Qualifier : I am not American ( Therefore ) Question : How is it that George Bush is President ?

Question

I genuinely don't want this to turn into a pit of political venom - but, after reading much material, news articles, watching TV, listening to commentary, for a long time now, I just dont get why G W Bush is president.

I am from NZ - I dont hate the guy - but there seems to be so many things out there illustrating GW's dodgyness - Dodgy big business mates, dodgy oil deals, Haliburton, Enron, his brothers - It all seems to wash off him. What am I not understanding here ?

I would hugely appreciate answers that are NOT along the lines of " you are evil you uber liberal Bush hater ". I am not uber liberal and I am not a Bush Hater - I just want to know how the guy who at least from the outside looks very dodgy, has been elected President of the United States, twice. What am i not getting ?

Answer 1

you are evil you uber liberal Bush hater.

Seriously, you have to look at the opposition candidates and see that they were no choice at all. If the Democrats could have brought someone to the table that was a better choice we probably wouldn't have at least re-elected G-Dub. But John Kerry was not a better choice. The Bush family holds a lot of political clout in this country and Karl Rove is a brilliant albeit somewhat villianous politcal strategist. At this time in our history America does need something of a Cowboy to weather our internal political "civil war", partisanship is at an all-time high in this country, it takes a man who is willing to sacrifice image to get somethings done. And we need that cowboy attitude to hold our place in the world. After the fall of the USSR we were left as the only true Superpower and alot of other countries want to bring us down. The best analogy I have heard is John Kerry and Al Gore are intelligent men who are like chess players, they analyze every move, look at long-term strategy, try to figure out what their opponent is going to do and while they are trying to figure out all possible scenarios the badguys are blowing-up our national monuments and killing our people. Conversely G-Dub is a checkers player and when he sees an a$$hole, HE JUMPS 'EM. That is what we need right now. And that is why I voted for him in the last election.

Answer 2

Election 1: Bush won because a number of different factors came together in his favor.

1) The Democrats didn't nominate a terribly strong candidate--Al Gore came across as stiff and wonky and could never really settle on a campaign strategy. While Bush was clearly not from the electoral A list Gore wasn't either--watching a debate between these two was incredibly painful to watch. Also Bush ran as a relatively centrist candidate who turned to the right once he won.

2) Ralph Nader ran a prominent campaign for the Green Party, which sucked away a significant number of votes from Gore.

3) The Electoral College. Idiot system, idiotic outcome. Allowed the election to be thrown into the federal court system where--surprise!--a court with a majority of sitting Republicans ruled in W's favor.

4) This is relatively subtle-- Americans tend to give a party two terms in power and then switch to the other party. So after two terms of Clinton we get a Republican...

Election 2:

1) The flipside of point 4 above-- Americans tend to reelect Presidents unless something has gone spectacularly wrong. While a lot of people concluded that the war in Iraq was a disaster, these folks tend to vote Democratic anyway.

2) The Dems nominated another weak candidate, John Kerry, and the Republicans ran an extremely strong and focused campaign.

Hope that helps.

Answer 3

First of all, he did not win the majority vote in 2000. However, because of a little hiccup in our election process, he still one the majority in enough states to win the whole thing.

Then, came 9/11, and we all loved him for about two months. Before another year had gone by, we were headed to a war most of us did not want. He did it anyway, and most Americans genuinely feel it was the wrong decision. However, for a while many of us thought he knew something we didn't, so we trusted him. Big mistake.

Then came 2004. I thought for sure he had screwed everything up enough to get booted out of Washington, but unfortunately, he had marketed himself as the candidate that stood for Christian values. Apparently, all the churches were pushing their members to vote for him or something, because he won again. In 2004, he won both the popular vote and the electoral college. *sigh*

At present, he is fighting to not have the lowest approval ratings among Americans in history. Most Americans do not like the war or are actively opposing it. Most Americans do not like Bush, and most do not like VP Cheney.

This did finally translate in 2006 when the Republicans couldn't squeeze out any more good will, even with "Christians" on his side.

Now hopefully we can fix the Iraq mess as much as possible, leave their country, and start making amends with all the other countries.

There are intelligent Americans who know we are not better than other countries, just different. We love the U.S., but most of us know we should reach out for allies before going into a hasty war.

We realize that it shouldn't be called a war on terror, because it's a war we can never win. It will be a continual battle against the insane radicals who do horrible stuff to other people. Unfortunately, no matter how many Middle Eastern countries we bomb, there will always be those insane people in this world somewhere.

We also realize that the 9/11 connection only goes so far before it starts sounding like a desperate excuse for starting a war.

