50 reason why Bush has to go.

[Jetfire]

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/allnews/tm ... _page.html

US writer Judd Legum, of the American Progress Action Fund, has compiled 50 reasons why the Bush administration should no longer be in control of the US...

1 PRESIDENT Bush has spent more than $140billion (£87.5bn) on a highly controversial and unpopular war in Iraq.

2 HE was committed to capturing Osama bin Laden "dead or alive" then reversed his stance and said: "I truly am not that concerned about him."

3 WHEN asked at an April 2004 press conference to name a mistake he'd made during his presidency, Bush couldn't think of a single one.

4 HE ignored estimates from General Eric Shinseki that several hundred thousand troops would be needed to secure Iraq.

5 SINCE he took office, five million Americans have lost their health insurance cover.

6 BUSH'S top legal adviser wrote a memo to the President advising him that he can legally authorise torture.

7 VICE President Dick Cheney (below) said Iraq was "the geographic base of the terrorists

who have had us under assault, most especially on 9/11". The 9/11 Commission found Iraq had no involvement in the attacks and no links with al-Qaeda.

8 IN May 2003, Bush landed on an aircraft carrier proclaiming "mission accomplished" and announced that major combat operations were over in Iraq. Asked if he regretted the stunt, he said he'd do it all over again.

9 IMAGES of firefighters carrying flag-draped coffins through the rubble of the World Trade Center were used to score political points in a Bush campaign advert.

10 MORE than 1,300 Allied troops and 19,000 Iraqis have lost their lives in Iraq.

11 AFTER weapons inspector Charles Duelfer said there was "no evidence that Hussein had passed illicit weapons material to al-Qaeda", Bush insisted: "There was a real risk Saddam would pass weapons, materials or information to terrorist networks."

12 BUSH sent troops into battle without adequate body armour or armoured vehicles.

13 FIVE times as many US agents have been assigned to investigate Cuban embargo violations as have tracked bin Laden's and Saddam's millions.

14 THE Bush administration let disgraced Enron boss Ken Lay - a close friend of Dubya's - help write its energy policy.

15 BUSH officials instructed the FBI to question people planning to protest at political conventions.

16 CHENEY told voters that unless they elect Bush, "we'll get hit again" by terrorists.

17 BUSH did nothing to prevent the US minimum wage from falling to an inflation-adjusted 50-year low.

18 DESPITE an al-Qaeda training manual suggesting terrorists come to the US to buy assault weapons, Bush has not acted on it.

19 DICK Cheney said Americans "will, in fact, be greeted as liberators" in Iraq.

20 BUSH granted the 9/11 Commission just $3million (£1.8m) to probe the attacks, while the commission that investigated the Columbia shuttle crash got $50million (£31m).

21 MORE than three years after 9/11, just five per cent of all cargo - including cargo transported on passenger planes - is screened.

22 BUSH blocked efforts to allow Medicare to negotiate cheaper prescription drug prices for pensioners.

23 SINCE 9/11, Attorney General John Ashcroft has detained 5,000 foreign nationals in anti-terrorism sweeps - none have been convicted of a terrorist crime.

24 BUSH has openly opposed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, undermining nuclear non-proliferation efforts.

25 HE awarded a multi-billion-dollar no-bid contract to Halliburton - a firm that still pays Cheney huge sums in deferred compensation (Cheney is a Halliburton shareholder).

26 BUSH officials told Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan about plans to go to war with Iraq before telling Secretary of State Colin Powell.

27 RECORDS show that Bush performed no National Guard duty in a six-month period in 1972 and a three-month period in 1973, despite trumpeting his role.

28 BUSH relentlessly pushed an energy bill containing $23.5billion (£14.6bn) in corporate tax breaks - much would have benefited campaign contributors.

29 SECRETARY of Homeland Security Tom Ridge awarded contracts to several firms in which he is an investor - including Microsoft, GE, Sprite and Pfizer.

30 BUSH created a massive tax loophole for sports utility vehicles - allowing, for example, the write-off of the entire cost of a new Hummer off-roader.

31 BUSH said gay marriage was a state issue... before supporting a constitutional amendment banning it.

32 HIS top economic adviser, Greg Mankiw, said the outsourcing of American jobs abroad was "a plus for the economy in the long run".

