I know I’m late to this thread, and for that I apologize. But I really do take exception to the constant comparison between BDS and ODS. While they both exist, they are distinctly different.

From what I recall, there were three major contributors to BDS. In each case, the fears of the Bush critics were later confirmed, which validated and heightened the BDS for any other actions he took in office. Let’s recap:

1- the 2000 Florida election - Democrats were crushed by this and convinced that the election was stolen. Everyone else (including me), thought they were just being sore losers and wrote them off. The reality turned out to be that, yes, the election in Florida was actually stolen. Katherine Harris admitted in court that thousands of legitimate black voters had been prevented from voting. She chalked this up to an honest mistake, although it was her directives that specifically led to it. You would be surprised at how many supposedly politically astute people are completely unaware of this.

2 - the PATRIOT act - civil libertarians were up in arms about the potential for abuse and the expansion of governmental powers. It would only be used against terrorists, we were all told. We found out much later that the government could not resist temptation and used the PATRIOT act to justify pretty much anything they wanted to do. As we all know now, the most common use of the act is involved with drug busts.

3 - the invasion of Iraq - the evidence for WMD was not conclusive, and Bush basically went “all in” with his political capital on Iraq. When no WMDs were found, that ended the credibility of the administration in the eyes of many. That was when I left the GOP for greener pastures (no pun intended).

I think BDS didn’t really take hold until late 2003, when it was clear that we invaded another country on false pretenses. Obama has done nothing remotely that contrary to this country’s interests.

All of the other blights on the Bush administration — the Katrina non-response, torturing prisoners, politicization of the DOJ… those only added fuel to the existing BDS fire.

The worst that Obama has done so far is run up TREMENDOUS deficits in his first year, but I think most would agree that this is a direct consequence of inheriting an ugly recession. He made the decision to “stimulate” the country out of it. This may turn out to be a bad idea, but it’s definitely the kind of policy decision that is resolved through elections.

In contrast, many of the problems that led to BDS are the type that have been historically handled in criminal or international war crime courts. While there is obviously a lot of political partisanship feeding both BDS and ODS, the cardinality of the “sins” of each administration are quite different.