"Hurry here, hustlin' there. No one's got the time to spare.

This is the guy I voted for twice. I am not a man who lives with regrets in any area of my life. Regrets are for the weak and the pitiful, of which I am neither, I simply take what I learn from mistakes and apply that knowledge to future decisions, hopefully avoing the same mistake more than once. Bush isn't running again and that is a good thing. I admire him for the right things he has done in the face of the certainty that he would be ostracized no matter what decision he made, but he has also left me disappointed, and in some cases, disillusioned with the direction in which he led my beloved country. I can't put it any better than Jeff Jacoby does in this piece, so here it is..and no, I didn't ask the Globe's permission!

warned in 2002 that Iran and North Korea were part of an "axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world." On his watch, he vowed, the United States would "not permit the world's most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world's most destructive weapons."pledged at his second inauguration to support "democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world." He let it be known that the truculence of rogues and dictators would not be indulged. "Some," he said pointedly, "have unwisely chosen to test America's resolve -- and have found it firm."posed a stark choice to the sponsors of jihadist violence -- "You are either with us, or you are with the terrorists" -- where is he now? And, more important, where is the foreign policy he once stood for?Ayman Nour rots in an Egyptian jail, Washington continues to send $1.8 billion in aid each year to the brutal regime of Hosni Mubarak. The administration restored full diplomatic relations with Moammar Khadafy's Libya, stopped designating it a sponsor of terror, and even invited the Libyan foreign minister to the White House. But it has forsaken Fathi el-Jahmi, Libya's foremost democratic dissident, who has spent years in Khadafy's dungeons for daring to advocate pluralism and free speech.Weekly Standard cover story on Condoleezza Rice's record as secretary of state, Stephen Hayes notes that six years after Bush vowed to keep Iran and North Korea from going nuclear, "North Korea is a nuclear power and Iran is either on the brink . . . or making substantial progress." Despite a "seemingly endless series of multilateral negotiations" aimed at neutralizing the two dictatorships, Pyongyang and Tehran have grown more, not less, provocative. "And in each case," Hayes writes, "the State Department has gone out of its way to avoid dealing with these provocations lest they jeopardize our diplomacy."

Bush was the leader who

Whatever became of him? That president who in the wake of Sept. 11

For some time now it has been apparent that the Bush Doctrine -- with the signal exception of Iraq -- didn't survive the Bush presidency. Notwithstanding the president's heartfelt words about supporting democratic reformers, for example, dissidents and freedom-seekers have largely been forgotten.

"When you stand for your liberty," Bush told the world's prisoners of conscience in 2005, "we will stand with you." Yet while the brave democrat

So it has gone, in one country after another. In Russia, in Saudi Arabia, in China, the Bush administration's commitment to liberty and democratic reform has subsided into little more than lip service. The principled "freedom agenda" Bush championed so ardently has evaporated. In its place is the old "realist" agenda he had sworn to overhaul: stability, business-as-usual, stand-by-your-(strong)man.

And what about those dangerous regimes that were seeking the world's most destructive weapons?

In a dispiriting

an essay for Foreign Affairs. Now, alas, she presides over an all-too-Clintonian foreign policy, one in which negotiations and agreements and deal-making outweigh actual improvement and change. From North Korea to the Palestinian Authority to the United Nations, the principles of the Bush Doctrine have been forgotten. "We have gone," one State Department official sadly tells Hayes, "from a policy of preemption to a policy of preemptive capitulation." Is that to be the epitaph of Bush's foreign policy?

A new tax to lower gas prices? Please tell me they are joking! As the senate grilled the heads of Americas largest oil companies as to why prices are so high and what they intend to do about it, they hung thinly veiled threats (probably culled from Obama's speech which he stole from Hillary about the very same tax) of a new "windfall profits" tax over their heads. Is there anyone who actually believes that the oil companies are afraid of such a threat? Is there anyone who actually believes such a tax would have a lowering effect on the price of oil? Americans have already proven they are willing to bite the bullet and pay the price, even as they cut consumption, but I say to you now, the price of gas is going nowhere but up no matter what taxes are imposed on oil companies and We The People will, once again be the ones who bear the brunt of another tax imposed in the wake of another government head hunt so it will appear that they are trying to help We The People. Big Oil(or Big anything else, for that metter)will not be the ones who eat the losses brought about by new taxes. We The People, will eat that cost.

