I don't even agree with everything Bush has done. He calls himself a "conservative," but has run the country as a liberal--adding new programs to the government, increasing its size--unlike a true conservative. However, this man is still our President. He has to make decisions that I couldn't dream of making. See how much he has aged since he has been in office? I'm sure he hasn't had it completely easy.
Most people that I've talked to that "hate" Bush give me reasons such as "He's stupid." Wow. Okay. Great reasoning. Half of America is stupid. We give our attention to Paris Hilton going to jail, Ho-hand snorting more cocaine, and whether or not Brangelina will stay together. More people vote for American Idol than the President. And they're the ones complaining?
Among the questions Bush was asked was "Do you blame yourself for the demise of Tony Blair?"
I think that Bush handled himself really well with these borderline accusative statements.
I was really impressed with Tony Blair's closing statements, saying "..the easiest way to get people to like you is to speak out against America. You get a round of applause. Speak out against the president..." (Bush in the background "You get a standing ovation.")
He spoke of defending the values that England and America share (moralistically and democracy, itself). Blair also said that "...in the end, politics is really a public service...the choices that we make are hard."
I can't help but feel that a lot of politicians have lost sight of their positions being a "public service." For example: Ted Kennedy (had to mention him somewhere. Tradition. The Public Service he does is to drink most of the beer to spare someone else from drinking that same bottle.) Less jokingly: Nancy Pelosi; national traitor and democracy killer. Why do I call her this? Pelosi is threatening to take away minority power--to silence them so she can push her bills through (I guess the minority didn't like the curtains?). If a GOP or any other party candidate were to try to silence the Dem vote, the media would have a field day!
What was actually said:
PRIME MIN, BLAIR: And so, you know, yes, of course it's like -- anybody who's sitting there advising a politician in, you know, any part of Europe today, if you want to get the easiest round of applause, then get up and attack America, you get a round of applause; you attack the president, you get a --PRESIDENT BUSH: Standing ovation. (Laughter.)
PRIME MIN. BLAIR: Yeah. (Laughs.) And that's -- that's fine, if everyone wants to do that. But when all of that is cleared away, you're left with something very, very simple, fundamental and clear, that that battle for values is still going on.
And you know, you can debate about the mistakes and the issues, and you can debate about Iraq, whether we should have done this or we should have done that, but actually what is happening in Iraq today is that our enemy is fighting us.
And therefore, if what happens when our enemy fights us is that we drift away from our friends, that we kind of make the little accommodations so that we don't escape some of the difficulty and the responsibility and occasionally opprobrium of decision-making, if we do that, our enemy takes heart from that. They watch that; they watch what we're doing the whole time. They ask, "Are these guys standing up for what they believe; or if we carry on, is their will going to diminish and they're going to give up because it's just too difficult, because the public opinion's too difficult or the opinion polls tell them it's too difficult."
Now that is the decision of leadership, and it's not just a decision for me and him, it's a decision for everybody who's engaged in politics. And people run down politics and say it's all, you know, just a series of positions and attitudes and sound bites, and occasionally even lies and all the rest of it. Actually, what politics is in the end, when it's done in the right way, when people stand up for what they believe, is it's about public service, and there's nothing to be ashamed of in that. And the fact is, the decisions are difficult; of course they're difficult. And we took a decision that we thought was very difficult.
Bush was asked whether he thought he’d hurt Blair politically. He didn’t say no.
REPORTER -- however inadvertently, you once said that you would like Tony Blair to stay for the duration of your presidency. He's not doing that. PRESIDENT BUSH: Yeah.REPORTER: Do you think you're partly to blame for that?
PRESIDENT BUSH: (Laughs.) I haven't polled the Labor Conference. But, could be! (Laughs.)
The question is, am I to blame for his leaving? I don't know.
In other news...anyone else notice that Jesse Jackson looks like a cross between a Boston terrier and Brain from "Pinky and the Brain"? And he's just as annoying.
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