100 Mistakes for the President to Choose From

[Guest guest]

(It should be easy to make a list into the thousands.)

 

 

http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF & b=64326

 

100 Mistakes for the President to Choose From

 

May 3, 2004

 

During a prime time press conference on April 13, President Bush was

asked to name a mistake that he has made since taking office and what

he has learned from it. Bush, who was unable to answer the question,

admitted " maybe I'm not as quick on my feet as I should be in coming

up with [a mistake]. " But weeks later, Bush still hasn't answered the

question. In the interest of assisting the President with this

surprisingly difficult task we've compiled this list of 100 mistakes

he has made since taking office:

 

Iraq

 

1. Failing to build a real international coalition prior to the

Iraq invasion, forcing the US to shoulder the full cost and

consequences of the war.

 

2. Approving the demobilization of the Iraqi Army in May, 2003 –

bypassing the Joint Chiefs of Staff and reversing an earlier position,

the President left hundreds of thousands of armed Iraqis disgruntled

and unemployed, contributing significantly to the massive security

problems American troops have faced during occupation.

 

3. Not equipping troops in Iraq with adequate body armor or

armored HUMVEES.

 

4. Ignoring the advice Gen. Eric Shinseki regarding the need for

more troops in Iraq – now Bush is belatedly adding troops, having

allowed the security situation to deteriorate in exactly the way

Shinseki said it would if there were not enough troops.

 

5. Ignoring plans drawn up by the Army War College and other

war-planning agencies, which predicted most of the worst security and

infrastructure problems America faced in the early days of the Iraq

occupation.

 

6. Making a case for war which ignored intelligence that there

were no Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq.

 

7. Deriding " nation-building " during the 2000 debates, then

engaging American troops in one of the most explicit instances of

nation building in American history.

 

8. Predicting along with others in his administration that US

troops would be greeted as liberators in Iraq.

 

9. Predicting Iraq would pay for its own reconstruction.

 

10. Wildly underestimating the cost of the war.

 

11. Trusting Ahmed Chalabi, who has dismissed faulty intelligence

he provided the President as necessary for getting the Americans to

topple Saddam.

 

12. Disbanding the Sunni Baathist managers responsible for Iraq's

water, electricity, sewer system and all the other critical parts of

that country's infrastructure.

 

13. Failing to give UN weapons inspectors enough time to certify

if weapons existed in Iraq.

 

14. Including discredited intelligence concerning Nigerian Yellow

Cake in his 2003 State of the Union.

 

15. Announcing that " major combat operations in Iraq have ended "

aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln on May 1, 2003, below a " Mission

Accomplished " banner – more U.S. soldiers have died in combat since

Bush's announcement than before it.

 

16. Awarding a multi-billion dollar contract to Halliburton in

Iraq, which then repeatedly overcharged the government and served

troops dirty food.

 

17. Refusing to cede any control of Post-invasion Iraq to the

international community, meaning reconstruction has received limited

aid from European allies or the U.N.

 

18. Failing to convince NATO allies why invading Iraq was important.

 

19. Having no real plan for the occupation of Iraq.

 

20. Limiting bidding on Iraq construction projects to " coalition

partners, " unnecessarily alienating important allies France, Germany

and Russia.

 

21. Diverting $700 million into Iraq invasion planning without

informing Congress.

 

22. Shutting down an Iraqi newspaper for " inciting violence " – the

move, which led in short order to street fighting in Fallujah, incited

more violence than the newspaper ever had.

 

23. Telling Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan about plans to go to

war with Iraq before Secretary of State Colin Powell.

 

Counterterrorism

 

24. Allowing several members of the Bin Laden family to leave the

country just days after 9/11, some of them without being questioned by

the FBI.

 

25. Focusing on missile defense at the expense of counterterrorism

prior to 9/11.

 

26. Thinking al Qaeda could not attack without state sponsors, and

ignoring evidence of a growing threat unassociated with " rogue states "

like Iraq or North Korea.

