President (To Win Colorado)
See Full Big Line
(D) Kamala Harris
(R) Donald Trump
80%
20%
CO-01 (Denver)
See Full Big Line
(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) V. Archuleta
98%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
See Full Big Line
(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Marshall Dawson
95%
5%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
See Full Big Line
(D) Adam Frisch
(R) Jeff Hurd
50%
50%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
See Full Big Line
(R) Lauren Boebert
(D) Trisha Calvarese
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
See Full Big Line
(R) Jeff Crank
(D) River Gassen
80%
20%
CO-06 (Aurora)
See Full Big Line
(D) Jason Crow*
(R) John Fabbricatore
90%
10%
CO-07 (Jefferson County)
See Full Big Line
(D) B. Pettersen
(R) Sergei Matveyuk
90%
10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
See Full Big Line
(D) Yadira Caraveo
(R) Gabe Evans
70%↑
30%
State Senate Majority
See Full Big Line
DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
See Full Big Line
DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
August 19, 2006 05:35 PM UTC
124 Comments
“Married women with children, the ‘security moms’ whose concerns about terrorism made them an essential part of Republican victories in 2002 and 2004, are taking flight from GOP politicians this year in ways that appear likely to provide a major boost for Democrats in the midterm elections,” according to the Washington Post.
“This critical group of swing voters — who are an especially significant factor in many of the most competitive suburban districts on which control of Congress will hinge — is more inclined to vote Democratic than at any point since Sept. 11, 2001.”
but on the other hand, say the Dems are in control. Say they make this big sweep that you all are praying to your trees about. I am looking forward to riding your asses when inflation jumps, taxes jump, unemployment jumps, mortgage forclosures jump, terrorism jumps, etc.
I’m not saying Bush is the answer. He is far from the answer. He only wanted to finish what his daddy started. But if you think another Carter will tranform this country into proserity, you are nuts.
Same goes for that little rich Kerry or that lunatic “the sky is falling” Gore.
So what is your choice? Another Clinton? Oh yeah, that is what we need. A pissed off extreme left liberal in charge. A liberal that is pretending to be a moderate. Like many of you on this blog.
I’d rather have Elmer Fudd in charge. At least he doesn’t have a history of scandals like the Clintons do.
Clinton – inflation down, tax rate constant (taxes in total were up because the economy was booming – do you prefer a recession), national debt paid down, unemployment down, mortgage foreclosures down, no 9/11 or Iraq disasters.
I don’t care if you are a libertarian or a right-wing nut case (is that redundant?) – we were much better off under Clinton than Bush by almost any measure of what we got.
– dave
It is a known fact that those policies implemented by one president in their first term ar due to the policies enacted by their predecessor. For example, Ronald Reagan inherited a catastrophe of an economy from Jimmy Carter. Reagans policies flowed into George H. Bush’s administration. Thus Bush did well for the first two years. Things went sour because he had to deal with a Democrat controlled Congress. Same with REagan. Reagan was limited because of Tip O’Neill and James Wright.
Clinto had to deal with a Republican controlled Congress after 1994. Tax cuts were in place and things moved upward. Bush did well his first term. Why? Because of the changes enacted by the Republican House and Senate. Not Clinton.
Why then the downturn? Answer: The economy always goes into a down turn at least an average of every 11 years. Not necessarily a recession, but a softening of the economy over all. It is a historical fact and phenomenon. It takes at least 18 months for the effects of any administration’s changes to be felt by the economy.
Whatever Bush does now with the economy, will pass on to the next president’s first administration.
Just to clarify… Reagan only inherited the first few months of his economy from Carter. Bush inherited the first 7 years of his economy from Clinton.
Here’s one for the books. Why was it that Jimmy Carter during his first 51 days in office was unable to get any of his reform proposals passed by a Democrat controlled House (Tip O’Neill) and Senate?
Why is it that he holds the record for having done so?
Answer: Jimmy Carter and his populist idiots in Plains Georgie blew into D.C. with a mandate to reform everyone and everything. His staffers thought that it would be funny if they gave Tip and Mrs. O’Neill the last two seat numbers in the Kennedy Center for the Inaugural Ball.
Big Mistake..O’Neill calls Carter’s Office and say to his staffers:
“I know you folks didn’t do this on purpose becausse your too stupid for that!!! Tell your boss I have him in my back pocket.”
To say that Reagan only inherited 6 months from Carter is alughable. Much of the losses the Repubs realized in the 1982 loss of the Senate was due to the economy. Reagan would have accomplished much more had he had a Republican controlled House and Senate.
Clinton wasn’t able to do more damage because the REpubs controlled the House and Senate. Otherwise, Clinton would have raised taxes much higher than they were. The Dems only controlled the House until 1994 under Clinton. He was still reeling from the tax increases of George Herbert Bush (Read my Lips…No New Taxes).
In addition, Clinton pegged housing to the 15 year Treasury, Bush has since changed it back to the 30 year Treasury. Clinton did a great deal of debt shifting using short-term Treasuries. These are now coming due under Bush II.
P.S.: This crap annoys me…George Herbert Bush is not the Same as George Herbert Walker Bush. Bush II is not a Junior, and Bush I is not a Senior!!! Would you Dems please get your stuff straight?!!!
Shrub aint half the Bush that his Daddy was.
Let me get this straight. All good things that happened during Clinton’s term were either left-overs from Reagan/Bush or because of the Republican congress?
And all bad things that are happening now are due to Clinton?
So how was it that Clinton was powerless to bring about the wonderful economy during his term but powerful enough to leave Bush II with 6 years of a disaster?
I think you are putting your viewpoint before logic…
– dave
ps – I do think Bush I’s tax increase was a very good thing for the country and helped Clinton imensely. Of course the Republican base screwed Bush I for doing such a good thing.
Daddy Bush was a fool to try to build himself into some macho hero character with his “Read My Lips” statement at the GOP Convention in ’88.
However, two years later, he experienced a moment of rational thought and saw the wisdom in trying to reduce the federal deficits so he agreed to the tax increase passed by Congress.
This did lay the foundation for Clinton’s balanced budgets, but it wasn’t enough. Clinton had to ask for, and get, the ’93 tax increase for which the Dems paid dearly with their House and Senate majorities.
Daddy Bush and the Congressional Dems in ’94 did the ultimate sacrifice in politics: they put national interest ahead of their own political interests, indeed, ahead of their own survival.
Can anyone imagine Junior doing what his Daddy had the balls to do? I think not…………..
but I’m much better off now than I was under Clinton. I make way more money and have more money in the bank.
If Bush didn’t drag us into this war I bet you couldn’t say that the country in general is worse off now. But that is a moot point as we are spending a vast majority of our resources fighting a war aginst lunatics that we will never win.
But putting another Clinton in office will not be the grand answer. And I voted for him the first time.
His wife on the other hand scares the crap out of me. Bill was just a laid back womanizer but his wife is a woman scorned.
I would like to see Guilliani (don’t know if I spelled that correctly) in there. He brought NYC together after 911.
911, we seem to have forgotten about that. Where are all the flags and unity anymore? How soon we forget.
Gecko:
I, a lib Dem, like Rudy Giuliani and could vote for him. He’s good on economic and national security issues. He’s also good on social issues (pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-gun safety legislation).
Does it scare you as much as it scares me that we are on the same side on this one?
I agree that Rudy is, for the most part, a moderate. However, if he wants to survive as the Republican nominee for U.S. President, he will have to veer right and appease the far right of the party. Once he does that, I’ll have a hard time trusting him and would have to think long and hard before I voted for him.
“911, we seem to have forgotten about that. Where are all the flags and unity anymore? How soon we forget.”
