Republicans & Conservatives Archives

When a person commits a wrong in full public view, does it make sense for that person to claim media bias when the media cover the story of the wrong?

This President has committed and continues to commit so many wrongs in the full view of the world, debts, and deficits, tax cuts for wealthy while so many lose unemployment benefits, insurance, and middle class standing, he orders 1500 Americans to their deaths in Iraq on the basis of flawed and invalid intelligence, etc. etc. etc., and when the media covers such acts viewed by more than 100 million Americans as reckless, wrong, and flawed, you see media bias?

Truly bewildering, since the defense of media bias never saved a wrong doer as far as I can recollect.

No surprise here.
Aside from FOX, TV is very liberal and aside from Air America and NPR, radio is very conservative.
I personally prefer shortwave radio.

Since Kerry isn’t running for the Senate JUST the President of the United States there are no negative stories to report about him.
He hasn’t been President and isn’t President so there are no bad President stories to run.
Since being a Senator is not a prerequisite to becoming President we won’t hear much about his Senate career.
We hear about his being a war hero because it is important to be one?, even though Clinton was not.
If he is caught in a lie it doesn’t matter because he doesn’t have to make any decisions except for what his next meal will be.
People hate Bush. It doesn’t matter who is running against him. They would be cheering for Charles Manson.
We are in a blame Bush for everything mode. Forget what anyone else in this world may have done. We have Bush to blame.

Check this pic out… the locations of the top 16 colleges vs the electoral map. pretty funny and very telling. It just goes to show that the less educated or less informed are more prone to succumbing to fear mongering and spin.

Top colleges by who’s standards?

2 of the top 5 engineering schools are not listed on that map, Rose Hulman and Purdue.

I’m curious what the basis for ‘top college’ was?

David:

I wonder how you would feel if we reversed your logic on this issue. Since millions feel Kerry has done wrongs (Viet Nam issues, medals, Senate votes etc), how would you feel if the media simply portrayed his negative side as the truth.

I’d say that since the country polls out at a virtual tie between Kerry and Bush, there should be as many who feel Kerry has committed wrongs as feel that Bush has committed wrongs. Remember also that the “wrongs” you attribute to Bush are not considered “wrongs” by everyone. They are wrong in YOUR opinion.

I’m seeing an inherent bias here. Its the “Since I think “X” is wrong, then I agree that it should be brought to the public’s attention”. This belies the objectivity that is supposed to be the realm of journalism. By taking a position, and then reporting on THAT position, you are inherently biased. You’ll undoubtedly be right some of the time, but also wrong some of the time.

jbod, where have you been living? The media aired all of that ad nauseum, and we have a number of Isadora Badi reports in the center column demonstrating that the media was far more negative toward Kerry when those stories broke.

It would appear that you are the biased one here with unbelievable selective memory.

I think that attempting to demonstrate a media bias by comparing the number of postitive and negative stories ignores the fact that the candidates are not equal. If they were clones, who did exactly the same thing all the time, then an imbalance in the reporting would indicate a bias. However, the fact that things keep exploding (literally and figuratively) in Iraq means that there are going to be more negative stories concerning the president’s performance. That doesn’t mean the media is biased, just that he’s doing a bad job. Kerry doesn’t have as many things going badly for him, but whenever he does do something stupid, he gets slammed by the media (they are still covering the remark about Mary Cheney, for example).

I think that the reason conservatives feel that the media is biased is that it is the media’s job to search out problems. Regardless of what Pres. Bush thinks, reporting sunshine and happiness is not the job of the media. They are to serve as watchdogs and identify problems that need to be addressed. Conservatives, in general, are conservative. By nature of being conservative, they don’t want things to change, or want to go back to “the good old days.” (note bush’s desperately trying to be Reagan, even down to his TV ads) Pointing out problems interferes with the conservative’s world view.

One other comment. If the mainstream media is biased towards the left, which I don’t agree with, isn’t that a sign that the left may be right? Who has more experience than a reporter in finding things out and trying to understand the world, in access to important people and places? I think that if as a result of their experiences, most journalists are personally liberal, that’s a pretty good place to be.

