I Didn't Write That!
30 September 2004
Round One To Kerry
Round One To Kerry
"By not allowing himself to be reduced to tears, the president was a big winner tonight."
Rob Cordry, The Daily Show
Ohhh...I'm feeling much better tonight.
It's true, as Jon Stewart remarked, that the two sides of the debate seemed like competing campaign speeches--which indeed they are--but there was quite a distinct difference between the impressions formed by either candidate's performance this evening. This was aided by the networks, apparently, doing what I thought they were only doing on pundit-free, raw C-Span, on which I was watching. I feared if I watched any other source I would hear pundits mumbling color commentary all the way through.
When I watch presidential debates, the only one allowed to talk over the candidates with spontaneous commentary is me, dammit. I do tend to get over-excited and shout at the screen--I'm told this is very amusing to observe, assuming one isn't interested in paying very close attention to the debate. The presidential debates are to me what the Super Bowl is to others, but I only get to see it once every four years.
So I opted for the closest thing I could get to a raw feed, but as it turned out this was a joke--it turns out Fox News was handling the cameras and distributing the feeds. Tonight's debate was purely on foreign policy, and going in, the media poodles seemed to have thought for reasons passing understanding that Bush would have the advantage. That seems to assume Bush has any foreign policy successes beyond "we're makin' progress" to declare.
On C-Span the debate was split-screen. There apparently are 32 pages of rules worked out between the campaigns, and it seems that split screen was against said rules, which no network signed onto. Some also had to do with podium height--specifically that they be exactly equal. The split screen, however, would appear from the first long two-shot seen at the beginning to only emphasize a salient fact: Bush looks short and puny and Kerry looks tall and presidential. They attempted to rectify this in the split screen by lining up the tops of their heads, which only made Bush look shorter and more hunched. They say that height alone is usually enough to decide a presidential race.
So glamour points go to Kerry, not just for that, or for not raising his voice even once while Bush did a number of times(more about that in a bit) but for a later moment where Bush attempted to get chummy, saying that he wanted to "put a leash on" his daughters. Both had a nice little laugh about that, followed by the only moment they smiled at the same time--making Bush's attempt at looking charming backfire. Bush really didn't want us to see these alongside one another. Kerry had a nice, very white smile(almost sanded--you shouldn't look directly at it, it'll scar your retinas) while Bush came off looking every inch the chimp. One wonders how a man with a full mouth of teeth still manages every time he grins to look like the village idiot Gummy Jethro. A man who hides his teeth a lot when he smiles has something to hide in his mouth.
For Kerry's part as far as the substance of the debate, he did pretty much the least one should expect from a presidential candidate. Bullet point after bullet point, tightly organized and reasoned, finally articulating the difference between his view and Dubya's on Iraq, best summed up thusly:
KERRY: I have a plan to win the peace in Iraq. Bush went in without a plan, and worse, directed resources away from getting Bin Laden, the actual person that attacked us.
BUSH: Ben who?...My plan was fine, is fine, and it's going fine, and to say otherwise is insulting our great ally Poland and depress our fighting men and women, none of whose funerals I've attended but your brains will go all warm and fuzzy as I tell you a made-up story about a war widow I had a laugh with named Missy. What, I have to answer the question? (huff) Jeezus, is this boring. (sniff) Damn, I hope this itch on my cheek ain't another boil. Hell, is that thing on?
Bush clearly wasn't aware that the entire thing would be broadcast split-screen not just by dull ol' C-Span, but by most of the major networks--including Fox. If he had, he would certainly have been much more circumspect in his huffy reactions during Kerry's time, which were a fascinating sight throughout. One wonders if the networks picked this exact moment to fuck Bush. The punditsphere--even Fox--was very quick to give Kerry the victory, and surprised at Bush's terrible performance. Relentlessly throughout he displayed what several Hardball commentators referred to as a "monarchical" air.
He looked impatient, annoyed, a bit irritable at having to be at this debate at all and quite obviously looking upon it as a formality to be gotten through. Just like his disastrous press conference last spring, he robotically repeated the talking points till they all ran together, and seemed miffed when he actually had to elaborate, so repeated them more. And there was one implied excuse after another, on the basis that they're doing the best they can in the waronterruh, but it's "hard work." He said again and again it was "hard work," making you wonder when he'd accompany this with a "whew!" and a wiping of the brow, but this would have shown more obviously that he was sweating. He was going quite red in the forehead toward the end. And pundits quickly compared his "peevishness" to Gore's petulant, condescending 2000 sighs. In fact, Bush sighed a couple of times himself.
He looked desperate and got mad a few times, opening statements with great pissy huffs of impatient breath, as he often does when caught off-guard. Kerry had more than talking points to say. Bush didn't. But he did get a number of things across. He implied that he didn't particularly care about getting the troops home "just to get 'em home." He pretty much said that Hussein, not Bin Laden, was the great financier of terrorism. (Bin Laden does not do actions himself--he funds them like a venture capitalist. So this is a particularly telling confusion, if confusion it is) He chided Kerry for daring criticize his handling of the war, calling the war "the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time"--in fact, repeating it so many times that one might start to take it as his own view if one didn't know better--and a "grand diversion," because it would lower troop morale. (One imagines getting killed for no reason lowers it even more) Apparently despite that Homeland Security is alarmingly incompetent, at least it's got a "lot of good people working hard." (Most of us would prefer a lot of efficient people working intelligently, but this is the century of lowered experctations) He also defended attacking Iraq rather than concentrating efforts on Bin Laden by saying "Bin Laden doesn't get to decide" who or when we attack.