Answer 4

I sure hope you get an answer that explains the whole thing, I'm certainly confused and I've been here all my life. This is my offering, the republicans absolutely can't stand the thought of democrats being in control of any branch of our government so they are better organized about getting their vote out during our elections. So, what you see is the product of the American voters electing a President TWICE, yikes, that is a sorry excuse for the leader of America. Like I said, anything rather than a democrat.

Answer 5

a million. "Honor and dignity" grow to be continuously code for "I won't get a BJ interior the Oval workplace". huge deal! 2. "Tax alleviation" grow to be for the rich, the working classification have been given a pittance, and it wasn't paid for. extra deficits! 3. risk-free from harm? He did no longer something the different President would not have performed, yet he shredded the shape in doing so. 4. The Iraq Invasion succeeded with the protection stress that Clinton outfitted. The brains of the Bush group blew the occupation. 5. Afghanistan democratic? that's chaos! Their alleged President somewhat is mayor of Kabul, and the Taliban is gaining. 6. No baby Left in the back of is a failure. that's unfunded mandates, and encourages coaching to the attempt and different dodges. 7. Welfare reform grow to be the Clinton Adminstration. Bush inherited 4% Unemployment and bosoted it to 7.2! 8. common? He stated till now the 2006 election that Rumsfeld could be his protection Secretary till the top of his term. After the election, Rumsfeld grow to be sacked. Bush admitted plans for this have been underway till now the election. HE LIED. Plus, Bush grow to be the 1st President with an arrest checklist (robbery, attack, below the effect of alcohol employing). he grow to be a failure in business enterprise, and have been given away with unlawful insider paying for and advertising.

Answer 6

Presidential elections are won by winning enough Electoral College votes -- which are determined by state -- NOT the popular vote.

In 2000, the Republicans who ran the election system in Florida removed tens of thousands of registered Democrats off of the election lists. Thus, when they showed up to vote, they were told they weren't registered.

That's how BushCo stole the 2000 election (Gore won the popular vote, but that was irrelevant).

In 2004, about 1/3 of the country voted on paperless voting machines, most of which were made by a company owned by a man who wanted Bush president.

Those machines elected Bush (well, Republicans also managed to prevent a lot of Democrats from voting, too).

Exit polls taken in precincts WITH paper ballots or receipts, accurately predicted a Kerry win; Exit polls in precincts with no paper backup predicted a Kerry win, but the tallies went for Bush.

That's the short story. There are more shenanigans and details, but those are the biggest reasons.

(The biggest Democratic region in Florida received their absentee ballots Saturday before the election -- making it impossible to get their ballots marked and sent in before Election day, and the judge who heard the case blamed them, rather than election officials; another scummy story that springs to mind. There were a lot of them.)

Americans don't like to think of their election systems as having been rigged, and the media, of course, won't publicize this sort of stuff, so very few people realize that Americans did NOT elect Bush President.

(Aw, come on, are you SURE you don't hate him? If not, why not?)

Answer 7

Basically we have a 2 party system. There are other parties but they are not going to win a national election anytime soon. Bush was the best candidate for the job during the periods he ran. Both other candidates were far to the left of center, as are the leading candidates now for the Democratic Nomination. We are basically a moderate people and the far Right and Left do not appeal to a majority of Americans. Bush found the closest to center he could and he won.

Answer 8

I am an American. Nice to meet you.

I have been to Europe and Asia and I find that the news is reported different then in the States. I am not saying which is right but they present the news different. The facts are often the same but the view of them changes.

I also find many countries have a different view of the world then U.S. citizens.

The two above statements are part of it.
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I am not trying to be offensive but all of the complaints you list are not facts or a reason not to vote for Bush. They are general statements "dodgy", Haliburton, his brothers. Could you give us hard facts and maybe we can address them directly. i.e. I know that Cheney worked at Haliburton but that doesn't make Cheney or Haliburtion evil. What about this bothers you?

Answer 9

Bush pimped religion, and patriotism, moved down to Texas from Kennebunkport, bought a fake "Ranch", and got the Southern redneck, military, gun-toting, holy roller votes every president seems to need these days to get elected.

It's really as simple as that.

Our hayseed/redneck brothers in the South pick the presidents these days. Sad, but true. The freshmen flunkies run the university.

And oh yeah. His father only got to be president because of Reagan's popularity, and because of his family name, he got to be president. In his first election, he lost the popular vote. The majority of Americans did not vote for Bush. The deciding state with suspect electoral votes was Florida. Where his brother was governor. Real banana republic scummy type stuff. The conservative rabble worked the system to put him in office.

Answer 10

What your are reading and seeing on the news is mostly from our own liberal press. They have been in the pockets of the socialists for years and hate President Bush. Though I have come to dislike him myself, he was elected by the majority of American voters. Twice! The Commiecrats can't stand to be out of power, even when they control the House and Senate. Don't believe everything your read in the press or see on TV.