I do not like Hillary Clinton. I disagree with 99.99% of everything that falls from her megalomaniac driven piehole. I believe she is a socialist who would like to see everyone(with the exception of her and her family)in America in the same boat. Her ideas genuinely frighten me as do most short sighted ideas in any arena. She has proven herself to be a liar, or at the very least, an imbellisher, and a hypocrite not to mention wielding double standards like a bronze shield. Facts are an afterthought to her. Truth is a trivial matter better left to those of less importance. She is arrogant and condescending and I think she would be a disaster that would make the Carter and Dubya administrations look like a walk in the park.

I just don't get it. I don't understand mean people. It is just too easy to be friendly and fun, entertaining and cordial. I won't say that I never argue or jump down someone's throat when it is called for, but I am, in essence, a pretty nice guy. I enjoy people. I enjoy making them comfortable in my presence and I like to make people laugh. When you are my close family or true friend there is nothing I possess that you cannot have if you need it, and some of my friends and I disagree vehemently in some areas but are able to rise above that where our friendship is concerned. The same goes for family. I have been married three times and involved in one long term relationship, and with the exception of wife #2, I get along well with them all. Just because things don't work out the way we thought they would is no reason to harbor ill will, so I don't.

Recent posts on this board became extremely personal and vile, and for the first time, I reported a violation. I think everyone knows to what I speak. As I sit here wondering what possesses some people to just plain be mean, I wonder if I have ever sounded that way. I really hope not. I don't dislike anyone on this site and hold no grudges no matter what we have argued about in the past.

I argue on this site regularly with many of you folks, but I have always enjoyed meeting and speaking with all those who have attended the meet n greets no matter how we have gone at it in the past. Randomfactor and I are regular nemisis' here on Bako blog, but I know him to be friendly and a man of his word. I may disagree with most of what he has to say, but I respect him in anycase and that is only one example.

I cannot imagine being mean for the sake of argument to anyone here, and if I ever come off like that I sincerely hope someone on the site calls me on it. I may be sarcastic and cocky, but I strive never to be rude. It is simply uncalled for.

This is not a forum to air personal vendettas, grudges and fights. There have been instances where parties involved in divorces have used this forum to air their dirty laundry, and it really got under my skin. If you have something you want to say to someone involving personal matters, say it to their face or shut the hell up. I am afraid of no one, but even that doesn't mean I am going to get in the face of everyone with whom I have a personal issue. I have learned over time that just ignoring some people is the best way to deal with them. If they wish to allow me to live, rent free, in their heads, that is their problem and I refuse to allow it to become mine.

I am sick of the "War For Oil" mantra of the uninformed people who blame everything from gas prices to the lastest supernova on Bush. If this war is for oil, where is the OPEC glut that would flood the market to drop oil prices as it did in the 80s and again in the 90s? The Arabs may hate us, but they're aren't about to sacrafice their number one cash cow. They have, and never will stand by while we import our own oil from the Gulf. They want us to continue to feed in their pasture and will not allow us to simply build our own pasture(to those who don't understand analogies, "pasture" means "oil reserves"). Even a hint of self reliance where oil is concerned had caused gluts and drastic price cuts in the past. Well..There is always the possiblity of a secret undersea pipeline from Iraq to Crawford funded by the CIA and built by illegal immigrants from Mexico and India, but it too may have been damaged by well informed eco-terrorists or the president of ExxonMobil.

I'm about two weeks behind on this due to simply having too little time to be online and I figured since the last post on this topic was May 6th, nobody would see my comment.

This has to do with all the hoopla surrounding Ben Stein's film. I won't go see it, but that's only because I have a hard time paying nine skins to see ANYTHING! Just by the films premise I knew there would be a lot of backlash and hootin' and hollerin'.

I still think it's funny when the anti-(insert your favorite hate)folks on the left throw such a fit about such things. In this case, a film that calls the right to debate where we came from into question.

