So Ms. Walsh thinks that the exercise of free speech is both un-American and treason (aid and comfort to an enemy). Must have been reading the parts in the old Soviet Criminal Code about the penalties for anti-Soviet propaganda and enemies of the people. Be proud, Ms. Walsh, that Stalin is looking down from Heav…er…uh…UP from Hell and smiling upon thee.

Joan Walsh: “The climate right now is that Republicans use everything they can to undermine and delegitimize this president. And it‘s actually un-American. It‘s traitorous, in my opinion. Do you want to give aid and comfort to our enemies? Continue to treat this president like he wasn‘t elected and he doesn‘t know what he‘s doing! He knows what he did. He knows what he‘s doing. I‘m proud of him. I believe that he has the stalwart, resolute nature to get this done.”

Foxtrot U, Joan Walsh, foxtrot u beach. Let’s just change one word in your hypocritical screed with respect to when George W. Bush was President:

“The climate right now is that Democrats use everything they can to undermine and delegitimize this president. And it‘s actually un-American. It‘s traitorous, in my opinion. Do you want to give aid and comfort to our enemies? Continue to treat this president like he wasn‘t elected and he doesn‘t know what he‘s doing! He knows what he did. He knows what he‘s doing. I‘m proud of him. I believe that he has the stalwart, resolute nature to get this done.”

This President is doing a pretty good job of undermining and delegitimizing himself without ANYONE’s help.

CJ,
I really enjoyed the liberal’s response to liberal Tom Hayden. Cannibalism.

Where was this woman when Bush was President and her side was pretending he wasn’t elected and doing everything it could to destroy him politically and personally? Was that traitorous and un-American? I actually think some of it was, the parts that were personal destruction, not honest policy disagreement.

Just another choice the liberals don’t want you to have.

Heh.

CJ – In a prophetic impulse, a few months ago I had printed up some bumper stickers that say, “Question O-thority.”

If you see a Jeep driving around the Dee Cee suburbs with this on its backside, feel free to honk.

(Oh, and if you want one, email me. I’ve got a few left.)

I thought only Democrats could criticize Republicans. Isn’t that like one of the five spiritual laws or something? Gosh, darn, Mr. Whipple, those Demmies sure got soft skin to be so ugly acting!

Loathing the American president is a fine American tradition that goes back to John Adams – at least. I’m pretty sure Adams loathed Washington, so it may go all the way back. Whatever, I’ll bet calling those who loath your preferred president “un-American” goes back that far as well.

Why this should be is an interesting question. I think it has something to do with our ambivalence about having a king. And, of course, our favorite American game remains “who’s really in charge here”. Cynical? Maybe. Justifiably cynical? I think so.

Myself, I’ve disagreed with much done by Bush II, Clinton, Reagan, Ford, Nixon, and Johnson. I remember Kennedy and Eisenhower, but was too young to consider them critically. The only one I really loathed was Bush I, although Jimmah Carter is working on it, post-presidentially. Go figure.

Typical Leftist attitude: despise anyone who disagrees with you. Throw epithets and labels around like confettit and call your opposition un-American. It also requires you to ignore your behavior when the opposition party is in control. But they are exempt from charges of hypocrisy because they are always right.

What jerks and morons! They really need keepers.

FW Ken, can you tell me why you really loathed Bush I? This is a phenomenon that interests me. I’m asking seriously, no snark. Thanks.

Dittos to Katherine: I’m curious how someone apparently conservative can loathe 41 and only be on the way to loathing Carter. Do elaborate, FW.

Ditto Kate and Ed. Inquiring minds want to know.

I should have put “loath” in the past tense. I regard inordinate attention to the presidency – in fact, the national government as a whole – to be inappropriate and I try to reserve my emotional energy for matters closer to home. Nevertheless, I do regard Bush I as a failed and miserable presidency.

Before 1980 and after 1982, GHWB was pro-choice. For political gain, he pretended a pro-life stance. That’s the core of my disgust, Katherine. However, I also regarded him as an inept president, probably as much as Jimmy Carter, though in better times. To my view, Bush I was an amoral pragmatist. Now I’m pretty pragmatic myself, but one needs a moral compass informing the pragmatic decisions, and I didn’t see that in him.

Ed-

I was young under Carter, cut me some slack. I knew he was incompetent (didn’t everyone?), but his recent attempts at theology have really disgusted me. But that’s recent.

Thanks, FW Ken. I don’t disagree with much of your assessment of Bush 41. An opportunist, not very successful as a president, lacking a compass. Your analysis is based on actual events, so you can’t help me with what I don’t understand, which is a pathological hatred of the Bush family beginning with Bush 41. He wasn’t even a conservative, for goodness sake! I recall an editorial in a small-town Midwestern newspaper which rejoiced when a nor’easter did serious damage at the Bush home in Kennebunkport. ?? Bush 41 signed a law allowing some tax breaks for victims of the event, and then didn’t take advantage of it himself, thinking it would be unethical. There were people who hated Bush 43 apparently because he’s 41′s son, long before the 2000 election mess, Iraq II, and so on.

