Goldberg and Guthrie

As you may know, Congress recently let the 1994 assault weapons ban expire. More than two-thirds of the country support the ban. It was very easy to predict - even a year ago - that this would happen. Why aren't Democrats talking about this and only this? Why didn't the Kerry campaign immediately have ads ready to go? Why aren't we injecting this talking point into the media?
Here is the ad I would run:

NARRATOR (a woman): At his convention, George W. Bush bragged about how he stood on the graves of hundreds of police officers and firefighters. (Shot of Bush during 9/11; scary music.)

COP: (being interviewed) I think leadership is about more than slogans... it's about doing the right thing.

NARRATOR: George Bush stood with our police officers when they were dead.... (shot of Bush at World Trade Center

COP: Sure, I admired the President that day...

NARRATOR: But now, George Bush stands by while the leaders of his own party allow a ten-year old bill banning assault weapons to expire...

COP: (tearing up) My first partner was killed when he was shot in the chest with an assault weapon. (silence, while he cries.)

NARRATOR: George Bush - he stood by our cops when they were dead. Why won't he stand by them when they're alive?

COP: (shaking head) I just don't understand it...

NARRATOR: This message was paid for by Police Officers for Sensible Gun Control (or some such group.)

Unfair? Probably. Full of provable falsehoods like the Swift Vote ads? No. (I promise a crying cop whose partner was killed by an assault weapon could be found.) Effective? Probably.

Andrew Sullivan:

THE FLIP-FLOPPING NANNY: Saletan on Bush. Bush is for big government except when he's against it; he's for restraining spending, except when he's boosting it; he's for rooting out insurgents in Iraq, until he favors a more "sensitive" strategy; he's for free trade, except when he's against it; he's against stem cell research, except when he's bragging about it; he's pro states rights, unless they do things he disapproves of; he's in favor of responsibility, except when it comes to the budget; he's pro-U.N., except when he's against it; he's for church-state separation, except when it comes to federal funding. Any decent opponent would make mincemeat of Bush's wavering, straddling and inconsistent policy pronouncements. But Kerry is useless. And if he's this useless as a candidate, how good would he be as a president?

I don't agree with the final two sentences. In the current media environment, I think it would be supremely difficult for anyone to get this type of attack to stick against Bush (too much indoctrination of the "says what he means" and "strong leader" ideas re Bush). But I certainly do agree with the Bush critiques.

to be negative, but Kerry's Presidential campaign is the most ineptly run organization I have ever witnessed. Who are these people? How is it possible that we are losing to this man?

WHY THE HELL IS THE DNC RUNNING ADS ABOUT BUSH'S GUARD SERVICE? Who in the hell gives a flying fuck? The damage from the Swift Vote ads is done - you can't wait three weeks to respond, and even then the response should have been only to point out that those ads were based on total and complete fabrications. But here's the point about the Swift Vote ads: Bush and the RNC can deny they had anything to with them! They can have the benefit of the negative attacks, and claim they are against negative attacks. WHY IN THE FLYING FUCK DON'T THE DEMOCRATS UNDERSTAND THIS? The only thing that has frustrated me this much in the last few years is Mike Brown's failure to hire a General Manager.

How cowardly is the DNC? If you're going to launch unfair attacks, why not make them effective? Why not make fun of his total inability to speak? Why not run a split-screen ad showing what was happening at the World Trade Center and what Bush was doing in Florida? Why not accuse Bush of using terrorist attacks as a political tool? Why not accuse him of stealing elections?

Ultimately, the problem with this election is simple. The only important issue is national security. I don't think you can make that strong of a case that Bush's pre-9/11 and his actions right after 9/11 were any different than any Democrat's would have been. (Yes, there is a strong, strong case to be made that the Bush administration put a much lower priority on terrorism than the Clinton administration, but the Democrats simply can't communicate messages like that and, frankly, it's probably too complicated for most Americans to understand.) The case you CAN make against Bush is simple: he hurt our cause in the war on terror by launching a poorly planned, costly and unnecessary war in Iraq. This war not only cost lives and diverted resources, it strengthened Islamic terrorism by destroying any hope of forming an effective international coalition against it.

BUT DEMOCRATS CANNOT EFFECTIVELY MAKE THIS CASE BECAUSE JOHN KERRY SUPPORTED THE WAR IN IRAQ. There, I said it. Also, and I will deny ever having said this between now and the election, his vote against the $87 billion was a cowardly and politically stupid thing to do. Yes, I know the arguments about why he supposedly voted against it; but I also remember when it actually happened, and anyone with half a brain realized that he was voting against it because he was losing to Howard Dean, a candidate with a clear anti-war position.

