Bush Legacy Tour

PORTLAND, OR- The Willamette River waterfront was the backdrop for our event in Portland on Wednesday. A group of local activists turned out to see the bus in addition to joggers, moms with strollers, Frisbee players and people enjoying their lunch break on the beautiful walkway on the waterfront. We had a packed speaking program for our event that included a number of different organizations.

Cassandra Villanueva from Oregon Action put a ton of work into the event and make it great. At the podium we had  Jo Ann Bowman, former Oregon State legislator and current Director of Oregon Action speak, in addition to Chris from Jobs With Justice and Dan Bell from ACORN. They all spoke about the many ways that the conservative policies support by Bush and his allies like Senator Gordon Smith have affected the members of the community that they work with. It was great to see such a broad coalition of organizations come out and support our efforts. 

We had a lot of positive feedback and great comments from the people of Portland. One that particularly struck me was from Gerry who said she will remember the Bush Presidency with tears.

“This exhibit made me cry. What a waste. So many lost opportunities and so much to recover.” 

I met Kevin from the Washington County Peace Council at the event and he invited us to come with the bus to the weekly peace vigil that night in the suburb of Beaverton. We were able to work out the logistics and join them with the bus for an impromptu event. The crowd loved the bus and were thrilled that they had a bus appearance to coordinate with the vigil they have held every week for years and will continue to hold, “until the war is over.”

Kevin and his fellow activists were kind enough to offer to buy us dinner but we needed to get going to Salem. This link has some excellent quotes and slogans from participants in the weekly peace vigil. 

The bus was quite the sensation at our hotel in Portland as well. At the risk of bloggertising we stayed at the hip Hotel Jupiter which is hotel of choice for most bands traveling through Portland. We were staying there because they are used to accommodating very large tour buses and are very affordable. There were young musicians and their crews all over the common areas of the hotel and the bus was a big topic of conversation and drew a lot of support. Everyone loved it and wanted to talk to us when they found out we were “with the bus.” Eat your heart out Death Cab for Cutie, The Bush Legacy Bus rocks harder.

SEATTLE, WA-It is unfortunate that we only made one stop in Washington, not only because of its breathtaking scenery but because of how much the disasters of the last eight years have taken their toll on the state.

• Washington has footed 12.2 billion dollars for the Iraq War bill and lost 85 soldiers and has 880 more that have been wounded.
• The medium family income in the state has gone down close to $3,000 since Bush took office.
• The state has lost 29,000 manufacturing jobs since 2001.
• Washington relies heavily on the timber industry and has been hard hit by the lack of construction due to the housing crisis.

Statistics that dismal don’t really require much annotation from me. I would like to share some of the comments from a few of  the people who attended our Seattle event. They shared some strong ideas about what the Bush legacy will mean to them, their family, and their community and also what they think of the Bush Legacy Tour.

“Great exhibit! What a travesty Bush has committed-along with his cohorts.”

Anonymous

“Very informative. I took my kids and told them about what Bush has done. Hopefully he will go down as the worst and most destructive leader in history so that future generations don’t let this happen again!”

Nina

“I will remember the Presidency with deep, deep sadness for the loss of hope I witnessed in the people of this country. I fear about what is being left to my daughter: poverty, hatred by other nations, and the destruction of what our country truly means!”

Kelli

“I will remember negatively. Bush squandered the surplus with his tax cuts and wars. He has deprived veterans access to VA healthcare and was incompetent as a war leader.”

John

“Ruined economy, endless war, mass corporate corruption.”

Warren

“Very informative. The large presence of the bus, means something. Don’t stop ‘till he’s gone.”

Andrew

BOISE, ID-Touring the country in a bus like this can give you a good take on the red vs. blue state, culture-war, theories. So far, I have been unable to discern exactly where these designated red and blue territories begin and end. Based on what all the pundits say, I thought as soon as we crossed the Mississippi we would be spending our time scraping garbage off the windshield that would be thrown at the bus. This has not been the case at all. Far from it. In fact, we easily had one of our warmest receptions today in Boise, Idaho. 

