pause for a moment and reflect:

this is the last weekend that Bush will ever be President.

right now, he's getting the last of his things packed at the White House. the moving trucks are busily taking out the last of his stuff.

it's the End of an Error. what one writer called "one of those tragic flukes in a democracy where the wrong person maneuvers their way into office."

most of all, I'm grateful. Obama ain't perfect--he's a Washington player, like the rest of them--but he's mostly saying the right things. he's intelligent and thoughtful. he doesn't say words like "nukular", or "patriotize", or "misunderestimate". he won't try the 21st century Neocon maneuver of Government By Fear. in other words, the worst case scenario is--he's going to be far better than Bush.

so, here's to the Last Weekend of Bush. may he disappear into the Texas sunset, a shoulder-hunching, sniggering, shoe-dodging troll crawling back under the bridge, never to be heard from again. cleaning up his mess will be reminder enough.

"End of an Error"....tell that to the 10 million Africans that are still alive today because of his anti-AIDS & Malaria programs.

"End of an Error"....tell that to the 10 million Africans that are still alive today because of his anti-AIDS & Malaria programs.

only Bush (or, that is, Frist) would have the gag-inducing hubris to claim that Bush's abstinence-based "AIDS program" "saved ten million lives."

first, a huge part of the paltry sum spent was required to be spent on promoting "abstinence and fidelity."

second, the roadblock to drug distribution was largely due to drug companies refusing to sell it at less than a stunning profit--due in part to Bush's own maneuvering to ensure that profit.

third, Bush's program sought to undermine much larger efforts already underway--that didn't require faith-based ideology and organizations to function.

and so on. seriously, man, go and read a bit of critique on the "program". compare and contrast.

Butch- Since when did Republicans start giving a crap about AIDS or Africa? Since it's nearly the only thing Bush got right, suddenly every Hawk has a soft spot for the third world.

Ha!

"....the roadblock to drug distribution was largely due to drug companies refusing to sell it at less than a stunning profit--due in part to Bush's own maneuvering to ensure that profit."

Proof you don't know what you are talking about. Before the program was initiated, AIDS drug therapies in Africa cost patients $4000 per year and were being administered to 50,000 people. Today, costs $125 per year and is being administered to more than 2.1 million.

I know your hate for the man is palpable, but credit where credit is due.

Even The Messiah thinks so:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/12/01/world.aids.day/

And this appears to have panned out as predicted - especially around here:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/dec/09/bush-wont-get-credit/

Yes, of course, Butch, any other White House occupant would have done much less to fight AIDS, no doubt about it.

Proof you don't know what you are talking about. Before the program was initiated, AIDS drug therapies in Africa cost patients $4000 per year and were being administered to 50,000 people. Today, costs $125 per year and is being administered to more than 2.1 million.

like I said, there's a reason why drugs got cheaper. what's missing is you haven't yet investigated why that is. clue: it wasn't because drug companies suddenly decided to take zero profit.

and above all that is the big picture of what Bush did, overtly, to undermine international efforts already (still) underway. it's well documented, butch--why not read up on it?

but wait--if links impress you, here are a few:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200812030018

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/04/AR2006040401628.html

warning--they'll take several minutes to read.

From the WaPo link (I don't bother with Media Matters):

"The Office of the U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator requires that 20 percent of all AIDS spending go for prevention. Half the prevention budget must be spent to stop sexual transmission of HIV. Two-thirds of that spending, in turn, must be used promoting abstinence and fidelity."

Tranlation: a whopping 6.6% of the money is allocated to promoting abstinence. Boy, that Bush is sure a meanie.....

butch, if you'd read the rest of that article--the part following that quote--you'd see several reports on why that is, indeed, very harmful (including the government's own GAO.)

and yet again, i say--i think you're missing the big picture. carefully selecting a few sound bites to justify your conclusion--never mind the absurdity of claiming (or even verifying) that Bush "saved ten million lives"--only flies with those unwilling to put the story together.

"... don't bother with Media Matters ...." Yeah, when a brain is rock-thick, rock-solid, and rock-dead, then salient facts would be a bother.

Well, if you can't lead the willful blind to read, you can read to the blind ... and for the record.

