LOL! What a firestorm. Here is my last contribution to this thread.

First, when I said that Dubya is the dumbest president since I've been alive, I meant it. That has nothing to do with presidents I like or don't like. For example, I intensely disliked Nixon but he was extremely intelligent. We are talking about old-fashioned down-home stupid here. In my personal opinion, he may be mildly disabled. Listen to him when he is talking without a prepared statement. See how confused the guy gets when presented with off-script material and situations. I am no fan of Bush yet it still pains me sometimes to see him floundering like that.

Bush is stuck in "concrete" mode. Children have very concrete thinking, the abstract is tough if not impossible for them. As teenagers, most develop the ability to move their thinking up a notch, to embrace concepts and ideas that are complex and not simply black-and-white. Others, such as Bush, are very literal and never progress further.

Someone mentioned LBJ. Yeah, LBJ was obsessed with Vietnam and turned a skirmish into a major disaster. But he also called up every favor in his book to get southern Democrats to vote for civil rights legislation. He had true compassion for the poor and for children. A bad president? Yes. A dumb president? Not a chance. He was intelligent even while extremely wrong.

The "War on Terror" is no different than the "War on Drugs", "The War on Porn", the "War on Poverty", etc. Its not a real war, it will never end and never be successful. Administration officials have admitted that. Bush wants the onerous Patriot Act to be made permanent to "combat" this permanent war. In other words, trash the Constitution and the Bill of Rights for good.

The intense and widespread spying on Americans was so dreadful that the New York Times sources were all from NSA employees. Imagine that, the NSA frightened about what they were being asked to do! Then the FBI leaked information from their agency dealing with the extensive spying they were being asked to do.

Bush claims that his spying on citizens is not illegal based almost completely on rulings made during a real war, WW II. You know, the one where Congress actually passed a formal declaration of war. He brags about there being no lawsuits opposing him. Well, only the aggrieved parties are allowed to sue and their names are all classified! How convenient.

Bush is so concerned about terrorism that he commits more than 6 billion dollars each month to Iraq but ignores the millions who pour over our open borders. In fact, he want to reward these people with citizenship, snubbing his nose at those who go through the long, and legal, process. States and private citizens are now trying to fight back, defend our borders. That is one of the few real obligations of the federal government under the Constitution but our federal government is too busy elsewhere.

Government conducted in the shadows is dictatorship, pure and simple. No checks, no balances, just the administration making unilateral decisions critical to America's freedoms. If he had followed the law, if he had consulted the special courts even after the fact... No, he felt, and still feels, that he alone knows what best for the rest of us.

But the worst of all is the meek capitulation of so many Americans. In the name of fear, in the name of combatting terrorism, in the name of feeling safe, in the name of the sad old canard "I have nothing to hide", citizens are ALLOWING Bush to continue these heinous actions.

People always see only their own selfish and immediate needs. When Hitler came to power, he only persecuted those who had nothing to do with the majority of Germans. When he consolidated that power and started large scale persecution of Jews, gypsies, etc. the vast majority of Germans didn't worry because they had "nothing to hide." Even during most of the war, it was never close enough to home to care all that much. They were "Good Germans."

It really saddens me to see people here using the same excuse fhere in the United States: "I have nothing to hide so who cares?" Too many "Good Americans" for a healthy society to continue.

There are other things I could list and expand upon but I won't. The destruction of the economy is easy to see. The downgrading of education and outsourcing of jobs, even defense related, is simple to track. Our continuing coddling of China whose economy is attacking us on all sides is clear. Arguments that other countries have it worse than us so everything is OK.

The barbarians are at the gates and all of us, not just Bush, are covering our eyes and denying it.