Especially the financial incentives. Cheney was the former owner of one of the biggest contractors for the war, and they were all tied to the oil industry.
The funny part was the massive gas tax that doubled my gas budget, which was later repealed, but gas prices were unaltered by the repeal. And I think that’s happened like 3 times in my life. I still remember thinking a dollar was expensive for gas.
Bush was the "cleanest" Republican since Nixon only because he was such a Cheney puppet that Dick Cheney's wedding ring is still lost up his ass somewhere.
Cheney was president during that timeframe.
I mean, he was double-dealing for the O&G industry right alongside Cheney. He was just the face of the operation while Cheney did all the backroom dealing.
But the idea that the Bush Family wasn't flagrantly profiteering? Give me a fucking break. Family members and friends got lucrative jobs in senior administrative positions. Lobbyists got promoted to executive board rooms. Portfolios rapidly outpaced the market growth rates.
Just ask how Michael Brown, a guy in the boutique thoroughbred horse business, ended up heading FEMA, ffs. Why do you think The Ashcroft Group landed Oracle and AT&T as clients?
Family of Secrets -> Oil depletion allowance -> Quartz -> Piezoelectricity -> Ultrasound -> Lazzaro Spallanzani -> List of Catholic clergy scientists -> Lorenzo Albacete -> Catholic University of America -> Charles Coughlin
Thanks for the rabbit hole! I now know more about a whole deal of subjects, starting with a political theme, gliding over taxation of natural resources, physical phenomena, priest scientists, history of how we found out that bats don't fly by sight, finding out that there were priest scientists in my lifetime, the information that there is an catholic university in the US and landing on the wiki page of a antisemitic radio priest during the time of WW2 that reached around 30 million americans during his prime (funnily enough tying back into the radio grade quartz that is a valid resource for the Oil depletion allowance).
Edit: I haven't even looked into your 2nd link yet.
So many people around now who weren't even born yet when dubya was fucking the country up and have only experienced the sanitized version of his legacy where he's portrayed as nothing but a dumb fall guy.
Family of Secrets is such a goddamned mindfuck. That plus Chaos (about the ties between MKULTRA and Charles Manson) made my summer a few years back real freaky.
I've heard it was before he was president too, supposedly before he was governor too if I remember right.
Not sure he's ever directly given any details about the cocaine deal, but I remember him being pretty public about being intentionally sober because he knew he couldn't handle it. Although, I don't think he considers himself an actual alcoholic.
I remember him being pretty public about being intentionally sober because he knew he couldn’t handle it. Although, I don’t think he considers himself an actual alcoholic.
by all means, fuck dubya, but as a "person" he seems reasonable. This is a mature , smart, and humble way of looking at it and managing yourself.
Beyond some of his actions as president, he does pretty consistently come off as a pretty alright dude. I really enjoyed the series of paintings he did on the value of immigrants a few years back.
America can be a lawful society and a welcoming society at the same time.
Can you imagine anyone on the Republican side saying that now?
I was gonna say. His entire fucking cabinet was his handlers. Shrub couldn't have successfully managed a baseball team if he hadn't been surrounded by more competent people.
And they obviously read part of it based on their comment. Either they stopped after the arrows or their reading comprehension is USA-tier. Them and everyone who voted them up.
W apologia is still fucking W apologia. Everyone started reminiscing on him for some reason after Trump's first election and it made me want to puke. It'd be what, nearly a million dead Iraqis because of his bullshit? Nah, I'm going to get angry when people start making light of his war crimes and say untrue things like he had no financial stake in it.
The post is not apologia and not making light of his crimes. The post is saying there was no one who had leverage on him such that they could force him to do all the stupid shit he did. He just invaded a country and kicked off multiple decades of war in the Middle East for no comprehensible reason, like compromat. In the absence of a "mitigating reason" (as much as you can mitigate "war crimes"), it makes his actions look even worse
I had never heard of W gaining direct financial compensation from going to war. Oiling the US war machine doesn't directly benefit many politicians; it just hoes the farmbed to ensure a healthy crop of corruption keeps growing.
> Created ICE
> Created TSA (No fly list, porno scanners, etc)
> Created the Patriot Act
> Created No Child Left Behind Act (Left lots of children behind)
> Lied to invade Iraq (Hundreds of thousands dead, inspired ISIS, Abu Ghraib)
> Lied to invade Afghanistan (Hundreds of thousands dead again)
> Somehow didn't catch Osama
> Botched Hurricane Katrina response, domestic humanitarian disaster
> Emboldened a wave of evangelicism that dulled American culture for years
> Normalized state torture in the west at Guantanamo
> Halliburton
> Vice President shot a guy
> Greatly expanded NSA domestic surveillance and FISA
These are just the big ones off the top of my head, I could go on.