That's right, Bush saw through Bin Laden's crafty attempt to divert us toward attacking and killing him by attacking our country, and Bush attacked Iraq instead just to show him who's boss.
About this, Kerry had a pretty good comeback, to the effect that attacking Iraq in response to 9/11 was akin to FDR declaring war on Mexico in response to Pearl Harbor. Another was in reference to the fact that the first and most important thing our armed forces secured in Iraq, long before we ever bothered with the government offices, utilities, or museums or what have you, was the oil. From this fact, Kerry said, one might get the impression, if one is an Iraqi, that "well, maybe they're just after our oil."
In his father's case we'd expect all the self-pity and petulance One finds that Bush has become far too used to the hermetic environments protected by loyalty oaths that his handlers have arranged across the US like something between birthday parties and cult meetings. He gets so surprisingly angry at any question he's unprepared for. And the next debate is purely about domestic policy, and on that front, Bush has nothing; he has predicated his entire identity as president on foreign policy, and he barely has anything there. But he has been as miserable a failure as can be imagined domestically. Already some supporters are deserting him.
And then there's Edwards vs. Cheney. Strap yourselves in.
Oh, and after the debate, the online donations to the Democratic Party suddenly started coming in at the rate of five per second.
¶ September 30, 2004 0 Comments
"By not allowing himself to be reduced to tears, the president was a big winner tonight."
Rob Cordry, The Daily Show
Ohhh...I'm feeling much better tonight.
It's true, as Jon Stewart remarked, that the two sides of the debate seemed like competing campaign speeches--which indeed they are--but there was quite a distinct difference between the impressions formed by either candidate's performance this evening. This was aided by the networks, apparently, doing what I thought they were only doing on pundit-free, raw C-Span, on which I was watching. I feared if I watched any other source I would hear pundits mumbling color commentary all the way through.
When I watch presidential debates, the only one allowed to talk over the candidates with spontaneous commentary is me, dammit. I do tend to get over-excited and shout at the screen--I'm told this is very amusing to observe, assuming one isn't interested in paying very close attention to the debate. The presidential debates are to me what the Super Bowl is to others, but I only get to see it once every four years.
So I opted for the closest thing I could get to a raw feed, but as it turned out this was a joke--it turns out Fox News was handling the cameras and distributing the feeds. Tonight's debate was purely on foreign policy, and going in, the media poodles seemed to have thought for reasons passing understanding that Bush would have the advantage. That seems to assume Bush has any foreign policy successes beyond "we're makin' progress" to declare.
On C-Span the debate was split-screen. There apparently are 32 pages of rules worked out between the campaigns, and it seems that split screen was against said rules, which no network signed onto. Some also had to do with podium height--specifically that they be exactly equal. The split screen, however, would appear from the first long two-shot seen at the beginning to only emphasize a salient fact: Bush looks short and puny and Kerry looks tall and presidential. They attempted to rectify this in the split screen by lining up the tops of their heads, which only made Bush look shorter and more hunched. They say that height alone is usually enough to decide a presidential race.
So glamour points go to Kerry, not just for that, or for not raising his voice even once while Bush did a number of times(more about that in a bit) but for a later moment where Bush attempted to get chummy, saying that he wanted to "put a leash on" his daughters. Both had a nice little laugh about that, followed by the only moment they smiled at the same time--making Bush's attempt at looking charming backfire. Bush really didn't want us to see these alongside one another. Kerry had a nice, very white smile(almost sanded--you shouldn't look directly at it, it'll scar your retinas) while Bush came off looking every inch the chimp. One wonders how a man with a full mouth of teeth still manages every time he grins to look like the village idiot Gummy Jethro. A man who hides his teeth a lot when he smiles has something to hide in his mouth.
For Kerry's part as far as the substance of the debate, he did pretty much the least one should expect from a presidential candidate. Bullet point after bullet point, tightly organized and reasoned, finally articulating the difference between his view and Dubya's on Iraq, best summed up thusly:
KERRY: I have a plan to win the peace in Iraq. Bush went in without a plan, and worse, directed resources away from getting Bin Laden, the actual person that attacked us.
BUSH: Ben who?...My plan was fine, is fine, and it's going fine, and to say otherwise is insulting our great ally Poland and depress our fighting men and women, none of whose funerals I've attended but your brains will go all warm and fuzzy as I tell you a made-up story about a war widow I had a laugh with named Missy. What, I have to answer the question? (huff) Jeezus, is this boring. (sniff) Damn, I hope this itch on my cheek ain't another boil. Hell, is that thing on?
Bush clearly wasn't aware that the entire thing would be broadcast split-screen not just by dull ol' C-Span, but by most of the major networks--including Fox. If he had, he would certainly have been much more circumspect in his huffy reactions during Kerry's time, which were a fascinating sight throughout. One wonders if the networks picked this exact moment to fuck Bush. The punditsphere--even Fox--was very quick to give Kerry the victory, and surprised at Bush's terrible performance. Relentlessly throughout he displayed what several Hardball commentators referred to as a "monarchical" air.
He looked impatient, annoyed, a bit irritable at having to be at this debate at all and quite obviously looking upon it as a formality to be gotten through. Just like his disastrous press conference last spring, he robotically repeated the talking points till they all ran together, and seemed miffed when he actually had to elaborate, so repeated them more. And there was one implied excuse after another, on the basis that they're doing the best they can in the waronterruh, but it's "hard work." He said again and again it was "hard work," making you wonder when he'd accompany this with a "whew!" and a wiping of the brow, but this would have shown more obviously that he was sweating. He was going quite red in the forehead toward the end. And pundits quickly compared his "peevishness" to Gore's petulant, condescending 2000 sighs. In fact, Bush sighed a couple of times himself.
