I ask all of you... Before the 2008 elections do any of you remember Republicans going after Bush...

[busterbrown]

for his fiscal policies?

It seems to me the criticism of Bush only began by Republicans when Election season began.

Watch below as Kristol and his CNN Pal both try to push the concept(lie) of Republican push back against Bush..

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/03/bill-kristol-bill-maher-tea-party-104123.html

[Scootaloo]

1. Actually yes, to a degree

On the rightist forum I used to troll they hated how big a spender Bush was. Thing is, they hated democrats for existing... so, you know, priorities.

[calimary]

2. A small degree. What I saw mostly was them all closing ranks around him.

It was horrible that any of us on the other side of the aisle were critical, or offered an opposing view, or debunked his lies. Nobody listened to our side. And when they try to draw another one of their lovely false equivalencies now - about how HORRRRRRRRRRRRIBLE our side was to bush and what names we called him and blah-blah-blah, what little our side did was NOTHING compared to what their side is doing now. AND ALSO: THEIR side gets MUCH more coverage than our side did. There were entire protests and rallies and weekend-long gatherings that were completely ignored. COMPLETELY. There was this citizens' march through the streets of New York City during the republic-CON convention. It went on, with gusto, an ongoing parade of humanity marching through town hour after hour after hour for two straight days. And the only place you could see it was on CSPAN. The networks ignored it completely. And it took over almost all of midtown Manhattan. But if you hadn't watched CSPAN or gone online to liberal blogs, you wouldn't even have known it had happened.

I attended numerous anti-war actions and protests and rallies during the run-up to Iraq, and I remember seeing NO coverage whatsoever at all but one of them - the candlelight vigil that went on across the country and many parts of the world - on the eve of the Iraq War. Kinda like with Occupy, and also with Moral Mondays. Almost NO coverage. Total radio silence and TV/cable blackout. Another example - it took Michael Moore coming out with "Fahrenheit 911" before ANYBODY realized there had been HUGE protests in Washington DC on Inauguration Day, so much so that bush's limo in the inaugural parade was stopped in the street by crowds that wouldn't let it pass, and they had to sneak him into the White House the back way. Michael Moore had that coverage in his film. He'd scrounged film bins from stuff left on the edit room floors that hadn't been used on the network/cable coverage of the day's events. Just blacked it all out. NOTHING. Not a word. Not a photo. NOTHING. I remember seething during that movie, and so angry by the time it was over that I turned to my husband and said - "do you remember seeing ANY coverage of that, that day? Do you remember seeing or hearing anything about that protest that stopped bush's limo and wouldn't let it proceed (people attempting one last time to keep him out of Al Gore's White House), the protest signs about the stolen election and Selection 2000? Do you remember seeing ANY coverage of ANY of that?" And of course his answer was no.

But for heaven's sake get 13 teabaggers together with funny hats and a few lawn chairs and it leads the Nightly News.

[unblock]

11. +1

[dlwickham]

12. I remember right wingers attacking Bush on another board I'm on

repukes seem to eat their own but only to a lesser degree than Democrats do

[Skittles]

3. there was a bit of squawking about the prescription plan for seniors

but complaints about starting two wars without paying for them, for example? No

[madinmaryland]

13. I don't recall them whining at all about the tax cuts in the early 2000's that cost the gov $2T.

[JHB]

4. Google "Bush is a liberal" and ye shall find

There was some concern is some circles about his lack of concern about the cost of his ventures, but it was either policy-wonk stuff or recast as "Bush spends like a liberal". And it had no political weight whatsoever. In Cheney's words:"Reagan taught us that deficits don't matter."

So Kristol is wrong in his usual way: he remembers the weightless gloss of grumbling about spending under Bush, and thinks it backs his position-of-the-day

[calimary]

5. bill kristol is a chickenhawk of the first order, and a certified IDIOT.

Useless hunk of flesh sitting there in his comfy chair in the nice air conditioned studio with his soft lily-white hands that never get dirty and never had to fuss with a decent day's work. And he never saw combat, never served, never wore his country's uniform, never put his own coddled fleshy little white ass in harm's way for the U-S-of-A. But he sure was damn eager to see YOU do it. Or your spouse. Or your kids. Detestable schmuck!

[Gravitycollapse]

6. I don't give a shit what the Republicans did. nt

[Hippo_Tron]

7. They're all drastically oversimplifying a more complex phenomenon

The Tea Party may be for fiscal discipline (even if they don't understand why they're for it) and its members may have been for it under the Bush administration. But the fact of the matter is that when there's a Republican President, his administration is inherently going to pacify the right to the point that they don't take action in the numbers we've seen. Under Clinton you saw the rise of a bunch of right wing nutjobs after Waco. You didn't see them emerge after Ruby Ridge (which contrary to revisionist dating happened under Bush I) because as long as there's a Republican President the right will generally not rise up like that. The fact that the current President is black certainly helps fuel the Tea Party, though it's not just about race.

It's the same with the anti-war movement on the left. Obama has done a lot of things that piss off the core of the anti-war movement but they can't rally the kind of numbers they could under Bush, because there are others on the margins who don't see the threat under a Democratic President.

[CJCRANE]

8. There was a switcheroo.

In the Bush era, a tiny group of Repubs and libertarians comprising Ron Paul and his followers criticized Bush but they were considered the (lunatic) "fringe". The Repub base had nothing to do with them, ostracized them even.

Then come 2009, the "Tea Party" (disgruntled Repub base) suddenly took up Ron Paul's language and used it against Obama. But they escaped the hypocrisy charge by claiming to be the all new bipartisan Tea Party (not the old recycled GOP base).

[napkinz]

9. Republicans, then and now ...

[malaise]

16. Great post napkinz

Rec

[Jamaal510]

10. Bush who?

[IMG][/IMG]

[YarnAddict]

14. Actually, yes

They didn't like his Medicare Part D, didn't like No Child Left Behind, basically didn't like any spending, other than on the military.

[busterbrown]

15. Yea I remember No Child Left Behind and I don’t remember a lot of criticism from the right..

Medicare part D gave a lot of money to Healthcare companies which are huge supporters of Republicans.. So again I disagree..