The Future Of The Bush Administration

[Scalliwag]

A republican friend and I were discussing Bush's dismal poll ratings and popularity (or lack thereof) and how farther they could fall. I told him I was pretty sure they would fall into the teens and he made the best argument against that I ever heard. It was not that Bush would never deserve lower polls but that there is a percentage of people that would never admit Bush was a failure because it would be admitting they were wrong.
Even Hitler had supporters after he died and the death camps were revealed because there were people that were just as messed up as he was. To this day there are people that deny the death camps ever existed.
I use the Hitler example to show that a leader cannot be more evil or extreme and this theory actually works in Bush's favor because no matter what anybody says, he is not a Hitler. Not evil enough.... not smart enough

Nixon hit a certain low after it was so obvious he was a scumbag, but still had his supporters. Clinton's popularity actually went up because republicans overplayed their cards and it even cost them seats in the midterm elections. Not only that but I think Clinton has actually benefitted from being followed into office by Bush since Bush was such a critic and became such a failure himself.
Now since there has been absolutely no oversight of the Bush administration and no investigations of any kind, do you think it is possible for his popularity to tank much farther? Anything short of personally capturing Bin Laden I don't see them going up.
If he goes along with democrats and tries to be bipartisan at this point everybody knows that 6 years into this he is only trying to salvage some sort of positive to his legacy.
I do think that those that do not like him will only dislike him worse as time goes on but that even a low 20% approval rating is not realistic because there will always be at least that many to support him regardless of anything he could do. If they don't admit he is a bad prez at this point, they never will.

Bush is notorious for having a very difficult time admitting failure and I fully expect the last of his supporters to be the same way.

[CaliforniaRose]

Not that I support his policies or politics, but my guess is his approval rating will go down then rise towards the end of office. The reason, even though lots of people dislike him, there will always be a sense of nostalgia and there will always be a fear the next person will be worse. So i'm going with somewhere in the 30's, probably low 30's which is what google research puts him at now (used this site: http://www.pollingreport.com/BushJob.htm).

[Zerodynamic]

i think after civil war breaks out in Iraq, he shall plummet to a new low..

I mean, look at what hes doing! He's bring all of his fathers advisers into his cabniet, and desperately trying to salvage a grim situation.

[Scalliwag]

i think after civil war breaks out in Iraq, he shall plummet to a new low..

I mean, look at what hes doing! He's bring all of his fathers advisers into his cabniet, and desperately trying to salvage a grim situation.

So many in his administration are from the Nixon administration. Nixon was Ike's vice prez during the McCarthy era. To me that explains their mentality as far as how they are towards their political opposition. The way they did Max Cleland and others with the smear campaign when Bush had high approval ratings was the exact same thing they did in the McCarthy era.
The current republican party still has very strong ties to that thinking. Not that some dems do not want to see the reps destroyed, but they don't have the Karl Rove's and Lee Atwaters behind their policies.
Until they get rid of people like them I think that they need a good dose of their own medicine.
A republican investigated Iran-Contra (Lawrence Walsh) because democrats wanted to show fairness. A three judge panel appointed the most rightwing extremist (Ken Starr) to investigate Clinton because the first guy was not extreme enough.... hence investigating BJ's and imprisoning people for not testifying what he wanted to hear.

So when you hear repubs cry about how the dems are going to launch relentless investigations and mistreat the Bush administration, be a little slow to feel much sympathy. After all Bush was fine with it when it was Clinton getting hit with them.

[Scalliwag]

Wow, someone voted 71-80%? Boy, maybe we should have bets on the polls? Just kidding but that is very interesting. I would love to hear the theory there. Does someone believe he is going to do something really good or are they just being optomistic?
I am relying a little on history so I pulled up a link with some history with very interesting numbers. Reagan took a dive (to 46%) when it became clear to most people he had been lying about Iran-Contra but pulled out.
In the end of the Cold War going in his favor his numbers went high. Most people failed to see that Gorbachov had more to do with that than Reagan. After all, if it would have been someone like Khrushchev running Russia this would have ended in buttons being pushed. After all, Brezhnev had signed the SALT II treaty before Reagan even came in. That's reality. Gorby was a reformist. Reagan deserves huge credit for taking advantage of the situation, he just spent a LOT more money on it than neccesary. That led to the first trillion dollar deficit. But I digress...

