Bush Facts

2004-1-26 06:12:00

Gail writes the following about Bush:
My dislike for his way of thinking began when (almost immediately upon taking office) he allowed more arsenic to be put into our water. OSHA won't let my local Home Depot employees cut treated wood (treated with arsenic) but its okay for me to drink more of it in my water. And that was just the door opener.

JJ:
No wonder you dislike him because your facts are incorrect. Bush did not allow more arsenic into the drinking water. The amount of arsenic in the drinking water has gone down since Bush took office.

Here's the real story.

Days before leaving office Clinton issued quite a number of decrees, pardons and executive orders that were more controversial than he wanted to face while in office. He thought he could make some benevolent decrees, get all the credit for his legacy and let Bush take the heat in the implementation thereof.

One of these was a decree that the standard for arsenic in water should be reduced from 50 parts per billion to 10 parts.

When Bush took office he had the problem of implementing this standard which Clinton gave lip service to but did nothing about for eight years.

Here was the problem Bush faced. Most of the nation was not effected by the new standard as their water had little arsenic, but these who were effected were the poorer rural communities that did not have the money for new water systems. The cost of conversion would be billions and would increase the water bills in areas effected around 50%. Because many in these areas were poor the economic effect would be significant, perhaps taking money away from other health programs and spending causing an overall reduction in health rather than an increase.

Then he was advised of another problem. The studies that were cited for increasing the standard of arsenic content were all done in other countries. Those heavily quoted were from Bangladesh, Taiwan and China. There were areas where 50 parts per billion seemed to have a negative effect and others where they did not.

In the United States a study was done of people living in areas where the arsenic level was up to 166 parts per billion and no out of the ordinary health problems were discovered. This study was ignored by the EPA.

It only made sense for Bush to negate the Clinton decree and call for further study on the subject. This is what happened and after seven months he looked at additional studies and decided it would be best to go ahead with the new standard, but give the areas effected until 2006 to make the conversions.

Even given this time period the cost is going to be a hardship for many of the rural cash-starved areas of the country that will suffer health benefits from taking one program to give to another. Many of these rural communities are angry that they cannot make their own decisions concerning their drinking water and that their cost for water will be going up 50%.

The sad thing is that critics of Bush lambaste him with lies such as accusing him of "adding arsenic to the drinking water." He never added any, but studied the situation and wound up supporting a higher standard. After all the accusations against him supported by the press he was just about forced to comply no matter what the new studies revealed.

I'm a big believer in pure drinking water myself, but I can certainly sympathize with the situation that Clinton laid on him. There were positive and negatives of either choice. It was not a black and white good or evil for many believe that the new standard, which will cost billions, will create more grief than it will take away.

Another interesting point is that many of those who insist on the higher arsenic standard support fluoridation of our waters. Little do they realize that the fluoridation process adds lead, mercury and arsenic to the water

Gail continues:
His administration has allowed, promoted, initiated or sponsored more environmental desecration and destruction than any other (or several combined) administrations before him-

JJ:
Where do you get this idea? I've looked into each accusation against him in this area and found him to be much more environmentally friendly than any president in recent history. If you look at the facts you will agree with me. If you look at the emotional knee jerk emotional reactions and false accusations then you will disagree.

A case in point is his Health Forests initiative. We here in Idaho, one of the most forested areas in the world, understand the basic principle that if we thin out some trees then large forest fires will not happen and thousands of innocent animals do not have to be burned alive. When I was younger, before the environmentalists ruined our forest environment by preventing commercial thinning, we never had the out-of-control fires the way we do today.

The environmentalists writing in our local paper admit that they do not want any forest thinning that benefits the logging industry or that makes money for any corporation. These guys would rather destroy the great forest beauty we have here than let a poor logger make a living.

Gail:
and in this has created more power to and less accountability from corporate interests that would benefit from destroying our earth and endangering our health.

JJ:
Where do you get this idea? He's going after corporate crooks much more than Clinton did. Clinton spent his time going after Bill Gates who is one of the few who is helping the world economy and attempts to obey the law.

I keep hearing this nebulous accusation about Bush with no facts to back it up.

Gail:
What really hurts and saddens me deeply is the continued use of technologies that are (some say suspected, some say proven irrefutably) killing whales and dolphins and I would suspect other marine life as well although I have no reports of anything but whales and dolphins.

JJ:
I have heard this stated long before Bush became president, but do not have enough facts to give an intelligent opinion on this.

Gail:
He sent our young men and women into war and said we should support them yet cut health care benefits for war veterans. Whether you believe in this war or not, this is no way to treat those fellow Americans who put their life on the line for ours. And that so many military personnel & their spouses and children are living below the poverty line is horrid.

JJ:
Again, you are a victim of propaganda here. Bush did not cut health care benefits to Veterans. The health care benefits causing the controversy were cut by the Clinton administration in 1995 and many Veterans are upset that Bush has not restored them in full. The veterans involved are those who the government believes are financially able to provide for themselves.

On the other hand, instead of spending the $10 billion to restore these benefits he spent $22 billion on increasing retirement benefits for disabled veterans.

If I were a disabled veteran and had a choice of more retirement money or health benefits I would go for the cash in hand myself and take care of my own health.

The fact is there is always a shortage of money to do all the spending that is desired and you can criticize any president for where he does not spend.

My complaint against Bush is that he spends too much money trying to please every one. Even though the environmentalists are giving him grief he has still increased the EPA budget by 12%. His enemies accuse him at every opportunity of short changing education, but he has increased federal spending here a whopping 70%.

He's allocated several billion for hydrogen fuel research and $15 billion to fight AIDS in Africa and still gets no respect from Nelson Mandella.

This man is the most criticized president with distorted accusations since Abraham Lincoln. Maybe it's because we are in a new civil war, but on an astral level.

I know of no clearer definition of the means by which we realize our desires than to experience in imagination what we would experience in the flesh were we to achieve our goal. The experience of the end wills the means. Neville