He looked desperate and got mad a few times, opening statements with great pissy huffs of impatient breath, as he often does when caught off-guard. Kerry had more than talking points to say. Bush didn't. But he did get a number of things across. He implied that he didn't particularly care about getting the troops home "just to get 'em home." He pretty much said that Hussein, not Bin Laden, was the great financier of terrorism. (Bin Laden does not do actions himself--he funds them like a venture capitalist. So this is a particularly telling confusion, if confusion it is) He chided Kerry for daring criticize his handling of the war, calling the war "the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time"--in fact, repeating it so many times that one might start to take it as his own view if one didn't know better--and a "grand diversion," because it would lower troop morale. (One imagines getting killed for no reason lowers it even more) Apparently despite that Homeland Security is alarmingly incompetent, at least it's got a "lot of good people working hard." (Most of us would prefer a lot of efficient people working intelligently, but this is the century of lowered experctations) He also defended attacking Iraq rather than concentrating efforts on Bin Laden by saying "Bin Laden doesn't get to decide" who or when we attack.
That's right, Bush saw through Bin Laden's crafty attempt to divert us toward attacking and killing him by attacking our country, and Bush attacked Iraq instead just to show him who's boss.
About this, Kerry had a pretty good comeback, to the effect that attacking Iraq in response to 9/11 was akin to FDR declaring war on Mexico in response to Pearl Harbor. Another was in reference to the fact that the first and most important thing our armed forces secured in Iraq, long before we ever bothered with the government offices, utilities, or museums or what have you, was the oil. From this fact, Kerry said, one might get the impression, if one is an Iraqi, that "well, maybe they're just after our oil."
In his father's case we'd expect all the self-pity and petulance One finds that Bush has become far too used to the hermetic environments protected by loyalty oaths that his handlers have arranged across the US like something between birthday parties and cult meetings. He gets so surprisingly angry at any question he's unprepared for. And the next debate is purely about domestic policy, and on that front, Bush has nothing; he has predicated his entire identity as president on foreign policy, and he barely has anything there. But he has been as miserable a failure as can be imagined domestically. Already some supporters are deserting him.
And then there's Edwards vs. Cheney. Strap yourselves in.
Oh, and after the debate, the online donations to the Democratic Party suddenly started coming in at the rate of five per second.
¶ September 30, 2004 0 Comments
20 September 2004
Goddammit
Goddammit
Well, for the first time in years I trust Dan Rather and this is what it gets me. That'll teach me. Here's a better analysis on the matter than I could write.
The crummy thing about all this tussle about the forged memos is that there already is considerable evidence regarding Bush's "service" during Vietnam, but this memo matter effectively immunizes Bush against further iterations on this theme. There is some speculation that Karl Rove or another Bush surrogate may have issued this poisoned evidence as just such an inoculation, as Kerry and Bush's respective service has become an issue(and ought not to be, as Kerry went to Vietnam and Bush did not--this should be a no-brainer). Meanwhile the Kerry campaign drags its heels bizarrely, and news regarding Seymour Hersh's book about Abu Ghraib and about Robert Novak being ordered by a judge to reveal his source regarding Valerie Plame's outing as a CIA agent, who does in fact begin to appear to be "Scooter" Libby.
Kerry has to ace the debates. I get a feeling he won't. I'm not very hopeful about the next few months.
Well, for the first time in years I trust Dan Rather and this is what it gets me. That'll teach me. Here's a better analysis on the matter than I could write.
The crummy thing about all this tussle about the forged memos is that there already is considerable evidence regarding Bush's "service" during Vietnam, but this memo matter effectively immunizes Bush against further iterations on this theme. There is some speculation that Karl Rove or another Bush surrogate may have issued this poisoned evidence as just such an inoculation, as Kerry and Bush's respective service has become an issue(and ought not to be, as Kerry went to Vietnam and Bush did not--this should be a no-brainer). Meanwhile the Kerry campaign drags its heels bizarrely, and news regarding Seymour Hersh's book about Abu Ghraib and about Robert Novak being ordered by a judge to reveal his source regarding Valerie Plame's outing as a CIA agent, who does in fact begin to appear to be "Scooter" Libby.
Kerry has to ace the debates. I get a feeling he won't. I'm not very hopeful about the next few months.
Labels: politics
¶ September 20, 2004 0 Comments
09 September 2004
Remarkable Coincidences
Remarkable Coincidences
From Slate, describing Kerry speaking yesterday over "...the shouts of a protester—"You said you committed atrocities. You said you burned villages"—who was silenced when the man standing next to him put him in a headlock. After the speech, Kerry spokesman David Wade said the protester was a man named Mike Russell, who Wade said was the Bush-Cheney chairman in Bracken County, Ky., during the 2000 election. "He is now, coincidentally, with the Swift Boat Veterans," Wade added."
¶ September 09, 2004 0 Comments
From Slate, describing Kerry speaking yesterday over "...the shouts of a protester—"You said you committed atrocities. You said you burned villages"—who was silenced when the man standing next to him put him in a headlock. After the speech, Kerry spokesman David Wade said the protester was a man named Mike Russell, who Wade said was the Bush-Cheney chairman in Bracken County, Ky., during the 2000 election. "He is now, coincidentally, with the Swift Boat Veterans," Wade added."
¶ September 09, 2004 0 Comments
Cheney: Vote For Us Or Die, Puny Humanoids!
Cheney: Vote For Us Or Die, Puny Humanoids!
And also catching fire in the news is Dick Cheney all but saying that the apocalypse will happen should we vote for John Kerry. God is very quick these days.
In 1992, the senior Mr. Bush wooed the voters with "Message: I care.'' So this week, Mr. Cheney wooed the voters with, Message: You die.
