No Crony Left Behind

New Rule: In the next fifteen months, President Bush has to perform at least one act that doesn't make money for someone he knows.

Take "No Child Left Behind." At first it just looked like gentle empty bullshit, a way to neutralize the Democrats edge with voters on education issues. What did it even mean? And how could you be against it? Education. It was a perfect cause that would honor the legacy of any president...'s wife. Which made it even more perfect for pre-9/11 Bush. And who could it hurt? No one. It made Lady Bird Johnson's wild-flowers-by-the-highways project look like the fucking Marshall Plan.

Except, like all Bush ideas, there was more to it. To meet the requirements of "No Child Left Behind" America's public schools have ordered more than eleven million standardized tests in the last two years. (New York State alone ordered 1.7 million.) The cost of the tests -- and the testing industry, including test prep -- now exceeds two billion dollars a year. And 90% of the industry is controlled by five corporations. And the largest of them is McGraw-Hill. And the McGraw family just happens to go back 80 years with the Bushes.

Another beneficiary of No Child Left Behind? Neil Bush's educational software company. The one funded by the United Arab Emirates. The one Barbara Bush said the Katrina victims had to spend her donation on.

Which is, of course, all blood under the bridge. But when Bush does anything, there's always some profit motive behind it. Nothing is free but the hookers. So it wasn't surprising that he announced his post war plans were to replenish the coffers with speeches. But before that, he has to do one purely altruistic thing. Just one.

Bill Maher is the host of HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" which airs every Friday at 11PM.

Comments

[LPK]

He should write a memo to self:
"Do not start World III."

[Boletus]

I would be perfectly happy just to hear him utter these words before he fades into bad memory: "Maybe invading Iraq wasn't such a great idea after all." Fat chance of that, of course.

Nope, the only useful thing he can do is go away, like a skunk out of a trash can, into the night. It's like being pinned under a car: you won't start feeling better until after the car is no longer on top of you.

Question is, does this country have what it takes to elect a president that is not an idiot, a crook, or both? I'd like to think so, but I will no longer be that surprised if not.

[Soulsurfer]

Never happen, ever. These guys have raised the bar several notches in the government/crony gut-the-till game. He's unashamedly racked up more debt than all other administrations, and claims fiscal prudence. He's occupying a Muslim country we invaded on false pretenses, and claims to be spreading democracy. The man is a lunatic, and we are sheep, or worse, for taking it. The list of his transgressions against the planet and humanity are too numerous to list here. Why does everyone STILL give "W" any credence or respect at all, when he is so clearly a lying sociopath? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.....­.

[MrJoyboy]

As Bush so eloquently said, we must educate our childrens, and our children's childrens, so that no childrens are left behind.

[mpgarr]

Are you really serious Bill?? George W. Bush do anything altruistic? Not doing things to enrich both himself and his capitalist cronies???

Expect to see him become even more vile----and to promote people to run things, like the guy he has proposed to run the VA---pretty much incompetent---

Bush do anything good? He has not done one thing good in the past seven years-why the hell should he start now???

[TheyLive]

Don't forget: the second main objective of the "No Child Left Behind Act" was to require that schools provide access to military recruiters. After all, no empire without soldiers.

[taikan]

There is an act not designed to make money for one of his cronies that you can expect from George Bush before his presidency is over -- a Presidential pardon for the members of his administration who have violated the law on so many occasions, including Cheney and perhaps Bush himself.

[GloJo]

Shrub better GET all the money now - if he thinks he is going to make a boodle on speaches he is sadly mistaken. Who in their right mind would pay him to make a speach anywhere in the world. Maybe some of those he has made rich but that would just be the same money going around in a circle.

[darker]

Bush-Cheney walked into office announcing they are ENTITLED to do anything they want--BECAUSE they were "elected". This happened TWICE.

Bush-Cheney's performance and its outcome shows
how dangerous it is to vote based on IMAGE designed by publicists, advertising.

Without forethought and seriousness, the VOTERS WILL ALWAYS LOSE by choosing FALSE WINNERS for superficial, media manipulated reasons.

[Stevelagain]

Do you REALLY believe no child left behind was about enriching Bush? Really? I give you more credit than that actually.

Look at your top running democrat party candidates. What company hasn't given them money? They wouldn't be able to perform their job if on the basis of having gotten money.

If we selected candidates on the basis of having no business experience, no connections to the American, free enterprise economy...­..what kind time warp machine would you use? Something to snag people from the 60's that grew up in a commune?

I really think you are working No Child Left Behind way way to hard here in order to gain yet another Bush smear.

[surfergirl]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN FILL WHO COFFERS? WITH SPEECHES

[verisimilitudeness]

Nice Idea Bill,
What myopic americans have failed to notice; we've all cashed in the altruisms for homilies and the rhetorical counterpart of admonitions. While we busy ourselves fretting over illegal immigrants and amoral sodomites, W and his cronies have been laughing all the way to the bank. Historians will soon ruefully point out that Democracy can be distorted and corrupted to the point of its antithetical nemesis communism. Reminds me of the joke I heard once:
Q: What's the difference between capitalism and communism?
A: In a Capitalist system, man exploits man. With communism, it's the other way around.

[dr7854]

Are you kidding? Not in this lifetime, or any other, will Bush EVER do ANYTHING just because it's the right thing to do. If it doesn't enrich his family, friends, or even more disgustingly, his sitting Vice President, or if it doesn't give him additional unConstitutional powers, the Thief in Chief doesn't give it a 1st thought, net alone a 2nd!

[kellygrrrl]

I wouldn't trust Bush to change a lightbulb without starting an electrical fire.
Everything he does is a disaster.
Just put him in a coma for the next year.

NEW RULE:
Bush can do absolutely nothing for the next 15 months

[downhill73]

Bill, they have testicle festival every year in montana, its apparent the democrats don`t have any testicles. We need to get as many as we can up there, I`m sure they have some left, not sure what to do with Nancy P.,maybe she could just put them in her pocket and pretend she has some, downhill.