“Who has more experience than a reporter in finding things out”
In Iraq, the soldiers who are there do and they paint a totally different picture than the mainstream media does.

kctim, I agree that the soldiers have a good perspective, but they are also hampered in thier objectivity by their comeraderie, their sense of duty, their loyalty to their commanders, etc. Really, what soldier is going to say “no, we can’t do the mission.” That there ARE soldiers who are saying that is a very bad sign. There are also plenty of soldiers who don’t think the war is such a hot idea. For overall perspective, I would still give the edge to the journalists.

you’re overestimating the importance of the bbc. how many americans get their news from british broadcasting? their obvious bias makes little or no difference for american voters.

by obvious bias you mean they represent what the rest of the planet thinks of the US?

well….hell…we don’t care bout no foriegner’s

by gum….

where’s me moonshine….

That was a low blow, rob. The BBC does not represent world opinion, just a slice of it.

I am concerned about media bias, too. I do not understand why Scott Peterson gets such negative news coverage. Why can’t the media be fair? Hardly any stories were presented on the evil prosecuter and that bitch Lacy.

By the way, the above was sarcasm.

Rhinehold,

The caption on the picture says by who. These are the best universities as ranked by the annual USNews report on universities. The top 16 are:

Harvard University
Princeton University
Yale University
University of Pennsylvania
Duke University
Massachusetts Inst. of Technology
Stanford University
California Institute of Technology
Columbia University
Dartmouth College
Northwestern University
Washington University in St. Louis
Brown University
Cornell University
Johns Hopkins University
University of Chicago

That’s the first time I’ve seen a picture posted here! I thought they were forbidden?

-Cf

I don’t think that that map says much about the relative intelligence of liberals compared to conservatives, since I think that the quality of a person’s education depends a lot more on what they put into it than where they go. I think that a more telling measure is that the more education a person has, the more likely they are to favor Kerry.

On the original topic, isn’t it a little bit interesting that the BBC, which is the “bised” news source discussed here, is the main outlet for our strongest ally? What must the UNfriendly nations think?

I mean no offense but you are all foolish and uninformed. The BBC DOES NOT do what American TV does which is put two opposing views simultaneously. You will NEVER see Bill Maher and Rush Limbaugh in the same interview in the BBC. What the BBC DOES do is to devote an entire program to ONE topic. Today its Democrats. Tomorrow its Republicans. The fact that they have an all-Democrat List is meaningless since they will have an all-Republican List the next day.

You guys really need some Prozac. Sheesh.

Aldous.

I like the map and the top universities

Professors are overwhelmingly liberal. No surprise. The liberal establishment believes in credentials over achievement. There is nothing worse than an educated fool. But let’s look at general intelligence among the populations.

I checked ranking of SAT scores among the states. Iowa consistently is the winner followed by its upper Midwest neighbors. Interestingly, only one of the states with a top university (Illinois) makes it into the top half among the states. I guess that is why the Ivies can’t recruit locally.

As for blue versus red and swing, the top half of the states include:

Swing = 6
Bush = 16
Kerry = 3

So if states were voters and we took the smartest half – 64% would vote for Bush; 24% would be undecided and 12% would go for Kerry.

Of course Kerry does better with the bottom of the class.

We live in a country of sheep, willing to be led based upon the way the wind blows. A majority of the electorate are more than willing to be told how they should vote. Biased reporting simplifies our lives.

I’m a church going, ex-military, scientific type who believes that “Faith” is for the lazy or the ignorant. If people would spend just a few minutes to think for themselves on what the truth is, we could have an election based on issues, rather than lies, and fear slinging. Limbaugh, Maher, Washington Post, Fox News, take your pick. By themselves, consitute biased reporting. If you take the time to evaluate what both sides are saying, you most often end up in the middle, which is usually closer to the truth that any of them want you to get. When did the creation of news supplant reporting of the news?

We live in a country of sheep, willing to be led based upon the way the wind blows. A majority of the electorate are more than willing to be told how they should vote. Biased reporting simplifies our lives.

I’m a church going, ex-military, scientific type who believes that “Faith” is for the lazy or the ignorant. If people would spend just a few minutes to think for themselves on what the truth is, we could have a meaningfull election. Limbaugh, Maher, Washington Post, Fox News, take your pick. By themselves, consitute biased reporting. If you take the time to evaluate what both sides are saying, you most often end up in the middle, which is usually closer to the truth that any of them want you to get.