The terrible beauty of its simplicity grows on you. It is a sign of the dark, macho, paranoid vice president's restraint that he didn't really take it to its emotionally satisfying conclusion: Message: Vote for us or we'll kill you.
"Because if we make the wrong choice,'' Mr. Cheney said in Des Moines in that calm baritone, "then the danger is that we'll get hit again. That we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States, and that we'll fall back into the pre-9/11 mind-set if you will, that in fact these terrorist attacks are just criminal acts, and that we're not really at war.''
These guys figure, hey, these scare tactics worked in building support for the Iraq war, maybe they can work in tearing down support for John Kerry. They linked Saddam with terrorism and cowed the Democrats (including Mr. Kerry, who has never been able to make the case against the Bush administration's trompe l'oeil casus belli) and fooled the country into going along with their trumped-up war. So why not link Mr. Kerry with terrorism and cow the voters into sticking with the White House they've got?
It's like that fairy tale where vipers and toads jump out of the mouth of the accursed mean little girl when she tries to speak. Every time Mr. Cheney opens his mouth, vermin leap out.
Maureen Dowd, New York Times
Also in the Times, which along with much of the media seem to have grown their balls back...
Immigration and homeland security strategies are policy fights, fair game for a political campaign. What's totally unacceptable is to tell the American people that the mere act of voting for your opponent opens the door to a terrorist attack. For Mr. Cheney to suggest that is flat wrong. There was a time in this country when elected officials knew how to separate the position from the person. The American people, we're sure, would like to return to it.
But the Bush gang never much cared about or liked the American people. One wonders, given power is their only object, what they will do when their backs are to the wall. And just why Bush now wants to give this "terror czar"--who would be part of the executive branch, and would therefore strengthen it(recall the power of Hoover)--budgetary powers which rightfully belong only to Congress.
And also catching fire in the news is Dick Cheney all but saying that the apocalypse will happen should we vote for John Kerry. God is very quick these days.
In 1992, the senior Mr. Bush wooed the voters with "Message: I care.'' So this week, Mr. Cheney wooed the voters with, Message: You die.
The terrible beauty of its simplicity grows on you. It is a sign of the dark, macho, paranoid vice president's restraint that he didn't really take it to its emotionally satisfying conclusion: Message: Vote for us or we'll kill you.
"Because if we make the wrong choice,'' Mr. Cheney said in Des Moines in that calm baritone, "then the danger is that we'll get hit again. That we'll be hit in a way that will be devastating from the standpoint of the United States, and that we'll fall back into the pre-9/11 mind-set if you will, that in fact these terrorist attacks are just criminal acts, and that we're not really at war.''
These guys figure, hey, these scare tactics worked in building support for the Iraq war, maybe they can work in tearing down support for John Kerry. They linked Saddam with terrorism and cowed the Democrats (including Mr. Kerry, who has never been able to make the case against the Bush administration's trompe l'oeil casus belli) and fooled the country into going along with their trumped-up war. So why not link Mr. Kerry with terrorism and cow the voters into sticking with the White House they've got?
It's like that fairy tale where vipers and toads jump out of the mouth of the accursed mean little girl when she tries to speak. Every time Mr. Cheney opens his mouth, vermin leap out.
Maureen Dowd, New York Times
Also in the Times, which along with much of the media seem to have grown their balls back...
Immigration and homeland security strategies are policy fights, fair game for a political campaign. What's totally unacceptable is to tell the American people that the mere act of voting for your opponent opens the door to a terrorist attack. For Mr. Cheney to suggest that is flat wrong. There was a time in this country when elected officials knew how to separate the position from the person. The American people, we're sure, would like to return to it.
But the Bush gang never much cared about or liked the American people. One wonders, given power is their only object, what they will do when their backs are to the wall. And just why Bush now wants to give this "terror czar"--who would be part of the executive branch, and would therefore strengthen it(recall the power of Hoover)--budgetary powers which rightfully belong only to Congress.
Labels: cheney, politics, trump
¶ September 09, 2004 0 Comments
08 September 2004
CYA
CYA
So the Ben Barnes interview aired tonight on CBS. Truth be told, there was far less of former Lt. Governor Barnes, apart from the barest facts about his shame at having helped Bush out of Vietnam while many whose names are on the Vietnam War Memorial died in his stead, than there was of many, many documents by the late Col. Jerry Killian(one intriguingly headed "CYA", three letters which may be heard a lot more in the coming months, concerning pressure from his superiors to go easy on Bush) which confirm that Bush was suspended from the Texas Air National Guard for neither performing any of his duties toward certification but also not even showing up to a required physical, and so very much more that the Boston Globe publicized as well today. Then there's the interesting fact, long since reported but unnoticed, that at the time Bush would have had to take his physical...
"...the Air Force announced its Medical Service Drug Abuse Testing Program, which meant random drug testing for pilots, including Guardsmen."
So much for Bush's post-convention bounce. It may not have been wise for them to pull a surprise as they did with the very right-wing character of last week's RNC convention, when what had been expected was an attempt to seem moderate again, the "compassionate conservative" pose. From Zell Miller on, the speeches became more poisonous and overconfident, focused on sneering, hatred, and avoiding anything like truth. In Bush's speech he even attempted to do a bad John Kerry imitation. What is this, a high school election?
Then Cheney tells us all that if Kerry is elected and there's a terrorist attack, on our heads be it. This from the administration that, rather than actually going after terrorists (and almost no mention of Bin Laden throughout the convention, but plenty of Saddam, Saddam, Saddam) instructs us to be worried, coat our houses in duct tape, but buy things.
