layla."
― your damn bass clarinet (Eazy), Friday, 28 December 2012 01:09 (eleven years ago) link
He's Richard Marx's "Angelia."
― the little prince of inane false binary hype (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 28 December 2012 01:11 (eleven years ago) link
JCM's Whenever We Wanted might have been his best.
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 01:34 (eleven years ago) link
what's that painting of him and clinton in front of the mosque upthread?
― wk, Friday, 28 December 2012 01:35 (eleven years ago) link
I think it was part of the 2004 Tsunami Relief fund?
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 01:40 (eleven years ago) link
Bush tried to surprise Clinton with a visit to his friend's office in New York City's Harlem; when Bush arrived, he found Clinton was overseas. So Bush sat down in his successor's office, put his feet up and called him on the phone. "Bill! It's George. Nice view! Nice desk!"
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 01:43 (eleven years ago) link
Ha, what is this, trying to get there first to hold open the door?
http://news.yahoo.com/famed-gulf-war-u-general-schwarzkopf-dies-former-012253521.html
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 02:49 (eleven years ago) link
weird times, those were.
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/image.php?id=1168&filename=P22412-16.jpg
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 02:51 (eleven years ago) link
http://bushlibrary.tamu.edu/image.php?id=2261&filename=HS767.jpg
― buzza, Friday, 28 December 2012 03:16 (eleven years ago) link
Bar?
― Big Sambola & The Tailspinners (C. Grisso/McCain), Friday, 28 December 2012 03:19 (eleven years ago) link
open and wet
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:15 (eleven years ago) link
During the 1988 presidential campaign, Donna Brazile, a campaign aide to Bush's opponent Michael Dukakis, was asked to resign after she told reporters that George H.W. Bush needed to "'fess up" about unsubstantiated rumors of an extramarital affair. Said Brazile, "The American people have every right to know if Barbara Bush will share that bed with him in the White House."
― buzza, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:16 (eleven years ago) link
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ipk3HlMEmp8/Tta3aCfE74I/AAAAAAAACnI/jH3b6dZd7v8/s1600/pict435.jpg
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:30 (eleven years ago) link
Looks like No. 3 is aping No. 5's hairstyle.
http://ww1.hdnux.com/photos/16/42/57/3812324/3/628x471.jpg
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:32 (eleven years ago) link
How this picture features not one, but two future presidents shows that America has a lot to answer for.
http://ww3.hdnux.com/photos/17/03/43/3946702/3/628x471.jpg
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:33 (eleven years ago) link
http://ww4.hdnux.com/photos/16/42/56/3812239/3/628x471.jpg
"Of course not, Biff. Now, I wouldn't want that to happen."
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:47 (eleven years ago) link
Anyway. The funniest about this thread so far is that we're all pretty much doing this:
http://ww1.hdnux.com/photos/06/33/03/1683672/3/628x471.jpg
― pplains, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:48 (eleven years ago) link
Damn, no video of "Message: I care" on YouTube.
― your damn bass clarinet (Eazy), Friday, 28 December 2012 05:09 (eleven years ago) link
The death watch:
Mr. Bush’s single term, from 1989 to 1993, proved a pivot point at home and abroad. The last president to have served in World War II, he managed the end of the Cold War, reunified Germany and expelled Iraq from Kuwait. He reauthorized the Civil Rights Act, updated the Clean Air Act and signed the Americans with Disabilities Act. But he broke his “read my lips” promise not to raise taxes and lost re-election when he seemed disengaged from a troubled economy.
and:
The nostalgia for Mr. Bush may say as much about these times as his. Those were the days when America went to war with Iraq and then got out, when the two political parties struck grand bargains tackling the budget deficit, when Russia was a newfound friend retreating from confrontation rather than provoking it.
Just as telling are Mr. Bush’s current friends and foes. Among the friends are some of the same Democrats who tormented him but now lavish him with praise. Among the foes are some of today’s Republicans, who see him as the epitome of everything they do not want to be.
