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The Spanish elections were a sign that Europeans had the necessary mindset for surrender.

Absurd. The US woke up to terrorism on 9/11. Europe has been dealing with it for centuries - the Spanish with the Basques, the English with the IRA, etc. are recent examples.

The Spanish elections were a sign that Spain is a democracy. They were also a sign that the Europeans weren’t as easily fooled into believing Iraq and Al Qaeda were linked as the FOX News viewers of the USA.

I am pointing out that a remarkable propaganda similarity exists.

Kerry and Bin Laden both want to live. They both likely want to have luxuries, money, friends, etc. Those similarities don’t mean a thing, and neither does this one.

Halliburton has been caught redhanded screwing the American taxpayers, and that’s the kind of thing Kerry’s speaking out against. Trying to link him to OBL because of that is pretty sleazy.

No country in Europe has yet turned on us. You may talk about Munich, but many of the older people in Europe lived through it, and have no desire to alienate us for the promises of a terrorists.

Fact is, I don’t want terrorists telling me what my political angle should be. Either Way. I will not be convinced to elect a man I believe to be an incompetent leader, by a blatant appeal to fear. I mean, hell, if we are electing our leaders out of fear of the terrorists, haven’t they won?

Oh, by the way. The Spanish threw out their government because they tried to manipulate the story for political gain. They tried to pin the blame on ETA, even as it obviously became apparent Al Quaeda was involved. Playing bait-and-switch politics with matters of such vital importance is just asking to become unpopular very quickly. Bush is learning this lesson, the Popular party in spain is learning it, too.

You have every right to believe as you do and voice your opinion. But doesn’t it make you uncomfortable to know that your dissent, the allusions to Vietnam, the blood for oil chants, the blaming Bush for being a total and complete failure is echoed back to us by ‘OBL’?

Halliburton is not a “company” doing business in Iraq. It is a WAR PROFITEER, bilking millions from the pockets of average Americans. In past wars they would have been arrested — or worse.

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not “insurgents” or “terrorists” or “The Enemy.” They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow — and they will win. Get it, Mr. Bush? You closed down a friggin’ weekly newspaper, you great giver of freedom and democracy! Then all hell broke loose. The paper only had 10,000 readers! Why are you smirking? -Michael Moore

Compare that to the statement from the tape by OBL. It kind of makes me itchy. There isn’t much difference between what Michael Moore says and what OBL says in these quotes and they are not talking about flowers or baseball, or some innocuous topic. Especially when Moor basically says that American soldiers should die in Iraq because a majority of Americans supported the war.

I’m sorry, but the majority of Americans supported this war once it began and, sadly, that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let that maybe — just maybe — God and the Iraqi people will forgive us in the end.

Stephen,

The Popular Party made a huge mistake in claiming is was Basque separatists so quickly. But it was probably wishful thinking rather than an attempt to mislead. The bombing itself was carried out in similiar fashion to previous Basque bombings, they were detonated by remote control. In other words, not a suicide attack.

The CATO institute has an article on this which agrees with your assessment.

True, opinion polls showed the Popular Party with a modest lead over the opposition Socialists before the Madrid bombings. That was largely because the Iraq war had faded as a salient issue for most voters. The bombings of the commuter trains again elevated the prominence of the Iraq issue. And when that happened, voters remembered their irritation with the Aznar government.

…They suspected (with good reason) that Aznar and his associates were trying to blame ETA to conceal the reality that the attacks were a payback for Spain’s support of Washington’s Iraq policy.

…The outcome of Spain’s election was a referendum on Iraq policy, not policy toward Al Qaeda. Allegations of appeasement are a despicable slur against a population that has already suffered grievously. -cato.org

Eric, when I think about OBL’s message, the logic of it does not seem to be reflected above. I mean, a sure way for OBL to insure that heads of state in Europe DO NOT yield to his offer is to make it. What head of state in Europe is going to voluntarily set themselves up as an appeaser to terrorists?

It does not make sense. It makes headlines, but, not sense. It may be that OBL is making the offer in the hopes that fearful citizens in Europe will put pressure on their heads of state to appease the terrorists in the name of their own security. I can see some of that happening. But, I do not see it happening in the kind of numbers that would threaten a head of state’s position in office.

It occurs to me that the audience intended by his message is not really Europeans at all. It is intended for the people of predominantly Muslim nations around the world.

The message has all the hallmarks of one from a head of state. It appears to me that the purpose of the messsage is to elevate OBL’s status as spokesperson for Muslim peoples, especially those in the Middle East. He does not have a country to call his own, but he appears to be declaring himself the representative of Muslim people, bartering and brokering a deal that will benefit “his” people.

I think to interpret his message as having any significant weight or power with Europeans is to miss the mark, and by being so literal, miss the real intent and real potential danger and power of his message. He is bolstering his own status by using the Europeans as a means of demonstrating his capacity to speak for and represent the interests of Middle Eastern Muslim populations. Therein lies the real threat and potential power of his message.

But doesn’t it make you uncomfortable to know that your dissent, the allusions to Vietnam, the blood for oil chants, the blaming Bush for being a total and complete failure is echoed back to us by ‘OBL’?

It makes me uncomfortable knowing that my president has helped bin Laden achieve some of his stated goals: removing US troops from Saudi Arabia, toppling corrupt Arab leaders like Saddam Hussein, creating a new Islamic state in Iraq, and encouraging new recruits and radical Islamic movements to flock to al-Qaeda.

And I find it interesting that Eric has to quote Michael Moore, who isn’t even a Democrat, to try to somehow make Democrats look like terrorist lovers.

It seems to me that if the rest of the world, Europeans, Arabs, Asians, everybody — including a majority of Americans — think that Bush is steering this country in the wrong direction, then I would have to start re-examining my positions, if I were you. Maybe you relatively few Bush supporters are right and you see something the rest of the world does not. But…

> Especially when Moor basically says that
> American soldiers should die in Iraq because
> a majority of Americans supported the war.

The quote you used to prove this assertion was taken out of context to prove some kind of point that Moore (with an “e” at the end - he’s not a North African Muslim, you know) somehow wants American soldiers to die.

The full context of Moore’s statement is something I am sure you would agree with: He was saying that he does not support the invitation of UN troops to help bring peace and stability to Iraq. He was saying “we chose to start this war, we are the ones who must finish it.”

I actually don’t agree with Moore’s view, but I feel obliged to point out your use of out-of-context quotations and straw men to present your argument (and this isn’t the first time, either).

Moore’s full paragraph:

There is a lot of talk amongst Bush’s opponents that we should turn this war over to the United Nations. Why should the other countries of this world, countries who tried to talk us out of this folly, now have to clean up our mess? I oppose the U.N. or anyone else risking the lives of their citizens to extract us from our debacle. I’m sorry, but the majority of Americans supported this war once it began and, sadly, that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let that maybe — just maybe — God and the Iraqi people will forgive us in the end.

