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RIP President George H.W. Bush

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by UPChip, Dec 1, 2018.

  1. Baron Scicluna

    Baron Scicluna Well-Known Member

    Didn't necessarily agree with him on a lot of things, but he seems like he was a good guy.
     
    lakefront likes this.
  2. Steak Snabler

    Steak Snabler Well-Known Member

    Speaking of wrestling, when George HW Bush was a youth baseball coach in Midland, Texas, in the early 50s, Wahoo McDaniel was one of the players on the team.
     
  3. lakefront

    lakefront Well-Known Member

    I recently mentioned Bagman podcast on agnew, Bush was used by nixon and agnew to try to influence the investigation of agnew. This link is to that specific episode transcript. The agnew story has been overshadowed by Watergate, understandably.
    He was not perfect, no president could ever be, but I do admire families like his. Like the Kennedy family, they had a lot and gave a lot,


    https://www.nbcnews.com/msnbc/maddow-bag-man-podcast/transcript-episode-4-turn-it-n935286
     
  4. heyabbott

    heyabbott Well-Known Member

    I don't admire families like the Kennedy's and Bush's. Regardless of their stated motivations, they did it for power, prestige and to build wealth, if not for themselves then to buy others so they could accumulate more power. Prescott Bush was not nearly the wealthy man that was Joe Kennedy. But the Bush family used politics to create wealth for themselves and their family. I admire JFK's generation of Kennedys, but not after.

    The entitlements that inherited generational wealth creates make any of them along the political spectrum ill suited to represent anyone but their own interests. No member of the Bush, Kennedy, Clinton or Trump families have a clue about living and working in America. They are too rich to know what it means to absolutely need a job on Monday and every Monday
     
    OscarMadison likes this.
  5. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    I am reminded of a anecdote from Ted Kennedy's first Senate campaign in 1962 -- at age 30. Touring a factory in Brockton or some such blue collar Mass. town, he was accosted by a burly hard hat who said, "I understand you've never worked a day in your life." Kennedy nervously assented. The hard hat then said. "Let me tell ya, you haven't missed a fucking thing."
    I do not think it is a bad thing when wealthy families have a tradition of public service. Quite the contrary. And to compare the Bushes and Kennedys to Trump would be comical if it weren't so obscene.
     
    lakefront likes this.
  6. BTExpress

    BTExpress Well-Known Member

    "Public service" is the polite way of saying "holding power."
     
    OscarMadison likes this.
  7. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    People with that much money can and do hold power with no obligations and no accountability all the time. Public office comes with both.
     
  8. lakefront

    lakefront Well-Known Member

    So I have misjudged putin, he is all about "public service"? (i am done with this on this thread, with all due respect)
     
  9. lakefront

    lakefront Well-Known Member

  10. garrow

    garrow Well-Known Member

  11. micropolitan guy

    micropolitan guy Well-Known Member

    RINO! RINO!
     
  12. WriteThinking

    WriteThinking Well-Known Member

    This is completely true. But that just makes them fortunate, not necessarily wrong for a public-office job.

    I agree with this. The tradition of and interest in public service by the Bush and Kennedy families makes their activity in it different in a very distinct way than Trump's. The former two families have, essentially, made politics into the proverbial family business. The actual ambition of it came Prescott Bush and Joe Kennedy Sr. The kids, whose interest in the field was stoked and actively developed and encouraged, just followed along until it became their business, and then, was passed down to the next generation the way my grandfather's printing business was to my uncle and cousins. So, it wasn't, and isn't, only about power. Once generational wealth comes into play, power isn't even needed, and often, it isn't even wanted. They do it because that's what their family does, and they do have an interest in politics and service.

    Trump's interest, on the other hand, really is only about power, or, at least, (his) perceived power. And, say what you will about him, his ascent to the U.S. presidency is truly the achievement of the American dream -- his long self-stated American dream. Trump has essentially done what teachers talk about in school -- how anybody, even someone unlikely -- can decide they want to be president, and really can do it.
     
    lakefront and maumann like this.
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