Unity buried under a sea of partisan bickering. Which is something all the partisans on this site should think about.
Let’s be clear here.
Clinton saw the Internet bubble that he had nothing to do with. Indeed, if he hadn’t increased taxes, the economy would have done much better. And it was the GOP congress, not Clinton, that kept spending and the budget deficit under control.
Bush’s tax cuts and spending gave us the greatest economic boom in history as incomes, income tax revenues and employment soared on real growth, not techno bubble stuff. He even created his own WPA, the airport screeners.
Now, even with the sharp drops in auto and housing sales, the economy is still growing and the market is steady, if not soaring, after a long bull market.
I could do the same thing if I had as large of a credit limit on my credit card as Bush belives he does. It will be all of us who have to pay for this republican record debt.
Everything good that happened under Clinton happened in spite of him.
Everything bad that happened under Clinton happened because of him.
Everything good that happened under Bush happened because of him.
Everything bad that happened under Bush happened because of Clinton.
Reminds me of an old saying “don’t argue with a mule. It does no good and it annoys the mule.”
Clinton had nothing positive to do with the boom of the 90s. And he wouldn’t have if he’d wanted to. He wanted to spend and tax, but the GOP congress deadlocked him and forced him into the diastrous Balanced Budget Act of ’97, which put the health care industry in turmoil.
Bush has had better luck with Congress. He got his tax cuts. He worked with the Fed. and he benefit from a generally strong economy, much as Clinton did. He certainly can claim more credit than Clinton even though no president controls the economy.
Lefty Dems just don’t get it. Didn’t in the 90s and don’t now. Just saying.
… I see a conservative talking about fiscal responsibility these days, I’m suddenly overcome with the righteous urge to laugh hysterically.
Of course, there’s nothing really all that funny about creating more debt in the last six years than every other president in history combined.
to win votes. That’s why I’m unhappy with both parties.
Unemployment numbers are still higher than under Clinton, and the numbers we do see are easily proven to be manipulated: average monthly job growth is less then working population growth over the entire term of Bush’s presidency. I don’t know the exact numbers, but my guess is that the number of >150,000 job growth months under Bush can be counted on one hand. That means real unemployment is much, much higher than reported.
And if this is the greatest economic boom in history for anyone except the corporate coffers, I’ll be very surprised. I make less now than I did 6 years ago – not inflation-adjusted – am better qualified to do my job (and more certified), and have worse benefits and a longer commute. And Denver is supposed to be one of the least-hit cities in the country. The stock markets are hovering at less than 10% above their 2000 levels, for a year-over-year investment return of < 2%/year for 5 years; that's pathetic.
What bits of the economy are still growing are doing so mostly on the back of consumer credit. Consumers are now spending more than they’re saving, and the bankruptcy rate is soaring. I’d like to blame it on Bush’s “go shopping” policy in the War On Terra, but I doubt I can pin it on him.
Gecko…sigh
We are currently facing the highest forclose rate in history, especially here in Colorado.
I could sit here an list all my own personal objections to this President and Administration, but there are folks who have compiled the items I agree with whole-heartedly, and have the scholarly aptitude that I don’t have the patience to invest in myself.
So, in no particular order of hierachical importance, this President has:
* Presided over the loss of approximately three million American jobs in his first two-and-a-half years in office, the worst record since Herbert Hoover.
* Overseen an economy in which the stock market suffered its worst decline in the first two years of any administration since Hoover’s.
* Taken, in the wake of the terrorist attacks two years ago, the greatest worldwide outpouring of goodwill the United States has enjoyed at least since World War II and squandered it by insisting on pursuing a foolish go-it-almost-alone invasion of Iraq, thereby transforming almost universal support for the United States into worldwide condemnation. (One historian made this point particularly well: “After inadvertently gaining the sympathies of the world ‘s citizens when terrorists attacked New York and Washington, Bush has deliberately turned the country into the most hated in the world by a policy of breaking all major international agreements, declaring it our right to invade any country that we wish, proving that he’ll manipulate facts to justify anything he wishes to do, and bull-headedly charging into a quagmire.”)
* Misled (to use the most charitable word and interpretation) the American public about weapons of mass destruction and supposed ties to Al Qaeda in Iraq and so into a war that has plainly (and entirely predictably) made us less secure, caused a boom in the recruitment of terrorists, is killing American military personnel needlessly, and is threatening to suck up all our available military forces and be a bottomless pit for the money of American taxpayers for years to come.
* Failed to follow through in Afghanistan, where the Taliban and Al Qaeda are regrouping, once more increasing the threat to our people.
* Insulted and ridiculed other nations and international organizations and now has to go, hat in hand, to those nations and organizations begging for their assistance.
* Completely miscalculated or failed to plan for the personnel and monetary needs in Iraq after the war, so that he sought and obtained an $87 billion appropriation for Iraq, a sizable chunk of which is going, without competitive bidding to Haliburton, the company formerly headed by his vice president.
* Inherited an annual federal budget surplus of $230 billion and transformed it into a $500+ billion deficit in less than three years. This negative turnaround of three-quarters of a trillion dollars is totally without precedent in our history. The ballooning deficit for fiscal 2004 is rapidly approaching twice the dollar size of the previous record deficit, $290 billion, set in 1992, the last year of the administration of President Bush’s father and, at almost 5 percent of GDP, is closing in on the percentage record set by Ronald Reagan in 1986.
* Cut taxes three times, sharply reducing the burden on the rich, reclassified money obtained through stock ownership as more deserving than money earned through work. The idea that dividend income should not be taxed—what might accurately be termed the unearned income tax credit—can be stated succinctly: “If you had to work for your money, we’ll tax it; if you didn’t have to work for it, you can keep it all.”
* Severely curtailed the very American freedoms that our military people are supposed to be fighting to defend. (“The Patriot Act,” one of the historians noted, “is the worst since the Alien and Sedition Acts under John Adams.”)
* Called upon American armed service people, including Reserve forces, to sacrifice for ever-lengthening tours of duty in a hostile and dangerous environment while he rewards the rich at home with lower taxes and legislative giveaways and gives lucrative no-bid contracts to American corporations linked with the administration.
* Given an opportunity to begin to change the consumption-oriented values of the nation after September 11, 2001, when people were prepared to make a sacrifice for the common good, called instead of Americans to вЂsacrifice’ by going out and buying things.
* Proclaimed himself to be a conservative while maintaining that big government should be able to run roughshod over the Bill of Rights, and that the government must have all sorts of secrets from the people, but the people can be allowed no privacy from the government. (As one of the historians said, “this is not a conservative administration; it is a reckless and arrogant one, beholden to a mix of right-wing ideologues, neo-con fanatics, and social Darwinian elitists.”)
Just kidding……….
I hear you. I don’t think a Kerry or Gore can do it better though and I’m certain a Clinton with a history of coverups can’t either.
So go Rudy………
because they come from a history site. More current and egregious items are being compiled. Items like the warrantless wiretaps, signing letters etc. will be included in the history later, since these items are more current and ongoing.
that Bush is doing the exact opposite of helping our economy.
Ok, that being said, what would your plan be to fix it? Who do you see winning the Dem nomination and Presidency?
I see Clinton as your man (er woman). Who do you see? And if it is in fact another Clinton, can you say with a straight face that she won’t drag us out of a war and into poverty?
at least, is that the belief of many that “liberal” policies automatically are bad for the economy is myth. Personal income tax rates in the great post-war boom of the 50s dwarfed those of today. Also myth is the notion that democratic presidents are somehow bad for the economy. History just doens’t bear that out. And your attempt to prove that when things went well with a republican president and a democratic congress it was to the credit of the president, whereas when they went well with a democratic president and a republican congress it was to the credit of the congress, is kind of laughable.