Now, on to Moore’s other quote:

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not “insurgents” or “terrorists” or “The Enemy.” They are the REVOLUTION…

I actually find this part very thought-provoking. Many of Bush’s supporters refer to Sadr as a “terrorist”, but I’ve always wondered about that term. Indeed, I’ve wondered a lot about what Sadr actually wants and who is likely to support him.

I mean, it seems perfectly logical that armed political factions would sprout up in Iraq, seeking to gain prestige, incremental pockets of power, and to eventually seize total power once our American troops leave. These groups are fighting against our soldiers, and I fully expect our soldiers not only to defend themselves, but to actively fight back - to root out these groups and kill them. That being said, I cannot logically accept that all of these insurgent groups are doing anything *morally* wrong, and I certainly cannot call them “terrorists” since they haven’t actually carried out any acts of terror as far as I know. I mean, attacking US occupying forces is not terrorism - it’s insurgency, but not terrorism .

Maybe they are terrorists, maybe they’re behind some of the suicide bombings over the past few months. But they used to tell us these attacks were by “Baathists”, and the Sadr people certainly aren’t Baathists! We don’t really know anything about these groups do we?

Anyway, even if they are “Militiamen”, or “freedom fighters” or whatever high-sounding name they might describe themselves with, it doesn’t mean that I - or Moore - supports their cause.

-Cf

> Osama Bin Laden, hidden in a mountain crevice
> no doubt, believes he can separate what exists
> of European support for America and it’s war
> on terror just by offering to stop the attacks.
>
> Where would he get the idea that this might
> even be plausible?

That is a very good question, and I applaud you for asking it. I have two answers:

1) He doesn’t think it’s plausible at all. Rather, the offer was a political move designed to gain support and to influence his image among Muslims. (David Remer said the same thing, essentially)

2) He got the idea to make this divisive offer from people like you who are constantly trying to point out how America is surrounded by weak allies and tacit enemies, both internally and externally. He was giving rhetorical ammunition to Bush Administration supporters who have no compunction about scoring political points by insulting and denigrating the courage and commitment of our European allies. Bin Laden’s statement may have been designed to use people like you like puppets to help further wedge Europe and America apart, making bin Laden’s job easier. (You even used bin Laden’s statement, at face value, as logical evidence to support your argument! “The logic is inescapable. Europe is a weak link.” Wow, Eric, nice going!)

Your pre-existing distrust of Europe’s motives, morals, and ethics — and your support of Bush’s hamfisted tactics in the war on terrorism — are exactly what bin Laden wants! And he intends to use voices like yours to further splinter his enemies.

Ultimately, I think it’s a little of both (1) and (2). You are right that the offer was preposterous - the European people and governments universally denounced it, as did the American left. It is foolish to think for even a second that bin Laden thought that Europe might actually accept the deal. The only logical reason behind it could have been to acheive goals of a political sort: to influence the opinions of (a) his supporters, and (b) his enemies.

It looks like Osama bin Laden acheived both of these goals: First, it made bin Laden look diplomatic in the eyes of the Muslim world. It made him look powerful, too, as if he had Europe bent over a barrel. Secondly, it made his enemies in America, in particular Bush policy supporters like yourself, distrust both Europe and the American Democrats even more than you did a week ago. Mission Accomplished.

Your attempt to use bin Laden’s statement as a tool to make the American left and our European allies look like tacit supporters of terrorism is not only ludicrous and insulting, but dangerous.

-Cf

I think it is a fundamental right of democratic societies to cast down leaders who try to con their people into one position or another. People don’t like to be suckers. They don’t like to be played. When the election comes along, those people are going to revolt. Thankfully, Spain shares with us a system that allows us to openly revolt against our government, bring it down, and replace it, without shedding a single drop of blood

The beauty of such a system is that nobody is immune from that. With the grave decision of whether to kill your neighbor and the keepers of the peace out of the equation, people can gather the resolve to do the same thing to those who enjoyed their favor, should they fail to govern wisely. I think people are fully willing to forgive a lapsed campaign promise, if they get the sense that the promise was broken because the candidate was being realistic in their policy decisions. Bush, unfortunately, pushes his policy, even when there is a broad consensus about it being unwise.

David,

It occurs to me that the audience intended by his message is not really Europeans at all. It is intended for the people of predominantly Muslim nations around the world.

I agree. It is a classic persuasive tool. Offer peace, even if you don’t mean it or expect it to be accepted. He doesn’t even have the power to ‘stop martyrdom operations’ by all of the loosly associated terrorist cells. He doesn’t have that kind of control anyway. It is a play to sympathetic ears on both sides. He is trying to increase his stature by appearing magnanimous and powerful at the same time.

Lee,

It makes me uncomfortable knowing that my president has helped bin Laden achieve some of his stated goals: removing US troops from Saudi Arabia, toppling corrupt Arab leaders like Saddam Hussein, creating a new Islamic state in Iraq, and encouraging new recruits and radical Islamic movements to flock to al-Qaeda.

If that were true would you prefer leaving troops in Saudi Arabia? Leaving Saddam in power? As for creating Islamic states, I thought that it was their choice for instance, when Saddam was in power, that they should have the government they choose? By the way, what US action would not have new recruits flocking to Al Qaeda?

Michael Moore is saying everything you’re saying and he’s been saying it from the beginning. Frankly I don’t know what Moore is, except extremely liberal.

CF,

I read the quote in context. First he says that the contractors are mercenaries, then Halliburton should be arrested and prosecuted, then he says that inserguents are revolutionaries, and that they will win. He must be talking about Sadr because he references the newspaper.

A newspaper which explicitly encouraged and incited Iraqis to kill Americans. A newspaper in the US which did that would also be shut down. I don’t know what kind of freedom of speech Moor(e) thinks he has.

We actually know quite a bit about these people. Sadr is in fact receiving money and support from Hezbollah in Syria and Iran. He leads a small faction of more extreme shiite’s. He has built a small militia force. He does not have majority support from other shiites. He has assasinated two other ‘rival’ clerics. Hardly a good resume for a spiritual leader.

On April 2, Sadr used his Friday night sermon to declare himself “the striking arm” of Hamas and Hezbollah, two anti-Israel organizations on the U.S. list of terrorist groups. “The fate of Iraq and Palestine are the same,” al-Sadr said, according to news reports. “We promise the Palestinians and all the oppressed that we will fight and defeat all the oppressors.” He also referred to the death of Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the Hamas leader killed by Israeli forces on March 22, as an attack on all Shiites.

Does he command an armed force?
Yes. Sadr created the Imam Mehdi Army, a force his aides claim numbers 10,000 men, to support his political movement and impose order. (Some reports estimate the number is more likely between 1,500 and 3,000.) His followers have clashed violently with militias supporting rival clerics, and over the weekend with coalition forces in the Baghdad slum known as Sadr City… -cfr.org

Anyway is this the guy Moor(e) thinks is freedom fighting? A Revolutionary? I refuse to watch bowling for Columbine, but doesn’t Moor(e) ridicule gun owners and gun lobbies asbeing out of control violent idiots?

The full paragraph of Moor(e)’s quote.