How can we be having this debate when both candidates essentially agree on the most important issues? John Kerry vaguely stands for competence and reason; George Bush vaguely stands for strength and pride. Yet, they both concretely stand for invading Iraq. When it came time to decide how to best use our armed forces, they both made the wrong decision. (As did I; but I sort of hold the President to a higher standard.)

John Kerry needs to win this election. We cannot let George Bush take over the Supreme Court. We cannot allow him to destroy our standing in the world. We cannot allow him to continue to slowly elevate to the status of law the hate and ignorance of the radical, religious right. We cannot allow him to cripple our government for years as he continues to enact preposterous tax cuts with one hand as he fights a war with the other hand.

But almost more importantly, after this election, no matter who wins, we very much need to fix the broken Democratic party.

Now, one of the reasons I've been posting so infrequently lately is that I'm really just sick of the campaign. Mainly, two aspects of it: the immorality of the Bush campaign and the defeatism I'm hearing from so many Democrats. Nevertheless, I just read this piece by Mark Schmit, and it's pretty good:

If I were running the issues department of the Kerry campaign, or any campaign, the sign above my desk would not be James Carville's "It's the Economy Stupid": my sign would say, "It's not what you say about the issues, it's what the issues say about you." That is, as a candidate, you must choose to emphasize issues not because they poll well or are objectively our biggest problems, but because they best show the kind of person you are, and not just how you would deal with that particular issue, but others yet to rear their heads. The best illustration of that is John McCain. The most admired political figure achieved his status in large part by his crusade for campaign finance reform. I've seen all the polls on this for seven or eight years, and "campaign finance reform," as an issue, is of interest to at most 5% of the public. I'd like for it to be otherwise, but it's not. And yet, for McCain, campaign finance reform is the perfect issue. It's tells a story about his independence, and his persistence, and it gives him a populist message without having to embrace more liberal economic policies. Clinton's much-derided "micro-initiatives" of the mid-1990s likewise sent a message about who he was: responsible, not extreme, neither a lover of government for its own sake nor a nihilist like Newt Gingrich. The insignificance of his gestures was a potent message in itself, and saved his presidency.

I don't think the problem with Kerry is that he talks about issues when he should be talking about character. That was Al Gore's problem. I think the problem is that the Kerry brain has split into an issues half, and a character half, and the two sides aren't communicating. The character half controlled the convention, and focused on Vietnam. Fine, but what did that say about how he would deal with Iraq? And the issues half has plans -- entirely good ones, even for Iraq. But those proposals don't reinforce any sense of the kind of person Kerry is, and how he would cope in a crisis.

Conversation between myself and a friend of a friend (whom I'd never met):

Me: Well, I think Bush has done a lot of bad things, but going into Iraq was, in my mind, clearly the worst.
Her: Well, but if we didn't we'd be in like a huge depression. Worse than in the 20's*
Me: Huh?
Her: Oh, yeah, definitely.
Me: Well, I don't like to dismiss arguments out of hand, and I'm sorry I'm telling you this, but I feel I have to dismiss this one out of hand. No need to discuss it.

That was it. I mean, I don't even think the Bush Administration claims that. Weird. And this person sells stocks to large institutional investors--I almost feel I should name the company to warn people that they have economic simpletons working the sales desk. But I won't.

*Yes, she actually seems to think the Great Depression was in the 20s and not the 30s. Wow.

Link:

Three years ago, the world came to a halt when terrorists attacked the U.S. In the weeks following the attacks, people tried to find some normalcy in their lives, something to be happy about, a way to move forward.

In 2001, the Yankees gave New York something to smile about.Now, HBO's moving documentary "Nine Innings From Ground Zero" tells the story of how baseball gave Americans, especially the citizens of New York City, a way to recapture the pride and sense of play that seemed to be lost in the rubble of 9/11.

A lot of people think the Kerry campaign waited too long to get down and dirty. Maybe. But even now, they're using the wrong stuff. The National Guard issue is nice, mainly because it's true, but I don't think it's going to sway anyone. Terrorism and homeland security is the place to get nasty, as Cheney did yesterday. In response to Cheney's "Vote for Kerry and die" comments, David Neiwert has some solid facts:

Cheney has created an opening for Democrats, really, to say what needs to be said: When it comes to terrorism, Bush was asleep at the wheel on Sept. 11. And he has driven us deeper into the ditch in the years since.

Just remember:

-- It wasn't Democrats who dragged the presidency through the mud with a political witch hunt culminating in a bogus impeachment trial, diverting the national interest from serious issues -- like the mounting threat of terrorism -- at a time when the threat was first manifesting itself.