I don’t think Hillary is the answer, either, and I don’t want to go back to the 70% plus post tax rate of the 50s, but I am kind of tired of conservatives simply assuming that deviating from the policies they favor will destroy the economy, as if those policies were writ on the rocks Moses brought down from the high country.
Well, on fixing the economy, Democrats are pretty well united: encourage an energy-independence boom. We spend $14 billion per year in oil and gas subsidies – only to see the oil companies pulling in and keeping record profits. We fail to collect even more in royalties because of some stupid bargain we made with the industry. We spend still more on agricultural subsidies to keep land untilled. All of that could be going to incentives and/or loans for wind farms, biofuels production, solar cell research, and energy efficiency incentives – all the while providing similar income for the farmers who really do need those subsidies (and removing them from the big agribusinesses who don’t).
Healthcare reform of some kind is also on the Democratic agenda. Healthcare costs are killing our businesses and driving our workers into bankruptcy. The exact nature of “reform” isn’t defined; most Democrats are proposing an expert panel from the private and public sectors to make recommendations.
Investment in real homeland security concerns will also drive economic growth – in those areas that really need it. The GOP has been sending a lot of money to protect museums in Podunk, USA. Democrats propose sending that money to first responders for better communications equipment, to spend on port protection and on airline upgrades, and on research to counter threats.
The basic points above (real security, energy independence, and healthcare that works for everyone) are part of the national party vision. I’d personally add “repeal the upper-bracket tax cuts and tighten tax laws; re-hire the people who used to audit upper-income taxes”.
As to who I want to see as our Presidential candidate, I’m not really into Mrs. Clinton – I’m tired of dynasties. Of the declared or expected candidates, I like what I’m hearing from Russ Feingold and John Edwards; I’m open to most of the rest of the field, too.
Your whole post is misleading and mindless. Where did you get that copy? Moveon.org?
The highest “Foreclosure Rate” actually ocurred during the late 1980’s and early 1990’s. El Paso County was the highest county in the nation with foreclosure rates. The courts were dealing with an average of 150 foreclosure filings per day.
Much of the foreclosure rates now are still due to the high-tech boom of the nineties. All for the following reasons:
1) People shifted from 30-year fixed rates to 15-year rates to pay off sooner. This increased the monthly payment 30 to 40%.
2) People shifted into short-term ARMS. The short-term rates have been increased 17 times by the Feds.
3) People refinanced their properties for 125% to value. When value decreased, they still owed much more than they can afford.
All of the above financing strategies work if one thing doesn’t happen…they lose their jobs.
The President tells us so – so why whould anyone be worried about that?
We should be so lucky as to have the Clintons returned to the White House. Just remember, Bush lied and thousands have died. No one died when Clinton lied.
would be just wonderful. Two lefties pretending to be moderates. Just great.
If that happened hold onto your wallets. I bet taxes would skyrocket, tax breaks for everyone including middle income taxpayers would end, social programs would increase at a rate that we could never pay for, and all the little liberals would be in socialist heaven.
We don’t need another brutal four years of partisan fighting. Clinton would do that – the R’s would hate her as much as the D’s hate Bush. Hillary would harm the Dems more than hurt. I don’t think the majority parties are going to enjoy wide margins in the House or the Senate in 08 so the next president will have to continue (or begin) working with both parties.
I want to see one of the parties have enough guts to nominate a leader, someone we can rally behind. Bush could have been this person but he missed too many opportunities after 9/11.
Can a leader be nominated in today’s 527, attack world where candidates’ personalities are whitewashed and wrung out before to make them palatable? If the last 10+ years are any indication, I’m not holding my breath.
The nominee must get through the base, made up of Wingnuts on the right and Wackos on the left. The nominee will likely be in the tank for either group, which makes it tough for a true leader to emerge. We can always dream though!
Your concern about a Congress without real functional majorities is a valid one. Even more problemmatic would be a split in party control between the two Houses.
That would make a ticket consisting of members of the “Gang of 14” the most logical pool from which to chose nominees.
However, none of the 14 could conceivably, with the exception maybe of John McCain or Lindsey Graham, satisfy the ideological wings of their parties.
Ken Salazar might some day be national material and tolerable to the left wing of the Democratic Party but not in ’08. We already saw how Joe Lieberman, the Democratic leader of the “Gang of 14” did when he ran for Prez in ’04 as well as in his run for re-election 10 days ago.
You have a short memory. Can you say Rwanda? Can you say Haiti? Can you say Vince Foster? How about the many other people closest to Clinton who mysteriously died?
Hmmm. How soon we forget.
Where is the causal connection between the lie about the blow job in ’98 and the killings in Rwanda and Haiti in ’93?
However, Shrub’s lie about Saddam Hussein trying to buy uranium (told in the middle of his State of the Union Address) was used as grounds to launch a war of aggression against Iraq which has led directly to thousands of Americans kids being killed and maimed.
Are you trying to blame the deaths in Rwanda on Clinton – then you have to blame all the deaths in Darfur on Bush, right?
Clinton himself says that his inaction on Rwanda is his single greatest regret.
Beyond Darfur, you’d also have to lay Iraq firmly at Bush’s feet. 3,400+ people died violently in Iraq this month due to the civil war there; more than 3,000 died last month. McLaughlin puts the total Iraqi casualty count at 129,000+. It starts to add up after a bit…
These two are not liberals. At best they are conservatives parading as liberals.
Salazar doesn’t have the experience nor the smarts to run for VP.
I blame 9/11 on Clinton. Far as I’m concerned, That tragedy and the war in Iraq and Afganhistan happened on his watch.
The man didn’t do the job. He left a mess for Bush, and what a mess he left.
I think that TERRORISTS are to blame for terrorism. Not Americans, not our government. What about anyone else?
although I think Bush was terribly inept, considering Clinton briefed him on inauguration day about Bin Laden, and the next 8 1/2 months that he basically ignored all signs that they were gearing up for attack. He was a little busy planning the big invasion of Iraq.
I can’t help but laugh when I read AS’s comments. Talk about reading them off a script. Might want to stop taking cheap shots at Brio and think for yourself, Another.
Too often we forget who the real bad guys are.
Who was president in Aug. ’01 when the NSA sent the briefing report (re: Arabs taking flying lessons but showing no interest in learning how to land the planes) down to the farm or ranch in Crawford, Texas?
And who was too busy clearing brush or whatever shit he was clearing to read the damn report?
Keep trying to blame this one of Clinton….you people are pathetic!
A self-described queer calling someone else pathetic!!!!
you may disagree but refrain from that kind of remark
just shows the limits of your abilities
Who was President when the Somolians wanted to turn Bin Laden out? Clinton. Who was it that refused to take action with Bin Laden when the Saudi’s offered him to them? Clinton. Who could have prevented 9/11 if they had not spent 15 months ignoring Bin Laden…Clinton.
That’s news to me. Sudan supposedly did, but they never offered him to us, nor did the Saudis. Clinton wanted the Saudis to take him from Sudan, because the FBI didn’t have enough evidence to prosecute him; but the Saudis never agreed to the exchange.
As to ignoring bin Laden, Clinton has been very open about the situations he faced: he couldn’t isolate bin Laden well enough to take him out; the one time he thought he had him, the GOP screamed “wag the dog!”
Get your facts straight before you embarass yourself.
