Though President Bush is “earning” a 60 percent approval rating from the American public, it is plainly obvious by nearly any objective measure that his presidency has been an utter and complete failure. Bush has had two years to implement his foreign and domestic policies, including a lengthy period of enormous popularity and support that he used to pass virtually all legislation he requested. What are the results?

The U.S. stock market has lost almost $5 trillion in value. The market has lost more during Bush’s first two years than the first two years of any modern president, including Hoover and the stock market crash of 1929.

The cause is not just terrorism. Stocks lost value twice as fast from Bush’s inauguration up until Sept. 10, 2001, than they have since Sept. 11. Unemployment has risen by 40 percent. Before Bush arrived in office, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected a $5.6 trillion surplus for 2002-11. Since Bush cut taxes for the wealthiest Americans, the projected surplus is $5.5 trillion less. We can forget about saving Social Security. In fact, Bush is now using Social Security tax dollars to fund the government. Including those dollars that Bush is stealing from future generations, his government will run a near-record $475 billion deficit.

ISU students, not only is the economy sinking and tuition going up, it is us who will be responsible for repaying this debt later. Since Bush has arrived in office, he has done nothing but alienate democratic nations that have stood with the United States for over 50 years. Bush has isolated the United States from the rest of the world on global warming issues, the deployment of a nuclear shield that will cost billions and is unproven, and most importantly, Iraq. All of this despite the fact that global unity with the United States was never higher than on Sept. 12, 2001.

Bush has squandered this opportunity, and worse, he has gone further and destroyed relationships that predated Sept. 11. As I write this letter, the most successful military alliance in history, NATO, is being pushed to destruction by Bush’s stubborn policies. The United States is preparing to start a unilateral action against Iraq that will make the United Nations irrelevant as well. Only one country has made a serious offer to assist the United States militarily, and many world democracies believe that this war is wrong. Evidently they have more concern for the lives of innocent Iraqis and U.S. troops than Bush does.

Will more people die if Saddam is contained (as he currently is), and allowed to keep whatever weapons he is rumored to have hidden underground and unused, or will more die if we wage a war in the deserts of the Persian Gulf and the streets of Baghdad (perhaps unleashing those very weapons on our own troops)? Will more terrorism against the United States be generated if we lead an attack on an Islamic state?

Saddam’s “weapons” aren’t going anywhere, but al-Qaida is. If you lived in Iran or Syria, and the United States attacked your neighbor without provocation, ask yourself if you would feel threatened. Perhaps some will feel threatened to the point of joining a terrorist organization. We should embrace and cooperate with the vast majority of sane people living in the Middle East, not alienate them. I believe the very idea of a pre-emptive strike is wholly un-American in and of itself.

What other war have the people of America started this way? We do not start wars. If we did, what right of ours is it to say that it is only America’s right to attack others?

Bush is a cowboy sitting in the Oval Office. He cannot manage the U.S. economy, he is sending our very own ISU students into a morally unjustified, fishing-expedition war and he is ruining America’s global stance and leadership. What is next?

Tony Borich

Freshman

Community and Regional Planning/ Environmental Studies