“You never hear anyone point to Bush 41,” said Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks, a Tea Party group. “By definition, a one-term president is a failed president. The American people rejected his economic policies.”
On the other side of that argument is Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa, who ran for the Democratic nomination to challenge Mr. Bush in 1992. “I know they’re building statues of Ronald Reagan at airports,” Mr. Harkin said, “but in terms of their lives and their life’s work, to me, Bush 41 is much more integral to the development of American government and the process of democracy.”
Mr. Harkin will attend this weekend’s events at the elder Bush’s library at Texas A&M University, organized by Frederick D. McClure, chief executive of the library foundation. Mr. Harkin will appear on a panel to discuss the Americans with Disabilities Act, on which he collaborated with Mr. Bush.
Also on hand will be another Democrat, former Representative David R. Obey of Wisconsin, who helped broker the 1990 budget deal that included tax increases. “If there’s a single word that you can use to describe Bush’s approach to politics, it’s governance,” Mr. Obey said. “It was a case where the adults ran the show.”
Other Democrats are quick to add praise. “I actually have a high opinion of Bush 41,” said former Representative Richard A. Gephardt, Democrat of Missouri, who ran for president in 1988. Mr. Bush showed “strong presidential leadership,” Mr. Gephardt said, in taking on his own party over taxes and not pursuing Iraqi troops all the way to Baghdad.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/04/us/politics/hindsight-proves-kinder-and-gentler-to-bush-41.html?ref=politics&_r=0
― Bryan Fairy (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 4 April 2014 02:07 (ten years ago) link
to say there is no such thing as presidential virtue is facile and incorrect. each president makes thousands of consequential decisions that affect millions, if not billions of people. some percentage of these are intentionally beneficial and not based wholly upon cynical political calculation. pretending every president is being of pure viciousness is stupid and just reinforces a false conservative narrative about progressives.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:43 (five years ago) link
OtmThat’s bably a controversial opinion on ilx though
― F# A# (∞), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:45 (five years ago) link
Probably*
Committing or actively aiding crimes against humanity tends to zero out "intentionally beneficial" acts IMO. John Wayne Gacy made a lot of kids happy when he did his clown act.
― louise ck (milo z), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:47 (five years ago) link
To disregard those acts, one must assume that you can't be President without doing horrible, inhuman things for indefensible reasons. If true, then we deserve to be wiped off the face of the planet.
― louise ck (milo z), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:49 (five years ago) link
heroism is generally portioned out in small doses, but to a surprisingly large number of people. it's nearly impossible to maintain a conspicuous heroism consistently over decades, and we should never expect it of anyone. but ascribing more than the ordinary amount of heroism to G. H. W. Bush is just the usual political posturing.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:53 (five years ago) link
I’m not saying Bush was good I just think it’s gross to gloat at someone’s death. I thought the same thing about people cheering when Bin Laden was killed.
― Trϵϵship, Friday, 7 December 2018 19:58 (five years ago) link
If true, then we deserve to be wiped off the face of the planet.
It's closer to true than most of us would like to admit, but your conclusion is just more hyperbole.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:58 (five years ago) link
Donne was wrong.
― louise ck (milo z), Friday, 7 December 2018 19:58 (five years ago) link
It makes the left look like assholes when they act like this for figures who 99% of America consider to be nothing like Bin Laden.
― Trϵϵship, Friday, 7 December 2018 19:59 (five years ago) link
― Trϵϵship, Friday, December 7, 2018 11:58 AM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
ok i was going to give you shit for your initial statement but now that you've made it clear you extend this courtesy to bin laden i find you more consistent
― ( ͡☉ ͜ʖ ͡☉) (jim in vancouver), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:01 (five years ago) link
I think it's a positive development in the Trump era that people are much less eager to cede to media narratives about "profiles in courage" or whatever and the "gloating" is, like Simon said, more of a corrective on this sickness than simply being glad a 94-year-old man finally died
cheering when Bin Laden was killed was muted anyway because it happened a decade after 9/11 and two awful unnecessary wars. it was a dulled, cloudy, anticlimactic feeling. if he were taken out in Tora Bora I think Americans would've celebrated as they did at the death of Hitler, not that much of a stretch.