Bay of Pigs happened within three months of Kennedy taking office; after eight years of Republican rule under Eisenhower. Kennedy took responsibility. He didn’t say “it is all Eisenhower’s fault.” Waco, first World Trade Center bombing and Somalia, happened within two months of Clinton taking power, after twelve years of Republican rule under Reagan/Bush I. Clinton didn’t blame the previous adminstration. Men know if it happens on your watch, you claim it.
Talk show jockeys and Georgie Porgie groupies don’t know what standing up means. Don’t have a clue. I am so sick of your whinning, Another Skeptic, Grecko..et.al.
Your preference has already been fulfilled–Elmer Fudd IS in charge! (He’s changed his name to… well, you know to what.) Always interesting to see that there’s someone out there who’s able to turn on a computer and still think that (a) invading in Iraq was a good idea in the first place and that the war has been conducted competently over the past 3-1/2 years (a period almost as long as WWII); (b) federal government handled the Katrina catastrophe well–just the way we’d hope for if some other castrophe hit nearby; (c) the “war on terror” is a big success, continuing freedom of Osama bin Laden and Zawahiri five years later notwithstanding, plots against transatlantic flights notwithstanding; (d) economy is sparklling, the decline in real incomes of most middle income Americans (that’s a FACT, brother, not vitrol) notwithstanding. Nothing like substituting labels for facts or rational anaysis. No wonder some people from Kansas think humans haven’t evolved from apes! Why not volunteer yourself as Exhibit A in their next campaign to take over the state board of education?
Invading Iraq was a good idea, but the war has been waged incompetently.
Plenty of people who support the war are unhappy with Bush on other issues.
Not everyone is so simple minded as you think.
Another skeptic, I appreciate a lot of what you post here, but…How can you continue to think that the Iraq invasion was a good idea? Jeeeesh.. even such neocon intelectual powerhouses like Fukuyama have stated that the preemptive war doctrine is a terrable foeirgn policy strategy. I am sympathetic to the idea of spreading democracy, but to think that it can be accomplished (especially in a society that is so vastly different to ours) by using military force seems wrong in so many ways.
It was a good decision to take Saddam down. If he were in charge today, he would be today’s Iran. He was an ambitious, viciious man who had to be toppled.
With the information and knowledge available at the time, invading was the thing to do.
That Rumsfeld has blown it so completely was unpredictable. But it’s not a surprise that the overly loyal Bush has stayed with him. Now we have a secretary of state who’s whispering appeasement into Bush’s ears, and who knows where we go from here.
And where we go from here is what’s important and more difficult to discuss. Second guessing is for sissies.
Forecasting, taking risks, putting your career and reputation on the line takes guts Clinton never had and Bush has shown time and again.
Guts: Clinton 3; Bush 10.
But first let me paraphrase a quote from the movie Million Dollar Baby, “Show me a fighter that’s nothing but heart and I’ll show you a man waiting for a beating.” Bush may have a lot of “guts”, but right now we are taking it in the chopper.
I think that Bush forgot about the forecasting part.
Putting any disagreements about how and why we got there aside, lets move foreword as you suggest and take a look at the options. I make no claim to be any sort of policy expert, but let me share a couple of reasons why I think that our only option left is to make a secure timed withdrawl.
(1) Iraq is in a civil war. I don’t care what rumsfeld and his yes men say. 3,000 civilian deaths/ month is 36,000 dead/year=civil war. Our troops have no buisness being in the middle of this.
(2) If we were going to go in and “win” this as some (McCain) suggest it would involve a massive assault on the shi’a militias (urban warfare in Sadre city) which would necessitate many more troops, supplies and money. I do not see bush starting a draft or raising taxes.
(3) If we were successful in putting down the militias, then there is still the Sunni and the real terrorists to deal with. Not to mention the meddling of Irqan.
It is not cutting and running as Darth Chaney suggests, it is admitting that the window of opportunity has closed and there is nothing more that we can do.
General Barry McCaffrey said today on MTP that his big concern is that this war is literally draining the budget that goes to keeping the military strong and intact for the future where (in 20 years) we will need to keep China in check. He said that it is near a breaking point.
We left Saddam in charge the first time around specifically *because* he was the equivalent of an Iran. He had the moxy to pull off one of the biggest hoaxes ever: that he still had a competent military and significant artillary, and could take on Iran if needed.
Weapons inspections did the job. More weapons inspections were continuing to do the job when Bush pulled the trigger.
The knowledge and information available at the time was cooked by Cheney, Feith, and company; whether or not Bush knew it, Powell certainly did, and so did DOE and parts of the CIA. It’s not like the CIA issued a report saying that toppling Saddam would make the situation worse (they did publish such a report). It’s not like the INR and DOE evaluations of the Aluminium tubes came back “Italian-made rocket tubes” (they did). It’s not like our evaluation of the Niger document came back “really lame forgery” (it did). And it’s not like every nation on the planet with a viable intelligence service came back and told us that Saddam’s agent didn’t meet Mohammed Atta in Prague (they did).
Iran was going along nicely with a moderate President – ineffectual though he may have been alongside the clerics – until we started rattling sabers. They even had an impressive display of sympathy for us after 9/11.
I do agree that the Iraq invasion might have gone differently if, instead of going with the Rumsfeld “Plan”, we instead listened to Gen. Shinseki, CENTCOM, the Army War College, and the State Department – all of whom offered numbers and plans for the invasion and/or the occupation following.
LOL, good one Gecko!
I am a somewhat moderate democrat (some on the far left say I don’t belong in the democratic party) and if I got to pick the president (not the democratic candidate but the president) I think my choice would be Al Gore.
But after the disaster of 2004 where Kerry snatched defeat out of the jaws of victory, I strongly supported Howard Dean as chairman of the democratic party. Not because I believed he had the answer, but because the bozos running the party clearly did not and so it was time for a radical change.
… continued at Liberal and Loving It
I was PO’d with the timid campaign which Gore ran in 2000, and in particular, the way in which he ran away from the label of being an environmentalist.
He actually allowed Shrub to steal the ecology issue from him, something I found amazing considering the fact that Shrub’s Daddy accused Gore of being a fringe environmentalist and nicknamed him “the Ozone Man” in ’92.
However, after seeing the incompetent campaign which John Kerry ran in ’04 and after seeing Gore do the talk show circuit to market his movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” I was impressed with him.
Gore was letting Gore be Gore. I could see voting for him in ’08……
He tried and failed once. And now that he has kicked his ecology issue into an obsession, what the hell would he do to us?
I can envision him banning the lumber companies from cutting trees. Which would in essence destroy the housing industry, which would put millions of people out of work. Including our precious illegal immigrants.
That would be #1.
#2 would be the banning of oil drilling because of greenhouse gasses. That would would put millions more people out of work and in the mean time make us even more dependant on foreign oil until alternate energy forms are exploited.
#3 would be raise taxes to cover the failed SS, welfare, medicare, medicaid, etc.
Gee, that means even more money taken out of our checks.
Let us hope to the rhino’s christ you are wrong.
Did that little detail of Gore getting 500k more votes than Bush slip by you once again?
We tried it your way, and all we have is a $1.5 trillion deficit to show for it.
Over the past 6 years, Republicans have proven themselves incapable of governing. Just how many more failures to you propose we endure before throwing the bums out? How far does our country have to sink?
Ditto. I didn’t like Gore in 2000 at all. Now, when I see him speaking at a MoveOn.org event, when I see Inconvenient Truth, and when I hear what he has to say, all I can think is, “And this man could have been our President.”
