Clinton goes to Ireland.. a contrast study

[SoCalDem]

Saturday, September 5 (Limerick, Republic of Ireland)
The defining moment, for me, comes on Saturday morning in Limerick. Twenty thousand people have been waiting in a pouring rain for hours to see the President. They are crying with gratitude and awe, in recognition of his work towards helping to secure a peace agreement in Northern Ireland. The President rises to the occasion as the love of the crowd sweeps over him. He is absolutely Kennedyesque as he delivers a moving speech celebrating the spirit of the Irish people. As we drive the 50 miles to Ballybunion, following the speech, people are lining the road, three and four deep, with signs and flags in support of the President.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. Sigh

this points up again the damage Bush has done, not only to our economy, not only to our lives, but to the reputation of our nation around the world. Hope the Irish protestors realize it is just Bush and not all of us who are arrogant morons.

These photos would make a nice webpage, btw, with photos from Shrub's visit beside them for contrast....

I won't make kitty cry. I have eight myself....

[RoyGBiv]

2. Visiting Ireland

A friend of mine visited Ireland back in March. It was a vacation he had been planning for over a year, and when it came to it, he was a little reticent to go.

But, he went, and when he was met at the train station at his eventual destination, the online friends he'd made who had invited him asked a simple question. "What's up with your President?" or words to that effect.

His answer: "He's an asshole..." From that point on, the drinks were on the house.

In other words, people in many parts of the world are much more intelligent and thoughtful than some Americans who tend to judge by nationality rather than individual quality. All my friend had to say was that he in no way supported our President, and he was a "good American" from then on out.

[imax2268]

11. Check this out...

Quite a difference huh...?

[SoCalDem]

12. WOW !!!!! Thanks for posting those n/t

:)

[Ganja Ninja]

14. Really a stark difference.

I wish someone could post these contrasting pics over at freep central.

The next time I hear the right bitching about blind democratic hatred I'd love to show'em these. It's not just us. It's the whole f**king world that hates the chimps ass.

[taquinas101]

15. Well, if we give Bush four more years . . .

We really can't say, "Hey, they hate our leaders, not us."

[Political_Junkie]

3. Guess you really don't know

what you've got until you lose it. I was never a big Clinton fan, but I never had to scour the news the way I do now, to see what kind of damage he was doing. I actually kinda miss the guy, or maybe what I really miss is being an American and proud. I hate what this bastard* has done to our country.

[SoCalDem]

4. Nor was I..

I did not even pay attention to stuff that was going on, until the Whitewater stuff started.. I sensed right then that things would go from bad to worse..

Even with all the travails he went through, we always had the impression that he was "at work"...and was trying to do his job , in the midst of chaos.

[Political_Junkie]

5. Yep, and the fact the rest of the world

liked him goes a long way. I feel like in the last 3 1/2 years America has put her worst face on. I want my country back! :mad:

[Blue_Roses]

13. but didn't you know, during that time...

Clinton was "sinning":eyes: according to the beloved Bush supporters known precariously as the "right" (or should I say the wrong!). I just don't get it...

We go from having 8 years of peace and prosperity, a President that other countries respected and now we end up with bush who has ruined all that for us and the "right" still thinks he's God and thinks Clinton is evil...:eyes:...I just don't get it...:mad:

[Ganja Ninja]

6. Thanks for posting this pictorial proof that ...

the world doesn't hate America. The world hates Bush and the GOP. When America is lead by someone that isn't a war mongering fool the world will again treat us as acceptable members of the world community.

[Vickers]

7. And aren't the Irish talking of ARRESTING Georgie when he goes there?

Man, I really love the Irish.

