What's up with America these days? Mr. Bush says stuff on how to improve other countries, like Iraq and Afganistan. But what about us? Sure democracy is what got America on the map in the first place, but were helping others out and not helping ourselves. We are springing back from recession which is good, but a lot is wrong. Taxpayers dollars are being wasted on things that don't amount to squat! Are brave soldiers, all volunteer, which really says something, dying for a cause that others(Iraq mainly) just don't want? After all, the US actually PUT Saddam in power! The No Child Left Behind Act is failing. Mr. Bush, who has done some really good things for America, just wasted a bunch of taxpayers money on something that was worse than the Bay of Pigs coup. With these and more problems I ask you, Why are we doing this? Really?

"The U.S. did not intintionally put Saddam into power."

Wrong.

Conservative15:
Second of all, anyone who doesnt have their heads in their ***** realizes that I was not talking about in the year 2001, I was talking about some time in the 1980s. And its true, whether your thick *** skull is able to take all of that in at the same time is not my damn problem. Maybe you should get it (your thick *** skull, that is) out of your ***, and wake up, to realize that while it may not be our duty to rebuild their country it is definately not our duty to destroy them. That would make us just like them, but I can tell you are already just like them. Whether you would admitt it or not I bet you were probably pretty pissed 9/11, And if we go over and destroy their country that makes us just like them. So, unfortunately for you, the U.S is a civilized society.
But on the same note you have to realize that its not the Iraqis that we went over there for, it was a Saudi Arabian who had taken over the Iraqis once civilized society. Saddam was a terrorist and after 9/11, any American who can just sit back and watch some other country, (Who doesnt have the man power, the technology or the money to fight a war on terrorism)is out of their FREAKIN minds.

First of all, everyone who thinks we entered Afghanistan to help them has rocks in their brains. We went in to defend ourselves. Same with Iraq. And Iraq was 12 years too late. It is not the duty to rebuild these countries. It is our duty to destroy as much of them as possible, and then install a leader who is allied to the US.

The U.S. did not intintionally put Saddam into power. However, we did help Afghanistan, because they were poor they could not buy weaponry to defend themselves against attackers. We help them out by giving them old weapons and teaching them military tactics. Then Osama Bin Laden comes into the picture, he overthrew the Afghani government because they were not comfortable using the weaponry they had. Osama then gained controll and forced the Afghani people to fight against the Iraqi government along with Saddam and his men. So in the long run our plan came back to bite us in the butt. Although I dont like, Noone really does, I do believe that this war was necissary, because, in order to end the war in the late 80's Saddam had to Sign an agree for the U.N. saying that he would not posess or fire any chemical, nucleur, or biological warheads. He may or may not have gotten rid of the ones we all knew he had then but deep down we all know he built more. We know this because he used chemical warheads on his own people. Now does this really sound like a person who would hesitate when it came to firing his missiles on us. I dont think so, and I am glad Bush didnt take any chances. While Bush has spent alot of time on the war against iraq, he has still managed to decrease the drug rates among teens, lower taxes(although they did come back up some), and increase the job market at the same time, thereby decreasing unemployment. So I think bush is an all around good guy and exactly what this counrty needs, someone who is going to stand up for it.

Praetor: Yes we got through the Great Depression and WWII. But you know what? People were used to hardships, we weren't in debt up to our eyeballs, and there was a general feeling that things could and would improve. Now we have the US coming under the control of generations which are pampered, with a huge national debt that seems to be skyrocketing regardless of who's in power, with Social Security nearly bankrupt, and quite possibly the most spineless society ever. Part of winning a war or getting out of a crisis is having the will to endure it. I think somewhere along the way, a lot of people lost that.

The U.S. did not *PUT* Saddam in power. We helped him against Iran, to be sure. But he was already in varying posiions of power in the 70s.

As far as the No Child Left Behind act, nobody knows what to do or can agree. Public schools are (mostly) well-funded, sometimes overfunded, but crumbling. Many are violent, teachers are underqualified, there is lousy attendance - what can you do? You could take care of the violence by throwing out violent and drug-dealing kids, but then you run into lawsuits and nutty groups like the ACLU. The teacher's union, the National Education Association, won't let you even think about enforcing qualifications and productivity monitoring, which exists evenywhere else in industry, and how can you deal with the myriad of other issues?

Sometimes it's just best to stop throwing good money after bad, and start over, completely fresh. Unfortunately, some of the forces (i.e. the NEA), are extemely powerful and way too entrenched to allow that to happen.

Look what America has been blessed with. We have the world's strongest military. Economic wise, compared with Iraq and Afghanistan, were rich! You have clothes on your back, your'e rich! You have food on your plate every night, your'e rich!

I think as the world's richest, most powerful nation on the planet, it is our duty to rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan.

However, that said, we should also rebuild America as well. We do need to spend $1 trillion a year to rebuild America's infrastructure and put ten million people to work doing so. We do need to move our country from a fossil fueled to a solar-hydrogren economy which would create two million jobs doing so. We do need to spend more on education as well as reform the educational system.

And I believe we can afford it. We recovered from the Great Depression AND fought World War II without breaking the bank. I don't see why we can't do this either.

Think about it.