Re media bias

Kerry falls in a lake, screams to Bush and reaches for help. Bush hears him and -astonishingly - walks across the surface of the water instead of swimming. He pulls Kerry to safety.

Headlines in the next day’s New York Times read:
“Kerry Reaches Out the Other Side”
“Bush Shows the he Can’t Swim”

John Kerry is a Navy Man and therefore can swim. George Bush was videotaped on 9/11 just sitting still with a blank look on his face when told of the attack.

A more likely scenario would be:
Kerry falls in Lake and saves himself. Bush sees Kerry fall and waits for Karl Rove to tell him what to do.

Aldous.

OK Jack, and what would we hear from Fox News?

“Bush should be nominated for Sainthood.”
“Kerry wants to legislate manditory lifejackets for all Americans”

Media Bias is when you start fabricating the news, rather than reporting it. Media bashing began in ernest with the Nixon administration. The more Nixon denied the accusations, the closer to the truth the reporters knew they were.

Freedom of the press is the great equalizer for the common man against tyrants.

Re: BBC election coverage. How coy of you not to mention that guests on the same programme will also include George W Bush’s former speech writer, David Frum; and “journalist”, Richard Littlejohn who is more right wing than Hitler.

Kerry betrayed his own band of brothers in the military. He’s got one guy who vouches for him becuase Kerry saved the guys life. I’d probably vouch for him too if he saved my life. Listen to the POW’s in “Stolen Honor” their voice is what counts becuase they suffered over the lies Kerry reported to the congress. By the way he admitted he had commited the same atrocities he was reporting which makes him a war criminal! He should have been hung for treason! These are the views of POW’s that suffered and Swift Boat Veterans that served with Bennedict Arnold!

What is also interesting is that numerous psychological studies have proven that deeply religious people have a lower IQ (on average). Go look in a psychology textbook or ask a psychology professor. Where do these people live? You bet, the Red States, which also fits the pattern in the map for university locations.

To be fair, the same studies show that people who are deeply religious are also more self-confident. Of course, Kerry is right that you can be confident but wrong.

A nice little example:

Where do you find evolution, a key foundation of science and Biology banned? NY, California? Good luck…. No, you’ll find that it’s the southern states like Tennessee mindlessly banning knowledge

michael,

You may want to have a checkup for Bush’s syndrome — the inability to tell the truth. It was more than one guy. If you saw or read about the Democratic convention, you would have noticed that his entire Swift Boat crew was out there supporting him. His critics are people who did not serve directly with him.

btw, have you guys seen Bush’s latest, fake “Whatever it takes” ad? This was taken from his website. I didn’t know Bush suddenly reversed his policy on human cloning, but I guess he’ll do whatever it takes.

DH,
What do you have to say about the POW’s that suffered from Kerry’s lies? There seems to be a correlation between his betrayal then and not wanting to support our military now. Nobody would vote for Bennedict Arnold if he were around today. Say what you say but I’m sure servicemen would trust Bush by their side over Kerry. As to the ad you so proudly pointed out. Both sides use manilpulation during an election. Please don’t tell me that democrats’s ads are 100% honest. I’m not arguing over silly ads. I’m concerned that half our country supports a war criminal (by his own words) because they can’t get over Sore Loserman from 2000. By the way 6 studies (documented by CNN or left wing TV) proved that BUSH still would have WON even if the supreme court had not intervened. The truth is democrats don’t like Kerry they just hate Bush! It is also ironic that Bill the man who could have taken Osama out, is campaigning with Kerry. How many terrorist attacks would it take for Clinton to act. Obviously not enough.

DH,
By the way, define deeply religous. You probably can’t so that theory or study is not provable! And what the hell does IQ have to do with voting. If the genius’ that unlocked the key to creating nuclear bombs were so freakin smart why didn’t they forsee the trouble their work would cause in the future. By the way people with high IQ’s lack common sense.

Flush the John’s cause their full of crap!

This article is ridiculous.

In a bad news week for Bush, straws have been clutched, and we get this. It is astonishingly dishonest, and has been unscrupulously designed to reinforce the preceptions of a very specific group of people.