I’m glad to know, Ken, that you can’t help me understand this pathology.

Katherine -
There is a coterie (I am not sure how widespread it is) of people who have this “thing” about the Bush family – I think it may even extend to the Herbert and Walker part of the heritage. It has to do with actions the entire family has done over the years.

It sounds like a mice bunch of conspiracy aficionados have gotten together to create the <eM”Great Bogeyman Bush Family.”

I will try to dig up some links later on this week end. If I find anything interesting I might post a link here, or you can email me for them. TUAD has my address and I think you probably have it also.

Hmmmm. That should be “nice bunch” instead of “mice bunch” in the above, but the rodent modifier does capture the squirreliness of these people!

By the way, is it jut me, or do most of the people who write for Salon regularly seem to have pathogenic problems of one sort or another?

OH dear, is it family talk you want? How about the Roosevelt crowd. The last good one was Teddy! But, even before Teddy there was the great grandad x2 or 3? He is the one that created the opium trade for all those poor New York city slum dwelllers–kept em calm don’t you know. Any way, he made such a mess in China that it created the Peking Rebellion! Look it up makes for an interesting read and might shed some light as to how long the dems have been a party to mafia groups of all ethnic sources! Of course, there was the J Kennedy and the Italian crowd during WWII. Then there was Truman who . . .

Woops! got off of my track–Truman of course did not have powerful family.

Katherine -

Here is a link to a pretty good overall view of the various conspiracy theories linked to the Bush and Walker families. Some of these go back to the 1800′s.

The link is http://tinyurl.com/yjzl4tu [I made a Tiny URL for it].

This might provider you some light reading matter for a slow weekend. Enjoy!!

Of course, you can Google or Yahoo “Bush Family Conspiracy” and get lots of hits.

What fun!

Oh, if only there were a way to recall this imbecile just this once!

Thanks, Allen Lewis. I’ve read some of the stuff about the Bush family. It’s pretty much nuts, most of it. I don’t understand what set the nuts off about this particular family, among other political families. My brother-in-law theorizes that it’s because they were born into the northeastern elite and committed treason by going to Texas. This is the crowd that tends to assume a southern drawl indicates idiocy. There’s a similar problem with Sarah Palin’s distinctly upper north flat vowels. These people don’t talk like us, say the elites. They must be defective.

Allen Lewis, you remind me that the Bush family was criticized extensively by conservatives during the 1980 campaign. The whole family was claimed to be associated with the Tri-Lateral Commission and whatever other bogeymen were around back then. For all I know, it might have been true.

The sad part is that as a man, George Herbert Walker Bush has much about to admire. From the White House website:

On his 18th birthday he enlisted in the armed forces. The youngest pilot in the Navy when he received his wings, he flew 58 combat missions during World War II. On one mission over the Pacific as a torpedo bomber pilot he was shot down by Japanese antiaircraft fire and was rescued from the water by a U. S. submarine. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for bravery in action.

If I remember correctly, he moved to Texas to work his way up from the bottom, although it may have been a family business. In any case, he did actually work for a living.

In many respects, he is much more admirable as a man than his son, who’s business career can be called undistinguished and derivative (ask people from Midland!). Bush 43 will, however, be judged the better president, I think, in time, although I disagree with much that he did, as well.

My two pennies, for what it’s worth.

Midwestnorwegian already posted the first thought that can to my mind when I read this so dittos to you Midwest. But I will repeat something that I have been saying for a very long time. The Left has been waging an all out battle against free speech for a very long time. Who brought us political correctness? Who twists and turns the English language to the point that it is painful to hear? Who undermines historic understandings then calls themselves “orthodox?” There are many things that conservatives can share in the blame. This one solely belongs to the left.

WTF: You got that right. The left also is solely responsible for removing American/English literature from the curriculum and replacing it with things like ethnic studies. They have essentially obliterated the cannon. There is also the part about forcing “hate speech” laws upon us. That idea should never have gotten past the supreme court–does anyone here know if it has been challenged?

This most recent, and completely organized assault first became evident back in the late 1960′s, or early 1970′s (?). Does anyone here remember the case in the midwest where a farmer rigged a pellet gun to go off in his barn, the next time the thief broke in, an event which had been happening repeatedly? In that case the farmer was found guilty and lost the farm. This is a keystone case and if you have reference to it, I would be grateful. It was the first time we were denied our rights to defend property and the thief was represented I believe by the ACLU.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

What the foxtrot?

Wanna do the foxtrot with Joan Walsh?

For the best illustrated BDS on-line, I recommend:
http://www.imao.us/archives/006272.html

For the record, the above DOES require a beverage warning.