-- It wasn't Democrats who minimized the seriousness of the Al Qaeda threat by dismissing President Clinton's missile strikes on their camps as mere "wagging the dog."

-- It wasn't Democrats who dismissed the warnings of the outgoing Clinton team regarding the need to take Al Qaeda and the larger threat of terrorism seriously, simply because they came from Clinton's team.

-- It wasn't a Democrat who went on vacation for month after receiving initial intelligence warnings about an imminent terrorist threat, and who failed to act on that intelligence in any discernible fashion.

-- It wasn't a Democratic administration that first focused its attentions on Iraq after the 9/11 attacks, only changing to Afghanistan after it became irrevocably clear that Osama bin Laden, and not Saddam Hussein, was responsible.

-- It wasn't a Democratic leadership that then withheld manpower from Afghanistan (almost certainly in anticipation of an Iraq invasion), depending to a large extent on help from local forces, which created an opening for the majority of the Al Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan -- including Osama bin Laden -- to escape over the Pakistani border.

-- It wasn't a Democratic president who then proceeded to (perhaps intentionally) misread intelligence and mislead the public about the nature of the threat posed by Saddam, successfully portraying him as an essential component of the "war on terror," when the reality both before and after the subsequent invasion was that Hussein played no role whatsoever in the events of 9/11, and had only a secondary and relatively minor role in terrorist activity. (It's worth remembering that a substantial number of the horrifying victims of his brutal regime were radical Islamists.)

-- It wasn't a Democratic administration that so poorly prepared for the post-invasion reality of the forced occupation of Iraq that it created a violent quagmire in which the death toll for American soldiers (not to even mention the thousands of civilians) has now passed 1,000. This quagmire is gaining all the earmarks of an insoluble mess, regardless of who inherits it, and competence and measured judgement -- none of which Bush has displayed -- will be required to deal with it.

-- Nor was it a Democratic president who, by creating the opening for an armed insurgency, has actually fanned the flames of terrorism by creating a massive cauldron for anti-American hatred and an environment rich for swelling the ranks of Islamic radicals.

-- It wasn't, in other words, a Democratic administration that foolishly, through its own arrogance and incompetence, handed Al Qaeda leadership nearly everything it hoped for at nearly every step of the drama: a lax mindset regarding security, an escape through Pakistan, a gift invasion of Iraq that diverted precious resources from the serious work fighting terrorism, a mishandled occupation that provided a groundswell of recruitment.

The latest Time poll shows a clear Bush lead.

There's really no way to a put a postive spin on this, except to say that if things stay as they are a country full of stupid people is about to exactly what it deserves.

Let's just all agree that Russian special forces, or SWAT, or whatever they are, can no longer raid any building in which hostages are being held. Because when they do, you know, everyone seems to die:

BESLAN, Russia (Reuters) - One hundred or more people were killed when Russian troops stormed a school Friday in a chaotic battle to free parents, teachers and children who had been held hostage for 53 hours by Chechen separatists.

Unbelievably irresponsible.

I was too disgusted by the revolting display by Zell Miller yesterday to post anything about it - and I still am. I would recommend you read, again, Andrew Sullivan's thoughts on the matter. (I'm really on an Andrew Sullivan kick today.) I do think yesterday was a disaster for the GOP - in that, Miller and Cheney's speeches did nothing to appeal to swing voters, and while they may have excited the Republican base, they likely did more to excite the Democratic base.

I thought today went much better for the Grand Old Party. Bush's speech was coherent and rational - and actually pretty good towards the end. I don't think it was spectacular by any means, and he looked absolutely terrified when those protesters started causing a hubbub. I would also point out that, with a few notable exceptions, Bush's speech steered away from the outright lies and deceptions that dominate the Republican talking-points these days. The Bush people have mastered this art for at least four years now - they never let Bush himself get involved with the scum that is the main thrust of his campaign. We, on the other hand, cannot grasp this actually very easy to understand concept - tonight, Kerry attacked Dick Cheney's record during Vietnam.

I thought before and think now that Bush will get a bounce from this. Something very good better happen at these debates, or the liberal blogging community is going to have a lot of great material for four more years.