― flappy bird, Friday, 7 December 2018 20:02 (five years ago) link
xp. my reaction is more sam jackson in a time to kill
― ( ͡☉ ͜ʖ ͡☉) (jim in vancouver), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:03 (five years ago) link
Shakespeare was right:
Tired with all these, for restful death I cry,As to behold desert a beggar born,And needy nothing trimmed in jollity,And purest faith unhappily forsworn,And gilded honor shamefully misplaced,And maiden virtue rudely strumpeted,And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,And strength by limping sway disablèd,And art made tongue-tied by authority,And folly, doctor-like, controlling skill,And simple truth miscalled simplicity,And captive good attending captain ill.
Tired with all these, from these would I be gone, Save that to die, I leave my love alone.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:04 (five years ago) link
Jarvis Cocker was right:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd6E1JpwMj4
― Your sweetie-pie-coo-coo I love ya (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:08 (five years ago) link
many xps - Alfred, why Dawn Powell?
― flappy bird, Friday, 7 December 2018 20:09 (five years ago) link
hottake: probably at least 50% of American presidents are both war criminals AND "decent people." It's function of being at the helm of American Empire.
― Fedora Dostoyevsky (man alive), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:09 (five years ago) link
― flappy bird,
She wrote well and was no one's fool, hence she's a hero.
― Your sweetie-pie-coo-coo I love ya (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:12 (five years ago) link
fortunately i have never cared what 99% of America thinks (fuck "Family Feud")
― a Mets fan who gave up on everything in the mid '80s (Dr Morbius), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:23 (five years ago) link
no argument there but I think the usual definition of "American hero" excludes artists, business, and most people... it's someone that made a (largely) selfless and substantial contribution and impact on the country/world... so Bill W. is obvious, MLK as well. Jackie Robinson also an easy pick despite being paid for his work. Jonas Salk is another big one I forgot. the guy that invented air conditioning? maybe.
xp
― flappy bird, Friday, 7 December 2018 20:27 (five years ago) link
xp we know, morbs.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:28 (five years ago) link
the "war criminal" stuff always seems a bit glib to me. there are valid criticisms of FDR's conduct of WW2 but i still wouldn't be comfortable throwing it in the same category as W's invasion of iraq.
― (The Other) J.D. (J.D.), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:34 (five years ago) link
For me it's simple: how many Americans had their lives improved thanks to a president's leadership? Hence my not giving two shits about James Polk's comfy residence in the upper echelon.
― Your sweetie-pie-coo-coo I love ya (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 7 December 2018 20:36 (five years ago) link
here's a Poppy grace note I learned: James Baker snuck in a Morton's steak and a bottle of Grey Goose one time that Jefe was in the hospital.
― Your sweetie-pie-coo-coo I love ya (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Friday, 7 December 2018 21:26 (five years ago) link
I assume everyone who wanted to read Maureen Dowd's lengthy paean to her friendship with Bush has done so w/out a link here.
biggest yuk: GWHB referred to Dubya as "my son Quincy"
― a Mets fan who gave up on everything in the mid '80s (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 11 December 2018 01:34 (five years ago) link
that picture of them in front of the Xmas tree is something else
― flappy bird, Tuesday, 11 December 2018 04:57 (five years ago) link
Can't wait till we get back to normal. pic.twitter.com/QtdjNgKBCB— Dennis Perrin (@DennisThePerrin) May 30, 2020
― brooklyn suicide cult (Dr Morbius), Wednesday, 3 June 2020 11:31 (four years ago) link