I watched the election special on the BBC last night and it was very fair and balanced. The panel consisted of Frum, Blumenthal, Moore and Littlejohn (right wing British loadmouth) and some member of an electoral reform committee. That means there were two ‘Lefties’, two ‘Righties’ and one independent. Could the the panel have been any more fair or balanced? They debated the issues in front of a crowd of nosiy Republicans and Democrats in Florida.

The rest of the names mentioned by Dan, will be appearing at DIFFERENT TIMES during the week, and will almost certainly be appearing alongside people espousing opposing view points.

The fact that the US is a much more conservative country than the UK, which has a more ‘liberal media’ as a result, should not obscure the fact that the FOXNews article, perpetuated by Dan, has very selectively presented the ‘facts’ in order to inculcate a siege mentality amongst the Bush base. This makes them suspicous of any media reporting bad news, and ready and waiting for the ‘truth’ which will be supplied to them via ‘reputable’ sources.

America is now a country divided, not only by political affiliation, but also by perception of reality, with FOX and Dan are doing their bit for the cause.

Finally, don’t forget that former BBC Chairman Gavyn Chairman Gavyn Davies, Director General Greg Dyke, and Reporter Andrew Gilligan had to resign after Lord Hutton found the suggestion in BBC reports that the Britsh government “sexed up” its dossier on Iraq’s weapons with unreliable intelligence was “unfounded.”

It is now a given that the dossier was ‘sexed up’ with the UK government having recently appologised for the way the evidence for war (the dossier) was presented. The Hutton report will go down in history as a whitewash.

The BBC may not be fair and balanced, and compared to the US media probably is more liberal, as UK is generally is compared to the US, but Dan your analysis is lazy, and given your reporting of the election special, uninformed.

Michael,

As for your first response: Good job of sidestepping the fact that that ad was 100% fake. Also, good job of sidestepping the fact that you mislead/lied. You said only 1 person supports Kerry from his swift boat crew when in fact EVERYONE who served under his command supports him. Did you pick up this sidestepping, dodging technique from Bush too?

As for your second response: It’s not one theory or study. It’s many, by many psychologists over the years. You can go look at the scientific journals for their exact definition. Most likely, they asked people themselves to define how religious they are from a scale of 1-10. As for how IQ is related to voting, if you read my initial post you would have seen how. A lower IQ means you’re less smart, which would mean that you’re more susceptible to the brainwashing (or more nicely, spin) techniques that the Republicans employ so well. It means it is easier for them to hide the truth from you, without you evening knowing it. Yes, this is a rough argument, but it’s based on scientific fact.

“What is also interesting is that numerous psychological studies have proven that deeply religious people have a lower IQ (on average).”
- What a racist remark! The black culture is one of the most religious cultures in America today. 80 or 90 percent say they use their faith to help them get through the hardships in their lives.
So if we take your baseless idea and apply it to black Americans, you are saying they are less intelligent and are prone to the Republicans brainwashing tactics. Then why do 80 or 90 percent vote for democrats?
I’ve seen it all now, degrading religion and a persons race just to get a guy elected. Where will it end.

Please stop putting up pictures. This should not become USA TODAY. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but we should use words here to paint pictures.

This thread is a joke. I can’t beleive that you folks are debating over the respective intelligences of party supporters or of people in different states. How inane.

The fact that extraordinarily smart people can belong to both parties bespeaks the reality that party affiliation has little to do with intelligence or education. Politics is determined by personal values and power, period.

Ironically, the fact that people from all parts of the political spectrum are actually debating this silly topic only proves the point that dumb arguments can come from anywhere.

-Cf

This whole post is a joke. Sorry, Dan, but to use a two week time period where Rice admitted she lied about the aluminum tubes, Rumsfeld admitted he never saw any credible evidence of Iraq/al Qaeda connections, and Kerry beat the pants off Bush in all three debates as evidence of media bias against Bush is just silly.

DH

Your conclusions don’t follow from your facts.

We don’t know how intelligence is distributed geographically. I don’t believe there is any real pattern. Besides, the Red states have higher average SAT scores than the blue states and support for the Republican Party correlates positively with education. I don’t think either of these things proves that Republicans are smarter than Democrats, but it does show that statistics can be used in any way we want to prove something that isn’t true.

