Top Ten Bush Lies
by David Corn, http://BushLies.com
All
presidents have lied, but George W. Bush has relentlessly abused the
truth. In "The Lies Of George W. Bush: Mastering The Politics Of
Deception" (Crown Publishers, October 2003)—a steely and scathing
indictment of the president and his advisers—David Corn, the Washington
editor of The Nation and a Fox News Channel contributor, reveals and
examines the deceptions at the heart of the Bush presidency. In a stunning
piece of journalism, he details and substantiates the all-too many times
Bush and his aides have knowingly misled the American public to advance
their own interests and agenda.
After I finished writing a 300-page book detailing a wide assortment
of George W. Bush lies—scores of deceptions, if not many more (I
haven’t counted)—my publisher requested that I produce a top-ten
list of Bush lies. It would be good for marketing, I was told. In my
mind, the "top" lies numbered far more than ten. And after
all, the book has fourteen chapters. A list of ten would have to leave
out entire swaths of this work, including sections on such important
subjects as global warming, missile defense, environmental standards,
Bush’s failed energy plan, and Afghanistan reconstruction. It also
would have to rely upon a false equivalency in order to provide a full
flavor of the book. One could easily argue that the ten most significant
lies of the Bush presidency all related to his campaign for war in Iraq.
But such a list would not be much good from a sales perspective, for
the point of The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception
is to show that Bush has lied his way through most serious policy matters
(as well as through his bid for the presidency). Thus, I’m forced,
as I brutally boil down 120,000 words to ten bullet items, to rely upon
lies that represent larger body of lies. So here is a painfully constructed
list—arranged in quasi-chronological order--that demonstrates the
severity and range of Bush’s serial lying but that only skims the
surface. For the complete picture—as well as for all the details
that support the below accusations—please read the book.
10.
"I have been very candid about my past." Bush said this during
a press conference a few days before Election Day 2000. He was then
in the middle of media firestorm that followed the revelation that he
had once been arrested for drunken driving. Of course, this statement
was untrue. He uttered it while he was trying to explain why he had
not been "candid" about his arrest record. And during the
campaign, he had not been "candid" about other significant
matters, including what seemed to be a missing year in his National
Guard service (which did not jibe with what he wrote about his service
in his autobiography) and his apparent (though unacknowledged) shift
from supporting abortion rights in the late-1970s to opposing them in
the 1990s. He also was not "candid" about the tax plans he
had pushed while governor of Texas. He always referred to them as "tax
cuts" and did not mention that his major tax proposal included
both tax cuts for property owners and an increase in the sales tax and
the creation of a new business tax.
9. "I’m a uniter not a divider." This was a Bush catchphrase,
a mantra. It was shorthand for his claim that he engaged in positive,
not negative, politics and could heal a political culture ripped apart
by the bitter ideological and partisan combat of the Clinton years.
Yet during the 2000 presidential campaign and the Florida fracas, Bush
and his lieutenants engaged in down-and-dirty and divisive political
maneuvers. Just ask Senator John McCain, Bush’s main Republican
opponent, whose record on veterans affairs was falsely attacked by a
Bush surrogate and who was accused falsely by the Bush campaign of opposing
research for breast cancer. As president-elect, Bush nominated one of
the most divisive ideologues in Washington, former Senator John Ashcroft,
to be attorney general. During a pre-inauguration interview, Bush acknowledged
that he expected Ashcroft to be a lightning rod. But would-be uniters-not-dividers
do not shove lightning rods up the backsides of their opponents. Another
example: during the 2002 congressional campaign, Bush accused Democrats—who
differed with him on employment rules for the new Department of Homeland
Security—of sacrificing national security for their own petty purposes.
He did this to help elect Republicans to office. Such a move was well
within his rights as a political player, but not the action of a fellow
who cares more about uniting than dividing.
8.
