A real big hand to Russ for compiling all this stuff in a neat way. For the complete list, please check back his site. Here's an extract of reasons that horrify me (talk about nepotism, incompetence and pure criminality):
"5. During the Bush Administration's war in Iraq, more than 1,000 US troops have lost their lives and more than 7,000 have been injured. Source: globalsecurity.org"19. Vice President Cheney told voters that unless they elect George Bush in November, "we'll get hit again" by terrorists.
Source: Washington Post30. The Bush Administration awarded a multibillion-dollar no-bid contract to Halliburton--a company that still pays Vice President Cheney hundreds of thousands of dollars in deferred compensation each year (Cheney also has Halliburton stock options). The company then repeatedly overcharged the military for services, accepted kickbacks from subcontractors and served troops dirty food.
Sources: The Washington Post, The Tapei Times, BBC News36. Top Bush Administration officials accepted $127,600 in jewelry and other presents from the Saudi royal family in 2003, including diamond-and-sapphire jewelry valued at $95,500 for First Lady Laura Bush.
Source: Seattle Times37. Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge awarded lucrative contracts to several companies in which he is an investor, including Microsoft, GE, Sprint, Pfizer and Oracle.
Source: cq.com40. The Bush Administration turned a $236 billion surplus into a $422 billion deficit.
Sources: Fortune, dfw.com43. President Bush is the first President since Herbert Hoover to have a net loss of jobs--around 800,000--over a four-year term.
Source: The Guardian45. In 2000, candidate George W. Bush said "the vast majority of my tax cuts go to the bottom end of the spectrum." He passed the tax cuts, but the top 20 percent of earners received 68 percent of the benefits.
Sources: cbpp.org, vote-smart.org46. In 2000, candidate George W. Bush promised to pay down the national debt to a historically low level. As of September 30, the national debt stood at $7,379,052,696,330.32, a record high.
Sources: www.georgewbush.com , Bureau of the Public Debt50. The Bush Administration proposed slashing funding for the largest federal public housing program, putting 2 million families in danger of losing their housing.
Source: San Francisco Examiner66. Since President Bush took office, more than 5 million people have lost their health insurance.
Source: CNN.com79. The Bush Administration has proposed cutting the budget of the Environmental Protection Agency by $600 million next year.
Source: ems.org81. Since 9/11, Attorney General John Ashcroft has detained 5,000 foreign nationals in antiterrorism sweeps; none have been convicted of a terrorist crime.
Source: hrwatch.org82. The Bush Administration ignored pleas from the International Committee of the Red Cross to stop the abuse of prisoners in US custody.
Source: Wall Street Journal83. In violation of international law, the Bush Administration hid prisoners from the Red Cross so the organization couldn't monitor their treatment.
Source: hrwatch.org84. The Bush Administration, without ever charging him with a crime, arrested US citizen José Padilla at an airport in Chicago, held him on a naval brig in South Carolina for two years, denied him access to a lawyer and prohibited any contact with his friends and family.
Source: news.findlaw.com85.President Bush's top legal adviser wrote a memo to the President advising him that he can legally authorize torture.
Source: news.findlaw.com87. The Bush Administration refuses to support the creation of an independent commission to investigate the abuse of foreign prisoners in American custody. Instead, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld selected the members of a commission to review the conduct of his own department.
Source: humanrightsfirst.org90. President Bush said he was committed to capturing Osama bin Laden "dead or alive" before he said, "I truly am not that concerned about him."
Source: americanprogressaction.org91. President Bush said we had found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, before he admitted we hadn't found them.
Sources: White House, americanprogress.org92. President Bush said, "You can't distinguish between Al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror," before he admitted Saddam had no role in 9/11.
Sources: White House, Washington Post95. When asked at an April 2004 press conference to name a mistake he made during his presidency, Bush couldn't think of one.
Source: White House97. Last year the Bush Administration spent $6.5 billion creating 14 million new classified documents and securing old secrets--the highest level of spending in ten years.
Source: openthegovernment.org100. The Bush Administration--reversing years of bipartisan tradition--refuses to answer requests from Democratic members of Congress about how the White House is spending taxpayer money.
Source: Washington Post
And a final post from Russ as well:
Get yourself your own opinion. Unfortunately I can't vote in the USA, nor can I vote in an election that will influence my daily life. But remember:
W. stands for Wrong
Update: just added another reason from Russ:
