I heard recently critiques of the President Barack Obama’s administration express how the Democrats don’t have any accomplishments to run on for their first year in office (2009-2010), so according to the critiques, Democrats are planning on running against George W. Bush again.
They’ll make him out as a boogeyman and castigate Republicans as cozy with Wall Street
Some are even calling the idea, "mythmaking".
I just love to watch the Republicans ignore history or seeming forget it. It’s extremely funny how they, the Republican Party, refused to run with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney’s record during the last presidential campaign in 2007 and 2008 (they simply ignored it) and instead run by invoking Ronald Reagan’s presidency.
Just as a reminder or to give those of you that weren’t around back then, Ronald Reagan was president 21 years ago, almost a quarter of a century. It’s pretty sad to know that the Republican Party has to reach that far back to able to claim any sort of real accomplishments while in control of the White House. Even that administration left behind a huge deficit, remember?
I’m sure those of you that paid attention to the presidential primaries and campaign last time around remember hearing every other word from the Republican candidates being about how Reagan did this, and Reagan did that, and how they want to follow through on Reagan’s vision for American, etc... In fact at times it was getting rather boring hearing the Republican candidates debate each other on who was closer to Reagan beliefs and policies then the other guy remember? I am sure I can find you some videos of those debates if you don’t believe me.
George W. Bush and Dick Cheney were in office for a full 8 years. By January 19, 2009, their administration and the Republican Party had left behind an unemployment figure of 7.2%. It was their (long with working with president elect Barack Obama) 750 bailout plan for Wall Street and Insurance companies that was voted on and received bipartisan approval. They left behind huge companies on the brink of bankruptcy which would have thrown our nation into another Great Depression with the loss of jobs if they had been allowed to fail. They left behind the worst recession in over a century.
That’s what the Bush/Cheney administration and the Republican Party left behind even after following through on what they claim is the solution to all our problems, giving Americans back their own money (5 tax cuts over 8 years).
The Bush/Cheney administration also left behind two active wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. They also basically ignored what was going on in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia. That administration claimed on several occasions that we had a victory in Afghanistan when our war there was actually failing and near a disaster.
So critiques of the Democratic Party, if Democrats decide to run against the Bush/Cheney administration and the Republican Party during the 2010 campaign, I think they have every right to remind Americans of their history.
It’s when we ignore history, when we most likely repeat it.
As far as the Democratic Party running on their own record goes; they not only have 2009 to report on, they have 1993-2001 during the Bill Clinton administration to run on. That administration left behind a surplus, remember? The surplus was ‘spent’ during the Bush/Cheney administration, remember?
Let’s discuss a little bit of what the Obama/Biden administration did in just one year in office.
They not only stopped another great depression from happening and kept our economy going; by supporting a Recovery and Reinvestment package with billions of dollars worth of new and repaired infrastructure with billions more being planned for this year. They kept firemen, police and educators on the job with this money also. They kept huge companies from going bankrupt which saved hundreds of thousands of jobs.
With the stimulus money they have created or saved over 2.5 million jobs. Just imagine what unemployment figures would have been if those huge companies had been allowed to fail (companies by the way that are already paying back the loans they received). They did this without a single vote from the Republican Party.
They gave Americans the largest tax cut in history within days of taking office and plan on giving even more to middle class Americans and small business this year.
The Obama/Biden administration took their time to reevaluate the Afghanistan war and came out with a plan that accordingto General McChrystal, the commander of US forces in Afghanistan, seems to be working. He’s already planning on an exit strategy.
The Marines just officially left Iraq proving once again that the Obama/Biden administration means what they say about getting combat troops out of Iraq.
They got passed through Congress two different health care reform packages without help from the Republican Party. This has been attempted by several previous administrations for decades, not one ever got this far. They continue to plan on getting something passed to help Americans with the sky rocketing costs of health care and abuse by health insurance companies. We can only assume it will be without much help from the Republicans.
The Obama/Biden administration and the Democratic Party did all that and much more. Please visit this diary for a small listingof accomplishments since Obama/Biden took office.
In summary folks, yes the Democratic Party has every right to run against the Bush/Cheney administration and the Republican Party. They are a huge part of America’s history, just as Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and other administrations were.
If Americans ignore that history, they are simply asking for more of the same messes left behind by future Republican leaders --to clean up.