I have met smart and stupid people from both parties. I think we have a tendency to think that those who disagree with us are not so smart as we are. But it is not true.

Michael, an interesting theory about intelligence. The smarter you are the less common sense. Smarter is the new dumber?

I’m also guessing you never heard of J. Robert Oppenheimer.

DH

Good try but no not all that served under the very dishonarble John Kerry support him. No not all that were on his boat were with him during the convention. One of his gunners supports the Swift Boats. As a veteran the Gulf War and my husband that currently serving I would absolutely consider giving up our retirement if Kerry is elected. I refuse to serve under a treasonous lying traitor.

> I refuse to serve under a treasonous
> lying traitor.

Um, that kinda makes you a traitor, doesn’t it?

-Cf

Crystal
I gave up after 10 years in the Air Force because of clintons actions and his policies. I understand why you feel this way, I would probably do the same.
All I can say is, it was rough at first but well worth it. I am glad I did it.
Good luck to you and your husband. Also, please give him my thanks for what he is doing and sacrificing.

Tim Huff
Kansas City, Missouri

CF

No - that doesn’t make me a traitor. I for one believe John Kerry should be brought up on charges. It has to do with the fact that I do not trust that man with my husbands life. We are a voluntary military, and we choose to get out and not “work” for a traitor. This week just proved how John Kerry doesn’t even support the military. He blamed the military for the loss of explosives and munitions. Those same explosives and munitions that were destroyed by our military. It seems he still is the same as he was when he came back from Vietnam. Blame the military. I don’t need him to despise my husband and put his life in jeopardy. I want a president who will SUPPORT and DEFEND the military. That is not John Kerry.

Tim

I appreciate your thanks and comments.

Crystal

Crystal, great example your argument displays. And how much safer would our troops be if the 30% or so who believe Bush is an inept commander in chief were free to withdraw from their committment? Those who serve in the military serve their nation, the civilians at home, and the government established by our Constitution. They do not serve a king or a single man or woman.

It appears from your argument that some soldiers know not whom they serve and prefer loyalty to the king as opposed to loyalty to our Constitution and all that it stands for. I hated Nixon when I was in the Army, but, I never dreamed of exiting the military because I did not like the political views or personal history of the President. I did not serve President Nixon, I server the will of the American people and the office of the President regardless of who sat in that seat.

Appears such loyalty is being redefined these days. While a serious threat to our nation in its own right, I am not surprised to hear soldiers and their families choosing service to the man over service to their nation. I fail to see any patriotism or loyalty in such actions however. I see only a product of the ME generation. Sad…

> He blamed the military for the loss
> of explosives and munitions.

You Bush people are amazing. It’s like you’re on drugs or something.

Rudolph Giuliani blamed the soldiers for losing the munitions, not John Kerry:

Rudolph Giuliani’s penchant for speaking his mind generated some trouble for the Bush-Cheney campaign yesterday when the former mayor suggested that U.S. troops, not the president, were responsible for the missing explosives in Iraq.

“No matter how you try to blame it on the president, the actual responsibility for it really would be for the troops that were there,” Giuliani said on NBC’s “Today” show. “Did they search carefully enough? Didn’t they search carefully enough?”

You see, Kerry blamed the President for not ordering the soldiers to secure the munitions in the first place!! He did not blame the troops:

After being warned about the danger of major stockpiles of explosives in Iraq, this administration failed to guard those stockpiles – where nearly 380 tons of highly explosive weapons were kept. Today we learned that these explosives are missing, unaccounted for and could be in the hands of terrorists.
…
In May of this year, the administration was warned that terrorists may be helping themselves to ‘the greatest explosives bonanza in history.’ And now we know that our country and our troops are less safe because this president failed to do the basics. This is one of the great blunders of the Bush policy in Iraq.
…
Every step of the way this administration has miscalculated – miscalculated about how many troops we need. Secretary Rumsfeld cavalierly dismissed the danger of looting — and now we know the impact.
…
Make no mistake: our troops are the best-trained and best-led forces in the world, and they have been doing their job honorably and bravely. The problem is the Commander-in-Chief has not being doing his.