It was on the same descending progression we are on now, relatively speaking it felt the same then as now, and if we continue down this spiral without annihilating ourselves the next one will make trump look just like dubya.
POS? No question. At least he didn’t wipe his ass with the Constitution on a daily basis. Sometimes, yeah, but not constantly. I don’t remember legitimate fears of the US becoming a fascist religious dictatorship, either.
I mean, his VP was definitely involved in all of that stuff. He only got the job because of his dad, and even if he himself wasn't a terrible person, like the reason he was where he was as president was because of all of the people around him, who were absolutely terrible people.
86 Comments
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 192 pts · 174d
:-|
Literally a book about them.
:-/
Now that they've cleaned that shit up.
:-|
8-|
The guy with $50M in his personal fortune and a family net worth of over $400M?
Shut the fuck up.
Gullible@sh.itjust.works · 60 pts · 174d
Thank you. I could feel an aneurism developing further with every subsequent line.
anomnom@sh.itjust.works · 8 pts · 173d
Especially the financial incentives. Cheney was the former owner of one of the biggest contractors for the war, and they were all tied to the oil industry.
Anyone remember what the wars did to oil prices?
Gullible@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 173d
The funny part was the massive gas tax that doubled my gas budget, which was later repealed, but gas prices were unaltered by the repeal. And I think that’s happened like 3 times in my life. I still remember thinking a dollar was expensive for gas.
Wilco@lemmy.zip · 40 pts · 174d
Bush was the "cleanest" Republican since Nixon only because he was such a Cheney puppet that Dick Cheney's wedding ring is still lost up his ass somewhere. Cheney was president during that timeframe.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 24 pts · 174d
I mean, he was double-dealing for the O&G industry right alongside Cheney. He was just the face of the operation while Cheney did all the backroom dealing.
But the idea that the Bush Family wasn't flagrantly profiteering? Give me a fucking break. Family members and friends got lucrative jobs in senior administrative positions. Lobbyists got promoted to executive board rooms. Portfolios rapidly outpaced the market growth rates.
Just ask how Michael Brown, a guy in the boutique thoroughbred horse business, ended up heading FEMA, ffs. Why do you think The Ashcroft Group landed Oracle and AT&T as clients?
mattyroses@lemmy.today · 5 pts · 174d
Exactly. Look up the Carlyle Group.
Wilco@lemmy.zip · 3 pts · 174d
He wasn't profiteering worse than any other Republucan prez was the point.
arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone · 23 pts · 174d
Both the personal scandals and blackmail material links are about George H. W. Bush, not George W. Bush.
tyler@programming.dev · 17 pts · 174d
And the wiki for the book literally says it’s all unproven conspiracy theories. Like uh…
arrow74@lemmy.zip · 4 pts · 174d
Someone has to remind us that wikipedia is an unreliable source, so thanks to the op commentor
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
Family of Secrets has plenty of dirt on Bush Jr.
arcterus@piefed.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 174d
As the other person said, that book is also full of conspiracy theories so...
Wildmimic@anarchist.nexus · 10 pts · 174d
Family of Secrets -> Oil depletion allowance -> Quartz -> Piezoelectricity -> Ultrasound -> Lazzaro Spallanzani -> List of Catholic clergy scientists -> Lorenzo Albacete -> Catholic University of America -> Charles Coughlin
Thanks for the rabbit hole! I now know more about a whole deal of subjects, starting with a political theme, gliding over taxation of natural resources, physical phenomena, priest scientists, history of how we found out that bats don't fly by sight, finding out that there were priest scientists in my lifetime, the information that there is an catholic university in the US and landing on the wiki page of a antisemitic radio priest during the time of WW2 that reached around 30 million americans during his prime (funnily enough tying back into the radio grade quartz that is a valid resource for the Oil depletion allowance).
Edit: I haven't even looked into your 2nd link yet.
chaogomu@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 174d
I'm going to throw an unrelated wiki link from my clipboard.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diggers
three@lemmy.zip · 7 pts · 174d
> He took the bait
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 5 pts · 172d
So many people around now who weren't even born yet when dubya was fucking the country up and have only experienced the sanitized version of his legacy where he's portrayed as nothing but a dumb fall guy.
dylanmorgan@slrpnk.net · 5 pts · 174d
Family of Secrets is such a goddamned mindfuck. That plus Chaos (about the ties between MKULTRA and Charles Manson) made my summer a few years back real freaky.
Vinny_93@lemmy.world · 120 pts · 174d
Zero personal scandals? Are we sure about that? Wasn't he an alcoholic with a coke habit?
pelespirit@sh.itjust.works · 108 pts · 174d
His wife killed someone while drunk driving too. Also, spreads arms over giant Middle East map, all that war based on lies.
