October 30, 2004
IS IT TOO MUCH TO ASK?
Can both parties create a unified front in response to Bin Ladin’s videotape?
Maybe it is too much to ask, but I think it’s worth asking anyway. I’ll be the first to admit, I’m suffering from political OD and have pulled away from the television and the blogs a bit because my head will explode if I don’t. I’m trying to focus on everything but voting on my own blog. Then came this tape and I saw an epiphany; an opportunity for us to get some sense of civility just four days before D-Day.
It started out all good. Kerry made his statement, then Bush made his. In my dreams, I had hoped that their camps would work together to make the same statement, but like I said, that was in my dreams. What they gave was good enough. I sighed in relief and went about my business.
Then later that night, I'm online and I'm seeing the blogs going back and forth. This is good for Bush because it keeps Americans afraid. This is good for Kerry, because it reminds Americans that Bush has let the real enemy go. I tend to agree with the Kerry folks because that was my first reaction. I was just so pissed he was not just alive, but throwing it in our face that he was strong and healed and had the gall to act as if he was giving us helpful advice.
As my centrist blood began to boil, I realized that there was no way the parties weren't going to use this in the last few days. It stirs up too much emotion and both sides have already shown that they're desperate in more ways than one. It seems as if they are sending their pundits on the news shows to do the criticizing for them. I don't expect they'll go crazy like the blogs because there is a thin line, but these guys and gals are smart. They will skirt that line, but fortunately don't seem to be doing too much of it.
Thank God we only have a few days. I for one, plan to watch TV Shows on DVD so I can hold on to my sanity. For a little comic release on the issue, I direct you to Wonkette. I'm Osama bin Laden and I Approve of This Message.
P.S. If you haven't seen The Princess Bride, you won't get it.
Posted by Politopics at October 30, 2004 11:39 AMI do not think you know the meaning of that word
Posted by: Rocky at October 30, 2004 01:24 PMI don’t want to violate blog custom, but I wrote a comment exactly for this situation on the red.
We all know bin Laden wants to do us grievous harm and somehow he figures he can accomplish part of this goal with his tape. I can’t know what it is he wants and I might be fooled into doing it, so the best thing I can do to frustrate his purpose is not accept delivery of his pernicious message.
I expect the proper authorities to study it and I hope they can get some clues to his plans. As for me (and you) no good can come from watching him.
Posted by: Jack at October 30, 2004 02:17 PMSITES LIKE REDSTATE.ORG AND BLOGSFORBUSH ARE SECRETLY CENSORING OPPOSITE POINTS OF VIEW
Thought you should know that Republican web sites are secretly censoring comments. Today, both Redstate.org and Blogsforbush.com deleted the comment below without any explanation. Redstate and Blogsforbush have been doing this to me for some time. Apparently, like Fox News, they permit some Democratic posts, but sift out the good ones away from their bloggership community. I believe that web sites who censor good hard hitting comments like this so they can’t even be debated on their sites should at least be upfront about what they are doing. BOTTOM LINE: RATHER THAN HONESTLY DEBATING THE ISSUES THESE SITES WOULD RATHER SECRETLY DUMP STRONG OPPOSING POINTS OF VIEW IN THE TRASH TO AVOID EXPOSING THEM TO THEIR BLOGGERSHIP. SUPPRESSION, RATHER THAN DEBATE OF, OPPOSING POINTS OF VIEW SEEMS TO BE A THEME WITH REPUBLICANS, WHO REQUIRE PEOPLE TO SIGN “LOYALTY OATHS” TO BUSH BEFORE ATTENDING THEIR RALLIES.
CENSORED COMMENT:
ELECTION IS HERE: TIME TO BOTTOM LINE IT
EVERYBODY KNOW’S THIS ELECTION IS A REFERENDUM ON BUSH. IF HE’S BAD, THEN IT’S TIME TO GIVE THE NEW GUY KERRY A CHANCE. IF NOT, THEN LET HIM GO FOR MORE YEARS.