And guess what, John Kerry is right. The troops were in fact never ordered to secure that facility:

The commander, Col. Joseph Anderson, of the Second Brigade of the Army’s 101st Airborne Division, said he did not learn until this week that the site, Al Qaqaa, was considered sensitive, or that international inspectors had visited it before the war began in 2003 to inspect explosives that they had tagged during a decade of monitoring.

Colonel Anderson, who is now the chief of staff for the division and who spoke by telephone from Fort Campbell, Ky., said his troops had been driving north toward Baghdad and had paused at Al Qaqaa to make plans for their next push.

“We happened to stumble on it,” he said. “I didn’t know what the place was supposed to be. We did not get involved in any of the bunkers. It was not our mission. It was not our focus. We were just stopping there on our way to Baghdad. The plan was to leave that very same day. The plan was not to go in there and start searching. It looked like all the other ammunition supply points we had seen already.”

It was a top-level strategic blunder, a blunder going all the way back to the President’s decision to send half as many troops as would really be required to secure the country properly. Nobody is blaming the troops for any failure whatsoever… well, nobody except Rudolph Giuliani.

See the difference? Do you see how your accusation that Kerry “blamed the military for the loss of explosives and munitions” is not only 100% false, that it is in fact the exact opposite of reality?

> I for one believe John Kerry should be
> brought up on charges.

So let me get this straight: You think that the military is somehow so corrupt that they are protecting John Kerry from being charged for treason? How can you say this and also say that you actually support the military? I for one have enough faith and trust in our military to know that if an American soldier or sailor ever did anything deserving of charges, and the military brass knew about it, that they’d press charges. Kerry hasn’t even been investigated by the military, much less accused or charged with anything whatsoever. Every single official military document in existence praises him. The charges come entirely from individuals and independent non-military political organizations. If you’ve got something on Kerry, prove it in a military court.

-Cf

And those trucks that the DoD claims (in a blatant use of taxpayer dollars for political purposes) took the HMX away before the fall of Saddam? They weren’t even parked at the bunkers that contained the HMX in question.

According to the IAEA Action Report on the facility, the HMX was being stored in only nine bunkers at the site. All of the HMX bunkers were sealed by the IAEA after verification, using metal seals on the front entrance doors.

DoD released on Oct. 28, 2004, imagery showing two trucks parked outside one of the 56 bunkers of the Al Qa Qaa Explosive Storage Complex approximately 20 miles south of Baghdad, Iraq, on March 17, 2003. According to the release: “It is not believed that all 56 bunkers contained High Melting Explosive also known as HMX. A large, tractor-trailer (yellow arrow) is loaded with white containers with a smaller truck parked behind it. The International Atomic Energy Association inspectors identified bunkers in this complex as containing High Melting Explosive.”

However, a comparison of features in the DoD-released imagery with available commercial satellite imagery, combined with the use of an IAEA map showing the location of bunkers used to store the HMX explosives, reveals that the trucks pictured on the DoD image are not at any of the nine bunkers indentified by the IAEA as containing the missing explosive stockpiles.

-Cf

CF,
You prove the point that the media is biased becuase you sound like Dan Rather. Did you cut and paste a CBS transcript to the thread?

David,
There is a difference between serving under a president that has different political views and one that is a traitor and whom commited treason. You can spin all you want but the fact remains not one Kerry supporter will acknowledge that Kerry’s testimony caused the prolonged suffering of POW’s in Vietnam. So keep spinning away just like Kerry. He refuses to address those POW’s becuase he is a coward!

You can spin all you want but the fact remains not one Kerry supporter will acknowledge that Kerry’s testimony caused the prolonged suffering of POW’s in Vietnam.

Wow. Even McCain doesn’t acknowledge that. Because it’s not true?

Hmmmm. thousands of POW’s against vs. 1 man.

I don’t know if you edited your quote from Fox News or if it’s another example of “Fair And Balanced” reporting but the rest of the lineup on the BBC panel you wrote about includes:

Bob Barr - Former Republican congressman, on the board of the National Rifle Association, and opponent of restrictions on American civil liberties.

Frank Gaffney - Deputy to Assistant Secretary of Defence Richard Perle 1983-1987, he is now president of the Centre for Security Policy, a leading conservative Washington think-tank.