For years I’ve been thinking, “shouldn’t we worry about more than terrorism?” It’s not politically correct to question the wisdom of a “war on terror”, but you have a better chance of getting struck by lightening or dying in your bathtub than being attacked by terrorists. The biggest threats to our (as Cheney would say) “non-negotiable way of life” are oil depletion and global warming. Both of those dangers have the potential to end western civilization as we know it. And when Al, near the end of Inconvenient Truth, had the courage stand up and say, “maybe we should be worrying about more than terrorism”, I applauded. I thought on one hand that finally, someone had the courage to say what our leaders don’t. Then I realized that half the country voted for this man, so maybe realism isn’t as fringe as I think it is.
It seems like the Democrats sell the American Dream vision to voters by promising not to screw anything up. Take Bill Ritter — he seems like a very competent manager, and maybe that’s what an executive branch needs. He’ll clean up corruption, restore funding to some critical services, and probably run the state pretty well…
But, as competent and decent as he may be, he’s no transformational leader. And what we need right now are transformational leaders. Makes me sad…
who kept running for the presidency only to be whooped each time. Gore could do more good outside of office than in.
I feared that Gore would degenerate into a left-wing Richard Nixon. Elected to the House, Senate, V.P., and then narrowly defeated for the Presidency (or as many believe, had the office stolen from under him), only to go on and obsessively plot his return and revenge………
I’m happy to see Gore is at peace with himself and has returned to the environment issue. I don’t think he’s going to run again, which makes him look all the more attractive as a candidate and potential president.
I think he just wants to go down in history as one of the people who tried to warn us of what we are doing to our planet.
Gore could have run a much better campaign. But the point remains that he did win in Florida. Even putting aside the flawed ballot layout in Dade County, there was a clear effort there to depress the vote (longer lines, “lost” registration, etc) among democratic voters.
– dave
If he did he would have been president. Saying anything else is just wishing.
Is your thesis that the final vote is inviolate and there is never any cheating or repression of the vote?
LBJ by his own statements admitted that he stole the vote to win as Senator in Texas.
JFK almost certainly won due to illegal votes in both Chicago (winning Illinois) and Texas (thanks to LBJ).
More recently there have been vote totals in some areas where the total vote was greater than the total voting age population. Those were “adjusted” but it leaves you wondering about places where it was not as blatant.
There are very credible arguments that Republican actions stopped a lot of poor & black citizens from voting. The “felon” list in Florida has been shown to have large numbers of people on it that can vote.
Put that aside, if the supreme court had not stepped in and appointed the winner, the recount would have almost certainly gone Gore’s way based on independent counts performed later by a group of newspapers.
So… yes Gore won. But by less than the margin of error in our voting system which gave the Republicans an opening to throw it to Bush.
– dave
The guy is costing Dems millions of votes. What an idiot.
I don’t like Howard Dean’s positions on everything, but I can do nothing but strongly support his efforts to get the democratic party engaged in the public dialogue even in areas where democrats are unlikely to win races for public office. I don’t belong to nor donate to political parties, but if Dean shows the resolve to continue that plan in a year when dems aren’t already riding a wave of public opinion, I might change that. I’d love to see my money spent on bringing up ideas and starting conversations, rather than running the four thousand and fifteenth TV ad in a competitive district.
… why are Republicans so loud about it? If he was truly bad they would all shut up so he stayed there.
Dean’s the only thing Republicans have going for them. And they’re making the most of it, but it won’t be enought to stem the anti-Republican tide, imho.
Dean as party chair has vastly increased the DNC’s income (and the various committees’ coffers are up, too). He is organizing state parties – all state parties. He has contributed people to the state parties to re-activate dormant areas.
I fail to see how he’s driving voters away; there are some pissed-off consultants in D.C. who are making a big stink, and the DSCC and DCCC chairs are whining a bit because the fact that they’re outraising the Republicans isn’t “good enough” – they want DNC money, too.
To some extent, what Dean is doing is a vastly accellerated copy of the Republican rise to power. Be active everywhere, field candidates in all races.
Compared to the DNC under prior chairs, Dean’s doing a great job revitalizing the party. Pat Waak is doing the same here in Colorado, and the county parties – especially the ones outside the metro – are loving every minute of it.
but it is real sad what the Japanese car industry is doing to us.
Ford is cutting back some 20% to try and stay afloat. GM is doing similar things. But because so many of you people buy Japanese cars, Toyota is going to be the number 1 manufacturer in the world.
That is sad.
Many will say they build a better car and that they put Americans to work.
I say if we didn’t buy so frickin many of their cars, those same people that are building Toyotas would be building Fords and Chevys, thus helping OUR economy. Not overseas economies.
How can it be that just because these workers when building a Toyota are thus providing a superior product, but the same workers if building a Ford are building crap?
After all, just because Toyotas are built here doesn’t mean the profits stay here. The profits go to Japan.
Soon we will be owned by overseas conglomerates.
Just a pet peeve of mine. We are giving our country away.
By the way, I have a 2003 Ford and a 1996 Chevy, both pickups that have had zero problems. And both were purchased new.
Maybe the problem is the labor force that is employed by the U.S. auto makers. Maybe the problem is also union wages. Maybe the problem is also obscenely expensive health insurance policies that employers have to provide. Wasn’t part of GMs problem the high wages they were paying long time employees? Isn’t that why the offered buyouts to the old timers?
My neighbor worked for GM for just over 20 years. The benefits, stock options, and retirement that GM provided was beyond my wildest dreams. She finally took the money and ran a few years short of retirement because she felt if she hung around, she’d end up with nothing. At least she got something from the buyout.
It seems most employees expect their wages and benefits to increase even when the companies profits don’t increase. How can a company possibly stay competitive if wages and benefits can’t fluctuate up and down? The economy fluctuates up and down, but god forbid an employee’s wages have to ride with it.
They brought us the 40 hour work week and benefits. Great. But now their time has come and gone. It is time to end them.
They are crippling many US industries.
And just look at what the teachers union has brought us…
Wow, how Reaganish of you. Let’s take down Unions to allow slave wages to the hard working men and women of American that build our roads, build or houses, drive our food from city to city along with the millions of other critical positions in society or workers hold.
So, let’s screw them in the name of corporate profit who are out and in-sourcing while screaming for a free market.
Strength in numbers and collective bargaining.
Ok, same worker base for both companies. Both build here in the US. What’s the one difference? It’s the management of the companies. (And management is responsible for continuing with impossible benefits, salary, and job protection for workers.)
It’s call free enterprise which everyone loves until someone does better than the company they work at. The better product will sell better.
– dave (who has always owned and always will own a BMW)
I have no sympathy for union members who demand exhorbitant wages, benefits and retirement benefits. They’ve priced themselves out of the market and have only themselves to blame.
And they and their unions back hard lefties who would socialize our country, so I can hardly worry about them. I only worry that when the Dems win in November, they’ll try to bail out Detroit with universal health insurance.
Then only Bush will stand in the way of disaster. And that assumes he will veto the dumb socialist legislation that a Democratic congress will try to enact.
Jesus, you sure woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Take some aspirin and drink plenty of water.
So time for a little fun.
Hi;
I’ll agree the unions are partly to blame. But how is it you let management totally off the hook. They are the ones responsible for competently running the company. They are the morons that agreed to the killer union contracts.
The union is supposed to get as much for their members as they can. Management is supposed to insure that union pay is affordable. Who didn’t do their job?
– dave
Forget the history.
What’s important is now and the future.
Under pressure from the markets and shareholders, Detroit’s top executives are in a crisis mode, cutting production and costs and revamping their companies as much as regulations and the unions will let them.
Under pressure from their members, UAW leaders are fighting change every step of the way, making it almost impossible for Detroit to recover and compete with foreign-owned auto makers.
I give Ford and GM a 60% chance of surviving.
You mean, like massive layoffs? That’s neither bold nor radical – it’s been done for many years now.