There is a lot of talk amongst Bush’s opponents that we should turn this war over to the United Nations. Why should the other countries of this world, countries who tried to talk us out of this folly, now have to clean up our mess? I oppose the U.N. or anyone else risking the lives of their citizens to extract us from our debacle. I’m sorry, but the majority of Americans supported this war once it began and, sadly, that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let that maybe — just maybe — God and the Iraqi people will forgive us in the end.

In context, Moor(e)’s statements say American tropps should die, rather than international troops.

1) Those who kill US troops are revolutionaries, freedom fighters, therefore our troops must be oppressing them, taking away their freedom.

2) He very explicitly says that a majority of American supported the war and that, “that majority must now sacrifice their children until enough blood has been let…”

There is no misinterpretation here. It is very clear.

Your attempt to use bin Laden’s statement as a tool to make the American left and our European allies look like tacit supporters of terrorism is not only ludicrous and insulting, but dangerous.

My attempt was to shine some light on the fact that some of the over-the-top incindiary Democratic rhetoric is being used for propaganda purposes by the enemy. Insofar as the incessant charges that Bush is a failed leader, may have known about 9/11, is killing civilians willy nilly in a hegemonic power grab and imperial stormtrooper fashion, and went to war for oil and the profits of Halliburton is hurting the cause of America whether Bush is in office or not.

What happens if Kerry wins? I don’t think anyone is taking that into account. After some of the things that have been said by democrats, Kerry would literally have to completely disavow the Bush administration as being war criminals in order to ‘internationalize’ anything. Is that good for America? Not to mention is it true?

Stephen,

Bush, unfortunately, pushes his policy, even when there is a broad consensus about it being unwise.

Or you could argue that Bush stands by what he thinks is right no matter what. Is it better to go along with something that is wrong just because you think it will keep you elected? …Or get you elected? Policy is by it’s very nature political. Are you saying that there is some kind of canon of accepted liberal doctrine, and anything outside that liberal doctrine is immoral? Indeed, even blasphemous?

Policy decisions are decided politically. Which means debate and disagreement. Consensus is not always arrived at or possible. There must be a policy nonetheless, and the buck stops at the President’s desk. He made the policy, and as Mr. Moor(e) stated a majority of Americans supported it at the time. A majority of Americans still appear to support it although that support has declined even in the face of partisan accusations that he lied, fabricated, falsified, and misrepresented the threat of WMD.

Come November the people will decide if Bush’s policies are wrong.

Nobody ever said Osama was stupid.

There is one slight difference between Osama and the critics of Bush Policy.

They haven’t blown up people.

Rhetoric that is extreme is usually false. This is more twisted thinking of the right.

Having nuances between black and white, good and evil, is a sign of leadership and intelligence not disloyalty.

Playing on the poorly educated, the racist, and the frightened is effective, but lowly. If you don’t know when you are being lied to, you are soon to be swindled. If you watched 60 minutes today and did not feel uneasy about the closeness of the Saudis and the Bushes, you are being blind,mute and deaf. Evil might be a little closer to home than we’d like.

Like everything Moore says, there’s an element of truth in this particular web of distortion and anti-American ranting.

The true part: the UN will never, because they refuse to and have traditionally refused to, play a significant role in military actions in Iraq or anywhere. Kerry’s promise to go to the UN, reestablish a spirit of international cooperation (which never existed) and turn Iraq over to the UN is so ridiculous that I don’t know he says it with a straight face (unless there really is something to the botox rumors). Because he voted for the war, this is the only way out of the box he’s made for himself is—to say Bush should have used the UN, that that’s what he was really voting for. If god forbid he should have the chance to pursue this policy and attempt to grovel before the UN (which Bush actually tried for months), it has no chance whatsoever at success. That he must know this bespeaks nothing more than his own hypocricy. That Democrats buy into it is merely sad.

ummm Martin, what is Brahimi there for?

Martin, that whole comment is just plain wrong, and you still don’t “get” the UN.

If that were true would you prefer leaving troops in Saudi Arabia? Leaving Saddam in power? As for creating Islamic states, I thought that it was their choice for instance, when Saddam was in power, that they should have the government they choose? By the way, what US action would not have new recruits flocking to Al Qaeda?

Eric, I was throwing Bush’s OBL inspired achievements back at you because you accused Democrats of having the same goals as terrorists.

But I’ll tell you what action wouldn’t have had new recruits flocking to Al Qaeda: The complete destruction of al Qaeda and the death of bin Laden.

Instead, Bush fixated on Iraq, giving bin Laden breathing room to regroup (probably in a lavishly furnished Saudi salon with broadband access and a kidney dialysis machine) and to make new alliances with other Saudi sponsored Wahabi terrorist organizations like Jemaah Islamiah and that Moroccan group that pulled off the Madrid bombings.

I find it odd that our fear of appeasement is so strong we refuse to consider options merely because they are being presented by the wrong side. I’m not saying we should in any way simply give in to what the terrorists want, but we have to consider that what they are after may be a valid goal (despite their unacceptable methods).

The fact that OBL and the liberals seem to share some viewpoints is merely a reflection of the fact that they both have a common aim: ending the killing in Iraq. Granted OBL’s goals extend rather further than that, but the first part is getting the US out of the Middle East. As Eric S. argues, the fact that Bush has also accomplished some of OBL’s stated goals does not make them invalid actions, merely double-edged ones.

Martin,
What the Dems are hoping is not that Kerry can somehow miraculously convince the UN to cover us for our mistake and put a more international face on the war. The hope is that Kerry will even bother to CONSULT the UN, and actually give weight to their decisions rather than simply ignoring them when they don’t do what we want. Maybe Kerry can convince them of our position, maybe they’ll tell us to get out of there now. What Kerry’s saying (not that I necessarily believe him) is that he will listen to the international community, and to whatever extent is reasonable, try to cooperate with them. It’s simply dishonest to intentionally misinterpret him to make him sound like more of a hypocrite.

Or you could argue that Bush stands by what he thinks is right no matter

Eric, The guy just doesn’t listen to advice. Powell tells him, you break it, you buy it. Well, we bought it, and America’s feeling the sticker shock. O’Neill tells him that the tax cuts are going to cause us to run deficits. Bush fires O’Neill, goes on to run the hugest deficit in history. Clarke tells him, you got to make Counterterrorism your number one security concern. Does he? No. He doesn’t even stay at the White House during the period when all the warnings are just being tossed in the administration’s lap. He wasn’t even being briefed by tenet during that period.

Unfortunately, his advisors are getting the message, and just telling him what he wants to hear. It’s not enough that Bush stays on message, he demands that everybody else does, too. This, I’d say, is one of the more damaging parts of Paul O’Neill’s book, which recounts meetings being more about scripted exchanges than about the hashing out of policy. Bush believes he knows what’s right for the country, but he is a man, and men are imperfect. To be so proud that one does not listen to good advice from others is an archetypal tragic flaw.

Policy decisions are decided politically. Which means debate and disagreement. Consensus is not always arrived at or possible.

Politics, in that sense, is process. I do not mean politics as process. I mean politics as in appeals to one’s base, appeals to voters.