KEY AREAS OF BUSH RECORD ON A SCALE OF 1 TO 10
TERRORISM – 2 OUT OF 10. THE BUSH RECORD: Bin Laden is yacking again trying to influence our election. Disgraceful and we should ignore him. But why is he still out there yacking??? The newspapers are saying bin Laden used sophisticated video equipment to record his latest message. Why is bin Laden if not caught, at least not desperately recording from some cave somewhere? Initially, Bush did a good job retaliating for 9/11 against the Taliban in Afghanistan by taking them out militarily, but then he took his eye off the ball. Bush moved on to invading Iraq before he finished the job of finding bin Laden. Bush even said he wasn’t concerned about bin Laden in 2002. Specifically, on March 13, 2002 according to an official White House transcript Bush said “We haven’t heard much from him [bin Laden]. And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is … . I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run.” With all the President’s tough talk and bravado and flipping back and forth on the issue of the importance of bin Laden, he has been weak, very weak, in focusing our military resources in the relentless push that is needed to completely dismantle al Qaeda. And while Bush lags back in the offensive against terrorism, in this country, even today, 95% of shipping containers are not inspected. Cargo holds in airplanes are not inspected. Luggage on buses is not inspected. Al-Zarqawi’s terrorism in Iraq is on the rise, resulting in more and more American and Iraqi lives lost each month, and al-Zarqawi recently announced he is teaming up with al Qaeda. As a consequence, with bin Laden and al Qaeda at large, now the President admits it’s not a matter of if the next terrorist attack will occur against the US, but when. Let’s hope bin Laden is similarly blowing smoke when he says he’s gearing up for another attack that will make 9/11 pale in comparison. BOTTOM LINE: BAD JOB FOR BUSH.
IRAQ – 1 OUT OF 10. THE BUSH RECORD: Bush rushed us into this war against Iraq to stop Sadam Hussein from amassing weapons of mass destruction. We heard evidence of Sadam rebuilding his nuclear program, stocking chemical weapons etc. IT WAS ALL WRONG. Where does the buck stop? Bottom line, with the President. All the other post-hoc reasons given by Bush for going into Iraq are lame. Bush now says we went in to liberate Iraqi’s to build democracy. Bunk. The poor Iraqi citizens are not even safe to walk in their own streets and whole sections of their country are lawless war zones. The reason things are so bad in Iraq is all our fault — we had no decent plan to secure the peace in that country. We also set a poor example of how a democratic country acts by scooping innocent civilians off the street to have low level military personnel subject them to bizarre torture designed to offend their religion and sexual mores. This is weird and unprecedented. If the President kept asking his military generals and administration officials about their plans, why didn’t he ask them how we are going to secure the safety of the Iraqi people after the war is over? It is well known that detailed plans for securing the peace were created by the State Department, only to sit on Rumsfeld’s desk and be chucked. The President’s other excuse for going into Iraq is that Hussein was planning on planning to obtain nuclear weapons. Weak! At the same time we were invading Iraq, North Korea had obtained nuclear weapons and was building more nuclear weapons and Iran was in the process of obtaining nuclear weapons. Also, for the record, North Korea’s citizens were far more oppressed and impoverished and in need of liberating than Iraq’s by any standard. Lot’s of people are asking, if we had to invade another country, did we choose the right one? Should we have gone into Iran or North Korea? Or nowhere! BOTTOM LINE: BAD CHOICES, BAD JOB.
THE ECONOMY: 3 [out of 10]. THE BUSH RECORD: Nice tax cut, even if it mostly benefited the rich, but no bang for the buck. If this is “trickle down” economics, where is the trickle? Maybe it’s trickle up economics because, for the first time since Herbert Hoover’s administration, we lost more jobs than we created. Net net over a million jobs are gone over the past four years! Even over the past several months during the so-called “recovery”, job creation hasn’t even kept up with population growth. Now government deficits are out of control and we will be paying for them for years to come. And what about the long run? As we all know, the key to economic success in the long run in a modern economy is the quality and level of education of the labor force. How are we doing there? Bush made a big deal out of the Head Start program to educate our young ones when he took office, but with all the spending and emergency spending on the war with Iraq, he ended up underfunding it by tens of billions of dollars! And what about the rest of his education program? There’s just not much to speak of. There’s no focus on what America really needs to be competitive: top quality high school and higher education for normal students from average income families. As for programs to help Americans get by with rising health care costs and fuel costs – there’s not much. The drug program for seniors is very hard to understand, especially for seniors, and is really a drop in the bucket compared to Bush’s failure to make good on his promise of legalizing the importation of drugs from Canada. There is no reason not to legalize drugs imported from Canada every day over the past four years and RIGHT NOW, except that the Bush administration is beholden to the big pharma/drug companies. Drugs in Canada are the same drugs manufactured in the same factories as the drugs we take in the US. Whole communities have been forced to break the law by sponsoring bus trips to Canada to avoid their elderly and sick from becoming impoverished from the astronomical cost of drugs in the US.