The UAW has an interest – workers. It’s their job to offset the management styles of corporate turnaround experts who swing an overly-liberal axe.
Monetarily, the auto industry has a simple problem: they’re saddled with the promises they made to their workers a long time ago. They promised healthcare and pensions, and they didn’t invest wisely enough to pay for those costs – or those costs (esp. healthcare) have spiraled beyond all expectations. I’m one of those people who think that corporate promises should be valuable, especially under contract law; I think the United bankruptcy deal sucked, for example. Not planning to meet your long-term commitments is not good corporate governance. And bad corporate governance causes problems – like impending bankruptcy.
I own a foreign car because said foreign car has features I want, that domestic cars didn’t offer. When I replace it, I might buy domestic, or not – but there is only one domestic car that even comes close to being a viable replacement, and the foreign manufacturers are constantly offering more and better.
My other car is currently a domestic model. When it gets replaced, my current options are all foreign.
GM does not and has not offered anything I’d be interested in since I’ve been a car owner. Ford offers one vehicle I’m interested in: the Escape Hybrid. And if you count Daimler-Chrysler as domestic, they’re stopping production of the only model I have interest in.
So if you want blame, point your finger towards the marketing and planning execs, who can’t seem to come up with what I want.
If labor is a problem at all (and the Japanese companies all use the same U.S. labor as the domestics…), it’s in their resistance to just abandoning plants and starting them up elsewhere. The Japanese plants are all new, and new plants are cheaper than upgrades. But abandoning skilled workers is no solution, either, and not what workers used to expect from their companies – you know, in the days where companies had some loyalty to their workers…
Rudy did a great job cleaning up the streets of New York and his claim to fame is how he handled 9-11. However, his reputation re: Family Values for all concerned are not so wonderful. He would not appeal to the Right Wing which is okay with me because they don’t appeal to me, and the Dems would have a field day regarding his past relationships. And you say Bill was bad. I say Bring Back Bill!! We need some sanity in this country and a leader who knows how to talk to people around the world.
consistently rates #1 among Republican choices for President. Unfortunately, all those Republicans are not involved in the convention process and do not pick the nominee. A clarion call to Moderate R’s to get involved early and stay late.
Unfortunately, most of the moderate Rs that I know don’t have the intestinal fortitude to put up with the crap that goes with trying to make it through the caucus process to becoming a delegate to the county assembly/convention and then to the state and certainly not to the national convention.
Actually, the real problem is that they don’t go to the caucus. All it would take is getting about a dozen moderate Rs to attend caucus, then we could roll the wing nuts and take over our precinct. If we could get that to happen on a larger scale, we could take over the assembly. And so on. And so on. If those moderates who sit at home on caucus night understood the importance of their attendance we could change the face of Republican politics in Colorado. There’s a pipedream.
Oh how I loathe Colorado’s caucus sytem!
I’ve gone to and held caucuses and have been elected to the assemblies.
Boring.
People just don’t turn out. Don’t like politics. Don’t want to do the work, which amounts to sitting in one place for a few hours.
So the hacks turn out, the activists for a cause, the liberals who are against abortion and use the GOP to impose their will, or try to.
If Roe vs. Wade were overturned, the moderates would get their party back, because the Repulsive Republican Radicals (RRRs) would go back to the Democratic Party.
I can’t even imagine the RRRs I know coming over to the Democratic side of the aisle. They have power now in the Republican Party and they want to keep it. I wish you luck over there; I didn’t see any hope for it – that’s why I play for the Democratic team now.
I figure someday the Moderates will get sick of the Wingnuts picking other Wingnuts for office, and they will get involved from the caucus level up. I can wait it out.
Rudy’s first marriage was to his cousin and that subsequently was annuled. Some might question the propriety of marrying a cousin, but such a marriage might actually win him Arkansas, Missouri, and couple of deep south states in a general election.
Rudy’s second wife, Donna Hanover, was a local TV journalist when they met and married. She worked the media skillfully when he arrogantly and unilaterally announced he was seeking a divorce. He came across as a cad in the way he made the announcement in a press conference without discussing it with Hanover first.
A friend of Hanover’s telephoned her when Hizzoner’s press conference was going on, and Hanover, literally within minutes, called her own competing press conference on the steps of the Mayor’s Residence. She made Rudy look like a selfish creep as she wiped the tears away from her eyes.
Hanover was in the driver’s seat for the rest of the divorce proceedings. Whenever Rudy tried to strike back, it involved petty gestures and they blew up in his face.
He tried to bring his paramour, Judith Nathan, to the Mayor’s Residence for official events but Hanover got the divorce judge to issue a restraining order on the grounds that until the divorce was final or Rudy’s term finished, it was Hanover home!
Rudy eventually had to move in with a gay couple who were friends of his, political supporters of his, and had a guest room available.
After Mike Bloomberg became mayor in ’02, and after Rudy and Donna were finally divorced, Rudy was able to return to the Mayor’s Residence where Bloomberg performed the marriage ceremony uniting Rudy with Judy. I don’t believe that Ms. Hanover received an invitation to the wedding.
I think there’s enough here to set off all of the bells and whistles down at Focus on the Family’s H.Q. simultaneously.
🙂
on reconnecting with a high-school sweetheart and marrying him. It’s about people who’ve rediscovered their old loves after losing or divoricing their spouses. I browsed it at the book store but didn’t buy it because it doesn’t apply to me. Search Donna Hanover at Amazon or Barnes & Noble.
I don’t think Rudy can get the GOP nomination, and I think voters would worry about electing a 72-year-old McCain who’s had a bout with skin cancer.
Yet, McCain’s much stronger than any of the Dems who are either integrity challenged or suspect when it comes to national security.
McCain seems to have decided that being President in ’08 is more important than remaining “maverick”. He’s been doing some pretty questionable bits lately. For Republicans, the bright side is he’s been ponying up to the RRR bar (not that he was truly that far away from there before, but he didn’t used to parade it…); kissing and making up with the Radicals might improve his chances in ’08. That and George Allen tanking with his ‘macaca’ comment last week.
From the AP:
More than 100 young women who expressed interest in joining the military in the past year were preyed upon sexually by their recruiters. Women were raped on recruiting office couches, assaulted in government cars and groped en route to entrance exams.
The military’s desperately overstretched as a result of this reckless war. With typical Republican logic, they’ve resorted to using unscrupulous bottom-feeders as recruiters and letting them run wild. Military recruiters have always tended to be sleazy, but it’s gotten much worse. They lie, cheat, and manipulate young people – especially disadvantaged young people – to make up for the planning mistakes of their superiors.
Now we’re learning that they rape and abuse recruits, too. It’s not just Abu Ghraib and Gitmo anymore. Like the old country song says, “War Is Hell On The Home Front Too.”
“This should never be allowed to happen,” one 18-year-old young woman said. “He had my future. I trusted him.”
She might as well be speaking for the entire country.
Blaming this on one party or another seems unfair and just partisan nonsense to me.
There’s a lot of pressure in the Army and Marines right now. Tailhook was ungood, but the number of stories coming out lately is making that look pretty limited.
We aren’t doing our best for our troops; we aren’t even making a serious effort. But then, that seems to define our President and our Secretary of Defense – not even making a serious effort.
Despite the promises of George Bush, it’s still a disaster:
Nearly half of New Orleans was still under water when President Bush stood in the Crescent City’s historic Jackson Square and swore he would “do what it takes” to rebuild the communities and lives that had been laid to waste two weeks before by Hurricane Katrina.
“Our goal is to get the work done quickly,” the president said.