The problem is, politics has taken over the decision-making process. It’s more important, that Americans get the tax cuts you campaigned on than making sure that America’s government doesn’t go into deficit. If that were not the case, Bush would have let go the tax cuts, in order to avoid the massive deficit he now runs. The 500 billion dollar deficit makes a prima facie case for the politicized nature of Bush’s decision making process.

A majority of Americans still appear to support it although that support has declined even in the face of partisan accusations that he lied, fabricated, falsified, and misrepresented the threat of WMD. Come November the people will decide if Bush’s policies are wrong.

Textbook Appeal to Popularity. It’s also dangerously out of touch with what the voters actually feel. Bush still enjoys some high points on things but I think you should take a look at all the numbers that aren’t all that flattering.

The reality is, popularity is not the defining standard of competent, effective policy. It can be gained by other means than as a reward for good policy. Bush is lucky Saddam was such an unpopular bastard with the American people. As far as I can see, that’s the main reason Americans still believe it was right to go to war. The only reason. As far as terrorism goes, a majority of Americans believe it’s worsened the situation. They don’t believe Bush knows what he’s doing, and they certainly don’t believe he has enough troops in Iraq.

As far as the accusations go, they’re backed up by facts. Facts your side should face. So many of the claims you make about the justice of this war, and the competence of it’s executions are based on arguments whose factual premises have been proved wrong or discredited. Partisan divisions do not determine reality, and just because it is a Democrat telling you something, doesn’t mean its a lie.

We went to war on information that was not only faulty, ambiguous, and sometimes downright false, but was known to be such by many of the people who put it out. The sixteen words, are just the most obvious examples. Can you prove to me that this information was reliable? I’d like to see you try. I’d like to see you present the facts that prove beyond a doubt that Iraq was a threat to our security.

And do me a favor: Don’t make me fact check you. Check the facts for yourself. I am sick of following up on conservative arguments and finding their premises to be poorly researched and selectively taken out of context.

I followed up on that Newsmax story concerning syrian terrorists plotting to use a chemical weapon in Jordan. They implied it might be one of the missing WMDs. Come to find out, they only had the raw materials for making that chemical weapon. If you are going to make the case for the war against Iraq, you got to do better than that. You cannot raise such hopes or stir such fears again and again without experiencing serious losses in credibility.

It really saddens me. It use to be that Conservatives were famed for their debating skills, their ability to demolish their opponents on the facts. Now they are known for their dogmatic insistence on policies they can’t defend based on the facts. So which are you? A capable interpreter of the facts, or a resolute denier of them?

It’s more important, that Americans get the tax cuts you campaigned on than making sure that America’s government doesn’t go into deficit. If that were not the case, Bush would have let go the tax cuts, in order to avoid the massive deficit he now runs. The 500 billion dollar deficit makes a prima facie case for the politicized nature of Bush’s decision making process

Stephen, number one, this is a mischaracterization of the position and is your your own interpretation of events. The tax cuts were needed. Putting more money in the hands of Americans is essential in a recession. If we have a deficit it is because we are unwilling to cut the budget. I am critical of Bush for this among other things like increasing spending on domestic programs. They should be cut back and reorganized.

You judge the decisions of the President by your own partisan standards. That’s ok, but I do not assume that your brand of advice is correct. On top of that you misrepresent the reason for the tax cuts in the first place. Democrats promise tax cuts, but when the get in office they amke up an excuse for why it is not possible. Today’s Democrats will never cut taxes. They have no problem raising taxes though, and spending more every year on social services.

What did JFK do in 1962 because there was a recession?. I’ll even link to a ready made argument for you to argue against it. How can an across the board tax cut be characterized as only for the rich? People making under $20,000 a year are getting back money they never even paid in taxes!

By your reasoning, democratic reasoning, Bush should raise taxes to cover the deficit. You’ll excuse me for not wanting to take the advice of the opposing party during an election for fear of sabatage. What would that do to the economy?

It’s funny that you bring up the ‘classic appeal to popularity’ when you use it in this very post. ie. A majority of Americans believe Bush’s actions have worsened the situation in the war on terror.

All of the ‘facts’ which you claim as proof that Bush has failed, mismanaged, etc. are not facts, but your interpretation of facts. That’s what I am tired of. The invasion was an astounding success by any standard, yet if one were to only have your account of it, it was an unmitigated defeat.

One year after the liberation there are still problems in Iraq. Imagine that. After 30 years of dictatorship, we can’t create a western democracy in one year. It is not that the Bush administration failed here but that democrats have no tolerance and no scruples when it comes to judging the political opposition. You contend that from the beginning Bush has been a failure, as proof of this you say he has been secretive. ? You say Bush had no proof that Iraq had WMD. Not only that but you say he made up proof, that he has lied, distorted the evidence etc. At the same time you expect him to have prevented 9/11 from vague reiterations of general known facts. This is not proof. This is spin. It is wholly partisan and even unfair criticism. You take ‘facts’ that I look at and come to a completely different conclusion.

Isn’t it more likely that your partisanship and hatred of Bush is coloring your judgment of the facts here? You are so intent on painting Bush as completely incompetent, completely filled with devious intent, completely wrong for America that one wonders if you would even see if a fact might exonerate him from your charges.

Your every argument amounts to accusing me of not having the ‘correct’ facts. I have the same facts you do. You are confusing your interpretation of the facts as the facts themselves. I know the difference. Apparently you do not.

I followed up on that Newsmax story concerning syrian terrorists plotting to use a chemical weapon in Jordan. They implied it might be one of the missing WMDs. Come to find out, they only had the raw materials for making that chemical weapon. If you are going to make the case for the war against Iraq, you got to do better than that. You cannot raise such hopes or stir such fears again and again without experiencing serious losses in credibility.

Frankly, I do not recall putting forward this information, Stephen. I saw that story, I don’t think it was at newsmax. I certainly don’t recall posting anything about it. I could be wrong, because lately I have been staying up way too late, but I think you may be confusing me with someone else.

I’m looking for where I might have inserted that into a comment, but I don’t see it. Anyway, I believe the article stated that they entered Jordan from Syria? Now that you’ve completely debunked the theory that it was Iraqi chemical weapons, just what are the facts?

Newsmax quote:

King Abdullah said that trucks containing 17.5 tons of explosives had come from Syria, though he took pains not to implicate Syrian President Bashir Assad in the al-Qaida plot, saying, “I’m completely confident that Bashir did not know about it.” -newsmax

Haaretz Daily quote:

It is believed that the organization of Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who is affiliated with Al-Qaida, planned the attack.

The cell entered Jordan through Syria at the end of March, with three cars laden with explosives and weapons. -haaretz.com

Where did they get that amount of primary chemical material? CFR:

How serious a threat are chemical weapons? Chemical weapons are very dangerous, but they’re not easy to acquire or use. Synthesizing chemical warfare agents is often difficult, particularly in home laboratories, and these supertoxic chemicals are extremely dangerous to handle and deliver in the large quantities needed to inflict mass casualties. Aum Shinrikyo, a Japanese doomsday cult, spent an estimated $30 million on chemical weapons research and had many scientists in its ranks, but it managed to kill only 19 people with the nerve agent sarin—both because it encountered problems making sarin, experts say, and because it had difficulty using it as a mass-casualty weapon. -cfr

BBC news:

An official involved in the inquiry in Jordan told AFP news agency: “We found primary materials to make a chemical bomb which, if it had exploded, would have made nearly 20,000 deaths … in an area of one square kilometre.

