237 of 278 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
BUSH'S CHARACTER TAKES A BEATING, September 29, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: Is Our Children Learning? : The Case Against George W. Bush (Paperback)
... With the publication of this immensely readable, witty, compact yet amply-documented book, Begala shows why we should all tremble if Bush is elected to the White House.
I'm more amazed than ever that Bush has dared to make "character" an issue in his campaign. As Begala's book attests, the red thread running through Bush's life and record is gross irresponsibility born of privilege. I already knew, for example, that Bush evaded the draft and used his father's influence to jump the waiting list for the national guard. But I was shocked to learn that Bush never showed up during the whole year that he was ordered to report to the Alabama National Guard. What's more, Bush told a press conference last June that he "didn't remember" what he did that year in Alabama. Really? The WHOLE year? (Why should that year be hazier than the two years after graduation he spent, in his words, "drinking and carousing and fumbling around")? Begala's discussion of Bush's business ventures is short but snappy. We learn about Bush's first foray, in which he raised, and promptly lost, millions of dollars invested by his father's friends-- and then sold this disaster dubbed "El Busto", by then worth just $38,000, to another of Poppy's friends for $1 million. Even more astonishing, we learn that Bush engaged in but was never prosecuted or even reproached for INSIDER TRADING in 1990 while a director of Harken Energy. He didn't even comply with the law requiring him to report the sale until eight months after the deadline. (Unfortunately the press is too busy dissecting "important issues" like open mikes and verbal gaffes to investigate commercial hanky panky).
As head of the Texas Rangers, Bush persuaded the citizens of Arlington to raise their taxes to pay for a new stadium, while the Rangers retained all the profits once it opened. Well, the people's loss was Bush's gain. For some strange reason, Bush's partners allowed him to increase his share of his holdings from 2 percent to 12 percent without Bush investing more of his own money. So, while citizens got the shaft, Bush reaped a windfall profit of over $14 million principally on shares he never bought. For doing what? For trading Sammy Sosa? Worse than that, Bush's meager record of PUBLIC service also comes across more like public plunder.
His tax plan would give the richest 1% NEARLY HALF of all tax cuts, while "most average working families would get about 60 cents per day." As Begala, citing UPI, notes, he's squandered Texas's budget surplus: "the first time in nine years that Texas has suffered a budget pinch." Thanks to Bush, say 44 environmental groups in Texas, Houston has the dirtiest air in America, causing hundreds of premature deaths each year. The problem is so bad that asthma rates among Houston's inner-city children have doubled in only two years! Small wonder too, because as Begala points out, Bush's idea of trusting people with responsibility is trusting pro-industry, anti-regulation people to occupy EVERY SINGLE position in his environmental agency. And I guess he also trusts us not to notice.
EDUCATION PRESIDENT? A cruel hoax. As Begala tells us, Bush already broke his promise to Texas voters to increase public education's share of the budget from 45% to 60%; it declined instead. Not only did Bush fail to give schools the money he promised, but he even tried to pinch $47 million from the teacher's pension fund to cover administrative costs normally funded from general revenues. He admitted in 1998: "Higher education is not my priority." Nor is the hiring of new teachers to reduce class size, universal prekindergarten, teacher testing and many other proposals Gore champions. Bush proudly chose as his running mate a man who was one of very few in the House to vote against Head Start, free immunizations for the poor, college student aid, and lunch programs for the neediest children.
Most damning are the words coming from Bush's own mouth: "I've never been a long-term planner about anything. I have lived my life with more of a short-term focus." That's in part because, as his own aides admit, Bush has an extremely short attention span. In other words, he's lazy. He can't be bothered to read 10-page policy papers. "I do need somebody to tell me where Kosovo is," he told the Manchester Guardian. I suppose reading the newspaper or looking at a map would be asking too much. (And what a fine role model for our students.) Too bad Bush didn't ask his adviser and full-time security blanket Condoleeza Rice about our delicately-crafted Taiwan policy, in place since Nixon. No president, including Dubya's Poppy, has ever been so reckless as to explicitly pledge to honor a defense pact with Taiwan. Begala writes: "Bush darn near committed us to a war with the largest country in the world." Next to that, I suppose the fear that Bush would make America a laughingstock is small potatoes. Still, I winced when I learned Bush told a Slovakian journalist: "The only thing I know about Slovakia is what I learned first-hand from your foreign minister, who came to Texas." Problem is, he met with the PRIME MINISTER of SLOVENIA.
After reading Begala's book I wondered: How can we expect Bush to keep government agencies honest and accountable if he can't be bothered with more than brief assurances and summaries spoon-fed by aides?
I agree with conservative columnist George Will, who sees Dubya as a careless, reckless adolescent. If he can't bother to prepare adequately for the most important job in the world, why should Americans bother to vote for him?
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53 of 62 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
It'll make you laugh, it'll make you cry., March 30, 2001
This review is from: Is Our Children Learning? : The Case Against George W. Bush (Paperback)
I bought this book and _George W. Bushisms : The Slate Book of The Accidental Wit and Wisdom of our 43rd President_ by George W. Bush, Jacob Weisberg. The choice of books probably tells you that I don't particularly like Bush. I still don't. Neither does the author of this book, Paul Begala. While Begala makes no claims to being non-paritisan here, he does claim to be as fair as possible to Bush, and I think that he succeeds. He raises questions about Bush and his character that somehow seem to constantly be ignored by the press, and the Republican Party-- for example, where was Bush when he was supposedly serving in the Alabama National Guard, and why can't he prove he actually served there. The book is readable with a hip sarcastic tone. It's very funny in many places. Unfortunately many of funniest patches are direct quotes from our 43rd president. If you buy it, don't buy _George W. Bushisms_ because most of them are here in the book. As a companion, I'd recommend _Shrub: the Short but Happy Political Life of George W. Bush_ by Molly Ivins instead. On the other hand, since we're stuck with Bush now, you might just want to not know about all this.
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56 of 66 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Strong evidence outweighs bias, December 29, 2000
This review is from: Is Our Children Learning? : The Case Against George W. Bush (Paperback)
Admittedly, Begala is not the most objective person in the world, and that alone will probably keep many from reading this book. But that doesn't change the facts, which Begala has meticulously documented. He uses the words of Bush's own supporters, like Larry Lindsey. He cites studies done by objective third parties, such as The New York Times and The Dallas Morning News. He talks to people close to the issues he discusses who have worked with W, like Texas legislators. If you cut through all the "ask Karl Rove" jokes (which I really enjoyed), you'll see that Begala has gathered strong evidence against W.
For all his talk of Al Gore's character, it's clear that W is not exactly the exemplar of moral fortitude he claims he is. And I won't even mention his intellectual laziness or the fact that his success stems strictly from his family connections, both of which speak for themselves. The bottom line is that those who discount Begala's book simply because of who he is are just as partisan as he is, but even worse off because they blindly follow W without considering his record and what it shows about the kind of president he'll be. Thanks for lowering the bar for us all, W.
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