He promised to spend federal money wisely and accountably. And he vowed to address the poverty exposed by the government’s inadequate Katrina response “with bold bold action.”
A year after the storm, the federal government has proven slow and unreliable in keeping the president’s promises.
The job of clearing debris left by the storm remains unfinished, and has been plagued by accusations of fraud and price gouging. Tens of thousands of families still live in trailers or mobile homes, with no indication of when or how they will be able to obtain permanent housing. Important decisions about rebuilding and improving flood defenses have been delayed. And little if anything has been done to ensure the welfare of the poor in a rebuilt New Orleans.
The AP documents the lack of progress in six areas: Emergency Assistance, Clean Up, Housing, Rebuilding, Levees, and Poverty.
Bush’s promises meant nothing…again. Does anyone really think this man and his incompetent administration can keep us safe?
No.
I hate to harp on this, but, so far today I’ve read cases for Bush’s impeachment, endorsements for Gore in ’08 and the idea that Hillary and Sen. Ken are conservatives posing as liberals.
This is moderate stuff?!
This is not moderate stuff.
Most posters on this site are well-informed political junkees who are absolutely wrong on the issues. I’m pretty sure that a lot of people here would be included in that crazy third of the country who thinks that the government executed 9/11. That is whacky, whacky, whacky! This is the type of rubbish you find on Daily Kos or other nutroots trash. My guess is that most of you support Lamont over Joe, even though Jomentum has carried him to a 12 point lead in Connecticut.
Security moms who vote for Democrats this fall don’t really care about security. If you think that Democrats are better on national security than there is no chance you will ever vote for Republicans. If you believe that we are at war against a brutal enenemy, namely Islamic extremism, a vote for the Democrats is a vote for defeat. Period.
What can I say? Most liberals so badly wish that their views are mainstream that they just pretend they are. Don’t give me polls. Polls said the GOP wouldn’t win in ’02 and they said Bush would lose in ’04 (after all, if your approval rating is sub-50, you’re never supposed to win). This fall the values voters will be out like never before and the security moms who really value security might complain about Bush or war or health care or whatever, but when the finger hits the screen, it’s gonna be for the GOP.
“nutroots”, “Daily Kos” …
When Republicans call guarding the world’s largest Prairie Dog “Homeland Security”, Democrats say “America can do better”. When Republicans say “If you believe that we are at war against a brutal enenemy, namely Islamic extremism, a vote for the Democrats is a vote for defeat,” Democrats offer a new direction: to fight an enemy, you have to be in the right country using the right weapons.
You say “we’re fighting them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here”, but we’re not fighting them in Spain, or London, or Bali where they’ve attacked since 9/11. So something’s not working right with that plan…
Bush has built – and deployed – a non-functional missle defense system that, even if it were working, is ineffective against the missiles of the only nation that can reach us – Russia. In building this system, he’s wasted countless billions of dollars and unilaterally voided the ABM treaty. The Democrats offer a better solution: restore the nuclear warhead reduction program that removed Russian missiles from potential theft, and truly dismantle the AQ Khan network that Bush has left largely intact.
Security moms are leaving the Republican Party because all they see is fear and loathing – no solutions. You can’t scare all of the people all of the time, or even for a very long time. After a while, Tom Ridge’s self-admitted political exercising of the Terror Alert system becomes expected (and disgusting); too many terrorist cells who can’t buy their own boots, and people just think of the boy who cried “Wolf!” when they hear of the latest “plot”. Frankly, anything’s better than what we have now.
It’s so easy to demonize Bush on any topic. It’s always his fault, as if he wrote the laws years ago that make the federal bureaucracy a rigid, uncaring mess and he created the culture of corruption in N.O.
Why is it that people see things so black and white and think they alone could do things better?
Never ceases to amaze.
So you think another president would have done a better job?
Let’s see. Gore blew it in 2000. So I guess he’d fix Iraq and N.O.
Kerry blew it in 2004. So I guess he’s our man.
Sen. Clinton made $100,000 in a couple of weeks trading the futures markets. She obviously has the magic touch.
Sen. Edwards made a fortune driving ob/gyns out of his state. He knows how to make things better.
Bill Richardson’s notorious for sexual harassment and other ethical lapses. Put him in charge.
Joe Biden plaigerizes. Maybe he can copy the Marshall Plan.
Lots of talent out there, that’s for sure.
You are on a roll today!:)
Gore “blew it in 2000” so badly, he got 500,000 more votes than Bush, and under a full statewide recount would have won Florida, too (nevermind the thousands of “Nader” voters in Palm Beach County…)
Kerry blew it IMNSHO, but he still may have won Ohio (lawsuit ongoing…).
Hillary Clinton’s deal with $100,000 I find to be the worst of the dirt that the GOP dragged out about her – yet she wasn’t ever prosecuted for it, so I have to question just how illegal it might have been.
Richardson’s sex scandal, if there is one, is so deeply buried it doesn’t show up on Internet searches. His ethical lapses apparently include lying about being offered a position on the KC A’s baseball team and leaking the name of Wen Ho Lee to reporters.
Biden – well, I don’t know what to say about Biden.
But compared to Bush, I’d take any of them, any day. I’d take most current Governors over Bush, including Bush’s replacement “Good Hair” Perry. I’d take a sizeable portion of the Senate and House over Bush – heck, I’d take Tom Delay over Bush, and as far as I’m concerned he’s a known crook. I’d take Nixon, Carter, Ford… I might even take Reagan in his second term, knowing what I know now.
To put it another way:
See? You can be Better Than Bush, too – I’d vote for you!
There’s a sex scandal involving Bill Richardson? OMFG (Unless you’re referring to his alleged involving in attempts to silence Monica Lewinsky by shipping her out of D.C. and up to work for him in N.Y.C. at the U.N.)
Just what is it that makes Joe so attractive to Repubs? It can not be his conservative voting record, after all he has voted with the Dems over 90% of the time while in office. It can not be his stance on abortion or “family values”. Is it just his Hawkish views on Iraq? If so, Joe’s views are no longer mainstream in that they are no longer supported by the majority of Americans. In fact it seems that it is a bit “extremist” to fully support the Bush administration in the way they have handled the war.
It is ironic that Lamont, who is a fiscally conservative buisnessman , is labeled an extremist liberal by Rove and Co. just for his opposition to the war and the way that it has been mis-handled. IMHO this is because they know that it is the war issue that is going to be their doom in a few months.
Stop quoting those ridiculous polls citing American’s peacenik stance on Iraq. The polls show that Americans are upset not with the war itself but how it’s being fought. They are actually more hawkish on the war than the administration. They are tired of seeing troops just hanging out and getting bombed. I guarantee that if the coalition troops went into a full-throttle incursion into the terrorist areas the public support for the war would increase.
Hmmm, in one post (“Gore – a real big conservative) it’s “don’t give me polls, they’re wrong!” In this post, it’s “here’s what the polls say, they’re right!” Your candidate for governor would be proud.
Most Americans are questioning why their children or grandchildren are facing the prospect of going to Iraq to fight between the Shiites and Sunnis in a civil war which we unleashed when we removed the only thing which kept the two sides in place (a thug by the name of Saddam Hussein), and in which both sides hate Americans equally.
I realize that our fearless leader will soon announce that we have “turned another corner” in Iraq. Does anyone over the age of six believe anything he says anymore?
He continually paints a cheery picture, and while that can work for awhile, if he doesn’t delivery, he’s ignored.
Americans know we’re in a mess and that there is no easy way out, and they know that the president hasn’t made the hard military decisions to win the war. He keeps putting the burden on the “commanders,” who are smart enough to not ask for what the president and Rumsfeld don’t want to give them.