...I have always been an Andrew Sullivan supporter; I've always thought he was a good man and a true, principled conservative. This is one of the better things I've read about this election:

I CANNOT SUPPORT HIM IN NOVEMBER: I will add one thing more. And that is the personal sadness I feel that this president who praises freedom wishes to take it away from a whole group of Americans who might otherwise support many parts of his agenda. To see the second family tableau with one family member missing because of her sexual orientation pains me to the core. And the president made it clear that discriminating against gay people, keeping them from full civic dignity and equality, is now a core value for him and his party. The opposite is a core value for me. Some things you can trade away. Some things you can compromise on. Some things you can give any politician a pass on. But there are other values - of basic human dignity and equality - that cannot be sacrificed without losing your integrity itself. That's why, despite my deep admiration for some of what this president has done to defeat terror, and my affection for him as a human being, I cannot support his candidacy. Not only would I be abandoning the small government conservatism I hold dear, and the hope of freedom at home as well as abroad, I would be betraying the people I love. And that I won't do.

Of course, this was obvious to some people in 2000; but where are the good men and women who are conservatives supposed to go? They are not Democrats. The Republicans - epitomized by their embrace of the hate and lie-filled speech of traitor Zell Miller - are fast becoming an unacceptable option to many good people. (Including, it seems, the Vice President's own family.)

However, this is a bed conservatives made for themselves. They surveyed the political landscape - and they sold their soul by allowing the religious right to become such an important part of the Republican base. This why Sullivan is such a fascinating person - and someone I very much enjoy reading. On one hand, he can write something as powerful and important as the above. On the other hand, he can somehow act surprised by this development. What Republican party has he been following the last 30 years?

According to Drudge, George W. Bush, our President, is going to be on the Rush Limbaugh show today. Perhaps Rush can ask him to compare the torture of Iraqi soldiers with his days as a frat boy at Yale...

At The Corner, Katie O'Beirne, a prominent pundit, writes:

Tonight's Message: Republicans fight back. Democrats light candles. It is so striking that the Democrats' Boston tribute to 9/11 was a remembrance of helpless victims who lost their lives that day. Those gutsy women reminded us of the stakes in this election by seeing a call to arms as the fitting tribute to their loved ones. Such a stirring reminder of the selfless heroes who walk among us would be an impossible display for the modern Democratic party.

One reason such a stirring reminder might be impossible is that George W. Bush (who incidentally was a coward when his country called him to serve) would have his Republican friends run ads claiming that these women didn't really lose relatives on 9/11, weren't really close to the relatives they lost, and are in no way deserving of our respect or admiration? Of course, those ads wouldn't be true, but...

Apparently, a popular item at the RNC is a small band-aid with a purple heart, intended to mock John Kerry's war record. Via Atrios, via someone else....

Why isn't something like this in every news story concerning attacks on Kerry's service:

While John Kerry received those so-called minor wounds, George W. Bush used his family's connections to avoid service in Vietnam by landing a spot in the National Guard. Those attacking Kerry's war record have been unable to produce a single piece of documentary evidence to support their claims. Meanwhile, all documentary evidence has supported what Kerry has said about his Vietnam service and Bush has been unable to produce records that prove he fulfilled all of his obligations to the National Guard.

Well, a better written version of that paragraph should be in all such news stories.

While writing that last post, I'm listening to Giuliani in the other room. Another blatant attempt to create a false connection between Iraq and 9/11, despite the fact that Iraq is and was, in Michael Moore's words:

A nation that had never attacked the United States. A nation that had never threatened to attack the United States. A nation that had never murdered a single American citizen.

Giuliani said this:

And it was here in 2001, in the same lower Manhattan, that President George W. Bush stood amid the fallen towers of the World Trade Center, and he said to the barbaric terrorists who attacked us, "They will hear from us."

Well, they heard from us.

They heard from us in Afghanistan and we removed the Taliban.

They heard from us in Iraq, and we ended Saddam Hussein's reign of terror.

And we put him where he belongs, in jail.

Was Bush actually promising that he would attack Iraq that day? Were there terrorists in Iraq that had been involved in 9/11? I ask again - are there any Bush-supporters out there who still read this blog with any thoughts on this matter? I really want to know: do you think this administration has been responsible for linking 9/11 and Iraq? Do you deny this, do you defend Bush's saying it, or do you think that it's true?

I was moving tonight, and have only had time to watch part of McCain's speech - on C-Span. I have heard no analysis. Has anyone claimed this speech his good? It's not - it's terrible. I've always thought he was a bad speaker - much worse than Dean on a bad day (except, of course, that ONE bad day) or even Bush on a bad day.

But beyond that... I wonder how conservatives respond to the liberal critique that Bush and the Republicans have tried their hardest to tie September 11 and Iraq together - despite the evidence that there was no such link. I have spoken about this to a few intelligent conservatives, and they insist that Bush has done no such thing. (Anyone out there care to comment on this? Do any of you U of C Federalist types still read our partisan bomb throwing - and also still support Bush? Do you think that Bush did this? Does it bother you?)

