And someone will be like “Oh are these the same Muslism that Reagan armed in the 1980s!!!!!! lol. ROTFL!!!!!!!! idiot!!!!!!!”

. He looked the American people in the eye and flat-out lied about his amnesty bill–and make no mistake, it was definitely his. There was no excuse, and absent any genuine apology, will be no forgiveness for that blatant lie. Coupled with his complete disregard for border security, he has dealt his own credibility a mortal blow.

I think Bush was a damn fool for promoting that bill knowing full well he had no domestic support for it.

I opposed that bill.. it was garbage.

Having said that.. I’m not clear as to what Bush’s lie was… can you tell me what it was?

. He also lied about pursuing terrorists and their state sponsors wherever they may be, as is evidenced by his hand-holding with the Saudis, whose own sponsorship of jihad is blatant, despite their disingenuous protests otherwise. Put his 2001 pledge down to political blather if you will, but he has repeated it in various forms since, intending us to take him seriously.

I wouldn’t call that a lie. I would call it failure to live up to policy. One of the main reasons why I supported the Iraq war was becauese I thought it was a stepping stone to taking care of Saudi and Iran..but that was not to be.

And when you consider the Democrats decided to go to war against the war that effectively ended any futher hardcore US action.. so the crippling of that aspect of US policy has plenty of blame to go around… the Democrats, the traitors at CIA, the traitors at State, the Media… the weaklings like C. Rice.

I dont see Bush as being a liar.

“All evidence suggests George W. Bush is a decent man who means well”?

I voted for GWB twice for President. Given the same circumstances, even with 20-20 hindsight over the years since 2004 (and mis-steps previously), I’d do so again. However, I feel more than justified in criticizing his character on two serious issues:

1. He looked the American people in the eye and flat-out lied about his amnesty bill–and make no mistake, it was definitely his. There was no excuse, and absent any genuine apology, will be no forgiveness for that blatant lie. Coupled with his complete disregard for border security, he has dealt his own credibility a mortal blow.

2. He also lied about pursuing terrorists and their state sponsors wherever they may be, as is evidenced by his hand-holding with the Saudis, whose own sponsorship of jihad is blatant, despite their disingenuous protests otherwise. Put his 2001 pledge down to political blather if you will, but he has repeated it in various forms since, intending us to take him seriously.

He has yet to make good on that pledge as regards the two greatest sponsors of global jihad/terrorism: Saudi Arabia and Syria. Not even a stab at it.

Well-intentioned? If so, he must be as stupid as his longtime detractors have asserted (and assertion I do not believe), for these two things cannot be the result of good intentions toward the American people he was elected to serve. And I doubt the core decency of anyone who shows no shame in lying to me as he did with his false claim that his amnesty bill was not an amnesty bill.

And yet.. in each of the two elections where I voted for him, he was the better man for the job (by at least an order of magnitude) than his opponents. Now that’s a sad, sad thing.

a friend asked how I could support George W. Bush for president when he was “just like the guys who picked on you in high school.”

What a stupid claim (on your friends’s part). How could she possibly know he was “just like the guys who picked on you in high school”? Had she met him? Was she there? Is there reliably testimony of GWB picking on gays or anybody in high school? Or, as seems more likely, wasn’t your friend just making sh*t up? based on her own demented stereotypes?

Whatever ability he had in TX seems to have disappeared this second term, they just don’t seem to be able to work together. I can’t lay on all the blame on him, democrats don’t feel a need to work with him in his lame duck/unpopular status…and there is a lot of intense “anger” from the base.

The number 1 problem that he has was his adminstrations total abondement of public leadership and the unwillingness to stand up to the lies of the Democrats.

My dislike of what has become of his terms in office is softened by the realization that as bad as he is, considering who the alternatives were, he is the best we got.

As his presidency nears an end, I find myself not liking him. But that doesn’t mean I dislike him. And I certainly don’t hate him.

I’ve never found any joy in watching President Bush take it on the chin in Congress, even if I’ve opposed what he wanted. And I’ve never wanted him destroyed because the country would suffer, especially abroad, to have a lame and ineffective chief executive.

I know a lot of Republicans, and run into many more who I don’t know, who also have conflicted opinions about the President.

I won’t live long enough to see it, but it will be interesting when enough time has passed to see how a future generation of historians measures the man and judges his presidency.

(As much as I dislike James Earl Carter, I don’t hate him either. As a committed Christian there isn’t room in my heart for hatred.)

(real media)
rtsp://video.c-span.org/60days/wh042608_dinner_bush.rm

I’m with you 110%! Popular opinion is almost meaningless in judging a presidency. Truman was almost exactly as unpopular as Bush, and is now widely regarded as near-great.

Also, Abraham Lincoln was uniformly loathed by the south, but what most Americans probably don’t know is that at times he was almost equally reviled by the north. There were no Gallup polls at the time, but Lincoln was easily our most unpopular president ever. I seem to recall his face on Mt Rushmore. Ronald Reagan’s popularity dipped into the 30’s and he was reviled by most of Europe. Another near-great. There was even a growing movement to impeach another famous G.W. — George Washington.

On the flip side, some of our presidents who have enjoyed high approval ratings have turned out to be among the worst and most corrupt. Harding and Clinton come to mind.

Bush has been a bold and visionary president. I really believe he will be judged another near-great by history. Certainly better than both Clinton and his father. It’s just sad that popular opinion has to be so ignorant.

“I like Bush” is a very unpopular, and rarely heard sentiment these days; takes some courage to stand up and say it. So good on you. I love president Bush and admire him greatly. The Anchoress had an excellent post a while back about much of the great good President Bush has done and about the man’s exceptional character. I wrote at the time, that there are a great many conservatives who should be shamed by her reminder of what a great man with the courage of his convictions looks like.

I have heard the personal stories from him about how genuine and kind the president is, and how bright he is. But who wants to hear personal stories, when the ‘image’ of the demon is so much more compelling.

People are amazed that to this day I still like Bush, I must have changed my mind by now. I haven’t, I still find him to be a good honorable man. He corrected his mistakes on Iraq, yes he has made other mistakes. Haven’t we all, but I have yet to find any reason to hate him.

I remember very clearly during his first term, many many conservatives were bothered by W’s straying from conservative princples (and in those policies that you listed, including: increasing Federal spending, NCLB, the Prescription Drugs thing, signing McCain-Feingold)

But the one thing that we said to each other was.. well at least he’s fighting the Islamic terrorists. Our rationale was all his domestic mistakes could be fixed.. we can’t fix anything if we’re dead.

However we didn’t take into account that the Adminstration would basically surrender public opinion about the war to the Media and Democrats. That he would advocate for open borders. That he would nominate Harriet Myers for Supreme Court. That he would allow renegades in the State Dept and the CIA undermine his foreign policy. That Iraq would spiral out of control. That there was no objective to take on Saudi Arabia or Iran.

It probably would have been best if he was a one term president .. and of course Kerry wasn’t his opposition.

Conservatives aren’t off the hook, as I see more responses on how he is *not* such a hard righty and willing to look to the other side for answers. His supporting Pell Grants instead of loans, support for government student loans to take over for banks who gave up, NCLB (which he worked on with Ted Kennedy - why isnt *he* getting some flack?) as well as Medicare Part D I find incredibly moderate for a supposed religious righty