I’m a little pressed for time today, so I won’t indulge in much analysis and background. I’m sure many are familiar with the story anyway. So instead, I’ll just link to an article, and pose a couple of questions: (1) Has Bush’s military record been adequately and fully explained? and the biggie . . . (2) Is it relevant, and … Read More
A Bad Catch Phrase By Any Other Name . . .
The Lieberman campaign has been rightfully mocked at its attempt to make "Joe-mentum" a political catch phrase. But that hasn’t stopped them from implementing Plan B: Behold the "Mo-Joe"! Sigh. Some people just try too hard.
Bush Priorities
Analyses of the Bush budget are starting to appear all over cyberspace, and it is sobering. If you want to get a bead on some of the President’s priorities, consider the following: Job training: Federal vocational and adult education cut 35% (from 2.1 billion to 1.4 billion); Assistance to workers displaced by NAFTA cut to zero — the unions are … Read More
You Won’t Have Dean to Kick Around Anymore
Daily Kos is reporting the latest Zogby poll numbers. Since Zogby was the poll that predicted a Kerry win in Iowa, these numbers may be worth looking at. Since Dean is running a distant third or fourth in Arizona, Missouri, Oklahoma and South Carolina, and given his financial problems, I predict he will be yesterday’s news on . . . … Read More
Goodbye, Dick?
Okay. She’s a gossip columnist, and not a very good/reliable one. Yet, the "buzz" is out. A well-placed source says that the president will “most likely” drop Dick Cheney from his re-election ticket and his first choice for a replacement is former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani. Read about it here. There’s also talk of Bush-McCain ticket. This could … Read More
A Split Decision
The following is a partial transcript of Joe Lieberman’s congratulatory telephone call to Carolina Panthers head coach John Fox. LIEBERMAN: Coach Fox? Joe Lieberman here – was that a great game or what? You bet it was! COACH FOX: Uh, thanks Joe, but I really don’t think… LIEBERMAN: Well Coach, based on what I saw tonight, I’d say you just … Read More
The Memory Hole
I’ve been a fan of www.memoryhole.org since they took an electonically redacted DOJ document, unredacted it, and posted it. (The document was an internal DOJ study which was highly critical of its own minority hiring practices. The DOJ heavily redacted the most incriminating parts, and posted it on its website. Someone was able to remove the electronic redactions, and it … Read More
Neglecting Intelligence, Ignoring Warnings…
The Center for American Progress has compiled a "cheat sheet" of sorts — a chronology of the Bush Administration’s failure (refusal?) to listen to intelligence agencies who said the case for war was weak. Nothing new in it for some of us, but it’s all compiled in one place (PDF version; hyperlinks to sources). Flawed in some respect, because it … Read More
Brokered Convention?
I was prepared to predict Kerry as the nominee, but poll numbers from the February 3 states give me pause. Naturally, Edwards is on top in South Carolina. But it’s these OTHER states that surprise me. For example, Kerry and Clark are in a statistical dead heat in Arizona. And Clark and Edwards both beat out Kerry by a significant … Read More
Finally! A REAL War Against Terrorism . . .
CNN reports: WASHINGTON (CNN) — The U.S. military is planning a spring offensive against remnants of the Taliban and al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan, a senior Defense Department official has said. Authorities have ordered troops, supplies and logistics into place to carry out the operation, the official said Wednesday, without detailing whether the new offensive would require more troops. The … Read More
The Blame Game
It seems (for most of us, anyway) that the WMD question is resolved — Iraq had none. But other questions remain . . . Was our intelligence bad? Or was our intelligence "messaged" by the Bush Administration in order to make its case to the American people? Kenneth Pollack of the Brookings Institute (and author of "The Threatening Storm: The … Read More
Notes from New Hampshire
For what it’s worth . . . I was raised in New Hampshire. My mother still lives there, and she’s just as much a political hound as I am. By way of background — she’s a registered independant, but always votes Republican (she’s a Republican of the McCain stripe, rather than the Bush stripe). She’s just emailed me her take … Read More
Fox News Misinforms (Subtitle: Duh!)
According to a University of Maryland study: Those who receive most of their news from Fox News are more likely than average to have misperceptions. Those who received most of their news from NPR or PBS are less likely to have misperceptions. These variations cannot simply be explained as a result of differences in the demographic characteristics of each audience, … Read More
Halliburton Execs Accepted Kickbacks
It’s hard being a moderate-to-left person these days. Because there’s so much to be smug about. The lack of WMDs in Iraq, for example. I know in many of us, there’s a rather unbecoming little "I told you so" crying to get out. So I’ll just link to this Halliburton Execs Accepted Kickbacks, and quietly try to suppress my gloat.
This May Explain It . . .
Bush-ites are proud to point out that Bush’s military budget is strong and robust, compared to Clinton — who "slashed" it. The best response to that is to point out that even though Bush was CoC, it was essentially "Clinton’s" military that won the Iraqi War. That shuts them up (sometimes). But there may be other reasons to explain the … Read More