In your personal view, what is the worst thing for which Bush should be remembered?

[Stinky The Clown]

Is it Iraq?

Is it our world standing?

Is it the complete reversal of our peace and prosperity?

Is it the looting of our national treasure?

Is it for the overturning of our fundamental rights?

For what overarching, grand matter do you, personally, think George Bush should be remembered for all eternity?

[Pale Blue Dot]

Not being impeached. nt

[Strathos]

1. All the above

And just being an idiot.

[Warpy]

2. Torture as official US policy

That, alone, should serve as a symbol of how far down these men have dragged our country. That, alone, will take the longest time to reverse unless we have the will to put these men into prison for it.

[NRaleighLiberal]

3. Living.... nt

[jimshoes]

4. Not giving a rats ass

while New Orleans was drowning.

[Divine Discontent]

20. smiling and eating cake while they drowned

is right up there, and torturing violently, enemy combatants... just sets such a sour mood among our country and oh, I don't know, encourages the fact that if the president doesn't give a hoot about the people of NOLA, then why should cops care about them, or their pets!
www.cafepress.com/warisprofitable <<-- top '08 candidates items

[Fridays Child]

5. Well, other tyrants are remembered, primarily, for the death and destruction they wrought.

So, even if I did think he should be best remembered for something else, he'll probably go down in history as a mass murderer.

[Mrs. Overall]

6. 9/11 happened on his watch and then how the tragedy was manipulated for his personal political gain.

[MistressOverdone]

7. Probably the election of 2000

[dajoki]

10. If that went the way it should have...

None of the last 6 1/2 years would have happened, therefore we wouldn't have to remember him.

[MistressOverdone]

12. Here's why I say that

there have been wars, there have been wars that people think were unjustified. There have been excesses and extremes, but there has never been an election decided by the Supreme Court. (Well, not quite "decided" but you know what I mean."

History has a way of losing a man's actual persoanlity and sticking with the "firsts" the "mosts," etc.

[dajoki]

14. Yes, that is true...

first to do this, most to do that, etc. I just believe that had the election not been stolen Bush would be no factor.

[StudentsMustUniteNow]

8. Abu Ghraib photos getting out, Quran flushing reports...

It has done untold damage to our national standing, and it will take years, if not decades, to overcome it.

[nosmokes]

9. torture.

[mikehiggins]

11. IRAQ eom

[fwiff]

13. An American experiment in in fascism

starting with the 2000 election.

Hopefully, it's a flirtation and not the beginning of deeper decline.

[Posteritatis]

15. After 9/11...

(Leaving aside any questions of who did it, who was responsible for it happening, etc etc etc...)

After that attack, the United States pretty much had infinite goodwill from the rest of the planet. Every country I can think of - present allies, countries where relations have fallen apart, both tiers of the "Axis of Evil" - at least made the sounds of being appalled and horrified and eager to Make This Not Happen Again. It was one of the few times the planet, or a significant chunk of it, has ever appeared united in sympathy or outrage or whatever about, well, anything I can think of.

Anyone at all in the White House for the last couple of weeks of September could, for all practical purposes, Run The Show. If anyone there said "This shows that we must do X!" then, for any reasonable-sounding instance of X, most of the planet's governments would have thrown at least some support behind it. Plan to boot the Taliban and al-Qaeda out of Afghanistan? Whatever's happened since then, there weren't that many countries who stood in the way of the idea at the time. That was just one thing, though. If anyone in the Oval Office gave any vaguely feasible suggestion of What To Do In Response, the planet would've jumped at the opportunity. If anyone in the Oval Office gave any pie-in-the-sky, less-feasible suggestions ("we must make amends for our pasts," or "we should fight to eliminate the conditions that give rise to such hatred," or anything else), I still think most of the planet would throw something behind the idea. If he'd made similar suggestions within the US ("people say the terrorists hate us for our freedoms; let's piss them off even more!"), I still think enough people would go for it to make good things happen.

Basically, Bush and the US in general had enough goodwill saved up as an immediate result of the attacks that they could probably have called for anything that sounded as though it would make a better world, and enough people would have fallen in step that it could have happened. I can't think of anyone in history who's had that opportunity and that potential, ever, and I think that's because nobody has before. I can't even begin to comprehend what the right person in the right place at the right time could do with that kind of power. I can't even begin to comprehend what the mediocre person could do with it.

Bush had it. And then he went and blew it so completely that five years later, American standing in the world was lower than it was before the attacks in the first place. He was in a position to alter the world in ways that it needed to be altered, and threw it away on chestthumping, hegemonic bullshit which had little to nothing to do with 9/11 or terrorism in the first place, and managed to re-alienate most of the planet besides.