And they are right, to an extent. I can point to no transcript where Bush or any important Republican explicitly links the two. Bush, like Clinton, is usually too smart for that. Except, Clinton used clever word games so he wouldn't have to admit that he engaged in consensual face fucking in the oval office. Bush (to the extent that he is able) engages in clever word games so that the American people will support his decision to send young men and women to a foreign land to die.

McCain's speech is a perfect example:

Four years ago, in Philadelphia, I spoke of my confidence that President Bush would accept the responsibilities that come with America's distinction as the world's only superpower.

I promised he would not let America "retreat behind empty threats, false promises and uncertain diplomacy," that he would "confidently defend our interests and values wherever they are threatened."

I knew -- I knew my confidence was well placed when I watched him stand on the rubble of the World Trade Center with his arm around a hero of September 11 and in our moment of mourning and anger, strengthen our unity and our resolve by promising to right this terrible wrong, and to stand up and fight for the values we hold dear.

He promised our enemies would soon hear from us. And so they did. So they did.

He ordered American forces to Afghanistan and took the fight to our enemies and away from our shores, seriously injuring Al Qaeda and destroying the regime that gave them safe haven.

He worked effectively to secure the cooperation of Pakistan, a relationship that's critical to our success against Al Qaeda.

He encouraged other friends to recognize the peril that terrorism posed for them and won their help in apprehending many of those who would attack us again and in helping to freeze the assets they used to fund their bloody work.

After years of failed diplomacy and limited military pressure to restrain Saddam Hussein, President Bush made the difficult decision to liberate Iraq.

Where does his discussion of the response to 9/11 end and his discussion of the Iraq war begin? In what way are the connected? How is this speech not planting in the mind of the listener the idea that 9/11 and Iraq are connected?

Moving on... later, McCain said this:

Our choice wasn't between a benign status quo and the bloodshed of war. It was between war and a graver threat. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Not our political opponents. And certainly -- and certainly not a disingenuous filmmaker who would have us believe...

AUDIENCE (Booing filmmaker Michael Moore who attended the convention):

Four more years! Four more years! Four more years!

MCCAIN: Please, please, my friends.

That line was so good, I'll use it again. Certainly not a disingenuous filmmaker who would have us believe, my friends, who would have us believe that Saddam's Iraq was an oasis of peace, when in fact -- when in fact it was a place of indescribable cruelty, torture chambers, mass graves and prisons that destroyed the lives of the small children inside their walls.

And if you could have heard those boos - unlike anything I heard at the DNC. (At least Bush hatred, if it exists, is directed at the actual person in charge of the conservative movement right now.)

Of course, there are many things to criticize about Moore's movie. But his response to this frequently made accusation makes sense. Nobody who watches this movie is unaware that Saddam Hussein was a terrible dictator. The media, the President, the Democrats and even the most ardent critics of the war - including Howard Dean, the most vocal - had told us this for years. That doesn't change the fact that somewhere in Iraq, children played in the streets. The actual choice before Iraq was not whether nor not to let a bad man remain in power or to do nothing - the choice involved deciding whether or not it was worth incinerating some of those children remove him. The choice involved deciding how many American mothers had to sacrifice their children to remove him. The media did an abysmal job of presenting that choice; Moore presented only the other side. Whether this is most useful response - and it's probably not - it's understandable, defensible, and certainly not worth talking about during a nationally televised speech.

Funny.

Sent by occasional G&G reader D O'B.

Steve Earle has a new album out, and a new blog. Find "The Revolution Starts Now" here. Read the four-star Rolling Stone review here.

It is a very good album, and much more political than the (pretty damn political) "Jerusalem." There are some fantastic songs on this album, including the title track and "Rich Man's War." However, I find many of the songs to be structurally (that is, musically) very similar to some of the songs on Jerusalem. Earle makes up for this shortcoming with potent lyrics and emotion.

Another oddity of this album, which was recorded at breakneck speed after the Abu Ghraib scandal broke, ("All but two of these songs were recorded within 24 hours of the first line hitting the paper," Earle writes in the liner notes.) is that the strongest songs are, in many ways, the two love songs, especially "Comin' Around," a duet with Emmylou Harris. It's funny, because I thought the best song on Jerusalem, after "John Walker's Blues" was the duet "I Remember You."

Oh, and no review of this album would be complete without, as a code, writing out the chorus to "F the CC:"

Fuck the FCC
Fuck the FBI
Fuck the CIA
Livin' in the motherfucking' USA

How, Chris Matthews was a guest on Bill Maher last night, and wow, he came really close to endorsing John Kerry. Interesting.