“The target of this bomb was the headquarters of the Intelligence Services,” situated on a hill in the western suburb of Amman, he added.

The official said another operation planned by the network was to use “deadly gas against the US embassy and the prime minister’s office in Amman … and other public buildings in Jordan”. -bbcnews

Chemicals:

The official did not reveal details of the chemicals involved. The official said the terrorists had also planned to use “deadly gas against the US embassy and the prime minister’s office in Amman … and other public buildings in Jordan.” -ict.org.il

Cars driven from Syria:

They said cars carrying explosives had been driven into Jordan from Syria. Both sides patrol the long desert border but smugglers often slip across it. -wired news

Look, Eric, if he doesn’t get the money from us, he has to borrow it. We already pay as a nation over three hundred billion dollars a year to take care of our previous deficits, money that people would not have to pay, if politicians were willing to keep their hands out of the cookie jars. But Bush is spending, and he’s not stopping anybody else from spending by using his veto power on additional spending bills.

I mean, you can’t go cutting taxes forever without insuring a concurrent cut in spending, which your people are doing nothing substantial to acheive. If you can’t get your people to stop spending, you will have to let the tax cuts lapse, and not go getting any more. Alan Greenspan is telling us that the worse thing we can do to our economy is run high deficits. We had to kick interests rates into the double digits the last time.

You say I misrepresent the tax cuts, but I don’t think you’re even clear on the methodology you use to justify their employment. Are we running deficits to improve the economy? Or are we giving back their money so they can use it more efficiently? Are we trying to starve the beast, or are we deficit spending simply for political benefit. Bush should cancel his tax cuts, and return them to their previous equilibrium. You may call that a tax hike, but your people call modest tax cuts that, so forgive me if I think your party abuses the term.

It’s funny that you bring up the ‘classic appeal to popularity’ when you use it in this very post. ie. A majority of Americans believe Bush’s actions have worsened the situation in the war on terror.

I was not using it as a main point, but as an indirect rebuttal to your appeal to popularity. I would base an Iraq policy on a realistic appraisal of the situation, and not one that expect us to be welcomed with open arms and strewn rose petals. Even your own people are expressing surprise at the ferocity of the fighting. So far, over a hundred soldiers have died in fight during this month, raising our totals over seven hundred. We are losing cities to an insurgency. Losing them.

Something is being done wrong. This is not a mere case of their being occasional trouble. Our soldiers are dying daily. Sticking with the occupation is of course the right thing to do, but getting into it this way in the first place was most decidedly a mistake. You can call me names and impugn my character all you want to, but that is the reality of the situation. The loss of control of a city is by it’s very nature an indication of a lack of effective awareness, capability, and/or administration on the ground.

Yes, I trust my interpretations. That said, my trust depends upon the facts. The stronger the facts, the stronger my trust in my interpretation. There are some things I won’t assert if I don’t see enough conclusive evidence to back it up, or if I don’t have a source backing me up. There are other things that I will assume you are aware of in the media. If you’re not, I’m not going to make your argument for you.

The Newsmax story was an example alone, one that had nothing to do with you, but which defined precisely the kind of response I didn’t want: big on speculation, big on ideology, but short on facts.

The NewsMax story’s headline is misleading, speaking of WMDs when all the terrorists had were the raw materials. One could legitimately speak of a WMD attack, because that was their obvious intention.

The CFR article addresses the issue generally, but doesn’t say much if anything specifically about the attack, though it does mention Syria as a source. Of what, it does not say.

The BBCnews article was part of what I saw before. It was a subsequent report which made clear that the chemical agents had not yet been manufactured

So on and so forth. Now what I would like to know is the following: were their any exotic ingredients that could be traced back to particular kinds of facilities, precursors that would not be widely available, nor easy to produce outside of an industrial setting?

And most importantly, what kind of agent were they looking to use?

If we answer those questions, we could establish any number of useful conclusion and theories based on them.

But there is one thing clear already: Al Quaeda is trying to make it’s own chemical weapons. We should be on the look out for that.

My biggest contention with George W. Bush is that he has been unwilling to pursue a true conservative agenda domestically. He has tried to ‘triangulate’ as popularized by Clinton and Dick Morris. He came into office trying to curry moderate favor. ‘Compassionate conservative.’ He has not tried to cut spending.

I believe that the solution to the budget deficit is spending cuts. The Federal Government could use some fat trimming. Certainly enough to balance the budget. That said, we are in a situation where we must spend more on not only defense but intelligence and counter terrorism. That leaves social programs.

I would be curious to hear what, if anything, Kerry is planning on cutting from the federal budget. His latest proposals to provide free college education to anyone who wants it doesn’t sound like a balanced budget to me.

Kerry proposes what he calls the State Tax Relief and Education Fund — a $25 billion, one-year, paid-to-the-states program to start counteracting the $200 billion shortfall in education funds available.

He also proposes $50 billion in tax credits available to students to help pay for college. This means, he said, to $4,000 per student. -uwire

Let’s see that’s $75 billion in campaign promises, what were you saying about campaign promises costing the taxpayer? And that’s just one small interest group. At least the President went for across the board tax cuts.

I agree with you fully that we should balance the budget. I’d be willing to give up my tax cut for equal cuts in social services. Will Ted Kennedy ever sign on to that? Or would we hear about how we are going to starve children and the elderly?

The facts are a two way street. Several witnesses can give conflicting testimony to identical events they all witnessed simultaneously. What do you notice? What do you focus on? What facts are important?

We are not losing cities, and especially not losing them in bold print. Again and again we see Democrats exaggerating the difficulties in Iraq and claiming that taking casualites is somehow unheard-of in armed struggle. And all in an attempt to vindicate their own idealogies.

Our casualties in Iraq still don’t equal—oh, the totals of any fifteen minute period during the Normandy landings. If we took zero casualities, would this prove the rightness of this or any cause? Of course not, and I wouldn’t expect to hear anybody say so. The rightness of the cause is its own vindication—and frankly, each death of one of our servicemen should only strengthen our resolve to see the job finished and the war won.

Not taking into account…

MR. RUSSERT: Senator, if you repeal the top bracket of the Bush tax cut, you get about $50 billion a year.

SEN. KERRY: Actually, you get about—you get more than that, Tim.

MR. RUSSERT: It’s pretty close. $200 billion over four years. And if you go through and add up
your—if you…

SEN. KERRY: Tim, no, that’s wrong. You get about $850 billion over 10 years.

MR. RUSSERT: It—well, it kicks out later.

SEN. KERRY: Right.