"My plan unlocks the door to the middle class of millions of hard-working
Americans." All the available slots of this top-ten list could
be filled by statements Bush made to sell his tax cuts at various points—on
the campaign trail, in 2001 (for the first major tax-cuts battle), and
in 2003 (for the second major tax-cuts battle). But I chose an assertion
from 2001 that echoed statements from the campaign trail, that would
be reprised in 2003, and that represented the best-sounding argument
for his tax cuts. Bush frequently claimed his tax cuts would help low-
and middle-income Americans, and in 2000 and 2001 he often spoke of
a mythical single-mom waitress, making $22,000 or so, who would be guided
into the middle-class by his tax cuts. The point was to make it seem
as if he truly cared for hard-pressed Americans and that his tax cuts
did indeed embody his promise of "compassionate conservatism."
(By the way, I am not placing on this list Bush’s claim that he
is a "compassionate conservative." That’s a rather relative
term more suitable for judgment than truth-based evaluation.) But when
the accounting firm of Deloitte & Touche reviewed his tax plan for
Time magazine during the 2000 campaign, it found that his beloved waitress
would receive no reduction in her taxes. Zippo. In 2001, the Center
on Budget and Policy Priorities found that this waitress might gain
$200 from Bush’s tax cuts if she managed to pull in $25,000 a year.
But such a sum would not place her on the highway to the middle class.
In fact, about 12 million low- and moderate-income families received
no tax relief from Bush’s 2001 tax cuts (and millions of families
were left out of his 2003 package). His plan unlocked few doors. Instead,
about 45 percent of the 2001 package was slated to go to the top 1 percent
of income earners. In 2003, Citizens for Tax Justice calculated that
individuals earning between $16,000 and $29,000 would net about $99
from Bush’s proposed tax cuts. Again, not an amount that would
cover the entrance fee for a middle-class life.
7.
"This allows us to explore the promise and potential of stem cell
research." That was what Bush said during an August 9, 2001, speech,
announcing his decision to permit the federal funding of stem cell research
that only used stem cells lines that existed before his speech. Bush
was presenting his policy as a Solomon-like compromise. Religious right
leaders and the Catholic Church were opposed to all stem cell research
because it uses cells extracted from five-day old blastocysts (or embryos)
in a process that destroys the embryos. (These embryos usually are leftovers
created by in vitro fertilization at fertility clinics and no longer
needed by the couples for which they were produced). But many prominent
Republican donors and patient advocacy groups supported stem cell research,
noting that scientists believed that studying stem cells (which have
the potential to grow into any one of the more than 200 different types
of human cells) could lead to treatments for Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s
and other terrible diseases. In his speech, Bush said that 60 stem cell
lines already existed—"where the life and death decision has
already been made"--and that these lines could support a vital
and vibrant research effort. Consequently, he said, federally funding
could be limited to underwriting research that employed only these lines.
Bush was trying to have it both ways. He could appease his social conservative
supporters by saying no to any federal support for new stem cell lines,
and he could claim to support research that might potentially help millions
of people. There was one problem. The 60 pre-existing lines did not
exist. The number was closer to a dozen—if that—an amount
that experts in the field did not consider sufficient for research purposes.
And when scientists and media reports convincingly discredited Bush’s
count—which Bush might have initially assumed to be correct—the
Bush administration kept repeating its untruthful position. Sticking
to the 60-lines fantasy (or lie) permitted Bush to avoid making an explicit
decision to curtail stem cell research. But in effect that was what
he had done without admitting it.