Now Ben Stein is a kook, a hack, an idiot, and his film is a "Documocumentary"(I always used the simpler "mocumentary" which "This is Spinal Tap" bestowed upon themselves, but I digress) using clips and snipets of dialogue taken out of context and only pieces of what people had to say to create the illusion that they agreed with the topic of the film or that some of the main targets in the film said something they really didn't say by stringing lines from differing times on differeing subjects together.

Anyone remember Bowling For Columbine, Farenheit 911 or Sicko? These were NOT documentaries and Michael Moore himself made that clear. They were his production of how HE believed things were. But even that admission didn't stop the rank and file haters from touting those films as the greatest documentaries ever made, when in fact, those films used the very same tactics.

Listen people. Maybe many of you need to go watch the History Channel or National Geographic Channel to get a feel for what a REAL documentary is. I'm not defending Stein's film because I have yet to see it, but I can't sit here and listen to the crowing of the films detractors who would, in another place, support the obvious self serving editing of a Michael Moore film simply because they shared his views and not due to facts in eveidence.

I don't know why, but it still amazes me at how thoughtless, mean and immature so many liberals can be. I suppose I should be used to it, but I am not sure that one should ever get used to such things. I actually hope I never do.

I recently sent an e-mail about the personal struggles, successes and values of Cindy McCain to everyone on my mailing list. It wasn't meant as a ploy to win votes for her husband(with whom I generally disagree), it was about her, not her political views. She isn't running for office nor do we hear much about her in the news and that is as it should be. It was merely a human interest piece that I found heartening and positive in these times of so many negatives on a woman who could be the next First Lady. Rather than appreciate the story for what it was she was attacked and ridiculed by a few of my liberal friends who stooped to the liberal gutter of namecalling. "Lush" and "dopehead" were a couple of the names that were directed at her.

Even with her troubles many years behind her and her successes and good works now the norm in her life, there are still those who can't let go of the bitterness that seems to drive their thought processes, keeping them from making the jump from simply voicing opinions based on emotion to engaging in rational, constructive debate or giving credit where credit is due.

I have never called anyone with whom I disagree a name simply because I disagree with them whether in my personal life or in my debates on any subject. I may have attacked their position, and even then I did it respectfully, but I never attacked them personally. Even in the personally disassociated world of politics I don't do it. I admit that in one post I referred to Hillary Clinton as "Billary", and when I read that post some time later I felt like an idiot for having used it. I felt it was beneath me because, as in all of life's situations, namecalling and demeaning nicknames are pointless and counter productive. I am intelligent AND clever and my arguments, writing style, grammar(forgive my typos..I don't use spellcheck),and wit prove that without the need to become part of the lowest common denominator. My emotions have no place in a rational debate. I save those for affairs of the heart, family, friends and fighting.

Whenever I read a piece, whether here or in the news, and see a writer sinking into the pit of character assassination through name calling based on their obvious distaste of another person(in this case Mrs. McCain), I immediately dismiss the entire piece as irrelevant as it is not about the real issue, but about the writer.

If someone wants to wants to blow their stack at an individual based on their opinion of THAT person(as I often do with my old buddy, Hugo Chavez), fine, I have no issues with that, but even then it should be done with rational speech and facts in evidence and not by namecalling and emotional outbursts. If you want people to take you seriously, you should always strive to sound serious and refrain from being petty and irrational.

 

Naw, Hugo Chavez isn't interested in anything but coming to the rescue od and serving his fellow Venezuelans by making their lives easier and more comfortable. Oh, and trying to buy into a spy sattlelite company in 2006. I realize this may sound like old news, but it just recently came to light. Hmmm., I wonder why? It wasn't a communications company. The comany in which he attempted to invest operates a functioning observation sattlelite according to documents filed against his part in the scheme. The sattlelite was launched by Israel in 2006 and Hugo's attempted investment was kept in the dark through backdoor entities but was, nonetheless, found out by Israel, who squashed the deal. I guess I'm not the only one worried by this closet despot.

Hey, I suppose any country should be allowed to have a spy sattlelite if they want one, but Hugo should see to the promises he made his countrymen about spending billions to bring that place out of the 18th century before he starts investing his country's cash in the espionage market.