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You are here: Home / Open Threads / The Lunatic Fringe

The Lunatic Fringe

by John Cole|  August 3, 20037:19 pm| 26 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads

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How much do the morons on the left hate Bush? This much:

So let’s all hope the President has a great August. After all, not everyone is as lucky as he is. Some of us have to work.

These twerps are actually trying to score political points because soldiers are still in Iraq and Bush is going on vacation. These guys are f—ing hysterical, and not in a funny way. I will say it again- if you had told me ten years ago that there would be a Republican president that the left would hate more and villify more than Reagan, I would have told you that you were insane. You just do not understand the seething rage these fruity nitwits have for Bush.

BTW- That was Steve GIlliard writing that at the Daily Kos, and he is one of the more strident leftist pinheads to ever grace the earth. Here is what the owner of the site wrote last year about Bush’s vacation:

I don’t begrudge the president for taking a one-month vacation. I would take one if I could. Yet why would Rove give the president’s critics an opening in the runup to the Fall elections? Politically, it’s not the wisest decision.

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26Comments

  1. 1.

    mark

    August 3, 2003 at 7:43 pm

    Kos and the rest of the left might just be dumb enough to think Bush won’t be on a “working vacation.” Hell, when is the last time ANY president actually took a vacation and forgot about things? It’s just not done.

    And on another note, Drudge has a teaser to a NYT story tomorrow that will show how Bush has become the most hated president by the left – even more hated than Reagan, Bush I and maybe even Nixon.

  2. 2.

    Matthew

    August 3, 2003 at 8:41 pm

    I’m sure Gilliard is horrified by the fact that Congress is in recess at the moment, too.

  3. 3.

    Mason

    August 3, 2003 at 9:14 pm

    Gillard and Lambert should start a site. They’d be a perfect match!

  4. 4.

    cameron

    August 3, 2003 at 9:32 pm

    “Bush has become the most hated president by the left – even more hated than Reagan, Bush I and maybe even Nixon.”

    I’d say the republican’s hatred of Clinton has all 4 of them beat…..by a landslide.

  5. 5.

    Chris

    August 3, 2003 at 10:06 pm

    “I’d say the republican’s hatred of Clinton has all 4 of them beat…..by a landslide.”

    I don’t think the Republicans ever portrayed Clinton as an ultra-leftist to the same point the left has painted Bush as a “fascist conservative”.

    Especially when Bush’s “conservativism” can be much more in line with his father’s Supreme Court appointee, David Souter, than anything truly responsible or conservative in the domestic arena.

  6. 6.

    Andrew Lazarus

    August 3, 2003 at 10:15 pm

    I don’t think that the Left’s hatred of Bush comes from his political beliefs, so it’s no refutation to say that Clinton wasn’t called an ultra-leftist. Now, the fact that Bush is stealthily furthering ultra-right policies under the guise of mainstream “compassionate” conservativism is one article, but I would add:

    1. his delusion that he’s a self-made man;
    2. the delusion that he won the election;
    3. the delusion that his destruction of the economy is leading to prosperity around the corner (actually, I don’t think that he wants prosperity, which is one reason I despise him);
    4. allowing his henchmen to smear people like Max Cleland as unpatriotic;
    5. His cowardly insistence that he was a target of Osama on 9/11

    I mean, I hardly expect conservatives to AGREE with me on this, but I want you to see that it’s much more than the policies per se.

    And indeed, the conservative hatred of Clinton was tangentially related to his politics, if at all. I think it had more to do with beliefs that the White House belongs to Republicans over draft-dodging Democrats. Plus, not only was he unfaithful, but according to Gennifer Flowers, he liked cunnilingus, and I don’t see the Republicans as respecting that sort of man.

  7. 7.

    John Cole

    August 3, 2003 at 10:39 pm

    Snicker. See Andrew Lazarus’s previous post for confirmation of my theory.

    BTW- just to cherry pick, Bush did win the election, and precisely WHICH policy is destroying the economy? Please say it is the tax cuts. Jeebus, get a grip.

  8. 8.