MR. RUSSERT: But initially, your first four-year term, it’s about $50 billion a year. If you go through and add up all the campaign promises you’ve made, about health care, education, environment, the National Taxpayers Union said it’s about $280 billion a year. So if you’re saving $50 billion, if you will, in terms of the tax cut…

SEN. KERRY: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: …with new revenues coming, but adding all that new spending…

SEN. KERRY: The National…

MR. RUSSERT: …you’re not going to be able to balance the budget.

SEN. KERRY: Wrong. They—you know, I love these experts in Washington who have an interest, incidentally, and so they skew things the way they try to figure them out. The fact is, they don’t take into account savings. They don’t take into account the innovative ways I’m going to pay for things.

Hey Eric, when you cite the Kennedy tax cuts, you fail to mention that he cut the top tier from 91% to 70%.

If you want to propose doubling the current top tier rate (currently 38.6%) then I’m right behind you.

The tax cuts were needed. Putting more money in the hands of Americans is essential in a recession.

Eric, when Bush first proposed the tax cuts it was because we had a surplus. Then it was because we were in a recession. Well, guess what? The tax cuts didn’t improve the economy or create new jobs.

If tax cuts created jobs like Bush wants you to believe, then we should have had the largest job creation ever. Instead, he’s on track to have the worst job creation under any president in sixty years.

Yes, tax cuts are supposed to stimulate the economy in a recession, but only if they’re targeted at large segments of the population who are going to consume goods and create demand. Putting the majority of the cuts into the hands of a relatively few people, while giving the rest a few hundred bucks at most, is not the way to stimulate the economy.

And imposing tax cuts without any way to pay for them is just dumb. Even Greenspan was opposed to the tax cuts unless they could be funded. Squandering the surplus Clinton built up and then driving the country into record breaking deficit spending doesn’t do anything to help the economy, either.

Reagan had to roll back his tax cuts, and Bush Sr. presided over the biggest tax increase in history. I applaud them for having the courage to put the good of the country over some wacky ideology.

If you want a good read on how Clinton turned a similar recession into the greatest economic expansion in American history, check out his Treasury Secretary, Robert Rubin’s book, “In An Uncertain World”.

Martin, please don’t try my patience or insult my intelligence. If we don’t have control of the cities, we’ve lost them. That doesn’t mean we can’t get them back, it just means that there is a reality we have to face about this situation before we can overcome it. I know my constant carping seems pessimistic to you, but the reality is, I’m trying to get people like you, and by extension the president who considers you his constituency, to face up to grave situation we are in and the mistakes that have led us there. And then, having faced that, we can make solid plans for our strategy in winning back what we’ve lost, and addressing the mistakes that got us there in the first place.

I don’t want this to become another Vietnam, another irrational restraint on the sometimes necessary policy of military action. But Iraq is fast getting there. We have lost over a hundred people in the past month. Over a hundred. Yes, that pales in comparison to Normandy Beach.

Normandy, though, took place under considerably different circumstances, almost sixty years ago. It had two technologically even forces throwing themselves at each other, with our side trying to overwhelm hardened defensive emplacements.

What it wasn’t, was an occupation, with a technologically superior force attempting to keep control with insufficient numbers. Don’t tell me they aren’t insufficient, because the generals are asking for more. They wouldn’t ask for more if they had all they needed.

Going into this, I realized and accepted that this would a high casualty effort, that deaths would not remain in the double digits as they did for Clinton’s various campaigns. That has never deterred me. What’s deterred me is the sense that the Soldiers are having to sacrifice their lives because people in Washington, the president and his staff included, didn’t do their jobs. I do wish to see this war won, and the job finished, but I want the responsible parties for it to suffer politically for the suffering they’ve inflicted on our country. This administration went to great, perhaps even criminal lengths to get into this war, and American soldiers are paying the price.

If Bush had found his WMDS, Seven Hundred would not be such an awful number. If terrorist camps were found with the WMDs in them, seven hundred would not be such an awful number. If we had sent troops in on the ground, in mass numbers to overthrow the Taliban and destroy the Al Quaeda organization there once and for all, seven hundred would not be such an awful number.

But we never sent troops into Afghanistan, for precisely the kinds of fears you now criticize as irrelevant, and we did not find WMD, much less find them in the possession of terrorists. We didn’t find a terrorist presence worth going to war for, or else this president would have reported such to the American people, rather than falling back to the only obvious good thing achieved: Overthrowing Saddam.

But if a change of management was his aim, then things have gone seriously wrong, because we are having far too much trouble reining in the insurgency for it merely to be bad luck. Somebody didn’t plan right for this stage in the game. Somebody screwed up, and I hope we don’t have to live another four years with those screwups still in place.

Lee,

Eric, when Bush first proposed the tax cuts it was because we had a surplus. Then it was because we were in a recession. Well, guess what? The tax cuts didn’t improve the economy or create new jobs.

Well, it does seem odd that when we have a budget surplus democrats say that we shouldn’t have a tax cut because we don’t need it to stimulate the economy, and when there’s a budget deficit they say we can’t afford a tax cut to stimulate the economy. Que?

Stephen,

But we never sent troops into Afghanistan,

…We didn’t find a terrorist presence worth going to war for,

That’s news to me. It’s probably news to the 12-14,000 troops in the Afghan area of operations too. (7,000 according to some reports. Difference may be combat and support troops.)

You’re right though, we didn’t find a terrorist presence of any worth in Afghanistan. Just Al Qaeda and the Taliban ‘army’. It didn’t take long to dismantle either.

Here’s another source for troops deployed currently in Afghanistan.

March 27 Marines, Sailors Will Assist In Search for Taliban, al-Qaida

KABUL, Afghanistan, March 27, 2004 — Some 2,000 Marines and sailors of the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, from Camp Lejeune, N.C., are deploying to Afghanistan to work with other coalition forces here, aiding in the hunt for the remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaida, according to Combined Joint Task Force 180 officials.

These Marines will join the 13,500 coalition troops currently serving in Afghanistan. -DefendAmerica.mil

Hey Eric,

Well, it does seem odd that when we have a budget surplus democrats say that we shouldn’t have a tax cut

That’s just wrong. Gore proposed a responsible tax cut that would have been more beneficial to those of us who aren’t making more than $200k/year and would have continued to pay off the national debt.

The OMB released a report stating that if Bush hadn’t gotten his tax-cuts-for-the-rich (congrats to him and his cabinet on their $2.5 million tax savings, BTW) we’d still be running budget surpluses.

I find it odd that middle class voters would let our leaders get away with something like that. In other countries, when the ruling party hands out cash to the wealthy at the expense of the poor and middle class, there’s usually a revolution. I guess we’re too civilized for that. :)

and when there’s a budget deficit they say we can’t afford a tax cut to stimulate the economy.

Wrong again, but I have to give you props for your “resolve” in “staying the course” on miscaracterizing Democrats. You’re a true Republican.

The tax cuts were not targeted at a population segment that would stimulate the economy. Studies have shown that the tax cuts targeted at the middle class (getting rid of the marriage penalty, child tax credits, and expanding the 10 percent bracket - all Democrat amendments, BTW) are the only ones helping the economy.