If Bush has been dishonest, his claim that he gives the commders what they need and want is the historic lie that will be debated for generations. This is a case history of how a politician manipulates the military instead of providing leadership.
So frustratingly sad.
why did EVERY SINGLE ONE of the Republican candidates for CO-5 (except Joh Anderson) sit there and say “I support Goerge Bush 150% – and failure to support this President is unconscienable”. What does that say about the skill set of Mr. Lamborn? What does it say about the last three years of Faux News demonizing every politician who questioned the President’s decisions BASED ON HIS LACK OF CREDIBILITY. If you say his credibility is shot, what does it say about the people (like Joe Lieberman) who say it is a disgrace to challenge his leadership?
Call the Dems radicals if you want (though I think you may find that many – not all – are reasonable and want to help govern, not rule) but give them credit for calling a spade a spade and disagreeing with the MESSAGE of this President. That is one reason why this Republican is crossing lines in a SELECT set of races – because I know the person running.
I talked to a Republican yesterday who said “I don’t need to hear what that Democrat is saying, they’re lying”. To which I replied, “I know this person, they aren’t”. Reply, “You know them, I don’t”.
That is the problem, I can’t tell you how many Republicans AND DEMOCRATS I see refusing to listen to the other side. Yes, there are people on both sides who lie for power. But only by taking the time to listen, to dissect the logic can you decide whether the person is or isn’t.
Queer Dude (I don’t think I even need to ask)…The anwer to your question: I do. I trust in the president. I believe he has the clarity that so many politicians lack. So do most Americans and that’s why he was re-elected.
Aristotle (there’s a much better name)…you caught me. We all use polls to support our case. Let’s just agree that polls are terrible indicators of what people think. Most polls are unreliable push polls and summer polling is notoriously bad. Some are good; others are bad. I’m just tired of people using polls to show how Americans are really truly just delightful quitters. The truth is that Americans probably have a lot of different views on the war but no matter what they think of the decision to go in…most are not for quitting. Lamont and other white-flag Democrats will lose if they advocate this position.
I’m thrilled to learn that my moniker is driving you to exercise you brain and ponder the possibilities of what it might mean, esp. since your brain doesn’t get much exercise with your blind acceptance of all the sound bites and other crap issued by the White House Communications Dept. about us bringing freedom to Iraq and “turning another corner.”
You should meet my brother, One Peculiar Guy!
I’m not one that believes much in the objectivity in polls, even if the pollsters are (occasionally) striving for it. Although following the CD7 Dem primary did show that some (very late) polls could be accurate.
I’ve posted on this blog that I think, regardless of the reasons we went to Iraq (I don’t buy the administration’s line one bit), staying until it’s truly stable is the right thing to do. I’m afraid it will take at least double the troops to do it and it’s far too late for that – the public will never stand for it at this point. If they’d sent 200,000+ to begin with… well, that’s pure Monday morning quarterbacking.
But I must say Queer Dude that it is a whole lot tougher to articulate support for the war with the press and the left breathing fire down the necks of advocates of absolute victory against Islamic terror. Your name is just, well, all so very queer. But that matters much less to me than your views.
Aristotle….send ’em in. I think, actually, you are very average in your estimate of the war. Most people probably agree with you. Bring more troops, do what it takes to kill the bad guys (even if it means making Katie Couric and Amnesty International cry…which it will) and it means getting tough on the guys we do capture. No matter what the Old Grey Lady says, we will never win if we treat Saddam & Co. like John Karr. So let’s have the troops! And you’re right about CD-7. Like I said, some polls are right on and others are just wrong and others don’t give the whole picture. I suppose that’s why we quote the polls that support our cases…maybe just maybe THAT poll will be right. When I see a poll, whether I like it or not, I ask myself whether it makes sense. It makes sense to me that President Bush’s approval rating is about 43 percent (that’s according to Rasmussen today). It’s not much lower and probably not much higher (although it should be).
You’ve got a lot of conservatives who don’t like how Bush rolls and so they may vote GOP and they certainly voted for him two years ago, but ask them if they love the job he’s doing, they will probably say no. And as a conservative, that’s fine by me. As long as good conservatives don’t defect to the Dummacrats, I’m fine with people saying whatever they want.
We don’t have another 200,000 troops to do the job. We’ve used up our military, and squandered our ties to the nations that might have helped provide forces.
Bring on the draft if you want victory in Iraq. Do it before the election, and every Republican in national office will be voted out.
A stable Iraq is the right thing to do (and the legal thing to do under Geneva Conventions), but I think it’s too late now. The manpower, the equipment, the willingness of the citizenry, and the willingness of the President to raise taxes to cover the war machine aren’t there. It would take us another decade or two to get it right from this point, assuming full commitment. The cost to the Iraqi people under that kind of occupation would likely outweigh the casualties of a civil war, and the potential for recruitment of terrorists by Al Qaeda and others would be immense.
In short, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the PNAC crew screwed the pooch on Iraq.
So in your estimation are the rising chorus of republicans who oppose the continuation fo the war like Chuck Hagel and perhaps George Will “white flag democrats”?
Today on Fox News Sunday, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) said that Iraq is in a “very defined civil war” and that the Middle East is “the most unstable we’ve seen since 1948.” He also reiterated that the United States needs to begin withdrawing troops within the next six months because staying the course just continues to “kill Americans and put Americans in the middle of a civil war that we have less and less control and influence over every day.”
Link: http://thinkprogress…
Bush is the most dangerous man on the planet. Arrogant, lying, clueless……………dangerous. The UK has been trying for years to get this “administration” to pursue a peace plan in the middle east……….but, accoring to a cabinet level Brit….”they just won’t engage”. Just this week he’s been called “crap” and of “low intellect” by our friends in Britain. A majority of Americans know it, and we’re going to see an end to this nonsense in November….when oversight returns to the U.S. Government. The rubber-stamp Republicans have presided over the most costly, illegal and wrong headed approach to foreign policy in the history of this great country….dragging it to the edge of the abyss in terms of negative world opinion, billions of dollars….for what? Let me remind FFF, Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. Remember Bush saying, “I just don’t think about him much any more” referring to Bin Laden? His promise to capture him just another in a long list of broken promises and failures by this Republican controlled government. Everyone who fails is either promoted or given a Medal of Honor. If I tried to run a company s way I’d be fired….long ago.
FFF attempts to put a positive spin on this disaster, and is clearly an apologist for the walking disaster that George Bush/Cheney/Rumsfield are. If they had any honor, they’d quit.
Such unthinking, inaccurate bitterness. Just amazing.
What the hell is with you yellow-pants republicans? Bill Clinton has been gone for seven years and you pigeons are still hiding under the bed. It’s 2006 folks, Bill Clinton is gone, he can’t hurt you any more. And whats with the perverse obsession with Hillary? If she’s so dangerous, why haven’t the republicans fielded a sane candidate to compete for her senate seat. Have you chicken shits given up on that race?
I thought republicans were the manly men, the stalwart and the stong willed. Why are you so sceered of Bill? Have you lost faith in your conservative and moral revolution? What about the permanent republican majority? Have you lost faith in George Bush’s ability to protect you from the Clintons and the Muslims? God, have you lost your faith in God?
Every time I make a cogent point in a debate with a republican, they respond by saying “…Oh yeah? Well Bill Clinton…so there smartass”.
Here’s the bottom line tunas. Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter were more outstanding leaders. Michael Morre never lies, and Al Gore will take your lunch money. Moreover, they can win wars and keeep God’s country safe and secure. Can you say that about your current idiot? And Hillary is twice the man that the fake texan George Bush Ju. is.
Stay under the bed cowards.