Economic fuckups, meltdowns of civil liberties, reducing politics to something even more inane than they currently are, unnecessary wars, screwing up global opinion even more ... Those are all failures, and they all piss me off. But taking that power, that opportunity, what was pretty much an actual unipolar moment as opposed to the usual PNAC bullshit, and throwing it away? That's the failure I want him to be remembered for decades or centuries from now. The others I take for granted from most world leaders; that one, I can't even consider forgiving.

[Totally Committed]

16. I'm not sure I could pick just one thing!

The man is a smorgasbord of SUCK.

Torture

Katrina

Fascism

Iraq

The attack on the Constitution

The Erosion of Church and State

His appointees

and on, and on, and on.......................

Take a dish and help yourself.

TC

[melody]

17. Destroying my country and spiritually crippling the majority of the people

And all the things that happened along the way.

He'll be remembered as the enemy insider who destroyed our nation.

[nadine_mn]

18. This gives him too much credit... what should be remember most

is not what Bush DID, but what we, as the American People, DID NOT do.


Were was the outcry at the stolen election?
Invading Iraq?
Destruction of our Civil Rights?


The list goes on, yet many of us (I include myself) sit by passively, shaking our fists in outrage from the comfort of our living room. Now I know many people have taken action, so please don't be offended, I am talking about others like myself. I became so disgusted with what happened in 2000 I let my disgust turn into apathy. 2004 compounded that feeling of futility.

But one day I started listening to Air America and started to feel hope again, the 2006 elections further encouraged me, and now DU. I am inspired by others who are turning their frustration into action.

Bush didn't do anything we didn't allow to happen. I refuse to give him that much credit - he isn't smart enough.

(edited for typos)

[Captain Angry]

19. Katrina.

Period.

Politics, national standing, etc. Those are sure nice.

But a city of our fellow citizens left (still to this day) for dead by these guys? That is why Bush should grace the pages of history books in the future. To show how callous an "elected" leader and his ideology can be.

[BootinUp]

21. I think allowing Alberto Gonzales and Rove to

fuck up our Department of Justice is right at the top.

[AtomicKitten]

22. Katrina + torture.

Probably the latter is worse for many reasons, and sadly some Americans dig torture.

But Katrina allowed BushCo's incompetence and arrogant bigotry to be shown on the tee-vee so we could all watch innocent and desperate people and animals die a horrible death. Sadly some Americans cheered for that too.

[jenmarie]

23. Being a liar.

and/or

Trashing our constitution.

[Rydz777]

24. The war. The rest are all impeachable offenses, but nothing

comes close to the war in the damage - direct, collateral, irreparable -that Bush has done to this country with this disastrous adventure.

[razors edge]

25. Murder of two nations. n/t

[LeftishBrit]

26. The Iraq war

So evil and unnecessary.

The shocking neglect over Katrina rates pretty high too.

[election_2004]

27. Choking on a pretzel

The list is too long, so I vote for the pretzel as a symbol of how ludicrous is entire "legacy" will be.

[lpbk2713]

28. He sat on his dead ass while thousands of his people suffered and died.

And then when it was time for accountability he was all finger pointing.

[salin]

29. Use of extreme and calculated propoganda to push public

opinion through the basis of lies to support his extreme policies.

For example, a month or so before the IRW vote - about 70% of the population opposed unilateral invasion of Iraq (that is - without UN involvement.) Then the nonstop propoganda began - and on a myriad of issues it continues to this day. Less effective - but nonstop.

This, of course, is coupled with overt disdain for the American public.

[ConsAreLiars]

30. Being the worst mass murderer since Hitler

A few thousand on 9/11, by deliberately letting it happen as a part of the PNAC plan.

A few thousand in New Orleans, through cold indifference.

A million in Iraq, because of greed and a lust for emperor-grade fame and power.

And many millions more around the planet through sheer negligence.

Add them up, he exceeds Stalin, rivals Hitler, and makes Pol Pot look like a some small time hoodlum.

[quiet.american]

31. Wreaking mass murder on hundreds of thousands of innocent people --

-- and causing perpetual agony and nightmares for the rest of their lives for God knows how many more thousands or millions of people. This includes our troops and their families.

[leftofthedial]

32. having been squirted out

of babs' rancid womb

[Faux pas]

33. Stealing the 2000 election, that's where all of this started. n/t

[lpbk2713]

34. Kicking

Certainly the possibilities are endless for this perpetrator of multiple crimes against humanity.