SOCIAL ISSUES: 4 [out of 10]. THE BUSH RECORD: The country is completely divided down the middle on these issues. There’s not much to speak about here, as there are reasonable arguments on both sides of the aisle. It’s a shame Bush couldn’t build more unity, but you can’t blame him entirely for people being put off by his big Texas swagger. Except for stem cells that is. In the abortion debate, it’s a real live fetus lost versus no gain for anybody. With stem cell research, it’s not even a fetus versus gain for millions of sick people. Bush says he is permitting stem cell research, but according to all the stem cell doctors I’ve heard speak, he really isn’t. There are only a few old and sick cell lines that can be used. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of embryos are frozen only to be ultimately discarded because it’s against the law to use them for stem cell research. Makes you think.
BOTTOM LINE: Given Bush’s weak record, it’s time to give the new guy a chance. Kerry proved himself capable and Bush’s match during the debates. Many of the people hollering about Kerry should remember about all the similar hollering about Clinton, who turned out to do a pretty good job for America. No big wars on his watch. A great economy. Lots of terrorist attacks averted through hard work leading up to the turn of the millennium, whereas the Bush administration ignored similar signs leading up to 9/11.
SITES LIKE REDSTATE.ORG AND BLOGSFORBUSH ARE SECRETLY CENSORING OPPOSITE POINTS OF VIEW
Thought you should know that Republican web sites are secretly censoring comments. Today, both Redstate.org and Blogsforbush.com deleted the comment below without any explanation. Redstate and Blogsforbush have been doing this to me for some time. Apparently, like Fox News, they permit some Democratic posts, but sift out the good ones away from their bloggership community. I believe that web sites who censor good hard hitting comments like this so they can’t even be debated on their sites should at least be upfront about what they are doing. BOTTOM LINE: RATHER THAN HONESTLY DEBATING THE ISSUES THESE SITES WOULD RATHER SECRETLY DUMP STRONG OPPOSING POINTS OF VIEW IN THE TRASH TO AVOID EXPOSING THEM TO THEIR BLOGGERSHIP. SUPPRESSION, RATHER THAN DEBATE OF, OPPOSING POINTS OF VIEW SEEMS TO BE A THEME WITH REPUBLICANS, WHO REQUIRE PEOPLE TO SIGN “LOYALTY OATHS” TO BUSH BEFORE ATTENDING THEIR RALLIES.
CENSORED COMMENT:
ELECTION IS HERE: TIME TO BOTTOM LINE IT
EVERYBODY KNOW’S THIS ELECTION IS A REFERENDUM ON BUSH. IF HE’S BAD, THEN IT’S TIME TO GIVE THE NEW GUY KERRY A CHANCE. IF NOT, THEN LET HIM GO FOR MORE YEARS.
KEY AREAS OF BUSH RECORD ON A SCALE OF 1 TO 10
TERRORISM – 2 OUT OF 10. THE BUSH RECORD: Bin Laden is yacking again trying to influence our election. Disgraceful and we should ignore him. But why is he still out there yacking??? The newspapers are saying bin Laden used sophisticated video equipment to record his latest message. Why is bin Laden if not caught, at least not desperately recording from some cave somewhere? Initially, Bush did a good job retaliating for 9/11 against the Taliban in Afghanistan by taking them out militarily, but then he took his eye off the ball. Bush moved on to invading Iraq before he finished the job of finding bin Laden. Bush even said he wasn’t concerned about bin Laden in 2002. Specifically, on March 13, 2002 according to an official White House transcript Bush said “We haven’t heard much from him [bin Laden]. And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is … . I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run.” With all the President’s tough talk and bravado and flipping back and forth on the issue of the importance of bin Laden, he has been weak, very weak, in focusing our military resources in the relentless push that is needed to completely dismantle al Qaeda. And while Bush lags back in the offensive against terrorism, in this country, even today, 95% of shipping containers are not inspected. Cargo holds in airplanes are not inspected. Luggage on buses is not inspected. Al-Zarqawi’s terrorism in Iraq is on the rise, resulting in more and more American and Iraqi lives lost each month, and al-Zarqawi recently announced he is teaming up with al Qaeda. As a consequence, with bin Laden and al Qaeda at large, now the President admits it’s not a matter of if the next terrorist attack will occur against the US, but when. Let’s hope bin Laden is similarly blowing smoke when he says he’s gearing up for another attack that will make 9/11 pale in comparison. BOTTOM LINE: BAD JOB FOR BUSH.