Page Six:

YOU can make a lot of cracks about Foghat, the '70s arena rockers best known for "Slow Ride" - but don't suggest they're backing President Bush. U.S. News & World Report mistakenly reported that the band would be joining Randy Travis and Bobby Womack on a pro-Bush concert tour designed to counter the anti-Bush rock roadshow featuring Bruce Springsteen, R.E.M., Pearl Jam, Bonnie Raitt and Jackson Browne. "I have no idea where they got that," Foghat drummer Roger Earl tells PAGE SIX. "Foghat are not supporters of George Bush, and we're certainly not going on the road with him." In fact, Earl seemed downright smitten with the John Kerry-favoring Springsteen tour. "I'd like to see Bruce Springsteen and Bonnie Raitt for president. We'd go on tour with them in a minute!" The Long Island resident also offered up Foghat's services to entertain the troops overseas. "We support the troops 110 percent," he said. "We'd love to go over there and play for them, but no one has asked us yet." OK, we get it - you're available!

From the Cleveland Plain Dealer:



And note that the poverty level is only $18,660 for a family of four, so there are countless other millions living in de facto poverty that aren't counted by this measure.

Bill O'Reilly has said something very stupid.

His Talking Points Memo from a few days ago starts off with the intriguing question:

The USA dominating at the Olympics, but why?

Why indeed. Basically, the answer is because Americans are achievers; we encourage people to succeed; in general we are better than other people. Fine. I agree, I guess.

Before we move on to this next point, you should know a little background. O'Reilly has recently been focusing his no-spin brilliance on the Canadians. He dislikes them, and if Canada grants asylum to two U.S. Soldiers, he may even propose a boycott of Canada.

His next point is this:

In other countries, the emphasis on self-reliance has been beaten down by nanny states and entitlement cultures. Just take a look at Australia and Canada, for example. The Aussies have 20 million people to draw from. Canada has 30 million. Yet the Aussies have 35 Olympic medals, Canada just five.

"Talking Points" believes this is reflective of the systems in those countries. Australia is a place where self-reliance is emphasized and competition is celebrated. Canada has become increasingly socialistic, as big government programs ensure everyone is marginally taken care of. I may be wrong here, but I see the entitlement culture as a force against self-discipline and motivation.

Remember, more people choose to get their news from this man then any other cable new source.

Apparently, however, Canada's socialistic, big government society must move to Australia during the winter... look at these shocking numbers from the 2002 Salt Lake Games:

Canada: 6 Gold Medals, 3 Silver Medals, 8 Bronze Medals, 17 Total Medals

Australia: 2 Gold Medals, 0 Silver Medals, 0 Bronze Medals, 2 Total Medals.

Will those commie outback freaks ever teach their people about self reliance?

Are there any other possible reasons that explain Canada's relative lack of success in the Summer Olympics as compared to the Winter Olympics other than the welfare state?

Is it worth asking how already-Factor-boycotted France has somehow been able to pull itself out of its O'Reilly-caused recession to win 27 medals?

Is there anything funnier than Bill O'Reilly saying "'Talking Points' believes...."?

...with this column on ESPN Page 2. There is something a little racist about Americans rooting against their own basketball team in the Olympics - in fact, there may be something very racist about it. Thoughts anyone?

Bush uses Iraq Olympic team in ads. Iraq Olympic team complains, say they do not want to be part of Bush ads. Bush Campaign's response:

BUSH CAMP SAYS OLYMPIC AD WILL STAY UP:
"We're on very firm legal ground to mention the Olympics, to make a factual point in a political advertisement," said BC'04 spokesman Scott Stanzel... when the olympics is over the campaign will take the ad down, as scheduled.

Kerry uses John McCain in ad. John McCain complains, says he does not want to be part of Kerry ads. Kerry Campaign's response:

KERRY TO TAKE DOWN McCAIN AD:
"We respect John McCain's wishes, and will stop running the ads of him challenging Bush to denounce the attacks on his service. It's long past time that George Bush also take John McCain's advice and do the right thing by putting an end to the smears and lies attacking John Kerry's military service. George Bush needs to say this is wrong, he needs to say it must end," said Kerry spokesperson David Wade.

Remember when Al Gore said "no controlling legal authority" and the Republicans threw a fit. Guess what, Scott Stanzel? Most people who complained about your ad thought it was in poor taste; not illegal. Removing it isn't compelled by law; it's compelled by class and a sense of responsibility for the ads supported by your campaign. Obviously, the Bush campaign has none of that.

The White House web page (the president one, not the porn site) has an "Ask the White House" feature, wherein average citizens can ask questions of noted administration officials via the internet.