Gosh, I've felt so safe the past four years. God knows I wouldn't want that to change.
And then they have the absolute audacity to not only question Kerry's service but mock it--and all Purple Heart recipients, such as my father, Lt. John L. Roberson III, who volunteered and served in Vietnam at roughly the same time as Bush ducked his service--when Bush didn't even show up for the minimal, stateside service Lt. Governor Barnes pulled strings to get him into. Bush is a coward and a liar; he looks very much like what he is. Are our expectations of ourselves so low that we allow someone so incompetent to be president, thinking like a bunch of Homer Simpsons that if the president is dishonest and low, less will in turn will be expected of us, to our relief?
But he's also a coward and liar who has wealthy and powerful protectors, within his family and without. Many of the same economic class dying (and torturing) in Iraq were drafted to go to Vietnam and died in place of people like Bush. Some of that class did volunteer and were wounded or killed out of a sense of national duty, such as my father or John Kerry or many of my father's friends who died in the same fields my father's hand and mind were maimed. Meanwhile, George Bush got drunk and partied. And he snickers at those who did go, and Cheney defends his deferments because he had "better things to do."
Vietnam was a wrong, evil war. Nevertheless, the willingness to fight and die for what one believes in--and walking the walk--has to be respected, particularly when one doesn't have to. My father could have gotten out in ways Bush did, and did not, and whatever he might have been after Vietnam was entirely caused by his having been there. His maimed hand. His shaking brain that woke up with a start at the slightest noise. His three suicide attempts, the final one successful(in 1986). All because Vietnam destroyed his soul.
Meanwhile, Bush was having the fun a son of privilege is enntitled to. And now he sneers at those who actually went. Imagine if Clinton had tried to mock the elder Bush's World War Two service--the Republicans would chave mobbed him with torches.
They have no intention of doing anything but what any illegitimate leaders of a coup, bloodless or not, would do, which is plunder everything they can while they can, riding our fear to their own personal successes. Our country has been, for quite some time, in the hands of pirates. And arrogant pirates at that. I remember a time when the GOP at least acknowledged that people had to be lied to a bit more gracefully. Whereas the Bush camp is more like "Be Scared Shitless, America, and Shut Up."
Aren't there things we need to get on with in this country that they have ignored, like, oh, the fact most of us still have no fucking jobs? The spiraling poverty and crime rates? Who of us ever actually gave a shit about Iraq? Do we actually believe that Saddam was somehow connected to 9/11, or do we simply not care because we know that if it weren't one excuse, it would be another? How dare Republicans mock those they send to fight and die for their own profit, few or none of which are among their own children but rather the children of the poor who joined the army merely for college tuition or job experience? I think I just answered my own question.
The RNC was quite self-assured and could only hammer at Kerry's service, the same time-wasting mistake made by the DNC in making Kerry's heroism such a repeated point. Except, just as that backfired on Kerry, this is backfiring on Bush. The Swift Boat Veterans--whom no one doubts were GOP operatives--have been played out, and now Bush's complete lack of service--and the surprising venom of the convention--sink in instead. Today too, the Log Cabin Republicans withheld endorsement of Bush along with Andrew Sullivan doing so as well. Great time to fracture their on party. Buchanan's 1992 Culture War Speech seems almost reasonable compared to Zell Miller's.
I have said it many times: the minute the Republicans become drunk on hubris they fuck themselves to death. This may happen.
I personally just want a competent president who understands his best interests and mine are the same, as Clinton intelligently did. If John McCain were running against Bush I'd vote for him too. Anyone but this one, who will go down in history as the single worst president ever. By comparison Nixon was freakin' Lincoln, and I never thought I'd live to see such a thing.
¶ September 08, 2004 0 Comments
So the Ben Barnes interview aired tonight on CBS. Truth be told, there was far less of former Lt. Governor Barnes, apart from the barest facts about his shame at having helped Bush out of Vietnam while many whose names are on the Vietnam War Memorial died in his stead, than there was of many, many documents by the late Col. Jerry Killian(one intriguingly headed "CYA", three letters which may be heard a lot more in the coming months, concerning pressure from his superiors to go easy on Bush) which confirm that Bush was suspended from the Texas Air National Guard for neither performing any of his duties toward certification but also not even showing up to a required physical, and so very much more that the Boston Globe publicized as well today. Then there's the interesting fact, long since reported but unnoticed, that at the time Bush would have had to take his physical...
"...the Air Force announced its Medical Service Drug Abuse Testing Program, which meant random drug testing for pilots, including Guardsmen."
So much for Bush's post-convention bounce. It may not have been wise for them to pull a surprise as they did with the very right-wing character of last week's RNC convention, when what had been expected was an attempt to seem moderate again, the "compassionate conservative" pose. From Zell Miller on, the speeches became more poisonous and overconfident, focused on sneering, hatred, and avoiding anything like truth. In Bush's speech he even attempted to do a bad John Kerry imitation. What is this, a high school election?
Then Cheney tells us all that if Kerry is elected and there's a terrorist attack, on our heads be it. This from the administration that, rather than actually going after terrorists (and almost no mention of Bin Laden throughout the convention, but plenty of Saddam, Saddam, Saddam) instructs us to be worried, coat our houses in duct tape, but buy things.
Gosh, I've felt so safe the past four years. God knows I wouldn't want that to change.
And then they have the absolute audacity to not only question Kerry's service but mock it--and all Purple Heart recipients, such as my father, Lt. John L. Roberson III, who volunteered and served in Vietnam at roughly the same time as Bush ducked his service--when Bush didn't even show up for the minimal, stateside service Lt. Governor Barnes pulled strings to get him into. Bush is a coward and a liar; he looks very much like what he is. Are our expectations of ourselves so low that we allow someone so incompetent to be president, thinking like a bunch of Homer Simpsons that if the president is dishonest and low, less will in turn will be expected of us, to our relief?