6. "We must uncover every detail and learn every lesson of September
the 11th." Bush said this in November 2002, as he appointed Henry
Kissinger to be chairman of an independent 9/11 commission that Bush
had orignially opposed. (Kissinger lasted two weeks in the job.) But
Bush has not encouraged the uncovering of every detail. His administration
did not turn over information to the congressional 9/11 inquiry about
intelligence warnings the White House reviewed before 9/11. The administration
also refused to say whether certain pre-9/11 intelligence warnings—including
a July 2001 report noting that Osama bin Laden was poised to launch
a "spectacular" attack "designed to inflict mass casualties
against U.S. facilities or interests"—were shared with Bush
and what he did in response, if he had received them. Moreover, the
administration claimed that Bush’s awareness of these warnings
(not the warnings themselves) was classified information—an argument
unprecedented in the modern history of national security secrets. Bush
also refused to let the congressional inquiry release the portion of
its final report that concerned connections between the 9/11 hijackers
and Saudi citizens or officials. By resorting to such secrecy—which
happened to keep hidden information that might be embarrassing or inconvenient
for the Bush administration--Bush made it impossible for investigators
to "uncover every detail" and for the nation to "learn
every lesson."
5. "[We are] taking every possible step to protect our country
from danger." Bush said that a month after 9/11, and he has repeated
that vow several times since then, including at the start of his recent
month-long vacation at his Texas ranch. Every possible step? A reassuring
line, but it is not true. Two years after the attacks, there still is
no plan for enhanced security at the nation’s thousands of chemical
plants. (Over a hundred of them handle chemicals that if released could
threaten a million or so Americans.) According to the General Accounting
Office, the Bush administration has not even "comprehensively assessed
the chemical industry’s vulnerabilities to terrorist attacks."
In October 2002, Tom Ridge, Bush’s chief homeland security official,
said that voluntary regulations for the chemical industry would not
suffice, but that is the policy the administration has been slowly pursuing.
And less-than-everything has been the approach in other critical areas.
A recent report from a Council on Foreign Relations task force—headed
up by former Republican Senator Warren Rudman—says that not enough
has been done to improve the abilities of first responders and that
their basic needs will be underfunded by $100 billion over the next
five years. The nation’s ports have asked for $1 billion to beef
up security; the Bush administration has announced grants of $300 million.
Various reports note that the federal government has not done all that
is necessary to improve its biodefense capabilities. The administration
has opposed efforts to mandate the screening of commercial cargo carried
by passenger aircraft. (Most of this sort of cargo is not currently
screened—creating one large security loophole.) So "every
possible step" has not been taken.
4. "I first got to know Ken [Lay in 1994]." As the Enron scandal
reached the White House in early 2002, Bush uttered this remark, claiming
he had nothing to do with Lay until after winning the 1994 Texas gubernatorial
election. It was an apparent and clumsy effort to diminish his relationship
with the now-disgraced Enron chief. But in1994, Lay and Enron had been
leading contributors to Bush’s campaign. And Lay—long a patron
of Bush’s father—had worked with Bush in political settings
prior to 1994. In a pre-scandal interview, Lay noted he had been "very
close to George W." for years before1994. (In the mid-1980s, Bush’s
oil venture was in a partnership with Enron.) Bush also claimed that
his administration had been of absolutely no help to Enron. That might
have been true during the scam-based company’s final days. But
in the months preceding that, the Bush administration had assisted Enron
in a variety of ways. This included appointing individuals recommended
by Lay as top energy regulators and opposing wholesale price caps on
electricity during the California energy crisis, a move that came after
Lay (whose electricity-selling company was using manipulative tactics
to gouge California) urged the White House to block price caps.
3. "Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves
no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some
of the most lethal weapons ever devised." And, "[Saddam Hussein
is] a threat because he is dealing with al Qaeda." These two Bush
remarks go hand in hand, even though the first was said on March 17,
2003, two days before Bush launched the invasion of Iraq, and the other
came during a November 7, 2002, press conference. Together they represented
his argument for war: Hussein possessed actual weapons of mass destruction
and at any moment could hand them to his supposed partners in al Qaeda.
That is why Hussein was an immediate threat to the United States and
had to be taken out quickly. But neither of these assertions were truthful.