For general scouring of the Net in this regard, here’s a search:
http://search.yahoo.com/search?fr=ffds1&p=bush+derangement+syndrome

Just another example of “it’s only wrong if your side does it” …

Kind of like how Bush I was a corporate tool and puppet for all the money he got in donations … then some young Southerner Bill Clinton beat him at that came, and it must have gotten OK then, because none of the usual suspects complained about that.

And the irony is that if you changed one word – “Republicans” to “Democrats” – you would have my sentiments exactly in say, January 2002.

Bush I’s father, Senator Prescott Bush (1895-1972) (R-CT 1952-63) was a great proponent of “Planned Parenthood” in the 1950s, and helped make that evil organization “respectable” again in the late 40s/early 50s when its previous lauding of Nazi eugenics policies (an admiration which was mutual) threatened it with ruin: “family planning” and contraception was one of his great enthusiasms, and he was a member of Margaret Sanger’s “American Birth Control League” by 1940 — his first run for the Senate in 1950 was defeated by a massive turn-out of Catholic voters in response to denunciations of Bush’s views on the subject from Catholic pulpits throughout Connecticut. He passed this stance on to his son, who espoused the same views until he “saw the light” when he had the chance to become Reagan’s running mate in 1980. I will credit him with sticking to his new-found faith, as I will also do for Dubya, but I do wonder how much their wives, Barbara and Laura, “Old Believers” both — that is, in the cause of race suicide and child-murder (i.e., contraception and abortion) — managed to attenuate in their husbands any serious inclination to treat the issue as a “big deal.” (I’ve heard the same thing about Reagan’s Nancy as well.)

One of my best undergraduate friends was “Youth Director” in Reagan’s 1976 campaign; in December 1980 a return flight from the UK to Boston was diverted to DC, and so I spent a couple of days there with that old friend. He was in a sort of Wordsworthian ecstasy about the incoming administration, and had his invitation to the inaugural ball, but his critical senses had not deserted him entirely, for in the aftermath of some serious drinking on out parts, he got gloomy, and said that he feared that that “a**hole Bush” would “be the ruin of everything Ronnie stands for,” because, as he reckoned, RR rewards what he sees as loyalty with complete trust, and he thought that Bush would be RR’s successor, whether after one term or two (if Reagan’s health would allow two terms) — and then, once in office, he went on, he would ditch RR’s “social agenda” while paying lip service to it, and restore control of the national GOP to the “Nixonites” (or was it “Fordites?”), economic conservatives but social “libertines.” When one thinks of Bushites like Baker, Cheyney and Rumsfield, and Justice Souter of SCOTUS, I’m inclined to credit my friend’s prescience.

Thank you for the insight, Dr. Tighe. If memory serves, after 1992, Bush I reverted to his pro-choice stance. Barbara Bush never claimed a pro-life position. I don’t know about Laura Bush.

William Tighe: “[H]e feared that that “a**hole Bush” would “be the ruin of everything Ronnie stands for,” because, as he reckoned, RR rewards what he sees as loyalty with complete trust, and he thought that Bush would be RR’s successor, whether after one term or two (if Reagan’s health would allow two terms) — and then, once in office, he went on, he would ditch RR’s “social agenda” while paying lip service to it, and restore control of the national GOP to the “Nixonites” (or was it “Fordites?”), economic conservatives but social “libertines.””

I’m of the same entire cloth as your prescient friend. In fact, I have no problem whatsoever with an internal civil war within the GOP between the social libertines and the social conservatives. And if either hives off, so much the better.

It’s the same thing I say within the churches/denominations. When the religious liberals want to take the fight to the religious conservatives (be it the RCC, EOC, or the Prot denominations), the religious conservatives must contend vigorously against these liberal wolves. That means conflict. And not conflict avoidance.

Look what happened to TEc … the leadership adopted conflict avoidance for a very long time and now look at their nigh-irreversible heresy and apostasy. All because the shepherds lacked a spine to use their rod and staff.

Cowardice is the handmaiden to heresy and apostasy.

This is all very interesting. I knew, of course, that GHWB was never a program conservative — and neither was GWB, although the latter is consistently pro-life. But Prescott Bush’s career helps me very little in understanding why liberals have a pathological hatred of the Bush family. GHWB’s attachment to the Reagan train may explain it, I suppose. Still, it’s a sick phenomenon. Hate the father, hate the son, seems to be their rule. I admit that I expect little good from any Kennedy male, but I’m always ready to be pleasantly surprised, and I do believe that people should be evaluated on their own merits and not on the sins of their fathers. Sometimes people overcome the shortcomings of their upbringings.

“His Wall Street bailout leaves the poor, the unemployed, minorities and college students on their own. And now comes the Afghanistan-Pakistan decision to escalate the stalemate,…”

Oh I don’t know… He’s creating LOTS of jobs for “the unemployed, minorities and college students”… In the Army, Airforce, Marine Corps, not to mention the Navy!

[...] EVIL UNAMERICANISM– Remember when dissent was the highest form of patriotism? Salon.com’s Joan Walsh doesn’t [...]