IRAQ – 1 OUT OF 10. THE BUSH RECORD: Bush rushed us into this war against Iraq to stop Sadam Hussein from amassing weapons of mass destruction. We heard evidence of Sadam rebuilding his nuclear program, stocking chemical weapons etc. IT WAS ALL WRONG. Where does the buck stop? Bottom line, with the President. All the other post-hoc reasons given by Bush for going into Iraq are lame. Bush now says we went in to liberate Iraqi’s to build democracy. Bunk. The poor Iraqi citizens are not even safe to walk in their own streets and whole sections of their country are lawless war zones. The reason things are so bad in Iraq is all our fault — we had no decent plan to secure the peace in that country. We also set a poor example of how a democratic country acts by scooping innocent civilians off the street to have low level military personnel subject them to bizarre torture designed to offend their religion and sexual mores. This is weird and unprecedented. If the President kept asking his military generals and administration officials about their plans, why didn’t he ask them how we are going to secure the safety of the Iraqi people after the war is over? It is well known that detailed plans for securing the peace were created by the State Department, only to sit on Rumsfeld’s desk and be chucked. The President’s other excuse for going into Iraq is that Hussein was planning on planning to obtain nuclear weapons. Weak! At the same time we were invading Iraq, North Korea had obtained nuclear weapons and was building more nuclear weapons and Iran was in the process of obtaining nuclear weapons. Also, for the record, North Korea’s citizens were far more oppressed and impoverished and in need of liberating than Iraq’s by any standard. Lot’s of people are asking, if we had to invade another country, did we choose the right one? Should we have gone into Iran or North Korea? Or nowhere! BOTTOM LINE: BAD CHOICES, BAD JOB.
THE ECONOMY: 3 [out of 10]. THE BUSH RECORD: Nice tax cut, even if it mostly benefited the rich, but no bang for the buck. If this is “trickle down” economics, where is the trickle? Maybe it’s trickle up economics because, for the first time since Herbert Hoover’s administration, we lost more jobs than we created. Net net over a million jobs are gone over the past four years! Even over the past several months during the so-called “recovery”, job creation hasn’t even kept up with population growth. Now government deficits are out of control and we will be paying for them for years to come. And what about the long run? As we all know, the key to economic success in the long run in a modern economy is the quality and level of education of the labor force. How are we doing there? Bush made a big deal out of the Head Start program to educate our young ones when he took office, but with all the spending and emergency spending on the war with Iraq, he ended up underfunding it by tens of billions of dollars! And what about the rest of his education program? There’s just not much to speak of. There’s no focus on what America really needs to be competitive: top quality high school and higher education for normal students from average income families. As for programs to help Americans get by with rising health care costs and fuel costs – there’s not much. The drug program for seniors is very hard to understand, especially for seniors, and is really a drop in the bucket compared to Bush’s failure to make good on his promise of legalizing the importation of drugs from Canada. There is no reason not to legalize drugs imported from Canada every day over the past four years and RIGHT NOW, except that the Bush administration is beholden to the big pharma/drug companies. Drugs in Canada are the same drugs manufactured in the same factories as the drugs we take in the US. Whole communities have been forced to break the law by sponsoring bus trips to Canada to avoid their elderly and sick from becoming impoverished from the astronomical cost of drugs in the US.
SOCIAL ISSUES: 4 [out of 10]. THE BUSH RECORD: The country is completely divided down the middle on these issues. There’s not much to speak about here, as there are reasonable arguments on both sides of the aisle. It’s a shame Bush couldn’t build more unity, but you can’t blame him entirely for people being put off by his big Texas swagger. Except for stem cells that is. In the abortion debate, it’s a real live fetus lost versus no gain for anybody. With stem cell research, it’s not even a fetus versus gain for millions of sick people. Bush says he is permitting stem cell research, but according to all the stem cell doctors I’ve heard speak, he really isn’t. There are only a few old and sick cell lines that can be used. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of embryos are frozen only to be ultimately discarded because it’s against the law to use them for stem cell research. Makes you think.