Bush could have gotten the same economic stimulous without wasting trillions of dollars on people who make more than you and I.

That’s just wrong. Gore proposed a responsible tax cut that would have been more beneficial to those of us who aren’t making more than $200k/year and would have continued to pay off the national debt.

The key word there is proposed. Clinton also proposed a ‘middle class tax cut’. You’ll notice that once he got into office the budget was, “even worse than he thought,” and there was no tax cut.

In other countries, when the ruling party hands out cash to the wealthy at the expense of the poor and middle class, there’s usually a revolution. I guess we’re too civilized for that. :)

Why doesn’t that apply to all the other ‘social benefits’ handed out by the federal government? You might have a leg to stand on if the money were being taken from the poor and middle class and given to the rich. That’s not what’s happening. ‘The rich’ are merely getting back some of the money they had been paying.

The tax cuts were not targeted at a population segment that would stimulate the economy. Studies have shown that the tax cuts targeted at the middle class (getting rid of the marriage penalty, child tax credits, and expanding the 10 percent bracket - all Democrat amendments, BTW) are the only ones helping the economy.

Wrong. Money in the hands of taxpayers stimulates the economy. The rich pay more, they get more back. The only reason Democrats even talk about tax cuts to the middle class is that there are more voters in the middle class. But curiously they talk about tax cuts, but never actually do it. You have to go back to Kennedy I suppose for that.

Bush could have gotten the same economic stimulous without wasting trillions of dollars on people who make more than you and I.

Here’s the problem with democratic ideas of ‘stimulus.’ If laundering money through the federal government is so beneficial then why don’t we launder all money through the federal goevernment? 100% income tax? If politicians know how to spend that money better, rather than wasting it on the rich, why don’t we just put the rich out of business and put government in control?

The point? The point is that politicians don’t create jobs. They don’t create businesses. Rich people do. Entrepreneurs do. Moreover democratic policies generally make it harder for them to do it. In democratic minds the rich are the problem. Imagine that, American citizens, the problem.

If laundering money through the federal government is so beneficial then why don’t we launder all money through the federal goevernment? 100% income tax? If politicians know how to spend that money better, rather than wasting it on the rich, why don’t we just put the rich out of business and put government in control?

Because that would be ridiculous. That would be just as ridiculous as proposing the elimination of all taxes, tariffs and fees and still expect the government to function.

There are legitimate complaints about liberal tax proposals, but it is silly to use a logical fallacy. Can we stay away from such straw men arguments?

The serious answer to your question is that there are some parts of society that work better as run by the government than by the private sector. For example, the military, roads, environmental and food health protections, etc. That doesn’t mean we think that government should run everything.

Eric, your argument was that Gore didn’t even propose a tax cut:

Well, it does seem odd that when we have a budget surplus democrats say that we shouldn’t have a tax cut

I’ll take your subsequent mischaracterization as an acknowledgment that you made a misleading statement.

Clinton also proposed a ‘middle class tax cut’.

Clinton proposed several ‘middle class tax cuts’. Unfortunately they were all blocked by the Republican Congress who didn’t think they cut taxes enough for wealthy people.

The point is that politicians don’t create jobs. They don’t create businesses.

Eric, politicians have the power to create an economic environment that encourages job creation. Clinton did that. Bush hasn’t.

BTW, in February, the only reason we had any job growth at all was because Republican politicians are expanding the government at a record pace, thereby creating tens of thousands of new beaurocrat jobs. So your statement isn’t just misleading, it’s’ wrong.

Rich people do. Entrepreneurs do.

Yes, eric, entrepreneurs create jobs, but entrepreneurs aren’t necessarily rich. I started a business in the 90s, and I wasn’t rich. Most entrepreneurs aren’t rich. So you’re just making a totally uninformed statement there.

Moreover democratic policies generally make it harder for them to do it.

Clinton’s Democratic policies sure made it easier to create businesses. His economic policy created the confidence for me and thousands of others to put up their homes and cars as collateral for getting a business loan. I certainly wouldn’t do that now.

In democratic minds the rich are the problem.

No, Eric, that’s just a dumb statement. Thank you for trying to paint Democrats as Communist class warriors providing an emotional smoke-screen to cover your shakey grasp of the facts.

And every time you bring up the Kennedy tax cuts, I can only thank you. Kennedy cut the top rate from 91% to 70%. If that’s where you want the top tax rate, that’s fine with me. :)

Go back and read my post, Eric. I never said there wasn’t a terrorist presence in Afghanistan.

The fact that I coupled it with allegations of unfound WMDs should be a red flag as to what country I’m talking about in the last two paragraphs. I admit that my writing was sloppy enough there to invite the unwary to make that association, and that saying there were no troops was a mistake as well, because we did put a token force into action there. I chose the wrong words to speak to a substantial lack of American presence on the ground in Afghanistan. But I’m fairly shocked that such a seasoned debater such as yourself would take what I wrote their at face value, and not consider how unlikely It would be for me to make such a claim when only the paragraph before, I write this:

If Bush had found his WMDS, Seven Hundred would not be such an awful number. If terrorist camps were found with the WMDs in them, seven hundred would not be such an awful number. If we had sent troops in on the ground, in mass numbers to overthrow the Taliban and destroy the Al Quaeda organization there once and for all, seven hundred would not be such an awful number.

I’m clearly referring to Iraq in the first few lines, then Afghanistan in the second. I mean, when I say “If Bush Found his WMDs” what WMDs Could I have possibly meant?

So there are no more mistakes of this kind, let me put it to you in plain english:

If The WMD that Bush had pushed as such a hair-raising threat in Iraq with mushroom cloud imagery, and glasses of water full of enough chemical agent to kill millions had turned up, 700 deaths would have been acceptable.

If we had found terrorist camps or safehouse with clear evidence of the possession of WMDs in their hands or evidence of clear Iraqi command, control and protection of terrorist cells and cooperation with Al Quaeda, 700 deaths would be acceptable.

If we, instead of relying on the Northern Alliance, had sent our armies into Afghanistan to root out and destroy Al Quaeda once and for all, 700 deaths would have been acceptable.

700 deaths in Iraq are not acceptable when two thirds of the justification for our war vanishes when we invade. They aren’t acceptable when it turns out those justifications were based on negligent intelligence. They are doubly unacceptable when the administration ignores advice that more troops are needed to keep a lid on insurgent activities.

They are incredibly unacceptable when Bush fails to call for the armoring of vehicles and personnel from the get go, and waits until hundreds of soldiers are dead, some from preventable wounds, to do anything about it. Then he has the gall to go and say that Kerry voted down funding for such. Kerry’s bill, which he voted for, would have provided such funds. If voting against a bill intended to fund troops in favor of another bill that does the same qualifies as voting to deprive soldiers of needed supplies and armor, then many of Bushes supporters are as guilty as Kerry. If Bush promised to veto such a bill, or made any such indication, then he too is guilty of that.

But, oh, I don’t have to resort to such trickery of logic to make that point about Bush, because Bush failed to ask for the armor for men and vehicles in the first place.