Here is a list of recent participants in the chat:

August 12, 2004
Andy Card, Chief of Staff

August 13, 2004
David L. Johnson, Director of the National Weather Service

August 18, 2004
John Snow, Treasury Secretary

August 19, 2004
Don Evans, Commerce Secretary

OK, this all makes sense. Then, this:

August 20, 2004
Kerri Strug

Say what? Lovable Olympian Kerri Strug is authorized to speak on behalf of the White House? Apparently so... here is the full transcript.

The whole thing is pretty stupid. Here was one thing I enjoyed:

Katie, from Washington, DC writes:
Hi Kerri - What is like going from Olympic gold to the frantic world of Washington (especially the White House)? Were you able to carry any lessons you learned as a competitive athlete into politics?

Kerri Strug
It is so exciting living in Washington DC! I think it is essential for young people to work in DC for some period of time. There are so many things to do, see, and learn.

I think this is a strange message for the White House to send, given that the Republican party is supposed to be about states rights. On the other hand, that is so last decade.

Overall, there's nothing too bad in the chat. It's seems obvious to me that Kerri Strug did not write it - though there is nothing as obviously fake as there was when the Bush twins were permitted to speak for the White House for a week.

UPDATE: I tried to post this yesterday, but wanted to post a link to a blog - I thought Wonkette - who demolished an "Ask the White House" with the Bush twins, pointing out how obvious it was that two twenty-something girls did not write this. I couldn't find it. But, yesterday, Wonkette posted this, which similarly mocks a mailing allegedly from the Bush twins. Here is that post:

The twins haven't been especially reliable in keeping up our correspondence, so you can imagine our delight yesterday, when we received a long-awaited email from them. We hadn't heard from them since Christmas, which is fine, because that's apparently the last time someone took a picture of the two of them in which they were neither dressed in ball gowns nor horizontal. And this wasn't just any email: It was a "special message from Jenna and Barbara Bush." Sure, if by "special" you mean stump-speech pabulum, if by "from" you mean put their names on it, and if by "Jenna and Barbara Bush" you mean "Ken Mehlmann." Wait, that's not fair. . . of course Ken Mehlmann didn't write that email. Some assistant of his did. The campaign has as much as admitted this, telling Lloyd Grove that while the girls didn't necessarily write the letter, "the language is largely their own." Huh. What language exactly, you think? We're guessing the words "parties" and maybe "big." Certainly not "integrity."

Click on the link to read the full message. Very funny stuff.

UPDATE: Because I know that many of our 5 readers will not follow the link and read the whole letter by the Bush Twins, here is my favorite paragraph:

Our Dad has qualities that are needed in a good President - loyalty, humor (embarrassing as it sometimes may be), compassion, and, most importantly, integrity. We're not the only ones who see it. In fact, our friends - from varying political backgrounds - are supporting our Dad in November. Not only because of his decisions to liberate the women of Afghanistan or bring freedom to the people of Iraq, but because during the last ten years they met a man whose title was Governor or President, but who was always happy to be known as "our Dad." He made everyone feel welcome and comfortable in our house (except for the occasional boyfriend) and our friends got to know him as a really good guy.

UPDATE: This post is getting too long, but I have to point out that Pandagon has the definitive post on the letter from the Bush twins.

This settles it. Last year, John Kerry said this at a speech:

I remember well April 1968, I was serving in Vietnam. A place of violence. When the news reports brought home to me and my crew mates the violence back home and the tragic news that one of the bullets flying that terrible spring took the life of Dr. King.

Now, it turns out that JOHN KERRY WAS ACTUALLY IN A BOAT NEAR VIETNAM at the time, and not actually in Vietnam. How can I a man possibly expect to be President when he gave a speech noting the irony that, during the 1960s, there was a lot of violence at home while he was fighting the war abroad, when he fails to mention that at the time he was only on a boat ready to go to war, not actually fighting in a war.

The funny thing is, the above link is to Instapundit, who actually sort of corrects himself and admits that this a "stretch" and not a "lie." (Which, in itself, is at best a "stretch" and more like a "lie.") However, this story apparently came up on Fox News last night - as is noted in these two Corner posts: here and here. I'll let you know if similar corrections are posted there. (In fairness, the second Corner post links to Instapundit.)

Bush is now saying that he doesn't just want the Scumbags for Bush ads off the air, but all ads that don't originate with a campaign or political party. Kind of strange for any champion of free speech.