    Chris

    August 4, 2003 at 12:16 am

    You know, I wonder if Andrew Lazarus types feel on the one hand the election was illegitimate (despite the Supreme Court’s eventual ruling on the issue) yet that Roe vs. Wade must determine every judicial nominee’s fate (because of the Supreme Court’s ruling on that issue).

    Oh wait, no. That can’t be because if it hurts Bush, it must automatically be good.

    What’s so frustrating about the hyperventilating criticism of Bush from the left is that it really makes it hard to correctly position the constructive and probably more accurate criticisms of the Administration from this aisle on issues such as gun control, Saudi Arabia, Medicare, et al.

    Not that the left would pick up on most of those legitimate points – most couldn’t stand going to the right of Noam Chomsky, instead thumping their chests at whichever ideologue can be the most shrill by campaign time.

    If the Dems nominate Howard Dean, I have to honestly say he’s a candidate they deserve badly if they keep this up.

  9. 9.

    Chris

    August 4, 2003 at 12:18 am

    Eh, slight correction:

    “Oh wait, no. That can’t be because if it hurts Bush, it must automatically be good.” Lemme rephrase that:

    “Oh wait, but of course. Be inconsistent with your position of legal legitimacy as long as it hurts Bush. Yeah, that’s some pretty good logic, right?”

  10. 10.

    Chris

    August 4, 2003 at 12:20 am

    And John, here’s a pre-emptive strike to those who scream “Tax cuts bad! Rich people bad! Give to the poor! Bush steal money!”

    If my memory is correct, the tax cuts for the most part haven’t taken into effect yet until recently. I’m not going to say I know for sure, but that’s what I recall.

    Not that that will stop the folks who already have made up their minds without looking at facts, other than opinions disguised as such designed to only confirm one side of the issue.

  11. 11.

    M. Scott Eiland

    August 4, 2003 at 4:10 am

    Seeing Andrew use the word “delusion” repeatedly–and seeing what he’s using it in reference to–brings another word to mind:

    “Projection.”

  12. 12.

    Little Miss Attila

    August 4, 2003 at 10:03 am

    Andrew,

    I had never heard the story that Gennifer Flowers said Bill was fond of giving head.

    Trust me–this Republican, as a rule, respects “that sort of man” very, very much.

    What I respect less–and I’m far from alone on this–is a man whose appetites are so out of control that he stoops to sexual harrassment and rape, appearing to regard gratification as some sort of birthright. The woman’s interest/consent are apparently unimportant to Bill.

    That disgusted many of us. A lot. That level of disrespect for women, coupled with his sanctimonious pretense of feminism. The hypocrisy was maddening.

  13. 13.

    Andrew Lazarus

    August 4, 2003 at 10:10 am

    On the economy, let’s put it this way: Bush’s tax cuts have done nothing to spur a recovery. We know that because he’s going to be the first President since Hoover to preside over net job loss, and for that matter, we know from his own claims about how many jobs the tax cuts would create, WHICH ARE NOWHERE IN EVIDENCE. GWB has now tied the postwar record of 26 consecutive months of job loss, and he’s heading for more. This isn’t a delusion; sorry, Scott.

    Democratic tax cuts (I would go so far as to say MAINSTREAM tax cuts) would have been more targeted to increasing spending than making the rich richer. You can read dangerous radical Warren Buffett on why the Bush cuts were mostly in the wrong places. (The child credit is one of the exceptions, but is only a small component of the overall total.)

    Chris is quite wrong, the 2001 tax cuts are in full effect and many of the 2002 cuts are too. Not,of course, that I expect this to change anyone’s mind. (Snicker.)

    For one last comment on the election, I refer you to (1) the large numbers of conservative legal academics who thought the decision was a travesty [larger than the number of liberals unimpressed with Roe, and that’s not an empty basket either] and (2) the giveaway in the per curiam decision that the Equal Protection ruling is for this time and this train only, as Stevens put it. No one had ever IMAGINED using Equal Protection in an election setting.

