Bush's "Peace" medal

He's gotta be really proud of this piece of crap medal. It's probably the only medal that George is ever gonna get. Bush is one the most horrendous war-mongers of all time! And he gets a "peace" medal. Please.

But, he did. From mega-church clergyperson Rick Warren who hops around the world doing good things because Jesus told him to.

Here's the story:

"To mark World AIDS Day, Saddleback Pastor Rick Warren is hosting a Civil Forum of Global Health at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. Warren will present Bush with the first 'International Medal of PEACE' from the Global PEACE Coalition in recognition of his unprecedented contribution to the fight against HIV/AIDS and other diseases. ... The Bush administration reports that its AIDS initiative helped treat two million people this year living with HIV/AIDS."


If one had X-ray vision, one would have seen that when Bush accepted this medal yesterday with one hand, the other hand would be dripping the blood of literally millions of people who have died because of his stupid, perverse, military mercenary mistakes.

Many think that Bush belongs in jail not on a podium receiving medals for "Peace."


Not only so, but most accounts of this travesty (which highlights what a dim light the Saddleback guy is) fail to note that millions of people were not given assistance for HIV/AIDS because of the religious right's restrictions on the program. This program was coerced and constricted by the theology of fundamentalist Christianity!

Lindsay Beyerstein at majikthise puts it this way:

"Bush is being honored for the PEPFAR program, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, that's the initiative that stipulates that 2/3 of the prevention money should be spent exhorting people in the developing world [to] practice abstinence before marriage and monogamy thereafter. The remaining 1/3 can be spent on condoms, but condoms may not be promoted to young people, whom PEPFAR thinks should be abstinent.

"In 2006, 56% of the money set aside for the prevention of sexual transmission of HIV was spent on abstinence only propaganda programs."


Not only so, but any organization that promoted condom use or abortion was automatically out of the loop. Thus, Planned Parenthood, probably the largest and most significant provider of information and assistance with regard to HIV/AIDS in Africa and other developing countries, along with other similar organizations, were not given any funds.


In truth, millions of people were refused assistance because of the religious right's meddling in government policy. When the Bush administration claims that their AIDS program "helped treat two million people this year living with HIV/AIDS," we don't have a clue as to what that means.

We do know, however, that the Bush administration's so-called "initiative" was pretty much of a joke so far as actually making a difference, and in many cases made the problem worse by refusing to give out needed information and by refusing to allow distribution of condoms, because of the insistence of the religious right that abstinence be the guiding principle of the program.


Maybe someone could tell Warren of Saddleback to put together a new medal for the Smirking Chimp: "America's War-monger." That could be followed by another more in tune with reality: "HIV/AIDS Failure."