But he's also a coward and liar who has wealthy and powerful protectors, within his family and without. Many of the same economic class dying (and torturing) in Iraq were drafted to go to Vietnam and died in place of people like Bush. Some of that class did volunteer and were wounded or killed out of a sense of national duty, such as my father or John Kerry or many of my father's friends who died in the same fields my father's hand and mind were maimed. Meanwhile, George Bush got drunk and partied. And he snickers at those who did go, and Cheney defends his deferments because he had "better things to do."
Vietnam was a wrong, evil war. Nevertheless, the willingness to fight and die for what one believes in--and walking the walk--has to be respected, particularly when one doesn't have to. My father could have gotten out in ways Bush did, and did not, and whatever he might have been after Vietnam was entirely caused by his having been there. His maimed hand. His shaking brain that woke up with a start at the slightest noise. His three suicide attempts, the final one successful(in 1986). All because Vietnam destroyed his soul.
Meanwhile, Bush was having the fun a son of privilege is enntitled to. And now he sneers at those who actually went. Imagine if Clinton had tried to mock the elder Bush's World War Two service--the Republicans would chave mobbed him with torches.
They have no intention of doing anything but what any illegitimate leaders of a coup, bloodless or not, would do, which is plunder everything they can while they can, riding our fear to their own personal successes. Our country has been, for quite some time, in the hands of pirates. And arrogant pirates at that. I remember a time when the GOP at least acknowledged that people had to be lied to a bit more gracefully. Whereas the Bush camp is more like "Be Scared Shitless, America, and Shut Up."
Aren't there things we need to get on with in this country that they have ignored, like, oh, the fact most of us still have no fucking jobs? The spiraling poverty and crime rates? Who of us ever actually gave a shit about Iraq? Do we actually believe that Saddam was somehow connected to 9/11, or do we simply not care because we know that if it weren't one excuse, it would be another? How dare Republicans mock those they send to fight and die for their own profit, few or none of which are among their own children but rather the children of the poor who joined the army merely for college tuition or job experience? I think I just answered my own question.
The RNC was quite self-assured and could only hammer at Kerry's service, the same time-wasting mistake made by the DNC in making Kerry's heroism such a repeated point. Except, just as that backfired on Kerry, this is backfiring on Bush. The Swift Boat Veterans--whom no one doubts were GOP operatives--have been played out, and now Bush's complete lack of service--and the surprising venom of the convention--sink in instead. Today too, the Log Cabin Republicans withheld endorsement of Bush along with Andrew Sullivan doing so as well. Great time to fracture their on party. Buchanan's 1992 Culture War Speech seems almost reasonable compared to Zell Miller's.
I have said it many times: the minute the Republicans become drunk on hubris they fuck themselves to death. This may happen.
I personally just want a competent president who understands his best interests and mine are the same, as Clinton intelligently did. If John McCain were running against Bush I'd vote for him too. Anyone but this one, who will go down in history as the single worst president ever. By comparison Nixon was freakin' Lincoln, and I never thought I'd live to see such a thing.
¶ September 08, 2004 0 Comments
The Idiot AWOL
The Idiot AWOL
The media is finally picking up on the fact Bush, unlike many like my father, not only didn't go to Vietnam but didn't even serve his National Guard duty. As we all knew. I don't expect this news to affect the Republican voters in the least, as they already proved themselves a bunch of chicken hawks with their idiotic Purple Heart band-aids at the convention. They share his contempt for the military that Zell Miller nevertheless called the guarantors of free speech--the corrolary to this, in keeping to the disrespect for their sacrifice is that one is not supposed to use this gift soldiers died for out of supposed "respect" for them.
A simple test: next time you receive a present from a loved one, don't even open it. Throw it away in front of them. Then say it's because you respect their giving it to you too much. See how grateful and appreciative you appear.
The Republican chickenhawks and their army of convenience: They're all too willing to send other people's children to die, would never go themselves or send their own, and then have the temerity to mock those who were wounded. And for a war that what? Helps their national pride? Brings down oil prices? Is all Republicans get out of this war the delusion their dicks have been enlarged? What, one wonders, goes through their pin-sized brains?
Who cares, because contrary to what I'd said before(apologies for my idiot mistake), the Ben Barnes 60 Minutes interview is in fact tonight. Watch. Tape. Invite a Republican friend. Laugh, then console. Above all...be compassionate. That's what Dubya would want.
The media is finally picking up on the fact Bush, unlike many like my father, not only didn't go to Vietnam but didn't even serve his National Guard duty. As we all knew. I don't expect this news to affect the Republican voters in the least, as they already proved themselves a bunch of chicken hawks with their idiotic Purple Heart band-aids at the convention. They share his contempt for the military that Zell Miller nevertheless called the guarantors of free speech--the corrolary to this, in keeping to the disrespect for their sacrifice is that one is not supposed to use this gift soldiers died for out of supposed "respect" for them.
A simple test: next time you receive a present from a loved one, don't even open it. Throw it away in front of them. Then say it's because you respect their giving it to you too much. See how grateful and appreciative you appear.
The Republican chickenhawks and their army of convenience: They're all too willing to send other people's children to die, would never go themselves or send their own, and then have the temerity to mock those who were wounded. And for a war that what? Helps their national pride? Brings down oil prices? Is all Republicans get out of this war the delusion their dicks have been enlarged? What, one wonders, goes through their pin-sized brains?