    If Al Gore had shown the determination and drive of the GOP in FL, he would be President. (How? Having a few of HIS supporters in the counting room to shut down the “rioters” imported from DC.) One reason Dean is energizing the base is that he looks like he’ll bring that level of determination (also see under: Carville).

    [Sorry if I don’t find time to defend this position more, I just scored a job, although some other poor bastard lost it….]

  14. 14.

    David Perron

    August 4, 2003 at 10:20 am

    The guilt must be eating you alive, Andrew. I’d give it back if I were you.

    That, and you sure do make a large number of assertions with backing in fact whatever. Why should we take your word for it?

    I’m also a little unclear as to how you think Bush is “deluded”. How do you know what he really thinks? Is this just projection on your part, again?

  15. 15.

    Sweet Lou

    August 4, 2003 at 11:16 am

    I’ll agree with Andrew that we shouldn’t give Bush credit for winning the election. The Democrats, through hard work and preseverence, lost it. I thought I would never see another political party work as hard as the GOP did in 1996 to lose a presidential election. I was wrong.

  16. 16.

    Kimmitt

    August 4, 2003 at 12:57 pm

    The Left hates Bush because the Left is genuinely afraid that Bush is a Fascist who will turn this country into something which vaguely resembles 1930s Italy.

    Whether or not you agree with them, if you take for the sake of argument the idea that Bush might be such a man, then you will understand the depth of loathing and fear.

    The Right hated Clinton because Clinton proved them wrong over and over — he raised taxes and Federal revenues increased, then presided over an enormous postwar expansion. He and Al Gore put in the time and effort necessary to reform the Federal bureaucracy, cutting 300,000 jobs in favor of streamlined processes and computerization — which proved that the Fed was a manageable beast for a competent chief executive. He believed that some Federal programs improved the lives of people, and broke out the statistics on Head Start and student loans to prove it.

    Clinton was hardly a darling of the Left — it was just that we felt like we could interact with the man, so we backed him against the Christian Right-dominated Republicans. The Right is so far away from any kind of sensible policy discussion, however, that we all looked like the Paris Commune from way out there.

  17. 17.

    Moe Lane

    August 4, 2003 at 1:06 pm

    “The Left hates Bush because the Left is genuinely afraid that Bush is a Fascist who will turn this country into something which vaguely resembles 1930s Italy.”

    For their sake, I hope that your assessment of their beliefs is profoundly inaccurate*: it would be distressing in the extreme to have proof that the Democratic Party is in danger of being taken over by natural born damned fools.

    Moe

    *Which it is. There are a lot of Center-Leftists (and not a few actual liberals) who have somehow managed to oppose Bush’s policies without first having to see him as Satan incarnate, or even Benito Mussolini. The Left is more than the Hard Left, and it is long past time that the latter got that elementary fact through their collective heads.

  18. 18.

    David Perron

    August 4, 2003 at 1:27 pm

    Because, God knows Bush has shown every possible sign of his willingness to grab power and fulfill his lifelong ambition of becoming a totalitarian dictator.

    Do you even listen to yourself anymore, Kimitt?

    Actually, I could say the same thing about Bush. He was never big on the right, but he more than filled the “anyone but Gore” requirement. Which is pretty much the same as what you said about Clinton.

  19. 19.

    Mark Harden

    August 4, 2003 at 2:00 pm

    I’d say the republican’s hatred of Clinton has all 4 of them beat…..by a landslide.

    Funny, I don’t recall seeing any “Clinton = Hitler” signs on network news back in the ’90s.

  20. 20.

    Kimmitt

    August 4, 2003 at 2:03 pm

    Because, God knows Bush has shown every possible sign of his willingness to grab power and fulfill his lifelong ambition of becoming a totalitarian dictator.

    No, he’s shown several disturbing signs. The first, of course, was the powergrab associated with the 2000 elections; in isolation, it would have looked a lot like “politics as usual,” but as part of a larger pattern, it’s disturbing. The second was the appointment of Ashcroft as Attorney General; nobody knew at the time what a right bastard that guy was, but we’re coming to understand. Then there came the unrelenting secrecy, ranging from the hidden energy policy meetings (which had maps of Iraq divided into zones for different oil companies to exploit!) to the executive order directing all agencies to resist FOIA requests to the best of their abilities.