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world · 46 pts · 174d
Almost feels wholesome now a days.
Norin@lemmy.world · 28 pts · 174d
Oh, for those halcyon days of normal scandals like vehicular manslaughter and suit colors.
magnetosphere@fedia.io · 9 pts · 174d
Beige suits are an affront to everything this nation holds dear.
Restaldt@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 174d
Buckle up Buckaroo!
village604@adultswim.fan · 21 pts · 174d
He was just a puppet for that part. If 9/11 never happened he would have been a mediocre 1 term president.
It's pretty wild that he was actually pushing for a fast track to citizenship before that.
pelespirit@sh.itjust.works · 8 pts · 174d
Puppet or not, he went along with it and he was president.
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 3 pts · 172d
When your hurricane disaster response is so blatantly racist that Kanye West has to point it out.
IronBird@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
Skullgrid@lemmy.world · 25 pts · 174d
wasn't that before he was president?
There's financial incentive anyway, hooking up his boy Dick "Haliburton" Chaney
BarbecueCowboy@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 8 pts · 174d
I've heard it was before he was president too, supposedly before he was governor too if I remember right.
Not sure he's ever directly given any details about the cocaine deal, but I remember him being pretty public about being intentionally sober because he knew he couldn't handle it. Although, I don't think he considers himself an actual alcoholic.
Skullgrid@lemmy.world · 15 pts · 174d
by all means, fuck dubya, but as a "person" he seems reasonable. This is a mature , smart, and humble way of looking at it and managing yourself.
BarbecueCowboy@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 6 pts · 174d
Beyond some of his actions as president, he does pretty consistently come off as a pretty alright dude. I really enjoyed the series of paintings he did on the value of immigrants a few years back.
Can you imagine anyone on the Republican side saying that now?
village604@adultswim.fan · 6 pts · 174d
He's a guy you'd enjoy having a beer with, which was important criteria back then.
And his immigration policy aspirations before 9/11 were better than anything the DNC has put forth since.
MsPenguinette@lemmy.world · 64 pts · 174d
No handlers? We all already forgot about Dick?
GraniteM@lemmy.world · 39 pts · 174d
I was gonna say. His entire fucking cabinet was his handlers. Shrub couldn't have successfully managed a baseball team if he hadn't been surrounded by more competent people.
DudeImMacGyver@kbin.earth · 17 pts · 174d
This greentext is delusional
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 3 pts · 172d
Reads like someone who wasn't even around for Bush Jr regime.
cRazi_man@europe.pub · 7 pts · 174d
"Vice" is such a great movie.
jeff@programming.dev · 1 pts · 174d
I agree, but man, the Adam McKay movies make me depressed for like a week after I watch them.
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 174d
He was more of a rider for this cowboy.
ruuster13@lemmy.zip · 37 pts · 174d
He's as dumb as Donald but was raised with maybe 1-2 ounces of love whereas Donald was physically beaten with gold bars.
offspec@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world · 35 pts · 174d
That happens when your dad is CIA chief then VP then Prez.
Dubz has plenty of blackmail material, he just never had to worry about it.
DERRALEXANO@sh.itjust.works · 35 pts · 174d
uienia@lemmy.world · 33 pts · 173d
Because he was controlled by people who were all of these things. He was an easily controlled moron.
Formfiller@lemmy.world · 31 pts · 174d
Cheney was definitely his handler
loomi@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 174d
Came here to say this
NigelFrobisher@aussie.zone · 27 pts · 174d
Dick.
D_C@sh.itjust.works · 9 pts · 174d
He is one, or he wanted one?
derry@midwest.social · 14 pts · 174d
Cheney
Nomorereddit@lemmy.today · 26 pts · 174d
Hes got strong reverse hitler energy.
Started his presidency w war crimes, then got into painting.
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 174d
Too bad there are some corners being cut here.
festnt@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 173d
wait until we find out he birthed himself
BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 25 pts · 174d
Fuck this post Trump level bullshit. W was a fucking Nazi too. He just didn't sieg heil or fuck little kids like one.
offspec@lemmy.world · 19 pts · 174d
Do you think this post is lauding W?
qarbone@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 174d
And they obviously read part of it based on their comment. Either they stopped after the arrows or their reading comprehension is USA-tier. Them and everyone who voted them up.
BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 2 pts · 173d
W apologia is still fucking W apologia. Everyone started reminiscing on him for some reason after Trump's first election and it made me want to puke. It'd be what, nearly a million dead Iraqis because of his bullshit? Nah, I'm going to get angry when people start making light of his war crimes and say untrue things like he had no financial stake in it.
qarbone@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 173d
The post is not apologia and not making light of his crimes. The post is saying there was no one who had leverage on him such that they could force him to do all the stupid shit he did. He just invaded a country and kicked off multiple decades of war in the Middle East for no comprehensible reason, like compromat. In the absence of a "mitigating reason" (as much as you can mitigate "war crimes"), it makes his actions look even worse
I had never heard of W gaining direct financial compensation from going to war. Oiling the US war machine doesn't directly benefit many politicians; it just hoes the farmbed to ensure a healthy crop of corruption keeps growing.
