Pass It On!
Bush is lying. People are dying. And it's time to do something about it.
by Mike Hersh
Webmaster, MikeHersh.com

Sept. 4, 2003 (mikehersh.com) -- Just disagreeing with Bush on the issues is not enough.

Millions of Americans side with Bush on the issues, even though we know he's dead wrong, some because they are right wingers, millions more because they believe Bush's lies.

The Democratic candidates must expose the regime of lies because the mass media sure won't.
The media won't hold Bush to anything close to a reasonable standard. The media is so deeply into Bush, they celebrate when the rate of job losses slows slightly. Television news reports cover up Bush's slow-motion melt-down into another Great Depression. The media report Bush's deficit hikes and giveaways to the wealthy as "stimulus" despite the loss of MILLIONS of jobs and sluggish growth, twisting statistics like balloon animals to avoid the truth.

The truth?

Losing jobs -- even "more slowly" -- is a major catastrophe. We can't say this enough.

The US economy is hemorrhaging jobs, and America must create millions of jobs a year to grow. The Clinton/Gore Administration's stewardship of our nation helped created on average close to 3 MILLION per year. Losing millions of jobs means we are heading to economic hell. Another Great Depression.

Right wingers intentionally destroy jobs. They help their campaign contributors export jobs to pad profit margins. They want high unemployment so they can control their employees -- speak up, try to start a union, ask for basic dignity? There are armies of desperate unemployed all too willing to do your job for a lower salary without benefits.

All of this is because Bush lied all through the 2000 campaign about his reckless, proven destructive tax-and-spending policies. Bush lavishes huge gifts on his friends on our tab. His special interest supporters prosper as we suffer today and as our children will suffer tomorrow.

Bush wasted no time before wasting trillions of dollars of our taxes, going backward to failed policies. Thanks to Bush, the economy lies crushed beneath billions of dollars in new debt. Thanks to Bush, millions of us are out of work, struggling to find decent jobs, losing health care. We need a Democrat back in the White House to clean up the mess Bush made of the economy. Before we're a failed nation living in bleak desperation.

Foreign policy and national security fare no better under Bush. Like every GOP president since Teddy Roosevelt, Bush is making us less safe by undermining our geopolitical and strategic position and antagonizing the rest of the planet. Republicans claim they're tough on terror, and tough on defense. Nonsense. All they do is create conflicts, kill Americans, and leave messes for Democrats to clean up. Bush is perhaps the worst among this sorry Republican tradition.

Bush shamefully misleads us. Especially regarding his efforts to "protect us" from terror. Bush and his people manipulate our fear and anger over 9/11 to control us. Directly because of Bush administration lies, millions of Americans think Iraq was behind 9/11 and was about to deploy nuclear missiles.

Too many people give Bush the benefit of the doubt, despite his string of lies, because the mass media never reports on that. We have to make people understand Bush is lying about nearly everything. For example, Bush claimed Iraq wouldn't let in the UN weapons inspectors and so he had to lead us into war. That's an outright lie, but the media refuses to call Bush on it.

We have to inform people that Bush is lying and people are dying. Not just about Iraq, about everything. Not past tense. Right this minute. Bush's policies are wrong. But it's not enough to tell voters Bush is right wing and wrong. Yes, that's all true, but more conservatives than liberals vote. They support what Bush says he's doing -- what they believe Bush is doing. The problem is Bush himself, not just his positions.

Bush is illegitimate. He's a misleader, not the leader we need. He's wrecking the economy and he's endangering our lives. This is not just some polite political disagreement or heated partisan squabble -- much less a principled ideological debate. There are no rules in this confrontation, and it matters critically who wins.

Bush is not just wrong here and there on this or that fact or figure. It's not that some of his policies are less preferable than proposals we support. Bush is just not qualified. Bush is not acceptable. He is an usurper, a liar and a threat to the American way of life. This is not an overstatement. I don't want to see anyone on the Democratic side shrinking from this.

Bush uses his faux folksy manner and hundred of millions of dollars in special interest campaign cash to say Democrats will get Americans killed. He is making our children emotional hostages, telling swing voters they will die unless they vote for him. Bush is planning to rig voting machines to throw out our votes. If all else fails he'll sue us again to stop counting the surviving votes.

We will not win in November with our scintillating intellectual insights. Scoring scholarly debate points won't help us. We will win by connecting the dots on Bush's gross failures and crimes and hammering home the points people really care about. We will win by connecting emotionally and viscerally with voters.

It's not just that Bush's agenda is too conservative or his policies are a "break with the past."

Bush lies and the economy dies.

Bush lies and Americans die.

Troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, kids with asthma, people without health care, parents without jobs.

It's the lies, stupid.

Mike Hersh is a lawyer and activist who lives and works in Washington, DC. He encourages you to reproduce, excerpt or broadcast any material at our site, provided you identify the source as MikeHersh.com.