Who cares, because contrary to what I'd said before(apologies for my idiot mistake), the Ben Barnes 60 Minutes interview is in fact tonight. Watch. Tape. Invite a Republican friend. Laugh, then console. Above all...be compassionate. That's what Dubya would want.
Labels: politics
¶ September 08, 2004 0 Comments
03 September 2004
Kerry's Response
Kerry's Response
"We all saw the anger and distortion of the Republican Convention. For the past week, they attacked my patriotism and my fitness to serve as Commander-in-chief. Well, here's my answer. I'm not going to have my commitment to defend this country questioned by those who refused to serve when they could have and by those who have misled the nation into Iraq.
"The Vice President even called me unfit for office last night. I guess I'll leave it up to the voters whether five deferments makes someone more qualified to defend this nation than two tours of duty.
"Let me tell you what I think makes someone unfit for duty. Misleading our nation into war in Iraq makes you unfit to lead this nation. Doing nothing while this nation loses millions of jobs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting 45 million Americans go without healthcare makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting the Saudi Royal Family control our energy costs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Handing out billions of government contracts to Halliburton while you're still on their payroll makes you unfit. That's the record of George Bush and Dick Cheney. And it's not going to change. I believe it's time to move America in a new direction; I believe it's time to set a new course for America."
¶ September 03, 2004 0 Comments
"We all saw the anger and distortion of the Republican Convention. For the past week, they attacked my patriotism and my fitness to serve as Commander-in-chief. Well, here's my answer. I'm not going to have my commitment to defend this country questioned by those who refused to serve when they could have and by those who have misled the nation into Iraq.
"The Vice President even called me unfit for office last night. I guess I'll leave it up to the voters whether five deferments makes someone more qualified to defend this nation than two tours of duty.
"Let me tell you what I think makes someone unfit for duty. Misleading our nation into war in Iraq makes you unfit to lead this nation. Doing nothing while this nation loses millions of jobs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting 45 million Americans go without healthcare makes you unfit to lead this nation. Letting the Saudi Royal Family control our energy costs makes you unfit to lead this nation. Handing out billions of government contracts to Halliburton while you're still on their payroll makes you unfit. That's the record of George Bush and Dick Cheney. And it's not going to change. I believe it's time to move America in a new direction; I believe it's time to set a new course for America."
¶ September 03, 2004 0 Comments
02 September 2004
Yellow Dog and Cyborg Say: You're Not A Patriot!
Yellow Dog and Cyborg Say: Shut Up! You're Not A Patriot!
Well, well, it seems that the GOP has decided "Enough of the compassionate crap" and the fangs came out last night, starting with Democrat-in-name-only Zell Miller's ravings at the podium(and later telling Chris Matthews to "shut up" and challenging him to a duel when he dared question him) and continuing to Cheney's speech, which I think he thought was very hard-hitting and forceful but only sounded like the ravings of a villain off to his comeuppance. We see now that all they can do is shut up their opponents, but not defend their own bullshit at all. And chant like it was the Two Minutes' Hate in a completely spontaneous way, like when the delegates, glazed eyes and rabid smiles as far as the eye could see, simultaneously got out a bunch of flip-flops, held them high, and chanted "FLIP-FLOP" for the cameras. Again and again. All in all there were 57 interruptions like this in Cheney's speech. At one point they applauded then stopped, as though they'd blown a cue. I'd love to see the script that was handed out. (No doubt with very small words in large print)
As William Saletan eloquently puts it today at Slate:
If the convention speeches are any guide, Republicans have run out of excuses for blowing the economy, blowing the surplus, and blowing our military resources and moral capital in the wrong country. So they're going after the patriotism of their opponents. Here's what the convention keynoter, Miller, said tonight about Democrats and those who criticize the way President Bush has launched and conducted the Iraq war:
"While young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats' manic obsession to bring down our commander in chief."
"Motivated more by partisan politics than by national security, today's Democratic leaders see America as an occupier, not a liberator."
[please note that Bush himself has called them "occupiers"--onward...]
"In [Democratic leaders'] warped way of thinking, America is the problem, not the solution. They don't believe there is any real danger in the world except that which America brings upon itself."
"Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending. I want Bush to decide. "
Every one of these charges is demonstrably false. When Bush addressed Congress after 9/11, Democrats embraced and applauded him. In the Afghan war, they gave him everything he asked for. Most Democratic senators, including John Kerry and John Edwards, voted to give him the authority to use force in Iraq. During and after the war, they praised Iraq's liberation. Kerry has never said that any other country should decide when the United States is entitled to defend itself.
But the important thing isn't the falsity of the charges, which Republicans continue to repeat despite press reports debunking them. The important thing is that the GOP is trying to quash criticism of the president simply because it's criticism of the president. The election is becoming a referendum on democracy. In a democracy, the commander in chief works for you. You hire him when you elect him. You watch him do the job. If he makes good decisions and serves your interests, you rehire him. If he doesn't, you fire him by voting for his opponent in the next election. Not every country works this way. In some countries, the commander in chief builds a propaganda apparatus that equates him with the military and the nation. If you object that he's making bad decisions and disserving the national interest, you're accused of weakening the nation, undermining its security, sabotaging the commander in chief, and serving a foreign power—the very charges Miller leveled tonight against Bush's critics. Are you prepared to become one of those countries?
Well put. Think of what will happen, given this attitude, once they are in office again and don't have re-election to worry about.
Something, too, happened on the floor during Cheney's speech, a disruption of some kind that had cameras pointing away from him and toward the floor in a concentrated spot, and it was not reported what it was. Till today:
Twice on Wednesday, protesters did manage to breach the security cordon at Madison Square Garden. During Vice President Dick Cheney's speech on Wednesday night, a woman wearing a pink slip rushed the convention floor. She was quickly tackled and dragged out, while nearby conventiongoers covered the disturbance by raising their signs and chanting.