BeardededSquidward@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 3 pts · 174d
It's still glossing over the fact he did all that as well. I've seen far too much apologia for W as of late.
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 2 pts · 172d
It's definitely abusing the present to create a myth of relative harm that serves to sanitize the past. Ratchet effect.
Lucky_777@lemmy.world · 23 pts · 174d
Stern@lemmy.world · 16 pts · 174d
Dubya was doing it for the legacy. Daddy issues are a helluva drug.
SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca · 9 pts · 173d
No one could have predicted GW would be the intellectual one a few decades later.
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 12 pts · 172d
> Created ICE
> Created TSA (No fly list, porno scanners, etc)
> Created the Patriot Act
> Created No Child Left Behind Act (Left lots of children behind)
> Lied to invade Iraq (Hundreds of thousands dead, inspired ISIS, Abu Ghraib)
> Lied to invade Afghanistan (Hundreds of thousands dead again)
> Somehow didn't catch Osama
> Botched Hurricane Katrina response, domestic humanitarian disaster
> Emboldened a wave of evangelicism that dulled American culture for years
> Normalized state torture in the west at Guantanamo
> Halliburton
> Vice President shot a guy
> Greatly expanded NSA domestic surveillance and FISA
These are just the big ones off the top of my head, I could go on.
edit - Damn there's a big list, dive in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:George_W._Bush_administration_controversies
Ibuthyr@lemmy.wtf · 5 pts · 172d
Yet all this sounds like heaven in comparison to the cunts in charge now.
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 3 pts · 171d
It was on the same descending progression we are on now, relatively speaking it felt the same then as now, and if we continue down this spiral without annihilating ourselves the next one will make trump look just like dubya.
DudeImMacGyver@kbin.earth · 12 pts · 174d
OP is making some wildly incorrect assumptions about Dubya
ceenote@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 174d
Hatred of brown peopleLove of the game, baby.wesker@lemmy.sdf.org · 10 pts · 174d
Because of Daddy.
GeeDubHayduke@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 10 pts · 172d
So, anon is too young or too stupid to remember anything about Bush. Copy.
JoMiran@lemmy.ml · 9 pts · 174d
F_State@midwest.social · 9 pts · 174d
Zero Handlers? Seriously? I'm sure he had a team of them and that's not counting Dick Cheney who was more the President than he was.
SooperGoose@thelemmy.club · 8 pts · 174d
Here's a very informative video about why Bush JR was very bad.
https://youtu.be/Diih3J4-DzA
infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net · 8 pts · 172d
No no no, totally different criminal oligarchic blackmail conspiracy ring. Skull and Bones, not Little St James. Easy to confuse the two!
stoy@lemmy.zip · 7 pts · 174d
Say what you will about dubbya, but he seemed to at least have respect for the office he served.
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world · 15 pts · 174d
W was a POS.
Im just posting some greentexts
magnetosphere@fedia.io · 10 pts · 174d
POS? No question. At least he didn’t wipe his ass with the Constitution on a daily basis. Sometimes, yeah, but not constantly. I don’t remember legitimate fears of the US becoming a fascist religious dictatorship, either.
Mwa@thelemmy.club · 2 pts · 174d
TIL, George w bush nickname was "dubbya"
Bustedknuckles@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
The bar is in hell with the rest of us
Doomsider@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 172d
The guy that brought us legal torture!?
InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 172d
And tucker still hasn't done it on TV like he said
bizarroland@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 174d
I mean, his VP was definitely involved in all of that stuff. He only got the job because of his dad, and even if he himself wasn't a terrible person, like the reason he was where he was as president was because of all of the people around him, who were absolutely terrible people.
YoiksAndAway@piefed.zip · 5 pts · 174d
A combination of daddy issues and being a stooge for the neocons. This fucker needs to rot in Hell right next to Trump.
SpruceBringsteen@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d
And yet if you mentioned the Skull and Bones Society in his presence he might just get up and leave the room.
village604@adultswim.fan · 4 pts · 174d
That's such a dumb rule for what's supposed to be a secret society.
"We're going to keep our secret society secret by making our members be as obvious as possible about their membership every time we're mentioned. "
sirico@feddit.uk · 2 pts · 174d
Skull& bones baby also Michael Moore can't comment on this thread
cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca · 0 pts · 174d
Monica Lewinsky...?
mnemonicmonkeys@sh.itjust.works · 6 pts · 174d
That was Bill, not W