33 AT the behest of the french-fry industry, Bush changed the definition of fresh vegetables to include frozen french fries.

34 BUSH slashed funding for the largest US public housing program, putting two million families in danger of losing their homes.

35 BUSH refuses to release 27 pages of a Congressional report said to detail the Saudi Arabian government's connections to the 9/11 hijackers.

36 TOP Bush officials accepted $127,600 (£79,750) in gifts from the Saudi royals in 2003, including jewellery for first lady Laura Bush valued at $95,500 (£59,687).

37 AFTER receiving a memo from the CIA in August 2001 titled "Bin Laden Determined To Attack America", Bush continued his month-long holiday.

38 BUSH has proposed cutting the budget of the Environmental Protection Agency by $600million (£325m) next year.

39 DURING the Bush presidency, North Korea has quadrupled its suspected nuclear arsenal.

40 THE Bush administration went to court to block lawsuits by patients injured by defective prescription drugs and medical devices.

41 A DAY after Bush bragged about his efforts to help pensioners afford healthcare, the government announced the largest increase of Medicare premiums in history.

42 AT the behest of the tobacco industry, Bush tried to water down a global treaty that aimed to help curb smoking.

43 BUSH is the first president since Herbert Hoover to have a net loss of jobs - around 800,000 - over a four-year term.

44 BUSH gave security firm Accenture a huge border control contract, despite the firm moving operations to Bermuda for alleged tax reasons.

45 IN 2000, Bush said: "The vast majority of my tax cuts go to the bottom end of the spectrum." Yet the top 20 per cent of earners received 68 per cent of the benefits.

46 IN 2000, Bush promised to cut the national debt to a historically low level. On September 30, it stood at $7,379,052,696, 330.32 (£4.6trillion), a record high.

47 BUSH turned a $236billion (£147.5bn) economic surplus into a $422billion (£263bn)deficit.

48 HE ignored Red Cross pleas to stop the abuse of prisoners in US custody.

49 BUSH broke his pledge to place limits on carbon dioxide emissions.

50 BUSH once said: "You can't distinguish between al-Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror", before admitting Saddam had no role in 9/11.

[Best First]

44 BUSH gave security firm Accenture a huge border control contract, despite the firm moving operations to Bermuda for alleged tax reasons.

Thats me baby! We ain't a security firm tho... we do IT.

[Jetfire]

44 BUSH gave security firm Accenture a huge border control contract, despite the firm moving operations to Bermuda for alleged tax reasons.

Thats me baby! We ain't a security firm tho... we do IT.

Or so you claim..... perhaps your topic about paying tax is just a cover, you can afford an awful lot of Tf toys after all

[Best First]

i think its appalling that we avoid Tax in the US - the UK arm of the company does not as far as i know.

[Impactor returns 2.0]

lots of companys avoid tax tho by having thier accounts off-shore?

[Best First]

yep. and it sucks.

[Impactor returns 2.0]

morals and buiss.

If you could save money buy moving your accounts off shore and not paying Tax you would do so, no?

Do we not all try are best to pay the least ammount of Tax possible on everyhthing we earn/buy - for instance we all pick up a bit of duty free -
or you buy video games off play.com to avoid tax?

these guys are just doing it on far larger scale - but its still tax avoidance none the less?

[Jetfire]

morals and buiss.

If you could save money buy moving your accounts off shore and not paying Tax you would do so, no?

Do we not all try are best to pay the least ammount of Tax possible on everyhthing we earn/buy - for instance we all pick up a bit of duty free -
or you buy video games off play.com to avoid tax?

these guys are just doing it on far larger scale - but its still tax avoidance none the less?

Well it's not about avoiding tax. Many people are happy to pay, they just don't want to get stung for more than they feel they should be paying, especially when it goes on things that people feel it should not.

I've never picked up duty free, don't have a car.

And as for play.com, it's fair to say in the UK we tend to pay much more for everyday things than virtually everywhere else in the world.
We also pay plenty of tax so why shouldn't people, fairly and legally go for a cheeper deal in a internationally competative market?

play.com isn't illegal and its not avoiding tax-just paying less.