We set up in this red-state’s largest city, Boise, in front of the post office on 8th Street. The crowd was much larger than expected and we easily had a hundred people come on the bus in the hour that we were there. The response was excellent. One 83 year-old woman who was visiting her daughter in Boise was thrilled with the idea of the bus and is looking forward to our stop in her town of Tampa in September. She plans on bringing a group to the event. Another woman who is a transit bus driver for the city of Boise was so excited by the bus that she called all the members of her union and encouraged them to come see it. While some of the reactions centered on excitement over the bus, one woman was profoundly distressed by the museum. She came out of the bus in tears and could not continue looking at the exhibits. Seeing all the problems and disasters of the last eight years in one place was incredibly distressful for her. She was appreciative that we are getting the message out, however.

Quite a sight. 

WESTERN, US-The bus made a long journey from South Dakota to Idaho this weekend with our determined driver Joel at the helm. Along the way, they hit some important stops. The bus pulled into Mount Rushmore Friday morning. The bus was first greeted with the helpful smiles of the park rangers who were more than accommodating. The rangers went out of their way to help find a good parking space and helped accommodate the amazing snapshot below. The tourists stopped at Mount Rushmore crowded around the bus and it was photographed almost as much as the four statesman carved in the mountain. The reception at Mount Rushmore was amazing. One woman who had been taking photos of Mount Rushmore all morning said that, “This bus is the most patriotic thing I have seen all day.”

The next stop on the way west was Yellowstone National Park. The bus entered the north entrance from Montana into Wyoming. The height clearance was tight. A very friendly park ranger said that the bus was the biggest vehicle she had seen come through the park in the five years that she had been there. Once again the tourists took a strong interest in the bus. There were a number of campers eating and hanging out at the campground who came out of their campsites to take pictures of the bus as it drove through. Lots of thumbs up and “hey I like your bus” came from Yellowstone Visitors. With all of the accolades and fane-fare for the bus, the 45-mile trip from the North to the West entrance took over two hours!

ST.PAUL, MN-The people gathered at our St. Paul press conference yesterday gave us a very warm welcome. There was a great group that came out to support the project. The event was a pre-cursor of our visit to St. Paul during the Republican National Convention. A number of the organizers that were at the event shared stories about how frenetic everyone in the city was in getting ready for the RNC. Unsurprisingly, they also said that there was a strict clampdown all around the convention center to keep protesters out. I got to see the site where the bus will be during the convention. It should make for some very interesting stories to come when we bring the “legacy” to tens of thousands of Republicans attending the convention in September! 

Being in the Twin Cities so close to the anniversary (August 1st) of the I35W Bridge collapse was significant.  One of the important points the Bush Legacy Tour emphasisis is the incredible domestic sacrifices we have made to fund the Iraq War. One those sacrifices would most certainly be our infrastructure. Eliot Seide from AFSCME District Council 5 made the connection between two major, recent, disasters. He pointed to a poster we displayed outside the bus that showed a photo from Katrina and from the I35W Bridge collapse. He pointed out how in both disasters people drowned and it could’ve been avoided. He talked about the irony of our government spending money to build bridges in Iraq while ours crumble. It is unfortunate that all of the political leaders representing Minnesotans do not see that irony. Senator Norm Coleman, Representative Michele Bachmann, and  Representative John Kline have voted repeatedly to keep the troops stuck in a civil war in Iraq with no end in sight. All three also voted against another important domestic priority: healthcare for children. They cast their votes against the State Children’s Health Insurance Program which would provide healthcare for 30,000 Minnesota children. All three have priorities that fall in line most of the time with the Bush Administration. Representative Klein voted with the President’s priorities a whopping 92% of the time with Representative Baccman not far behind with 89% and Representative Klein a notable 86%.

It is no wonder that the wrong-headed priorities shared by Kline, Baccman, Coleman, and Bush have led us to spend trillions building infastructure in Iraq while our bridges crumble at home.

MADISON, WI- I met a woman at our Madison event who was very upset about the bus. She did not actually go through the bus to see the exhibits but found the very idea that we did not have anything positive to say about the President off-putting. She said that, “you can always find something nice to say about someone.”