 

27. Threatening to veto the Homeland Security department – The

President now concedes such a department " provides the ability for our

agencies to coordinate better and to work together better than it was

before. "

 

28. Opposing the creation of the September 11th commission, which

the President now expects " to contain important recommendations for

preventing future attacks. "

 

29. Denying documents to the 9/11 commission, only relenting after

the commissioners threatened a subpoena.

 

30. Failing to pay more attention to an August 6, 2001 PDB

entitled " Bin laden Determined to Attack in U.S. "

 

31. Repeatedly ignoring warnings of terrorists planning to use

aircraft before 9/11.

 

32. Appointing the ultra-secretive Henry Kissinger to head the

9/11 commission – Kissinger stepped down weeks later due to conflicts

of interest.

 

33. Asking for testimony before the 9/11 commission be limited to

one hour, a position from which the president later backtracked.

 

34. Not allowing national Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice to

testify before the 9/11 commission – Bush changed his mind as pressure

mounted.

 

35. Cutting an FBI request for counterterrorism funds by

two-thirds after 9/11.

 

36. Telling Americans there was a link between Saddam Hussein and

al Qaeda.

 

37. Failing to adequately secure the nation's nuclear weapons labs.

 

38. Not feeling a sense of urgency about terrorism or al Qaeda

before 9/11.

 

Afghanistan

 

39. Reducing resources and troop levels in Afghanistan and out

before it was fully secure.

 

40. Not providing security in Afghanistan outside of Kabul,

leaving nearly 80% of the Afghan population unprotected in areas

controlled by Feudal warlords and local militias.

 

41. Committing inadequate resources for the reconstruction of

Afghanistan.

 

42. Counting too heavily on locally trained troops to fill the

void in Afghanistan once U.S. forces were relocated to Iraq.

 

43. Not committing US ground troops to the capture of Osama Bin

Laden, when he was cornered in the Tora Bora region of

Afghanistan in November, 2001.

 

44. Allowing opium production to resume on a massive scale after

the ouster of the Taliban.

 

Weapons of Mass Destruction

 

45. Opposing an independent inquiry into the intelligence failures

surrounding WMD – later, upon signing off on just such a commission,

Bush claimed he was " determined to make sure that American

intelligence is as accurate as possible for every challenge in the

future. "

 

46. Saying: " We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found

biological laboratories. "

 

47. Trusting intelligence gathered by Vice President Cheney's and

Secretary Rumsfeld's " Office of Special Plans. "

 

48. Spending $6.5 billion on nuclear weapons this year to develop

new nuclear weapons this year – 50% more in real dollars than the

average during the cold war – while shortchanging the troops on body

armor.

 

Foreign Policy

 

49. Ignoring the importance of the Middle East peace process,

which has deteriorated with little oversight or strategy evident in

the region.

 

50. Siding with China in February, 2004 against a democratic

referenda proposed by Taiwan, a notable shift from an earlier pledge

to stand with " oppressed peoples until the day of their freedom

finally arrives. "

 

51. Undermining the War on Terrorism by preemptively invading Iraq.

 

52. Failing to develop a specific plan for dealing with North Korea.

 

53. Abandoning the United States' traditional role as an

evenhanded negotiator in the Middle East peace process.

 

Economic

 

54. Signing a report endorsing outsourcing with thousands of

American workers having their jobs shipped overseas.

 

55. Instituting steel tariffs deemed illegal by the World Trade

Organization – Bush repealed them 20-months later when the European

Union pledged to impose retaliatory sanctions on up to $2.2 billion in

exports from the United States.

 

56. Promoting economic policies that failed to create new jobs.

 

57. Promoting economic policies that failed to help small businesses

 

58. Pledging a " jobs and growth " package would create 1,836,000

new jobs by the end of 2003 and 5.5 million new jobs by 2004—so far

the president has fallen 1,615,000 jobs short of the mark.

 

59. Running up a foreign deficit of " such record-breaking

proportions that it threatens the financial stability of the global

economy. "

 

60. Issuing inaccurate budget forecasts accompanying proposals to

reduce the deficit, omitting the continued costs of Iraq, Afghanistan

and elements of Homeland Security.