Clinton's approval rating rose as more a disapproval to repubs because of their obvious witchhunt IMHO.

Bush is no Reagan and even staunch supports have to agree with that. Even some of us that think Reagan was more show than anything at least think he was presidential. I watch Bush talk during news conferences and it is painful. It's like every sentence is a Bushism. I find myself for a moment feeling sorry for him and then I think of some of the things he has done and just sit back and enjoy it.

Anyways take a look at the polls here. They are from a year ago and he has bottomed even more since, but you can see the numbers of other presidents.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/11/02/...in1005327.shtml Edited December 24, 2006 by Scalliwag

[Sonthert]

Anybody who thinks GWB will be remembered fondly is seriously mistaken. Although, I will admit. The guy who engineered keeping hundreds of Americans bound and gagged for political currency made out pretty well in the memory (or lack of) department...Ronald Reagan.

[Scalliwag]

If anything will be fondly remembered of him it will have to come from the next two years. There is not really anything I can think of since he came in that was great in terms of a president. Once some investigations get going I imagine it can only look worse for him.
People driving around with W '04 stickers completely crack me up. They have so much in common with him, they make a bad decision and stick with it until the end Even in Texas he has crushed many a staunch republicans spirit though. I really hate to see things swing too far the other way though.
In a lot of ways I hope that he pulls an Arnold and learns a lesson and tries to work with moderates to get something accomplished. That would be the best thing for the country.

General Barry McCaffrey and the other retired generals that warned early on that Rumsfelds plan of sending too few of troops into Iraq in the initial invasion took serious ridicule for voicing their opinions. I would like to see GW publicly apologize for the things he said about these men. That would be a start. Maybe admit that they were right and he was wrong and we are paying dearly for him being wrong now.

[ShishaFred]

I got a book criticizing the USA government for Christmas It was written by Noah Chomsky . You should check him out it's pretty interesting.

[Zerodynamic]

I got a book criticizing the USA government for Christmas It was written by Noah Chomsky . You should check him out it's pretty interesting.

eww.. chomsky. Biased liberal BS.

No offense to you fred, but that's the kinda crap thats ruining our country. Criticism is one thing, but when you start mixing in conspiracy theories (read Noam Chomsky's analysis on 9/11) and you have lost all credibility in my book.

[fizzgig]

This country has had so many conspiracies that it makes me sick. And I think his approval ratings will hang around 31-40%. Not because of anything that he's done good or bad, it's just that I don't feel that the polls will accurately reflect the public's true feelings. Anything that has to do with the media in my opinion cannot be trusted. Furthermore, I have my own conspiracy theories regarding 911 and I don't consider myself to be a liberal. I mean c'mon. We gave blankets infected with smallpox to the Indians. Conspiracies have been abound since the beginning. Bush is a puppet, just like all of the other puppets. One big conspiracy is that this country still thinks of itself as a democracy. What a joke. The jerk didn't even really win the first election, I highly doubt he really won the second one. I guess I'd better shut up tho, I'm sure I've already been red flagged since I collect guns. Big Brother is surely listening.

[Scheetz]

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enough said. Taken from the best page in the universe. But the last group gets me every time.

[rattler]

I would have classiefied myself as a Republican not too many years ago. I can't identify with the party anymore. They have given up on everything conservative. Secure borders...no, but let's see how many wars we can start in the middle east. Family values? Sure does not seem like it anymore. Support for Israel? doesn't seem like it. I'm fed up and I think alot of the American public is.

I would guess it will be at 31-40% most likely in the mid to low end of that range.

[Scalliwag]

The only thing they have ever had much passion for is lowering taxes for the wealthy and passing off debt to the next generations. They balk over social programs as wasteful spending here but have no problem spending much more (3.5b per week in Iraq) rebuilding a third world country because a huge chunk of that is going into their friends (Hallibrton's) pockets. They like to portray "family values" but want everybody to pretend their heroes Reagan and Rush have not been married 3 times each.

Bush told the democrats yesterday that he wants to control spending. When Bush came in he was given a balanced budget and him and his party blew that. The last thing a republican that voted for these guys should ever do is complain about wasteful spending again.