There has been much media debate over all this. But the postwar statements
of Richard Kerr, a former deputy director of the CIA, provide the most
compelling proof. He has been conducting a review of the prewar intelligence,
and he has told reporters that the intelligence on Hussein’s WMDs
was full of caveats and qualifiers and based mostly on inferential or
circumstantial evidence. In other words, it was not no-doubt material.
He also has said that prewar intelligence reports did not contain evidence
of links between Hussein and al Qaeda. The best information to date
indicates that the prewar intelligence did not leave "no doubt"
about WMDs and did not support Bush’s claim that Hussein was in
cahoots with al Qaeda. Bush’s primary reason for war was founded
on falsehoods
2. "We found the weapons of mass destruction." Bush issued
this triumphant remark in late May 2003, while being interviewed by
a Polish television reporter. He was referring to two tractor-trailers
obtained by U.S. forces in Iraq. The CIA and the Defense Intelligence
Agency had concluded these vehicles were mobile bio-weapons plants.
Yet they had found not a trace of biological agents on either. (And
no bio-weapon facility could be scrubbed completely clean.) In subsequent
weeks, it turned out that State Department analysts and even DIA engineering
experts—as well as outside experts—did not accept the CIA
and DIA conclusion, and some of these doubters believed the explanation
of Iraqis who claimed the trucks were built to produce hydrogen for
weather balloons. Whichever side might be ultimately right about the
trailers, this all-important piece of evidence was hotly contested.
It was hardly solid enough to support Bush’s we-found-them declaration
or to justify a war.
1. "It’s time to restore honor and dignity to the White House."
Bush said that many a time during the 2000 presidential campaign, and
in at least one ad pledged to "return honor and integrity"
to the Oval Office. See above--and read the book.
All presidents have lied, but George W. Bush has relentlessly abused
the truth. In THE LIES OF GEORGE W. BUSH: MASTERING THE POLITICS OF
DECEPTION (Crown Publishers, October 2003)—a steely and scathing
indictment of the president and his advisers—David Corn, the Washington
editor of The Nation and a Fox News Channel contributor, reveals and
examines the deceptions at the heart of the Bush presidency. In a stunning
piece of journalism, he details and substantiates the all-too many times
Bush and his aides have knowingly misled the American public to advance
their own interests and agenda.
When campaigning for the presidency, Bush vowed to “restore”
honor and integrity to the Oval Office, but Corn uses the president’s
own words and deeds to prove beyond a doubt that this claim was the
first lie of many. In other instances of presidential prevarication,
Bush has:
• Brazenly misrepresented intelligence data and relied on dishonest
arguments to whip up support for war with Iraq;
• Made numerous false statements about the provisions and effects
of his super-sized tax cuts;
• Offered disingenuous and misleading explanations about the 9/11
attacks, the war on terrorism, and homeland security;
• Lied about his connections—and those of his administration—to
corporate crooks;
• Presented deceptive claims to sell controversial policies on
the environment, stem cell research, missile defense, abortion, energy,
Social Security, health care, education, and other crucial issues;
• Dishonestly claimed to be a positive campaigner while engaging
in deceitful and down-and-dirty tactics during the 2000 presidential
campaign and recount drama.
The Lies Of George W. Bush is no partisan whine. It is a carefully constructed,
well-developed, and convincing fact-driven account that shows how Bush
has consistently relied upon duplicity to wage political and policy
battles. The book covers lies Bush told as a presidential candidate
(“I have been very candid about my past”); in his first days
in office (“We pulled back [the arsenic standard] so that we could
make a decision based upon sound science”); while selling a war
to the American people (“Intelligence gathered by this and other
governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess
and conceal some of the most lethal weapon ever devised”); and
as a crusader for tax cuts (“Tax relief for everybody . . . while
still reducing our national debt and funding important priorities”).
Corn explains with wit and style how Bush managed to get away with it,
and he explores the dangerous consequences of White House deceit in
a perilous age.
Source: http://BushLies.com