 

61. Claiming his 2003 tax cut would give 23 million small business

owners an average tax cut of $2,042 when " nearly four out of every

five tax filers (79%) with small business income would receive less "

than that amount.

 

62. Passing tax cuts for the wealthy while falsely claiming

" people in the 10 percent bracket " were benefiting most. "

 

63. Passing successive tax cuts largely responsible for turning a

projected surplus of $5 trillion into a projected deficit of $4.3

trillion.

 

64. Moving to strip millions of overtime pay.

 

65. Not enforcing corporate tax laws.

 

66. Backing down from a plan to make CEOs more accountable when

" the corporate crowd " protested.

 

67. Not lobbying oil cartels to change their mind about cutting

oil production.

 

68. Passing tax cuts weighted heavily to help the wealthy.

 

69. Moving to allow greater media consolidation.

 

70. Nominating a notorious proponent of outsourcing, Anthony F.

Raimondo, to be the new manufacturing Czar—Raimondo withdrew his name

days later amidst a flurry of harsh criticism.

 

71. Ignoring calls to extend unemployment benefits with long-term

unemployment reaching a twenty-year high

 

72. Threatening to veto pension legislation that would give

companies much needed temporary relief.

 

Education

 

73. Under-funding No Child Left Behind

 

74. Breaking his campaign pledge to increase the size of Pell grants.

 

75. Signing off on an FY 2005 budget proposing the smallest

increase in education funding in nine years.

 

76. Under-funding the Title I Program, specifically targeted for

disadvantaged kids, by $7.2 billion.

 

77. Freezing Teacher Quality State Grants, cutting off training

opportunities for about 30,000 teachers, and leaving 92,000 less

 

teachers trained than the president called for in his own No Child

Left Behind bill.

 

78. Freezing funding for English language training programs.

 

79. Freezing funding for after school programs, potentially

eliminating 50,000 children from after-school programs.

 

Health

 

80. Not leveling with Americans about the cost of Medicare – the

president told Congress his new Medicare bill would cost $400 billion

over ten years despite conclusions by his own analysts the bill would

cost upwards of $500 billion over that period.

 

81. Silencing Medicare actuary Richard Foster when his estimates

for the Administration's Medicare bill were too high.

 

82. Letting business associate David Halbert, who owns a company

which stands to make millions from new discount drug cards, craft key

elements of the new Medicare bill.

 

83. Underfunding health care for troops and veterans.

 

84. Allowing loopholes to persist in Mad-Cow regulations.

 

85. Relaxing food labeling restrictions on health claims.

 

86. Falsely claiming the restrictions on stem cell research would

not hamper medical progress.

 

87. Reducing action against improper drug advertising by 80 percent.

 

Environment

 

88. Abandoning the Kyoto Treaty without offering an alternative

for reducing greenhouse effect.

 

89. Counting on a voluntary program to reduce emissions of harmful

gasses—so far only a tiny fraction of American companies have signed up.

 

90. Gutting clean air standards for aging power plants.

 

91. Weakening energy efficiency standards.

 

92. Relaxing dumping standards for mountaintop mining, and opening

the Florida Everglades and Oregon's Siskiyou National Forest to mining.

 

93. Lifting protection for more than 200 million acres of public land.

 

94. Limiting public challenges to logging projects and increased

logging in protected areas, including Alaska's Tongass National Forest.

 

95. Weakening environmental standards for snowmobiles and other

off-road vehicles while pushing for exemptions for air pollution

proposals for five categories of industrial facilities.

 

96. Opposing legislation that would require greater fuel

efficiency for passenger cars.

 

97. Reducing inspections, penalties for violations, and

prosecution of environmental crimes.

 

98. Misleading the public about the Washington mad cow case and

the likely effectiveness of USDA's weak testing program.

 

99. Withdrawing public information on chemical plant dangers,

previously used to hold facilities accountable for safety improvements.

 

Other

 

100. Cutting grants to state and local governments in FY 2005,

forcing states to make massive cuts in job training, education,

housing and environment.