Stephen Moore - Economist and president of the Club for Growth, a high-profile pro-Bush tax-cuts political action group.

Bill O’Reilly - Outspoken and controversial host of Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor, he is reviled by liberal America - although he insists that he is an ‘independent’, not a conservative.

Congressman Mike Rogers - Republican Congressman for Michigan, loyal supporter of Bush and was involved in drafting the Patriot Act.

Michael Moore is not scheduled to appear. This information is from the BBC Channel Four web site.

Michael, please click my link before running off about media bias. It’s not from CBS. It’s satellite photos. You can look at them yourself. Jeez.

-Cf

satellite photos that don’t prove a thing. There is no conclusive evidence to support your claims. Although Kerry might have some info since he has all the answers. He probably got his info from France.

Can I join in? I’m not an American so I realise that some might think it rude of me to intrude but it’s almost impossible to resist when for me and many friends the outcome of this election is very important.

Most of this contribution I posted a little while ago on a non political forum, which somehow introduced a political thread. I have edited it very quickly in about five minutes to shorten it.

The important issue is one of practical politics, that is, what do the candidates want and how do they want to achieve it. Of course I can’t judge those without having some views of my own-it is inevitable that they will colour my decisions.

For example I believe in a liberal, that is a free and tolerant, state, that has a powerful respect for democracy and political integrity. I believe that fairness and respect for the truth are essential, not just nice to have, in a democracy. I also believe in the rule of law but I would be prepared to challenge a very bad law (eg one advocating genocide) and by illegal means if the circumstances demanded it. For example I hope I would have been prepared to kill Hitler.

I believe that the international community should in very extreme circumstances allow regime change (we are not expected to allow the man next door to beat his wife without someone interfering) and by force if necessary, but, at the moment, regime change is illegal. So I would not have supported the present Middle Eastern adventure on those grounds without explicit UN authority.

Although I do not understand homosexuality I believe homosexuals do not choose their inclination and because they, like everyone else, should have the chance of lifelong love I do not see why they should not marry. I take marriage to be the relationship that follows a public mutual declaration of love and intent to stay with another person for life. People were married long before our present religions were invented.

I believe it is a fundamental duty of a government to ensure that its citizens, most of whom after all don’t choose to be citizens, they just are because of an accident of birth, are secure. I mean by that the nation state is secure against foreign and domestic aggression, and that its citizens are protected against the effects of long term serious illness and unemployment. To me that is part of the social contract. Governments, in return for things over which citizens have no choice, such as taxes and conscription, have to give something in return.

But security must not be an excuse to behave in fundamentally illiberal ways. In our hearts we know what sort of governments lock up people in case they are a danger and do not allow them access to lawyers nor tell them of the charges (if there are any) against them. When I was young we called them police states, but I see similar characteristics in what The United States and the United Kingdom have done in the name of protecting our freedom. How do you protect a free society by denying people their basic rights? At what point did we think that shrugging our shoulders and ignoring real injustice to those living amongst us was discharging our civil responsibilities? When should we start to complain? When it happens to us?

There might be real enemies but it is a dreadfully bad thing to gain support by inventing new ones or exaggerating threats: the Nazis did that and the world still bears the consequences.

I am not silly enough to believe that governments must always tell the truth: the demands of very serious national security threats would I think for most people be an obvious example of when lying is acceptable but I believe very strongly that if a government gives a reason for doing something then for the sake of the integrity of the political process that reason should be true and not based on false claims that are meant to frighten children or those adults who, through fear, have lost the capacity to think.

I think it is very wrong to deliberately lie or otherwise mislead voters of your own views or those of your opponent. Those activities suborn the free democratic process, which ultimately is the only real barrier we have against a totalitarian state. For programmes such as such as Fox News (‘The more you watch the less you know’) is not only morally reprehensible but actually fundementally dangerous.

It is wrong to give power and money to friends and political supporters simply as payment for their support. Advantages should be earned by merit and not granted as rewards for greed. Pigs and their troughs belong on farms not in governments.

It only fear that causes some to hide behind barriers against those who want to be their friends. There are risks in even leaving our homes in the mornings but most of don’t feel the need to spurn our friends A friend is not an enemy because he won’t support you in everything you do: friends are allowed to disagree with each other.