Contrast Clinton with Georgie

[SoCalDem]

8. YOU MUST read this article.. "You sir, are no....."

article does not display "whole"...you must click on the last paragraph of each section to advance.



http://www.iht.com/articles/526262.htm


You, sir, are no Kennedy, Reagan or Clinton
Nuala O’Faolain NYT June 23, 2004
Bush visits Ireland

President George W. Bush is scheduled to make an overnight visit to Ireland this week for a two-hour summit meeting. On Friday, he’ll fly into Shannon, an airport whose use by the American military during the Iraq venture has been highly controversial here. Substantial protests are planned, but the protesters will, of course, be kept far from the president. He won’t even hear their chants. No doubt American television will show the president and his wife surrounded by harp-playing colleens and little girls in ringlets stepdancing in a medieval castle — this is an election year, after all, and there is an Irish-American electorate. In fact, the president and the Irish won’t encounter each other at all. The loss is ours, but it is America’s, too.
.
Bush is coming to a country that has been passionately pro-American since America took in our people after the Great Famine in the 1840s. Presidential visits have been a gift from that diaspora. John F. Kennedy came and assuaged some of the pain of all the farewells in our history. Richard Nixon came; I remember running almost three miles to the obscure graveyard in which an ancestor of his had been providentially discovered, beside me a couple carrying a plump 3-year-old between them, hoping to show the child an actual U.S. president. We didn’t make it, but we cheered when we saw the presidential helicopter take off over the bog.
.
Ronald Reagan came and protesters against American actions in Central America landed in jail, but on the entertainment side, he was the perfect partner in genial, Oirish leprechaunery. It was also believed that he leaned on Margaret Thatcher to bring her to negotiations with us on the future of Northern Ireland. That’s what has mattered most in modern Ireland’s relationship with America. Its friendliness to us has often been the power behind our dealings with Britain.
.
The Clinton administration and both the Clintons went further. They put a lot of time and effort into installing a political structure in Northern Ireland that will work, however long it may be delayed by local malice. When Bill Clinton visited the republic the place was brought to a standstill. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. If Clinton came back today, we’d find some way, even in the post-Sept. 11 world, to welcome him. But even in that world, is security the only consideration keeping Bush and the Irish people apart?
.
When Mikhail Gorbachev, at the height of his promise, stopped over in Shannon for just a couple of hours, there was a fiesta. His wife, Raisa, was taken to an outdoor folk museum behind what was meant to be impermeable security, but there was such a welter of children up trees, people holding out daffodils, boys balancing on walls and general happy mayhem that security became extremely flexible. True feeling finds ways to express itself. How can there be so little enthusiasm for welcoming Bush in as pro-American a country as exists on the face of the earth? Our intelligentsia is pro-American. American popular culture, far from being resisted as it is elsewhere in Europe, has been a precious modernizing influence on the grim patriarchy that dominated Ireland until recent times. we all have friends and relations in the United States. Ireland shut down more completely than any other country in the world — schools, pubs, business, transport, everything — on its day of mourning for the Sept. 11 attacks.
.
snip..... READ THE WHOLE THING....You'll be glad you did :)

[Vickers]

9. "But for the present administration...my welcome flag is furled"

Wow, that sentence says it all, doesn't it? Such a great friend as Ireland...what a sad situation.

Fuck you, Georgie. You are fucking up everything.

P.S. Thanks for the link, SoCalDem, I bookmarked that site.

[Tansy_Gold]

20. I think you can get the whole article if you click on the

PRINT button way at the bottom of the page.

then again, it was very early in the morning when I did that, so maybe I remember wrong.

[dbt]

10. Sixmilebridge, County Clare, July 1995:

"So where in America are you from?" asks the shopkeeper.

"Little Rock, Arkansas," says I.

"Oh! Do you know Bill Clinton?" comes the excited reply.

Shannon. Same Q&A. Ennistymon likewise. Ennis ditto. And on it went through Miltown Malbay, Spanish point, that little place on the Lisdoonvarna cutoff and up to Galway City.

The Irish know that we are them and they are us. They cannot abide the injustice that's been done to Far Americay.

:bounce:
dbt

"You scumbag, you maggot,
You cheap, lousy faggot.
Happy Christmas, your ass!
I pray God it's our last."

[SoCalDem]

16. kick for the night people

:)

[rumguy]

17. What year did Clinton visit?

Do you remember?

Very interesting pictures, very sobering.

[SoCalDem]

18. 1998...just after the impeachment fiasco started

and he managed to be gracious, and even spoke about his "troubles"..

[kaiso]

19. A great accomplishment by Clinton often overlooked.....

[Karenina]

21. Kick!

:kick:

[opihimoimoi]

22. Pond Kick

:kick:

Very good thread..... well done. Wicked Good.