... [TV LIARS] said of Bush's program to fight AIDS in Africa, "... a dramatic success." However, progressives and health organizations have, in fact, been critical of the legislation that authorized the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which required that starting in fiscal year 2006, 33 percent of funds for AIDS prevention be spent on abstinence-until-marriage education -- a provision the Bush administration reportedly lobbied Congress to add.

As Media Matters for America has documented, according to many of the government officials responsible for managing PEPFAR abroad, as well as the Institute of Medicine, the Government Accountability Office, and the Center for Public Integrity (CPI), the abstinence-until-marriage education requirement hindered PEPFAR's effectiveness in preventing the spread of AIDS. Congress removed the requirement when it reauthorized PEPFAR in 2008.

In a November 2006 report titled "Bush's AIDS Initiative: Too Little Choice, Too Much Ideology," the CPI stated that PEPFAR "has enabled his administration to funnel tens of millions of dollars to Christian faith-based organizations that support his ideology and form his political base." The report quoted Dr. Paul Zeitz, executive director of the Global AIDS Alliance, asserting that PEPFAR "is failing to stop the global spread of AIDS and failing to help lead the world to stop this deadly disease. ... We have a flawed framework with flawed policies that have kept us from being where we should be by now."

R - e - a - l . . . s-l-o-o-o-w: "flawed" "failed to stop" "failed to help"

Bush's AIDS Initiative: Too Little Choice, Too Much Ideology - Restrictive funding, emphasis on abstinence hinder $15 billion effort, By Wendell Rawls Jr., 11/30/2006

... the president set a goal of preventing 7 million new AIDS infections ... money in focus countries going for prevention has fallen ... from 34 percent of the total PEPFAR budget in 2004 to 22 percent this year [2006] ... About 40 million people in the world are living with HIV/AIDS, two-thirds of them in sub-Saharan Africa. ... In general, at least two-thirds of all foreign aid funds never leaves the United States ...
-- 3½ years after (PEPFAR's creation) about $8.3 billion has been spent for PEPFAR activities ... about same amount spent in three weeks of war in Iraq.
-- Less than $1 billion has actually been spent preventing people from contracting AIDS ... three days of war ...
In Uganda, In the two years since the new U.S. emphasis on youth abstinence began, the rate of new HIV infections has almost doubled ... A 2005 World Health Organization report said that new infections are no longer declining as rapidly as they did in the 1990s.

butch: you talk to yourself to try to rationalize yourself believing LIARS. No one listens to you, and no one ever did. You convince nobody else, since you repeat LIARS. You go on mouthing off, and showing you have not even convinced yourself you are rational.

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Besides, you hijacked the thread. It's about Good-bye, Good riddance, Slink-away-in-the-night Chimp chump.

Yet, it's not so sure the Drunk Dunce is going.

(From Wayne Madsen Report (WMR) ... the stuff subscribers see: )

January 15, 2009 -- Secret operations surround Inauguration

WMR has learned from knowledgeable Homeland Security and U.S. intelligence sources that a number of highly-classified operations are taking place around the inauguration on January 20 of Barack Obama as President.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has instituted a major move of personnel to an underground location at Mount Weather in Virginia. FEMA personnel are beginning to move to "the mountain" today and all FEMA and other "continuity of government" or "COG" and "continuity of operations planning" of "COOP" personnel will be fully in place on the eve of the inauguration of Obama, January 19 at the secretive facility that is located five miles southwest of Bluemont, Virginia . The underground complex is 48 miles west of Washington, DC in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

The FEMA operation follows the January 13 declaration by President Bush that the District of Columbia is a "federal emergency area."

Over 100 police agencies from around the United States have mobilized personnel and sent them to the Washington, DC area ...

On January 12, FEMA officially opened its National Exercise Simulation Center (NESC) at FEMA Headquarters in southwest Washington, DC. FEMA announced that the new center will provide support functions for the Presidential Inauguration. ...

WMR has also learned from a U.S. intelligence source that authorities will close to public traffic several bridges, roads, and highways in the DC metropolitan area but that this decision was made not for traffic control but to facilitate an outbound mass evacuation from the city. Only buses and authorized vehicle are permitted on closed roads and bridges on Inauguration Day. ...

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And besides besides, Obama's immediate directive might arrest the Drunk Dunce who then is not going anywhere ...