BOTTOM LINE: Given Bush’s weak record, it’s time to give the new guy a chance. Kerry proved himself capable and Bush’s match during the debates. Many of the people hollering about Kerry should remember about all the similar hollering about Clinton, who turned out to do a pretty good job for America. No big wars on his watch. A great economy. Lots of terrorist attacks averted through hard work leading up to the turn of the millennium, whereas the Bush administration ignored similar signs leading up to 9/11.
J
Maybe because it is too long and simply too partisan. As a child of the TV age and now Internet, we can’t take more than four (rather short) paragraphs. On an internet blog, you should be able to say all you need to say in less than 500 words in a post and maybe 100 in a comment.
Posted by: jack at October 30, 2004 10:34 PMHaha! Jack & I agree on something. I don’t care if it’s pro- or anti-Kerry. I just don’t have the attention span for something like that on a blog. It’s probably not worth it. No offense. :)
no good can come from watching him.
Jack, I think that’s the wrong attitude. That’s like telling Christians not to read the Bible and just rely on the priest to tell you what’s in it. :)
Seriously, I’m in the middle of this book, “Imperial Hubris”, and the guy’s point is that bin Laden - through these messages - has been very candid about his purpose. Rather than hide behind obvious falsehoods like, “They hate us for our freedoms,” Americans should know exactly who we’re fighting, and why.
Obviously, common sense needs to be applied in how much of it to believe, but to advocate its censorship is even more dangerous.
I didn’t mean it as censorship. It is true that if you can’t express your editorial comment in about 500 words, you are either trying to address too many subjects or not thinking clearly.
AP
Most of us who read these things have to steal time between other tasks. We really don’t have time to read litanies. I – at least – don’t have the time.
AP – you do a good job telling me what you think is a couple of paragraphs. I think I do too. That’s what I want. Did you read that entire post above?
Thanks for the comment. Here is a new condensed version with about 1100 words. Sorry I couldn’t make 500!
ELECTION IS HERE: TIME TO BOTTOM LINE IT
This election is a referendum on Bush. If he’s bad, then it’s time to give the new guy Kerry a chance. If not, then let Bush have four more years.
KEY AREAS OF BUSH RECORD ON A SCALE OF 1 TO 10
BUSH RECORD ON TERRORISM – 2 OUT OF 10:
* BIN LADEN ON THE LOOSE. Why the heck hasn’t public enemy number one been caught yet??? The reason is Bush took his eye off the ball and invaded Iraq before finishing the job of catching bin Laden. To the point, by March 13, 2002 Bush said, according to an official White House transcript “I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him.” Now the President says he wants bin Laden dead or alive. This is a huge FLIP FLOP on one of the most important issues facing our country.
* TERRORISM ON THE RISE. Never before have so many US and foreign troops and citizens died from terrorist attacks in Iraq and elsewhere. And the numbers are increasing. Bush hasn’t focused our military resources in the relentless push that is needed to completely dismantle al Qaeda. As a consequence, now the President admits it’s not a matter of if the next terrorist attack will occur against the US, but when. BOTTOM LINE: BAD JOB FOR BUSH.
BUSH RECORD ON IRAQ – 1 OUT OF 10.
* IRAQ WAS A MISTAKE. The reason Bush rushed us into war – that Iraq supposedly has weapons of mass destruction – was all wrong. Major major major mistake. For that kind of mistake, the buck has got to stop with the President.
* IRAQ IS A MESS THAT IS NOT BEING CLEANED UP. Iraqis can’t travel safely in their own streets. Iraqis avoid being near foreigners because of the risk of attack. Whole sections of Iraq are lawless war zones. Terrorism is increasing each month. Infrastructure is still in shambles. Why is the Iraq situation declining from bad to worse? The reason is we never had a decent plan to secure the peace in that country. Another bad mistake.