I wonder even more how he'll feel after 60 Minutes on Sunday does their interview with Ben Barnes, the man who got him out of having to go to Vietnam and feels sick about it.
Well, well, it seems that the GOP has decided "Enough of the compassionate crap" and the fangs came out last night, starting with Democrat-in-name-only Zell Miller's ravings at the podium(and later telling Chris Matthews to "shut up" and challenging him to a duel when he dared question him) and continuing to Cheney's speech, which I think he thought was very hard-hitting and forceful but only sounded like the ravings of a villain off to his comeuppance. We see now that all they can do is shut up their opponents, but not defend their own bullshit at all. And chant like it was the Two Minutes' Hate in a completely spontaneous way, like when the delegates, glazed eyes and rabid smiles as far as the eye could see, simultaneously got out a bunch of flip-flops, held them high, and chanted "FLIP-FLOP" for the cameras. Again and again. All in all there were 57 interruptions like this in Cheney's speech. At one point they applauded then stopped, as though they'd blown a cue. I'd love to see the script that was handed out. (No doubt with very small words in large print)
As William Saletan eloquently puts it today at Slate:
If the convention speeches are any guide, Republicans have run out of excuses for blowing the economy, blowing the surplus, and blowing our military resources and moral capital in the wrong country. So they're going after the patriotism of their opponents. Here's what the convention keynoter, Miller, said tonight about Democrats and those who criticize the way President Bush has launched and conducted the Iraq war:
"While young Americans are dying in the sands of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, our nation is being torn apart and made weaker because of the Democrats' manic obsession to bring down our commander in chief."
"Motivated more by partisan politics than by national security, today's Democratic leaders see America as an occupier, not a liberator."
[please note that Bush himself has called them "occupiers"--onward...]
"In [Democratic leaders'] warped way of thinking, America is the problem, not the solution. They don't believe there is any real danger in the world except that which America brings upon itself."
"Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending. I want Bush to decide. "
Every one of these charges is demonstrably false. When Bush addressed Congress after 9/11, Democrats embraced and applauded him. In the Afghan war, they gave him everything he asked for. Most Democratic senators, including John Kerry and John Edwards, voted to give him the authority to use force in Iraq. During and after the war, they praised Iraq's liberation. Kerry has never said that any other country should decide when the United States is entitled to defend itself.
But the important thing isn't the falsity of the charges, which Republicans continue to repeat despite press reports debunking them. The important thing is that the GOP is trying to quash criticism of the president simply because it's criticism of the president. The election is becoming a referendum on democracy. In a democracy, the commander in chief works for you. You hire him when you elect him. You watch him do the job. If he makes good decisions and serves your interests, you rehire him. If he doesn't, you fire him by voting for his opponent in the next election. Not every country works this way. In some countries, the commander in chief builds a propaganda apparatus that equates him with the military and the nation. If you object that he's making bad decisions and disserving the national interest, you're accused of weakening the nation, undermining its security, sabotaging the commander in chief, and serving a foreign power—the very charges Miller leveled tonight against Bush's critics. Are you prepared to become one of those countries?
Well put. Think of what will happen, given this attitude, once they are in office again and don't have re-election to worry about.
Something, too, happened on the floor during Cheney's speech, a disruption of some kind that had cameras pointing away from him and toward the floor in a concentrated spot, and it was not reported what it was. Till today:
Twice on Wednesday, protesters did manage to breach the security cordon at Madison Square Garden. During Vice President Dick Cheney's speech on Wednesday night, a woman wearing a pink slip rushed the convention floor. She was quickly tackled and dragged out, while nearby conventiongoers covered the disturbance by raising their signs and chanting.
I wonder even more how he'll feel after 60 Minutes on Sunday does their interview with Ben Barnes, the man who got him out of having to go to Vietnam and feels sick about it.
Labels: politics
¶ September 02, 2004 0 Comments
01 September 2004
Wait Until After The Convention
Wait Until After The Convention
While most of the media--with, so far, the notable exception of ABC News--fall all over themselves to glorify the masturbatory, self-congratulatory and sickening Republican convention, diminish the massive New York protests, and give the Swift Boat Veterans even a modest amount of credibility, the former Texas lieutenant governor Ben Barnes will be going on 60 Minutes this Sunday to talk at length about how he got Bush out of Vietnam(see previous posting further below). As most other major media outlets seem to be ignoring this entirely, do be sure to set your VCRs and Tivos.
Meanwhile tonight, apparently our killer cyborg of a VP, Dick Cheney, intends to attack Kerry, as has been the constant theme throughout this supposedly "compassionate conservative" event. Are you shocked? Oh, so am I, yeah. Who could have seen that coming?
¶ September 01, 2004 0 Comments
While most of the media--with, so far, the notable exception of ABC News--fall all over themselves to glorify the masturbatory, self-congratulatory and sickening Republican convention, diminish the massive New York protests, and give the Swift Boat Veterans even a modest amount of credibility, the former Texas lieutenant governor Ben Barnes will be going on 60 Minutes this Sunday to talk at length about how he got Bush out of Vietnam(see previous posting further below). As most other major media outlets seem to be ignoring this entirely, do be sure to set your VCRs and Tivos.
Meanwhile tonight, apparently our killer cyborg of a VP, Dick Cheney, intends to attack Kerry, as has been the constant theme throughout this supposedly "compassionate conservative" event. Are you shocked? Oh, so am I, yeah. Who could have seen that coming?
¶ September 01, 2004 0 Comments
