The Real Basis for Republican Obama Bashing

There is a pyramid scheme email message (source?) multiplying its way through cyberspace claiming that whatever there is to be mad about Obama's tenure in office there is ten times as much reason to be mad at Bush. Yet while there was no uproar on the part of Republicans about the disastrous economic and foreign policy failures of the Bush administration,  there is a great deal of Republican anger about those of the Obama administration. This can only be because of ... you guessed it.

Dear Friends,

Forward this to your Republican friends (if you have any....).

Now, since Obama's regime, all of a sudden, folks have gotten mad, and want to take America Back...BACK TO WHAT/BACK TO WHERE is my question?

After The 8 Years Of The Bush/Cheney Disaster, Now You Get Mad?

You didn't get mad when the Supreme Court stopped a legal recount and appointed a President.

If the Supreme Court stopped the recount, how could it have been legal?  I see. The author of this piece has  transcendent knowledge of legal matters vastly superior to SCOTUS.

You didn't get mad when Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate Energy policy and push us to invade Iraq.

There is little question that the oil companies wanted in on the "spoils of war".  There is also little question that they miscalculated badly on the projected return on the amount of investment involved. The Der Spiegel article of 12/6/10, with the advantage of perspective, has an interesting postmortem on the oil aspect of the Iraq invasion. It is a pretty thorough account and the lead to the article gives the general tenor:

US Involvement in Iraq: A Lot of Blood for Little Oil

Contrary to what many people believe, the Iraq war provided few advantages for the US oil industry. The diplomatic cables show that, in most cases, it was competitors to the Americans who often did better in the country. Only one US company truly profited: Halliburton.

But divvying up the spoils (which has proven illusory at best) is a factor, one way or another,  in every war. The question is whether there would have been an invasion without the prospect of an illusory boon to oil companies. That can never be decided definitively and to presume otherwise is to presume knowledge that is unobtainable. But the Democratic Congress including Kerry  supported the invasion on the basis that SH was a clear and present danger to the US.

The October 2002 resolution authorizing the invasion had the support of the majority of Democratic senators, as well as the support of the Democratic Party leadership in both the House and the Senate.

That was the stated purpose of government leaders most of whom derived no benefit from the likes of Halliburton, Exxon or BP. Moreover the argument that the invasion took place because SH was going to cut off the oil spigot is completely  off base as SH could hardly cut off his own money supply.

You didn't get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us.

As noted, the invasion was supported by both houses of Congress. That is the legal process.

[There follows a slew of questions regarding why didn't

Republicans under Bush get upset about government spending in Iraq, government borrowing (debt) and in general questions which cite incidents of wasteful or useless government spending under Bush. RINOS aside, the author has it backwards. Conservatives are always upset about big government (tax and spend). The author has the shoe on the wrong foot. In what follows I take up allegations that deal with other points]

You didn't get mad when Bush embraced trade and outsourcing policies that shipped 6 million American jobs out of the country.

This is pretty tricky business. The trouble is that in the real world the conservative free-trade argument which would back outsourcing operates in an environment which does not fit the free-trade model. There is all sorts of government subsidizing and sub-rosa protectionism involved in the real economic world. I leave the field of battle here to the author who, having greater wisdom, knows that all outsourcing is bad? Moreover, irony of ironies, it is not Republicans who are excoriating Obama for outsourcing it is Obama who is excoriating Romney for his alleged outsourcing.

You didn't get mad when they didn't catch Bin Laden.

Well, it's true Bush said that that was not the primary objective of his foreign policy but it was Clinton who had Bin Laden in his sights and neglected to pull the trigger. But I don't get the parallelism here. The pattern is why get mad at Obama for X when Bush is ten times worse with regard to X. Why get mad at Obama for  not catching Bin Laden?

You didn't get mad when you saw the horrible conditions at Walter Reed.

Completely false. Here is a headline from USA Today:

   Bush calls Walter Reed conditions 'unacceptable'

You didn't get mad when we let a major US city, New Orleans, drown.

Again, completely false. Here is a passage from the NYT:

WASHINGTON, Feb. 15 - The homeland security secretary, Michael Chertoff, endured two and a half hours of intense personal criticism Wednesday by Senate Republicans and Democrats investigating the response to Hurricane Katrina, several of whom said he bore responsibility for a multitude of errors that prolonged the suffering of Gulf Coast residents.

You didn't get mad when we gave people who had more money than they could spend, the 1%, over a trillion dollars in tax breaks.

The parallelism please? Why didn't conservatives get mad when Bush gave tax breaks since they got mad at Obama for doing the same??

You didn't get mad with the worst 8 years of job creations in several decades.

I'll give this some credence. The job losses started in earnest in 2009 but could arguably be blamed on the Bush administration with the caveat that the Democrats had control of both houses and were largely to blame for the housing bubble (the Bush administration did try to rein in Fannie, Freddie and Barney). But again, fixing blame is a big time enterprise and fair minded experts differ. Then  came the banking meltdown (I personally blame it on a Chinese mathematician: Recipe for Disaster: The Formula That Killed Wall Street ). Ok. Being a bit facetious here. But the idea is not s far-fetched as it may seem and the article is a fascinating read.

You didn't get mad when lack of oversight and regulations from the Bush Administration caused US Citizens to lose 12 trillion dollars in investments, retirement, and home values.

Answer, same as above.

You finally got mad when a black man was elected President and decided that people in America deserved the right to see a doctor if they are sick. Yes, illegal wars, lies, corruption, torture, job losses by the millions, stealing your tax dollars to make the rich richer, and the worst economic disaster since 1929 are all okay with you, but helping fellow Americans who are sick... Oh, Hell No!

Ah. At last the race card. It had to be coming.

Now how about reversing the question.  From signing statements to rendition, why is it Democrats were so mad at Bush for his policies when Obama gets a pass for many of the same policies?