    The crowning event, however, which appears to have changed President George W. Bush from just another lousy Conservative with crappy policies into a Man Selected By God To Defeat America’s Foes, Internal and External, was of course the terrorist attacks on September 11th. Since then, the passage of the USA PATRIOT act and AG Ashcroft’s decisions on how to apply that act have had a chilling effect on dissent. Now, it’s hardly a new tactic for Conservatives to accuse anyone who disagrees with them of being traitorous, but when Ari Fleischer says in a press conference “everybody has to be thoughtful about what they say as our nation goes into an increasing wartime footing,” in response to Bill Maher’s unbelievable gall in actually criticizing the President, we’re all pretty clear on how this Administration works. Especially since Maher’s show was cancelled right after.

    Bush is also an unbelievably profligate liar, and he displayed this tendency most when discussing the necessity of ignoring Afghanistan in favor of invading Iraq. In order to pull us into a war, he lied about Iraq’s military capacities, its connection to Al Qaeda, and the costs associated with the conquest and occupation of the area — even now, his tentative budgets submitted to Congress simply do not include estimates for the costs of rebuilding Iraq.

    This is an Administration that burns spooks’ wives when they step out of line. It is an Administration which verbally supported a military coup against a democratically elected President in Venezuela. It is an Administration which believes that any person, American citizen or no, who is accused of terrorism can be held indefinitely without formal charges, access to counsel, or any hope of even a military tribunal.

    So, yeah, there are signs. The Republicans haven’t organized anything like the brownshirts yet (though I feel quite confident in the nascent membership base), but then they haven’t had to — their softer tactics have given them more or less complete control over the levers of government.

    Let me put it to you this way; if the nation goes — from your perspective — collectively mad in November 2004 and elects a Democratic candidate (let’s say, for the sake of argument, the “French-looking” John Kerry) in a squeaker, do you really think that the Bush Administration would transfer power? I’m not sure, and that’s why I’m afraid of George W. Bush.

  21. 21.

    Moe Lane

    August 4, 2003 at 2:17 pm

    “(let’s say, for the sake of argument, the “French-looking” John Kerry)”

    Wasn’t he the one who served in Vietnam?

    Moe

    PS: For the rest, see previous comment on natural-born damned fools.

    Yes, I’m aware that the sentiment is probably reciprocated. Imagine my dismay.

  22. 22.

    David Perron

    August 4, 2003 at 2:59 pm

    I am sure, and that’s why I’m afraid for Kimmitt’s sanity.

  23. 23.

    Kimmitt

    August 4, 2003 at 4:15 pm

    Wasn’t he the one who served in Vietnam?

    Yes.

  24. 24.

    David Perron

    August 4, 2003 at 9:27 pm

    Kimmitt, I think you need to be asking yourself what’s the root cause of Bush being elected in the first place, and how you could have prevented it from happening in the first place.

    That, and what happened to the vaunted lefty sense of humor.

  25. 25.

    Barbar

    August 4, 2003 at 11:50 pm

    Ah, nice to see a calm, reasoned response to the “morons on the left”! John Cole is extremely calm as he dismisses idiots.

    Little Miss Attila: The right hated Clinton from the beginning, and spent years investigating him, coming up with the Monica Lewinsky scandal, and nothing more. I wasn’t aware that he was a rapist and serial sexual harasser, but of course since you stand on the “Reasonable Right” side of the debate, there’s nothing loony about your beliefs at all.

    And John — the point is that Bush has spent 1/4th of his Presidency on vacation so far. You really think the guy’s up late struggling with difficult decisions?

  26. 26.

    Father of Dirt

    March 13, 2004 at 12:24 pm

    Daily KOS ? Interesting name. Any Arabic speakers out their care to translate KOS for our general amussement. I wonder if he really does get some everyday, or is he just another snivelling little kos.

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