You take a segment of the prison population and make it the whole and act like it is some type of realistic hypothetical argument. Fact is, according to the Justice Department, violent criminals only make up 50% of of people sent to state prisons.

No use continuing this. I don't have time for straw men. As Dr. Evil would say, Bye Bye.

Joder, come back! I don't mind if you pick a white collar or non-violent criminal you would rather have on the streets so we can jail a DUI offender. Just name the offense more deserving of freedom.

Originally Posted by Cheshire_cat

Man cbwm do you ever get the feeling that were the minority on this forum?

Its why I love it here!

Originally Posted by Cheshire_cat

Like I said I did a search and none of these sources came up, and I never said I don’t believe it I just said I could not find it; but I do have to say that it seems you were right on that point.

Don't give up Cat. His claim is BS, you just got to dig up the facts he failed to provide. Here is a little help:
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0872695.html

The chart indicates that indeed Houston did have worse air pollution than L.A. for the first time in 1999. Not because Houston's air quality went down, but because L.A.'s air quality went up... WAY UP. The chart also indicates no clear correlation between the Bush Governorship and Houston's air pollution(the 10 year low..26... and the 10 year high.. 65.. both occurred during the Bush Governorship). Of more interest is that in 1999, Atlanta had worse air quality. Here is another link to show you that Houston, though polluted cant compare to our wonderful California air (as if that is somehow the governors fault).

http://lungaction.org/reports/sota07_cities.html

Anyway, why waste your time digging up facts? He provided none in his spurious allegations. To the Liberal mind, the very name Bush probably has some evil connotation the rest of the sane world is unaware of.

Here is another thing to think about. The guy ain't perfect. Sooner or later, if by pure luck if nothing else, they will dig up something dark, meaningful, and yes.. even factual on the guy. I never said he was a saint. I just said he is overbashed due to his liberal anti-charm.

The argument about who belongs in jail is futile, I don’t think you can defend that what Bush did was wrong, but I don’t think he has had a drink in a long while so while Bush has his faults it appears that he is not out driving and drinking now. It makes more sense to debate what he does or does not do in the present.

BTW – I want a straw hat.

I agree, as irrelevant as Obama's self admitted cocaine use(Yes, a crime in the U.S.). I like to think the Democrat's aren't running a crack head as the nominee.

Hey Cat, here is something else I thought was interesting. Look at the numbers on the air quality chart for the years 1991-2000 for Los Angles. You see how they spiral downwards? San Diego too? Guess who was governor of CA during that time of wonderful environmental clean up.. Thats right Pete "Tricky Pete" Wilson, the same man who outlawed Affirmative Action in California as prejudicial, setting a trend that we now see the Supreme court endorsing. I bet you never knew Republicans were such tree huggers. Only in California, now home of the one and only Governator.

Zero debunking going on in this thread.

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

Zero debunking going on in this thread.

Well lets see. We've established your "Bush created most polluted state as governor" is utter nonsense. We've established that having lost a congressional bid would not be a negative for anyone. We've established that a DUI conviction as a youth is irrelevant to the subject matter at hand. I guess I can take your silence you concur on all three points.

Then I was expecting you to apologize for filling your Bush Bash list with such utter nonsense, and provide something real, meaningful, and credible with facts to back it up. Ok.. going to hold my breath now.

No outcry, no complaining. I must not be doing my job right. I might as well debunk another factoid and see if that helps.

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

* Bush failed at every financial anything he's tried, be it sports or oil prospecting. Luckily it's been on other people's money.

ESPN provides a fairly decent time line of Bush's involvement in the Texas Rangers (Baseball team):
http://espn.go.com/mlb/bush/timeline.html

If you are reading what I read, it turns out George W. Bush (Dubya or Shrub) borrrows $500k from the bank in 1989 to buy a piece of the rangers. He puts together an investor group totalling $89million dollars to buy controlling interest, leverging himself in as managing partner($200k salary) with a built in 10% payout bonus should the team be sold and his investors meet a stated profit.

Over the course of the next nine years, uses another $106,302 of his own money to increase his stake in the rangers, investing in an enterprise he also manages.

In 1998, he sells the Rangers to Tom Hicks for $250 million. His investors are paid out as promised, and then some, and he successfully completes the conversion of $606,302.00(really $106,302, the 500k was borrowed) into $14.9 million. Now I aint had me much edjumucation in them there mathimatical thingies, but that sounds suspiciously like a financial success. Bank got it's money and interest, investors got their investment and interest, and Shrub made a killing. Where is all the "What a great American story" nonsense you like to give Bill Gates?

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

* Wasted Texas tax payer money buying a baseball team, only to trade Sammy Sosa.

He traded steroid feind Sammy Sosa. Who cares? What has that got to do with the price of tea in china? If it put more butts in seats in that stadium, thereby increasing the estimated value of his team, he did the right thing. As you can see, the numbers above don't lie.

Regarding the waste of taxpayer money, Bush used no taxpayer money in his aquisition of the team. The voters wasted taxpayer money building that stadium, a bill signed into law by Democrat Ann Richards, then governor of Texas. Use of tax funds to construct stadiums is not uncommon, as they are considered an improvement to the City infrastructure and often generate new tax revenue from the businesses that pop up around them. Regardless, the statement is incorrect or irrelevant on every level.

By the way, you missed at least two other legitimate scandals surrounding this story which, though they don't stick to Shrub, do leave a fairly sick sense of the type of advantage the rich and connected get in business.

Originally Posted by cbwm

Well lets see. We've established your "Bush created most polluted state as governor" is utter nonsense.

You conceded it was true and offered a revisionist interpretation of the facts. If that's what you call "debunking" it must depend what the definition of "is" is. Specifically, you admitted it's true Texas became the most polluted state in the Union under Bush's watch, but said it's really Pete Wilson's fault.

(Personal responsibility be forgotten.)

Originally Posted by Learning Newbie

You conceded it was true and offered a revisionist interpretation of the facts. If that's what you call "debunking" it must depend what the definition of "is" is. Specifically, you admitted it's true Texas became the most polluted state in the Union under Bush's watch, but said it's really Pete Wilson's fault.

(Personal responsibility be forgotten.)

I love the Clinton reference ("What the meaning of 'is' is). I think that phrase will out live Bubba. I didn't interpret any facts. I simply presented them(one step farther than you went), and pointed out you were misrepresenting them.

Fact 1: Houston was not the most polluted city in 1999, Atlanta GA. was.
Fact 2: If Bush is responsible for the net change in air pollution during his governorship, it is safe to say he created no more pollution in the state.
Fact 3: A Republican brought down the level of air pollution in California during the same period of time by several orders of magnitude.
Fact 4: California's 1999 number was an anomaly that has not repeated since. You will find L.A. is still number 1 for air pollution today, due to the population and geography. You will also find S.F. has zero pollution across the board, though more populous, due to the San Francisco bay winds which blow all the air pollution out to sea.

Those are the facts. You can try and spin them by saying "During Bush the Bush Governorship, Texas became the most second most polluted state in the union", but if you really think that makes Bush a polluter, you are probably the only one reading this thread who believes it. As far as the words you actually used,

Made Texas the most polluted state in America during his tenure as governor, which was a hard honor to steal from LA

They are patently false.