 I think she is probably right. I explained to her that the bus is by no means a personal attack on the President, and in fact one of the main goals of the tour is to hold accountable Bush’s allies in Congress that helped get us in this mess. (I think I now utter the phrase, “He didn’t do it alone” in my sleep after explaining the goal of the tour fifty times a day.) Despite this explanation she was still upset, not because she supports the President’s policies but because we did not say anything nice about the President. That’s why I need your help. I do get asked by the press from time to time about one good thing that the President has done. I really try to answer this question without sarcasm but I have a difficult time. Please share your comments below about one nice thing we can say about the President or his policies so that the next time I meet a “glass half full” person I will be ready!

INDIANAPOLIS, IN-Despite the hot, muggy, day we had a great event Monday in Indianapolis! We could not have asked for more energetic organizers on the ground. Lettie Oliver from the Central Labor Council did an excellent job of putting together the event and getting people out to see the bus. Several local labor leaders came out to speak and support the bus. Ken Zeller, the President of the Indiana AFL-CIO, seemed to know just about every person that happened to walk by and was a terrific spokesperson for the bus. Labor leaders David Warrick and Charles Clark did a great job of helping to rally the troops and get passer-bys on board.  They both seem to have their allegiances to the working people of Indiana because they declined my offer for them to come on the tour permanently and help draw a crowd! 

We were parked right in front of the State Capitol steps. We had two State Representatives come out of their offices and come on board the bus. Bill Crawford, Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee and Representative Greg Porter, Chairman of Education both loved the bus and said they want us to come back to Indiana ASAP. 

We had numerous government workers come out from the local office buildings to see the bus. Everyone I talked to expressed that we desperately need a change in Indiana and the entire US. At one point a gentleman looked me in the eye and said, “All you are doing is telling the truth.”

During the event, there was a man taking photos of the bus and of the people going in and out, who never identified himself as being from the press. I was later told that he works for the Republican Governor Mitch Daniels and was likely sent down to take photos of the government workers who came down to support the bus.

I don’t know what the appropriate punishment would be for a government employee who exercises both freedom of speech and assembly during their lunch-break! Hopefully it is not too severe. I sincerely hope that if that actually was an undercover photographer from the Governor’s office that he was on his lunch break as well and was not using Indiana tax dollars to spy on its own citizens.

COLUMBUS AND CINCINNATI, OH-Thank goodness I am not with a Pro-Bush bus tour or my job would be a lot more difficult in ways well beyond my personal opposition to the idea. The success of so many of our stops has been made by the people we come across that help us in a variety of different ways, simply because they like what we are doing. 

It is not always easy to get media attention on the weekend. Most news stations have a greatly reduced staff that has limitations on what they can cover. When we have media outlets cover us on the weekend it is nice to have some coffee and donuts to offer them.  Yet this Saturday morning in Columbus, finding donuts and coffee was not an easy task. When the hotel shuttle driver Adrian, found out I was with the tour, he offered to drive me anywhere I needed to go on my donut mission.

The first two bakeries were closed until I eventually settled for bagels. Adrian was great. He talked about how out of touch he feels this administration is. He said he would rather have his neighbor become president because at least his neighbor understands what it is like to have a low paying job, and worry about bills, healthcare, and housing. He feels that so many of the men and women that are making decisions at the top have never had to struggle or have not had to in so long that they have lost touch with the realities of working people. 

Speaking of working people, the bagels were appreciated by the hard-working reporters and photographers who visited the bus this morning. 

After our Columbus stop this morning, we headed down to Cincinnati for an unscheduled stop outside of the 99th Annual NAACP Conference being held at the Convention Center. Over 8,000 people were attending the conference. We pulled up in front of the convention center with the understanding that we would likely be kicked off since we did not have a parking permit. Sure enough, five minutes after we parked a police officer came around and poked his head in the bus. As I was getting ready to explain to the officer that we would be moving along, he asked what the bus was about. I told him and he asked if he could check it out. He came in, loved the bus, and said absolutely nothing about us needing to move the bus. In fact, a few minutes later, a large group of conference attendees came on board and explained that it was the officer that had told them to check out the bus and that it was great 

Having been born and raised in Ohio, I would like to say that is just the kindness of people from my home state that have contributed to the good will we saw on Saturday. Yet, this has been our experience everywhere. Along the way we have had many people help us for no other reason than that they support what we are doing. I believe it is the extreme dislike that people have for the Bush Administration and its allies that brings out a kindness and generosity in helping us on our mission. Bush was right about one thing: he is a uniter and not a divider.