I believe that nation states should treat other nation states with respect especially when there is disagreement between them. I believe that a nation state should not deliberately try to make itself so powerful that it can by force of arms impose its will on other nation states. If one nation state spends more on defence than the next ten nation states combined that reeks either of paranoia or aggressive intent. In schools bullies are ugly but as governments they are more than ugly, they are dangerous.

Although I cannot claim to be deeply impressed by John Kerry I share his broad values and I believe that if George W Bush wins the election that will be dangerous not only for the world but also for the United States in allowing people with highly questionable ethics to continue their present policies.

I feel deeply frustrated because it seems that the American people are sleepwalking their way to a land where their cherised liberties are being eoded in the name of protecting them and where obvious corruption is accepted as part of the political process. Please wake up.

Michael, your logic is obviously airtight. You win!

-Cf

Anthony, I appreciate your contribution. I think the best thing you can do to make a difference is to convince Blair and other EU leaders to submit a UN resolution promising more troops for Iraq in exchange for a UN mandate.

You guys know we can’t just cut and run from Iraq. The invasion may have been a mistake, but we need to finish the job of creating an free, open, liberal Iraq (and I don’t mean just hold an election - that’s meaningless without the institutions to back it up).

Don’t think we don’t realize you guys are slowly withdrawing your troops with your “routine troop rotations”. You can make a difference in how this whole thing plays out. You and the other EU citizens who are rooting for Kerry need to stop taking the free ride, and have your leaders make a difference.

Thank you American Pundit. I certainly feel that that the UN route is the only sensible way out of this impasse. The UN is often ineffective but the lip service that was paid to the UN by the Bush and Blair team before the invasion was depressingly cynical.

I don’t think for one minute that the UK is getting a ‘free ride’ but certainly British troops are generally in ‘safer’ areas than American troops. That is because it is not politically possible for British troops to take the casulties that the Americans are taking because the invasion of Iraq is more unpopular here than it is in the US.

I think it should be clear that my deepest objection to the invasion is the lies , lets not beat around the bush here, that we were fed as the justification for the war. I say ‘lies’ because I’m clear that one can also lie by deliberately misleading people about the relevant information for doing something.

Anyway, even at this late stage, back to the ranch…

I feel that nothing I nor anyone will now write will change voting intentions but out of sheer frustration, I have to ask is it possible that at least one Republican voter will at least consider that what President Bush and his friends have done in the name of liberty was self serving and misdirected and if so that Bush should not get at least that person’s vote?

In case anyone reading this thinks that the human cost was worth while can I remind people of the Lancet report (following a joint US Iraqi investigation) that about 100,000 extra Iraqs have died because of the invasion?

In the name of liberty and everything I hold dear which are my faith, my family and my country I ONLY would consider would voting for George W. Bush. To do so otherwise is to lead this country down a road the likes they have not seen. I am deeply afraid for this country and it’s citizens if they are that blind to do that.

The best thing this country could do would be to get out of the UN which is corrupt and extremely racist.

Crystal:

Whose libery and what kind of liberty are you speaking for?

What road is it that you think is the ‘the likes they have not seen’ that you are frightened of? Would it be a road where, for example, the government is prepared to pay more of the health care costs for people ? Or would you rather continue along a road where poor people with life threatening long term illnesses often cannot even get the basic medical care they need? If so, why does it frighten you?

Re the UN: you said, ’ The best thing this country could do would be to get out of the UN which is corrupt and extremely racist.’ No honest person with any knowledge of the UN would deny there are deep seated problems. So you want the US to leave an organisation which on balance most fair minded people would say is good for the world because it is racist and corrupt. So, while not necessarily conceding your description as an accurate one, if your reason to dislike an organisation is because of racisim and corruption, then you must have considerable difficulties in dealing with other organisations that, assuming you don’t live in New York City, are also racist and corrupt but which are much closer in geographical terms to you.

The point I’m making is that many organisations that are are generally for the public good have faults. The best response in such circumstances is to acknowledge the faults and to try and eradicate them. After all those of us who are not Americans have not given up on America simply because there is corruption and racism there. We cherise the values upon which the United States was founded. If other countries gave up on the United States because of frustration at its problems in much the same way that you want the US to give up on the UN then the world would be a much worse place.