Funny, these are exactly the reasons I am planning not to vote for Bush. He had 3.5 years and didn't come up with a plan to grow economy or to stop terrorism. His only ideas seem to be tax cuts for economy and democratization of Iraq for terrorism fighting, unless I missed something. None of these two ideas turned out to be terribly effective so far IMO, moreover I am afraid they both backfired.
Dude, I suggest you do a little more internet research to understand everything that's been done to fight terrorism and help soften the impact of the inherited recession. The list of achievements would fill more than a couple of pages. And as far as Bush's effectiveness up until now, I would say that so far he's been extremely effective. People forget, first of all, that the economy was reeling from the drying up of corporate invesment, the subsequent collapse of the stock market, corporate scandals, and the aftermath of 9/11. Yet, here we are three years later and we've had 6% GDP growth in the 2nd half of '03 with >4% growth in '04, the markets have rebounded, household wealth has exceeded the peak in 2000, interest rates are low, homeownership is high, and job growth is starting to come back. People also seem to forget that there hasn't been another attack in the US in 2.5 years, Al Qaeda cells have been broken up around the world, finances have been frozen, terrorist-supporting governments that once had provided easy haven to Al Qaeda now understand the real consequence of doing so, Libya has renounced its nuclear program, Iran has allowed IAEA inspectors back in, and China and Japan are more involved in disarming North Korea. Oh, and that's not even mentioning that there are now two budding (albeit fragile) democracies in the Middle East. Will an aggressive policy towards terrorism create a risk for attacks in the short term? Of course. Will it risk being unpopular to otherwise appeasement-minded peoples? Absolutely. But will it permanently marginalize terrorism in the long term? I'm certain of it.
I would never vote for kerry but bush needs to lead. How about coming out and saying we fight recessions by spending money in apporpriate ways. We need to spend it on defense of our borders and counter terrioism. Then we spent it on Iraq. We gave you tax cuts. But we must also bite the bullet. So we are cutting out the crap spending not increasing it. And as leader who is tough on crime and because I am a leader I declare that every dollar we spend fighting marijuana useage will be spent on protecting our borders from terriosts. As of today these wasted dollars incarcerating most drug criminals will be redeployed to areas that make more sense. I could think a dozen areas this guy could really lead. I mean we are at war. And yet I get nothing but crap. How about a leader in 04. P.S. I do not smoke pot or do drugs besides alcohol. I am just in favor of spending our money in the most important places. Think about what a smart spender of money would do for our economy. Just the thought that we had a leader.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/03/23/albright.excerpts/index.html WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Madeleine Albright, U.S. secretary of state during President Clinton's second term, testified Tuesday before the commission investigating the September 11, 2001, attacks.