* WE TORTURED INNOCENT IRAQIS. We disgraced ourselves. Bush says we are bringing Democracy to Iraq. Then we round up innocent people without adequate proof of wrongdoing, nearly all of whom have since been released, and subject them to bizarre torture aimed at violating their deepest religious mores. Sadly, this is not surprising since Bush has said we are not following the Geneva Convention, which protects our troops and citizens from outrageous conduct such as beheadings. Instead, in doublespeak, Bush’s administration said we are following “the principles of” the Geneva Convention. Even more shocking, no senior administration official such as Rumsfeld has been shown the door.
* DID WE INVADE THE RIGHT COUNTRY? At the same time we were invading Iraq, North Korea already had nuclear weapons and was building more. Iran was busily obtaining nuclear weapons. Lot’s of people are asking if we invaded the right country. Was Iraq really that urgent? Should we have gone into Iran or North Korea? Or nowhere! BOTTOM LINE: BAD CHOICES, BAD JOB FOR BUSH.
BUSH RECORD ON THE ECONOMY: 3 OUT OF 10.
* THE TAX CUT FAILED. Nice tax cut for the rich but it didn’t help the rest of the country. For the first time since Herbert Hoover’s administration, we lost more jobs than we created. Net net more than a million jobs are gone over the past four years. Even over the past several months during the so-called “recovery”, job creation hasn’t even kept up with population growth. Government deficits are out of control and we will be paying for them for years to come.
* TOO MANY AMERICANS ARE STRUGGLING. How are Americans getting by with rising health care and fuel costs? Not with much help from the government. There’s no help in the fuel area. The federal drug program is limited to seniors and is very hard to understand. This is really a drop in the bucket compared to Bush’s failure to make good on his promise to let everyone buy drugs from Canada. The President’s broken promise demonstrates that he holds the interests of big drug companies above those of the public. Drugs in Canada are the same drugs manufactured in the same factories as the drugs we take in the US. Whole communities have been forced to break the law by sponsoring bus trips to Canada to avoid their elderly and sick from becoming impoverished from the astronomical cost of drugs in the US.
BUSH ON SOCIAL ISSUES: 5 OUT OF 10.
* THE PRESIDENT HAS HELD THE LINE BUT IS DIVISIVE. Social issues are what is keeping the President afloat. The country is divided down the middle on social issues. There are reasonable arguments as well as misinformation on both sides of the aisle. It’s a shame Bush couldn’t build more unity, but you can’t blame him entirely for people being put off by his folksy swagger persona.
* OUT OF TOUCH ON STEM CELL RESEARCH. In a recent Annenberg poll in August, 64% favored and 28% disfavored use of embryos to conduct stem cell research. In the abortion debate, it’s a real live fetus lost on the one hand versus no health benefit for the mother. The stem cell debate balances a tiny embryo against health gains for millions of sick people. Bush says he is permitting stem cell research, but according to stem cell researchers, he really isn’t. There are only a few old and sick cell lines that can be used. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of embryos are frozen only to be ultimately discarded because it’s against the law to use them for stem cell research. If Bush gets elected, cures from stem cell research for millions of sick people are at least four more years away, and the US could lose the edge in this promising and potentially profitable field of research.
BOTTOM LINE: Bush’s record is weak. Time to give the new guy a chance. Kerry proved himself capable and Bush’s match during the debates. Many of the people hollering about Kerry should remember all the similar hollering about Clinton, who turned out to do a pretty good job for America. No big wars on Clinton’s watch. A great economy. At least four terrorist attacks averted by the Clinton administration through hard work leading up to the turn of the millennium, whereas the Bush administration ignored similar signs leading up to 9/11. Maybe that’s why bin Laden was so surprised that 9/11 exceeded all his expectations in running flawlessly.
Posted by: J at October 31, 2004 11:37 AMthis is a message from Europe:
Please
stop bush stop bush stop bush
your leadership affects everyone on this planet, think about it:stopbush
tell us your opinion
if you think that this is political crap we are sorry for bother you
thank u
AP – you do a good job telling me what you think is a couple of paragraphs. I think I do too. That’s what I want. Did you read that entire post above?
Of course not. Who has time to read all that? Besides, when you see that stuff in ALL CAPS, you know its ALL BS. :)
Hey flexo. I posted this in another thread, but I think it’s important, so I’ll repost it:
I appreciate your contribution to this forum. I think the best thing you can do to make a difference, is to urge your 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).
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 urge your leaders to make a difference.