See, that’s what gets me about you jumping on my botched wording and claiming it represents my entire point of view- it’s just trickery. I wish you would stop all this sophistry.

Lee,

Hey Eric, when you cite the Kennedy tax cuts, you fail to mention that he cut the top tier from 91% to 70%.

If you want to propose doubling the current top tier rate (currently 38.6%) then I’m right behind you.

…>>In democratic minds the rich are the problem.

No, Eric, that’s just a dumb statement. Thank you for trying to paint Democrats as Communist class warriors providing an emotional smoke-screen to cover your shakey grasp of the facts.

I stated that democrats have proposed tax cuts but never enact them. You then said it was republicans who wouldn’t pass Clinton’s tax cuts. In 1992-1996 Democrats controlled both the house and Senate. Not only did Clinton not deliver on any tax cuts, he raised taxes in 1993. You then went on to say that Gore proposed a tax cut. The last part’s moot because Bush is president. But I would have bet you a $100 dollars that no such Gore tax cut would have taken place.

KWAME HOLMAN: But once Clinton secured the nomination in July of 1992, he began backing away from his tax cut promise in the face of a rising federal budget deficit. Clinton, instead, offered another plan dubbed “The New Covenant.”

BILL CLINTON: That’s what “The New Covenant” is all about—an America in which middle class incomes, not middle class taxes are going up, an America, yes, in which the wealthiest few, those making over $200,000 a year, are asked to pay their fair share, an America in which the rich are not soaked but the middle class is not drowned either.

KWAME HOLMAN: Within a year and without a single Republican vote, President Bill Clinton got Congress to raise the top income tax rate on the wealthiest taxpayers, increase the tax on a gallon of gas by 4.3 cents, and raise the business income tax rate, but there was no middle income tax cut. -pbs

After promising to cut taxes, while campaigning in 1992, then raising taxes in 1993. Clinton then began promising tax cuts again in 1996.

KWAME HOLMAN: This year, President Clinton proposed a modest set of new tax breaks including a $500 per child tax credit, a reduction in the capital gains tax on the sale of a home, up to a $1500 tax credit for the first year of college tuition, and a tax credit for businesses that hire welfare recipients. The Clinton package is estimated to cost $152 billion over six years. -pbs

What happened in 1996? Republicans gained control of congress! Lo and behold there was a tax cut in 1997. Who’s tax cut is it?

Kennedy’s tax cuts were in the right direction. Why should you think otherwise? What kind of benefit does the nation recieve if we raise the tax rate to 70%? Does the government need nearly all of my money?

If the rich aren’t the problem in democratic minds, why are they always talking about how the rich are undermining America by underpaying ‘their fair share’? Isn’t that a reasonable assumption?

Stephen,

I’m sorry you took such offense to my taking you at face value. I just assumed you slipped into a generalization based on your previous disgust at Bush in widening the war on terror to include Iraq. Freudian slip and so forth.

But we never sent troops into Afghanistan, for precisely the kinds of fears you now criticize as irrelevant, and we did not find WMD, much less find them in the possession of terrorists. We didn’t find a terrorist presence worth going to war for, or else this president would have reported such to the American people, rather than falling back to the only obvious good thing achieved: Overthrowing Saddam.

I should have been more clear as well in my reply, because it seemed ironic that you stated it that way. There were no WMD in Afghanistan, yet they attacked us nonetheless, to devastating effect. It is that context within which the decision to remove Saddam was made. You see, we removed the potential operators of WMD in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

You know I’ve been reflecting on how this argument may go back to and have roots in the gun control debate. Do guns kill, or do people kill? Does the fact that America has WMD make the world more safe or less safe? I believe the latter and the former respectively. People kill people, inanimate objects do not. America’s strength is only a danger to the evil doer and the oppressor.

Hey Eric. That’s right about the ‘93 Clinton tax raising. After Reagan’s initial budget busting tax cuts, he had to raise taxes twice. Then Bush Sr. had to enact the biggest tax hike in history. When Bill Clinton got into office in ‘93, the deficit spending was still enormous. Robert Rubin’s book, “In an Uncertain World”, is a very good account of this topic. If you want to know how it all went down, that’s the place to look. But after all that, the result was Clinton’s “New Covenant”. We had personal income increasing across all segments and everyone was happy.

If Bush hadn’t squandered the surplus and had kept the Republican Congress from their “borrow and spend” ways, we’d be in good shape financially, close to debt-free, and able to pay for the Iraq adventure out of our own pockets. The economy and taxes wouldn’t even be an issue in this election, and you’d have no perception on which to hang your class warfare theory.

Thinking about the Reagan and Bush Sr. tax hikes, I could make the assumption that the Republicans make politically expedient cuts, then retract them. But I won’t. I know both of them realized that the original Reagan tax cut was irresponsible, that the supply-side experiment had failed, and they were commited to strengthening our economy. The exact thing Clinton did by building on the foundation he inherited.

At the end of Clinton’s second term when the economy looked strong and deficit spending was a thing of the past, a responsible tax cut made sense. A tax cut such as the one Gore proposed which was focused on the middle-class consumers who drive the economy and which would have continued paying down the national debt. You seem to have an inherent distrust of anything not Republican, so I won’t even bother trying to convince you that Gore would have done so, but there was no reason not to.

why are they always talking about how the rich are undermining America by underpaying ‘their fair share’?

What’s wrong with being fair? We have a progressive tax structure based on the assumption that the people who have gained the most from this country owe the most, and to judge by people like Warren Buffet, George Soros, Ted Turner, etc, they’re happy to meet that obligation.

Eric, the context was clear, and my position has been further clarified in my post. That is- the source of my disgust is not so much the decision to go to war with Iraq, as it is to do so based on faulty, suspect evidence. That’s the whole point of those “700 deaths” paragraphs- the war would have been more acceptable had what they said been proven upon our invasion.

The thing about the context of the decision to remove Saddam, is that your people largely had to create, to insinuate it into existance. When I first heard that Iraq was next in the War on terror, I could hardly believe what I was hearing, because in all my years of keeping up with the news, terrorism was not something I thought of when I thought of Iraq, and with good reason. Few if any people thought that way. Perhaps 9/11 made Americans more willing to go after their enemies in a military fashion, but the attacks themselves did not focuse America on Iraq. Our leaders had to do that and did so, it turns out, on faulty evidence.

People kill people, inanimate objects do not. America’s strength is only a danger to the evil doer and the oppressor.

Our bombs, our missiles, and our bullets are fully capable of killing innocent people with the guilty. That’s just a matter of physics. America’s strength can be a danger to anybody it’s turned on, because power is power, and the aims behind it are not so important as the effects that come of it. We will not always do right, and we have to be wary of our strength lest it inadvertantly make us enemies where none existed before.

That is- the source of my disgust is not so much the decision to go to war with Iraq, as it is to do so based on faulty, suspect evidence.

I understand. I disagree. But I understand.

I do not come to the conclusion that Bush lied. I believe I would have made the same decision myself. I cannot fault Bush for that very reason.

ps -great! I can delete those spam comments! Weeee.