As to the counter, Ezra nails it:

Wrong and Stupid
I think there's an easy response to this. "We don't want to ban all political speech, we want the president to denounce hateful, dishonest political speech. We know he's not good with nuance, but there's a line in the sand here and the Swift Vets have crossed it and done so funded by long-time supporters of the Bush family." Quite simply, they want the issue to be 527's -- a smart way of turning it on the one institutional advantage of the Democrats. We want the issue to be the unacceptability of lies and hate in the public sphere; that's a values debate and we'll win it. Particularly if we keep driving home the financial connections between Bush and the SwiftVets.

Further, if Bush thinks the campaign finance bill he opposed and then signed outlawed 527's, rather than created them, he was not only, by his own admission, wrong to oppose far-reaching campaign finance reform but too stupid to know what the bill he signed did. That means our president is wrong and stupid. God bless America, hail to the chief.

I'm finally going to watch "Outfoxed" this evening with some friends. To make it a bit more lively, we're going to make a drinking game out of it. I was sure that if I googled "outfoxed drinking game", something would come up. Alas, no. So, we're making up our own rules. Seeing as we haven't seen it yet, we're not sure if it will work. I'll let you know tomorrow. Here's what we have:

1. Drink whenever Bill O'Reilly says "shut-up."
2. Drink whenever Bill O'R accuses someone of "dodging" the factor or of otherwise being afraid of the factor.
3. Drink whenever Bill O'reilly claims that he is non-partisan.
4. Drink when Sean Hannity questions someone's patriotism
5. Drink when Sean Hannity says something demonstrably false
6. Drink then Brit Hume editorializes a straight news piece.
7. Drink whenever Walter Cronkite is on the screen.

Now is when I wish there was wider readership of this site, because then I could solicit for other ideas. But, well, we're stuck with these for now.

UPDATE: Rule 8: Whenever Neil Cavuto comes on screen, do something crazy

UPDATE 2: Clearly, rule number one will be our downfall. That was a tough three minutes there
UPDATE 3: If you want to get really, really drunk, you should drink every time someone says "some people say." Luckily, we don't have that rule.

UPDATE 4: This was an original rule, and I forgot to list it. Rule 9: Drink everytime Alan Colmes gets bullied. Also, drink every time you hear "fair and balanced."

FINAL UPDATE: Best rule: the Neil Cavuto crazy rule.

I think I tried to make this point before, but The New Republic does a better job than me.

There is little doubt that Libya's surrender of its nuclear ambitions has made the world safer. Even human rights advocates like Representative Tom Lantos encourage deeper ties with Tripoli to ensure that Libya does not resume its WMD program. "I'm strongly in favor of moving ahead with normalization. It's clearly in our national interests," Lantos told me. But, while the achievement is to be celebrated, the quick rush to reward Qaddafi, an unpredictable and vicious dictator, has cast further doubt on the White House's commitment to one of the pillars of its post-September 11 foreign policy: democratic reform in the Middle East...

Bush has hardly been shy about touting his democratization efforts. Last November, in perhaps his most significant foreign policy speech, the president cast aside six decades of American commitment to stability in the region. Instead, he announced that democratic reform in the Arab world "must be a focus of American policy." After the speech, White House spokesman Scott McClellan described advancing freedom and democracy as "a central element of our national security strategy." And, at the June nato summit in Turkey, a day after Iraq's new government assumed control in Baghdad, Bush again called for democratic change across the Middle East, urging Arab nations to "recognize the direction of the events of the day."

Yet, while Bush champions reform, Libya's massive human rights violations have not retarded Washington's drive toward normalizing relations with Tripoli. "I haven't seen the U.S. emphasize that they want to see progress on human rights," said one analyst with a leading human rights group. "They're too busy rejoicing [over] the encouraging signals on weapons." Adds one Capitol Hill lobbyist, "They're not making it the centerpiece of their discussions. The most important thing for Bush in Libya is that [Qaddafi] gave up WMD. I guess human rights were the price."

Bush can't have it both ways. Why did we go into Iraq? If it was to protect ourselves from WMDs, then it was a mistake: perhaps a mistake made in good faith, but a mistake nevertheless. If we happened to do good while there and overthrow an evil dictator, fine. But that is not U.S. policy. As demonstrated by our Libyan policy, the U.S. message to the citizens of the Middle East is clear: we will let you live in dictatorships, we will let your citizens be tortured, we will let your dissidents rot in jail cells - as long as your government makes our citizens a little safer.

UPDATE: My previous thoughts on Libya here - scroll down for all three posts. I think this is the best point I've made on this blog - I think the second of those posts is the best. (The best posts on this blog are the first post, and this one, both by Goldberg.)

I'm stealing this directly from Kos.

Picture of Bush rally:





Picture of Kerry rally: