BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 09:40 PM

Zogby International reports on this web page that a surprisingly large number of New Yorkers believe the Administration had foreknowledge of 9-11 and failed to act.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 01 Sep 04 - 09:44 PM

On this page, Amelia Gruber comments on failing respect for Da Gov in the eyes of American citizens nationwide.

Poll finds government falling in public's esteem
By Amelia Gruber

The public views the federal government less favorably this year than
last, Gallup poll results published Tuesday indicate.

Slightly more than a third of respondents to an early August survey by
The Gallup Organization expressed a "positive" or "somewhat positive"
view of the government. This represents a drop of seven percentage
points from a year ago, when 41 percent of Americans surveyed said
they looked favorably upon the government.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: freda underhill
Date: 02 Sep 04 - 05:23 PM

i'm staying with my daughter and her husband to be in southern austria. during my stay i've met his extended family and friends from austria, the netherlands, and italy. on each occasion of having dinner with a bunch of people from a different country, they all raised the topic of how much they dislike george bush, his government, and the war in Iraq. today i spoke to a dutch man who told me his son is in Iraq. he and his wife are very distressed and are praying for a change of government in the US in november.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 03 Sep 04 - 10:29 AM

The Columbia School Of Journalism's Review pans the desperate complaisance of AMerican journalism in failing to report the truth about distortions pronounced at tthe RNC, in this article

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: GUEST
Date: 03 Sep 04 - 02:45 PM

HE WAS RIGHT AFTER THE RUSSIAN CHILDREN
WHERE TAKEN INTO HELL

FIDDLE

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 03 Sep 04 - 06:54 PM

Articles of impeachment being promoted to remove the Bush Administration from office can be found at this web site.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: GUEST,GROK
Date: 04 Sep 04 - 06:35 PM

Like law will remove Bush, Cheney and the most powerful military organization in the world.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 04 Sep 04 - 06:57 PM

The connection between the National Socialist Party of Germany in the 30's, which elevated Adolf Hitler to power, and George Bush Sr., Karl Rove, et alia, is discussed in this article in Counterpunch magazine. If you believed in power-structure conspiracies it would be enough to make you nervous.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: GUEST,GROK
Date: 04 Sep 04 - 07:11 PM

Amos, I don't think there can be any doubt that a power structure is in place to control the world through economic means. MJ-12 and the secrecy to do with international banking demonstrate that 'money' is power. It can make or break whole countries, and with the USA nearing bankruptcy, the US government has to make its grab soon. IMO, we are looking at another decade, tops. The grab will have to occur before depleted oil supplies make it impossible--before debt makes it impossible. Hence the tremendous build up of the military. IMO, this has been in the works for at least a century now. Conspiracy?

Even paranoids have enemies.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 07 Sep 04 - 06:55 PM

An organization called Texans for Truth has come forward with an indictment of George's attack against Kerry on service-related grounds, the advertisement of which can be seen on this page.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 08 Sep 04 - 08:33 PM

OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
How to Watch the Watchers
By RICHARD BEN-VENISTE and LANCE COLE

The president's new civil liberties oversight board falls short of the
recommendations made by the 9/11 commission.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/07/opinion/07benveniste.html?th

--


"A free society is one where it is safe to be unpopular."
    --Adlai Stevenson

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 08 Sep 04 - 09:03 PM

This article discusses the Bush administrations falsification, censoring and manipulation of science.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Ebbie
Date: 09 Sep 04 - 01:13 AM

Jimmy Carter wrote Zell Miller, keynote Democrat speaker at the GOP convention, ending it this way:

"Zell, I have known you for 42 years and have, in the past, respected you as a trustworthy political leader and a personal friend. But now, there are many of us loyal Democrats who feel uncomfortable in seeing that you have chosen the rich over the poor, unilateral pre-emptive war over a strong nation united with others for peace, lies and obfuscation over the truth, and the political technique of personal character assassination as a way to win elections or to garner a few moments of applause. These are not the characteristics of great Democrats whose legacy you and I have inherited."

    Sincerely, and with deepest regrets,
    Jimmy Carter

Read more at http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/090904C.shtml

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 09 Sep 04 - 08:53 AM

Internationally, a poll of 35000 people reveal a very strong   edge for Kerry -- in factm if the world could vote Kerry would win by a landslide.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 09 Sep 04 - 11:01 AM

The New Republic reports on the growing scandal of Bush' actual manuvering in the Air National Guard, and his failure to perform as he promised.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 16 Sep 04 - 11:02 PM

Sept. 16, 2004  |  "Bring them on!" President Bush challenged the early Iraqi insurgency in July of last year. Since then 812 American soldiers have been killed and 6,290 wounded, according to the Pentagon. Almost every day in campaign speeches, Bush speaks with bravado about how we are "winning" in Iraq. "Our strategy is succeeding," he boasted to the National Guard convention on Tuesday.

But according to the U.S. military's leading strategists and prominent retired generals, Bush's war is already lost.

Retired Gen. William Odom, former head of the National Security Agency, told me: "Bush hasn't found the WMD. Al-Qaida, it's worse -- he's lost on that front. That he's going to achieve a democracy there? That goal is lost, too. It's lost." He added: "Right now, the course we're on, we're achieving [Osama] bin Laden's ends."

(Excerpt from Salon.com, subscription required)

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 16 Sep 04 - 11:27 PM

Maureen Down writes in A Dazzling Display to Mislead:

"...the administration has been so dazzling in misleading the public with audacious, mendacious malarkey that the Democrats fear the Bushies are capable of any level of deceit.

Iraq is a vision of hell, and the Republicans act as if it's a model kitchen. The president and vice president brag about liberating Iraqis and reassure us that they are stopping terrorist violence at its source and inspiring democracy in the region by bringing it to blood-drenched Iraq.

But what they haven't mentioned is that they have known since July that their rosy scenarios are as bogus as their WMD. That's when the president received a national intelligence estimate that spelled out "a dark assessment of prospects for Iraq" in the next 18 months, as Douglas Jehl wrote in yesterday's New York Times. Worst-case estimates include civil war or anarchy.


Unlike the president, the young men and women trying to stay alive in the unraveling chaos of Iraq can't count on their daddies to get them out of the line of fire."

---

I think she has summed up the Republican Zeitgeist in a single fell phrase: Go forth,and be audacious and mendacious.

The Great American Moral Code: Brass in all things and Lies when convenient. Sure saves a lot of thinking, doesn't it, George?


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 17 Sep 04 - 06:36 PM

Urgent: Please read George Bush's Plea for a Second Chance in which he finally comes clean while asking for your benevolent indulgence.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: dianavan
Date: 17 Sep 04 - 10:02 PM

That just about sums it up.

d

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 18 Sep 04 - 10:14 AM

The Guardian bemoans the complete mess the Bush administration has made of Iraq in this article.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 19 Sep 04 - 09:01 PM

This editorial discusses the poisonous impact of the Bush administration on democratic representative government.

"n a democracy -- a fully functioning one -- none of this would happen. We simply would not allow one man -- any man -- to diminish our country as we stood idly by. But we have. In large numbers we have fallen for Bush's hat trick. One by one, all across America, we have decided it was not important enough to find the truth, to vote for the good of us all.
"


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 20 Sep 04 - 04:54 PM

The respected on-line science journal Nature accuses the Bush administration of distorting science.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 20 Sep 04 - 08:42 PM

A detailed timeline of known facvts about the Bush AWOL timeline can be found in this chart.

Subject: Doctorow Writes of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 03:20 PM

GUESTWORDS: By E.L. Doctorow

    The Unfeeling President

    September 9, 2004 - Easthampton Star

    I fault this president for not knowing what death is. He does not
suffer the death of our 21-year-olds who
    wanted to be what they could be. On the eve of D-Day in 1944 General
Eisenhower prayed to God for the lives
    of the young soldiers he knew were going to die. He knew what death
was. Even in a justifiable war, a war not
    of choice but of necessity, a war of survival, the cost was almost
more than Eisenhower could bear.

    But this president does not know what death is. He hasn't the mind
for it. You see him joking with the press,
    peering under the table for the weapons of mass destruction he can't
seem to find, you see him at rallies
    strutting up to the stage in shirt sleeves to the roar of the
carefully screened crowd, smiling and waving,
    triumphal, a he-man.

    He does not mourn. He doesn't understand why he should mourn. He is
satisfied during the course of a speech
    written for him to look solemn for a moment and speak of the brave
young Americans who made the ultimate
    sacrifice for their country.

    But you study him, you look into his eyes and know he dissembles an
emotion which he does not feel in the
    depths of his being because he has no capacity for it. He does not
feel a personal responsibility for the 1,000
    dead young men and women who wanted to be what they could be.

    They come to his desk not as youngsters with mothers and fathers or
wives and children who will suffer to
    the end of their days a terribly torn fabric of familial
relationships and the inconsolable remembrance of
    aborted life . . . they come to his desk as a political liability,
which is why the press is not permitted to
    photograph the arrival of their coffins from Iraq.

    How then can he mourn? To mourn is to express regret and he regrets
nothing. He does not regret that his
    reason for going to war was, as he knew, unsubstantiated by the
facts. He does not regret that his bungled
    plan for the war's aftermath has made of his mission-accomplished a
disaster. He does not regret that,
    rather than controlling terrorism, his war in Iraq has licensed it.
So he never mourns for the dead and crippled
    youngsters who have fought this war of his choice.

    He wanted to go to war and he did. He had not the mind to perceive
the costs of war, or to listen to those who
    knew those costs. He did not understand that you do not go to war
when it is one of the options but when it is
    the only option; you go not because you want to but because you have
to.

    Yet this president knew it would be difficult for Americans not to
cheer the overthrow of a foreign dictator.
    He knew that much. This president and his supporters would seem to
have a mind for only one thing -- to take
    power, to remain in power, and to use that power for the sake of
themselves and their friends.

    A war will do that as well as anything. You become a wartime leader.
The country gets behind you. Dissent
    becomes inappropriate. And so he does not drop to his knees, he is
not contrite, he does not sit in the church
    with the grieving parents and wives and children. He is the
president who does not feel. He does not feel for
    the families of the dead, he does not feel for the 35 million of us
who live in poverty, he does not feel for the
    40 percent who cannot afford health insurance, he does not feel for
the miners whose lungs are turning black
    or for the working people he has deprived of the chance to work
overtime at time-and-a-half to pay their bills
    - it is amazing for how many people in this country this president
does not feel.

    But he will dissemble feeling. He will say in all sincerity he is
relieving the wealthiest 1 percent of the
    population of their tax burden for the sake of the rest of us, and
that he is polluting the air we breathe for
    the sake of our economy, and that he is decreasing the quality of
air in coal mines to save the coal miners'
    jobs, and that he is depriving workers of their time-and-a-half
benefits for overtime because this is actually a
    way to honor them by raising them into the professional class.

    And this litany of lies he will versify with reverences for God and
the flag and democracy, when just what he
    and his party are doing to our democracy is choking the life out of
it.

    But there is one more terribly sad thing about all of this. I
remember the millions of people here and around
    the world who marched against the war. It was extraordinary, that
spontaneous aroused oversoul of alarm and
    protest that transcended national borders. Why did it happen? After
all, this was not the only war anyone had
    ever seen coming. There are little wars all over he world most of
the time.

    But the cry of protest was the appalled understanding of millions of
people that America was ceding its role as
    the last best hope of mankind. It was their perception that the
classic archetype of democracy was morphing
    into a rogue nation. The greatest democratic republic in history was
turning its back on the future, using its
    extraordinary power and standing not to advance the ideal of a
concordance of civilizations but to endorse the
    kind of tribal combat that originated with the Neanderthals, a
people, now extinct, who could imagine ensuring
    their survival by no other means than pre-emptive war.

    The president we get is the country we get. With each president the
nation is conformed spiritually. He is the
    artificer of our malleable national soul. He proposes not only the
laws but the kinds of lawlessness that govern
    our lives and invoke our responses. The people he appoints are cast
in his image. The trouble they get into and
    get us into, is his characteristic trouble.

    Finally, the media amplify his character into our moral weather
report. He becomes the face of our sky, the
    conditions that prevail. How can we sustain ourselves as the United
States of America given the stupid and
    ineffective warmaking, the constitutionally insensitive lawgiving,
and the monarchal economics of this
    president? He cannot mourn but is a figure of such moral vacancy as
to make us mourn for ourselves.

# # #

---

With warm thanks to Nancy for pointing this piece out to me.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: freda underhill
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 09:46 PM

RESUME : GEORGE W. BUSH

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20520

EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE:
Law Enforcement:
I was arrested in Kennebunkport, Maine, in 1976 for driving under the
influence of alcohol. I pled guilty, paid a fine, and had my driver's
license suspended for 30 days. My Texas driving record has been "lost"
and
is not available.

Military:
I joined the Texas Air National Guard and went AWOL. I refused to take
a
drug test or answer any questions about my drug use. By joining the
Texas
Air National Guard, I was able to avoid combat duty in Vietnam.

College:
I graduated from Yale University with a low C average. I was a
cheerleader.

PAST WORK EXPERIENCE:
I ran for U.S. Congress and lost. I began my career in the oil business
in
Midland, Texas, in 1975. I bought an oil company, but couldn't find any
oil
in Texas. The company went bankrupt shortly after I sold all my stock.
I
bought the Texas Rangers baseball team in a sweetheart deal that took
land
using taxpayer money. With the help of my father and our friends in the
oil
industry
(including Enron CEO Ken Lay), I was elected governor of Texas.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS GOVERNOR OF TEXAS:
- I changed Texas pollution laws to favor power and oil companies,
making
Texas the most polluted state in the Union. During my tenure, Houston
replaced Los Angeles as the most smog-ridden city in America.

- I cut taxes and bankrupted the Texas treasury to the tune of billions
in
borrowed money.

- I set the record for the most executions by any governor in American
history.

- With the help of my brother, the governor of Florida, and my father's
appointments to the Supreme Court, I became President after losing by
over
500,000 votes.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS PRESIDENT:
- I am the first President in U.S. history to enter office with a
criminal
record.

- I invaded and occupied two countries at a continuing cost of over one
billion dollars per week.

- I spent the U.S. surplus and effectively bankrupted the U.S.
Treasury.

- I shattered the record for the largest annual deficit in U.S.
history.

- I set an economic record for most private bankruptcies filed in any
12-month period.

- I set the all-time record for most foreclosures in a 12-month period.

- I set the all-time record for the biggest drop in the history of the
U.S.
stock market. In my first year in office, over 2 million Americans lost
their jobs and that trend continues every month.

- I'm proud that the members of my cabinet are the richest of any
administration in U.S. history. My "poorest millionaire," Condoleeza
Rice,
has a Chevron oil tanker named after her.

- I set the record for most campaign fundraising trips by a U.S.
President.

- I am the all-time U.S. and world record-holder for receiving the most
corporate campaign donations.

- My largest lifetime campaign contributor, and one of my best friends,
Kenneth Lay, presided over the largest corporate bankruptcy fraud in
U.S.
History, Enron.

- My political party used Enron private jets and corporate attorneys to
assure my success with the U.S. Supreme Court during my election
decision.

- I have protected my friends at Enron and Halliburton against
investigation or prosecution. More time and money was spent
investigating
the Monica Lewinsky affair than has been spent investigating one of the
biggest corporate rip-offs in history. I presided over the biggest
energy
crisis in U.S. history and refused to intervene when corruption
involving
the oil industry was revealed.

- I presided over the highest gasoline prices in U.S. history.

- I changed the U.S. policy to allow convicted criminals to be awarded
government contracts.

- I appointed more convicted criminals to administration than any
President
in U.S. history.

- I created the Ministry of Homeland Security, the largest bureaucracy
in
the history of the United States government.

- I've broken more international treaties than any President in U.S.
history.

- I am the first President in U.S. history to have the United Nations
remove the U.S. from the Human Rights Commission.

- I withdrew the U.S. from the World Court of Law.

- I refused to allow inspector's access to U.S. "prisoners of war"
detainees and thereby have refused to abide by the Geneva Convention.

- I am the first President in history to refuse United Nations election
inspectors (during the 2002 U.S. election).

- I set the record for fewest numbers of press conferences of any
President
since the advent of television.

- I set the all-time record for most days on vacation in any one-year
period. After taking off the entire month of August, I presided over
the
worst security failure in U.S. history.

- I garnered the most sympathy ever for the U.S. after the World Trade
Center attacks and less than a year later made the U.S. the most hated
country in the world, the largest failure of diplomacy in world
history.

- I have set the all-time record for most people worldwide to
simultaneously protest me in public venues (15 million people),
shattering
the record for protests against any person in the history of mankind.

- I am the first President in U.S. history to order an unprovoked,
preemptive attack and the military occupation of a sovereign nation. I
did
so against the will of the United Nations, the majority of U.S.
citizens,
and the world community.

- I have cut health care benefits for war veterans and support a cut in
duty benefits for active duty troops and their families in wartime.

- In my State of the Union Address, I lied about our reasons for
attacking
Iraq and then blamed the lies on our British friends.

- I am the first President in history to have a majority of Europeans
(71%)
view my presidency as the biggest threat to world peace and security.

- I am supporting development of a nuclear "Tactical Bunker Buster," a
WMD.

- I have so far failed to fulfill my pledge to bring Osama Bin Laden to
justice.

RECORDS AND REFERENCES:
-All records of my tenure as governor of Texas are now in my father's
library, sealed and unavailable for public view.

- All records of SEC investigations into my insider trading and my
bankrupt
companies are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

- All records or minutes from meetings that I, or my Vice-president,
attended regarding public energy policy are sealed in secrecy and
unavailable for public review.

PLEASE CONSIDER MY EXPERIENCE WHEN VOTING IN 2004!

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: dianavan
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 11:22 PM

Thank-you Freda - Absolutely to the point. Who can argue with this? Who can defend this criminal? Is there any justice or will he just walk away laughing?

d

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 21 Sep 04 - 11:36 PM

Regarding Rather's embarassment for CBS:

What Is Bush Hiding?


By E. J. Dionne Jr.

Tuesday, September 21, 2004; Page A21

It is to be welcomed that President Bush wants to clear up questions about
his National Guard service. He wants more details out there, and good for
him. This story should be laid to rest, and the one person who can do it is
named George W. Bush.

Up to now, Bush has been interested in a rather narrow aspect of the story.
He wanted Dan Rather and CBS News to come clean about whether they used fake
documents in reporting on the president's Guard service back in the 1970s.

"There are a lot of questions and they need to be answered," Bush told the
Union Leader in Manchester, N.H., last week. "I think what needs to happen
is people need to take a look at the documents, how they were created, and
let the truth come out."

I couldn't agree more. And apparently CBS came to the same view. CBS messed
up, and yesterday, Rather fessed up. He said the network could no longer
stand behind the documents. There will be much hand-wringing about the media
in the coming days, and properly so.

But what's good for Dan Rather, who is not running for president, ought to
be good for George Bush, who is. "There are a lot of questions and they need
to be answered." Surely that presidential sentiment applies as much to
Bush's Guard service as to Rather's journalistic methods.

The New York Times put the relevant questions on the table yesterday in a
lengthy review of Bush's life in 1972, "the year George W. Bush dropped off
the radar screen," as the Times called it. The issues about Bush's National
Guard service, the Times wrote, include "why he failed to take his pilot's
physical and whether he fulfilled his commitment to the guard."

Oh, I can hear the groaning: "But why are we still talking about Vietnam?"
A fair question that has several compelling answers.

First, except for John McCain, Republicans were conspicuously happy to have
a front group spread untruths about John Kerry's Vietnam service in August
and watch as the misleading claims were amplified by the supposedly liberal
media. The Vietnam era was relevant as long as it could be used to raise
character questions about Kerry. But as soon as the questioning turned to
Bush's character, we were supposed to call the whole thing off. Why? Because
the media were supposed to question Kerry's character but not Bush's.

And, please, none of this nonsense about how Kerry "opened the door" to the
assault on his Vietnam years by highlighting his service at the Democratic
National Convention. Nothing any candidate does should ever be seen as
"opening the door" to lies about his past. Besides, Vietnam veterans with
Republican ties were going after Kerry's war record long before the
Democratic convention.

But, most important, there is only one reason the story about Bush's
choices during the Vietnam years persists. It's because the president won't
give detailed answers to the direct questions posed by the Times story and
other responsible media organizations, including the Boston Globe. Their
questions never depended on the discredited CBS documents.

Bush could end this story now so we could get to the real issues of 2004.
It would require only that the president take an hour or so with reporters
to make clear what he did and did not do in the Guard. He may have had good
reasons for ducking that physical exam. Surely he can explain the gaps in
his service and tell us honestly whether any pull was used to get him into
the Guard.

But a guy who is supposed to be so frank and direct turns remarkably
Clintonian where the National Guard issue is concerned. "I met my
requirements and was honorably discharged" is Bush's stock answer, which
does old Bill proud. And am I the only person exasperated by a double
standard that treated everything Bill Clinton ever did in his life ("I
didn't inhale") as fair game but now insists that we shouldn't sully
ourselves with any inconvenient questions about Bush's past?

I'm as weary as you are that our politics veer away from what matters --
Iraq, terrorism, health care, jobs -- and get sidetracked into personal
issues manufactured by political consultants and ideological zealots. But
the Bush campaign has made clear it wants this election to focus on
character and leadership. If character is the issue, the president's life,
past and present, matters just as much as John Kerry's.

Dan Rather has answered his critics. Now it is Bush's turn.

[e-mail]

© 2004 The Washington Post Company

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 22 Sep 04 - 09:19 AM

Regarding Bush's latest address to the United Nations in defense of hius adventures in Iraq, the New York times concludes:

"Mr. Bush might have done better at wooing broader international support if he had spent less time on self-justification and scolding and more on praising the importance of international cooperation and a strengthened United Nations. Instead, his tone-deaf speechwriters achieved a perverse kind of alchemy, transforming a golden opportunity into a lead balloon."

This man is a fucking MAROOOON!

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 23 Sep 04 - 01:00 PM

Bush Attacks Kerry While Cozying Up To Dictators


President Bush earlier this week attacked his opponent, saying "It's hard to imagine a candidate running for President prefers the stability of a dictatorship to the hope and security of democracy."1 Yet, it is President Bush who regularly declares his personal friendship and gratitude to some of the world's most oppressive dictators, often wining and dining them at his ranch in Texas.

In June of 2004, Bush referred to the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia as "my friend,"2 even though the Saudi Arabian government has been investigated for its financial ties to the 9/11 terrorists3 and is listed by the U.S. State Department as one of the world's most oppressive regimes on the planet.4

In April, he referred to the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak as "my friend" and welcomed him to the Crawford ranch by saying "I always look forward to visiting with him."5 Bush gave this praise to a dictator, even though Human Rights Watch notes that government "torture in Egypt is widespread and systemic"6 and the State Department says Mubarak has passed a Constitution in which the electorate is barred from being "presented with a choice among competing presidential candidates."7

In 2002, it was Bush who said "I want to welcome the President of China to our ranch, and to Texas."8 Bush was inviting into his home a dictator who, according to the U.S. State Department, presides over a government that regularly engages in the "arbitrary or unlawful" murder of its own citizens, kidnappings of political dissidents, and repression of religious minorities.9

Footnoted sources listed on this page.

A

Subject: RE: BS: The Question Laura Bush Could Not Answer
From: Amos
Date: 23 Sep 04 - 03:32 PM

The Question Laura Bush Could Not Answer: When Are Yours Going to Serve?

This moment of confrontation, between George Bush's wife and the heart-broken mother of a dead Marine, deserves more national attention that this brief article. But even by itself, it is a heartbreaker and it shows something of the panic that must regn in the hearts of the Bushes, who ride the powder keg of hbottled up truth and hidden mismanagement every day of thier lives.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 23 Sep 04 - 05:42 PM

Scores ofr Americans have expressed thoughtful views in Letters to George W. Bush on this website.

Most of them are disappointed in him. All of them are articulate and well worth reading.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 25 Sep 04 - 01:07 AM

London's Financial Times writes an analysis of the really bozo collapse of terrorism prosecutions in a number of ridiculous cases in this article.

The Bush administration in its anxiety and haste has been unable to obtain any convictions and has built cases on whimsy in several cases.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: GUEST,Jaze
Date: 25 Sep 04 - 11:04 AM

I find the flap over Dan Rather's story kind of amusing. But let's take it to another level. Did not George Bush launch and unprovoked attack against a sovereign nation based on informnation HE received and deemed reliable? Seems to me Bush should be most understanding of Rather's position. Yet we were all supposed to just accept that his information wasn't reliabe.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 25 Sep 04 - 11:52 AM

Well, attacking a nation... with lead and bombs, killing civilians, destroying homes buildings and lives, snuffing out daughters and sons... is one thing -- but Rather, armed with merely false DOCUMENTS but correct facts, has been categorized as far more heinous an offender for attacking a reigning President for misconduct which he actually did commit!!

Bush has repeatedly demonstrated that logic is not part of this.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 25 Sep 04 - 04:24 PM

Michael Moore details and excoriates President Bush & Co.'s history of flipflopping on policy regarding the Middle East and Iraq.

Makes Kerry look a steady-on as Gibraltar.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Sep 04 - 10:27 AM

great stuff. Keep it coming!

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 26 Sep 04 - 11:41 AM

Maureen Dowd, the bright light lady warrior of the New York Times, makes some telling remarks about the recent press show by Bush and Alawi.

Whole article found at this page.



Dance of the Marionettes
By MAUREEN DOWD

Published: September 26, 2004



It's heartwarming, really.

President Bush has his own Mini-Me now, someone to echo his every word and mimic his every action.

For so long, Mr. Bush has put up with caricatures of a wee W. sitting in the vice president's lap, Charlie McCarthy style, as big Dick Cheney calls the shots. But now the president has his own puppet to play with.

All last week in New York and Washington, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi of Iraq parroted Mr. Bush's absurd claims that the fighting in Iraq was an essential part of the U.S. battle against terrorists that started on 9/11, that the neocons' utopian dream of turning Iraq into a modern democracy was going swimmingly, and that the worse things got over there, the better they really were.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 28 Sep 04 - 10:31 AM

From Today's Papers for September 28, 2004, concerning Iraq civilian security forces:

"Meanwhile, contrary to the president's statements about "nearly 100,000 fully trained and equipped" security forces, the military has acknowledged that only 8,200 have been fully trained. (Reuters flagged the discrepancy on Friday.) Finally, the Post mentions that a respected analyst released a report recently concluding that the number of security forces is actually dropping "in part because of desertions and purging of low-grade personnel." "

Mister Bush again discovers that what he says and what is real are sometimes leagues apart.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: GUEST,peedeecee
Date: 28 Sep 04 - 04:08 PM

Here's a LOVELY bit of news that should be posted on various threads -- the newspaper in Crawford, Texas, which is Bush's home town, is coming out strongly in favour of Kerry. The editorial at the link is extremely good, especially considering that the Iconoclast (!) is a small, weekly newspaper.

The link below reports the story, but provides another link directly to the editorial.

CrawfordHatesBush

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 28 Sep 04 - 07:44 PM

The New York Times excoriates the sleazy extremes of the Bush campaign tactics as beyond the pale of decency. What else is new?

Story on this page .

Slimeballs.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 29 Sep 04 - 09:16 AM

The Washington Post provides an analysis that indicates the ground-truth situiation in Iraq is nearly FUBAR, and much worse off than President "Tell 'Em What They Want to Hear" Bush is indicating with his staged presentation by Alawi. Story on this page.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 29 Sep 04 - 04:39 PM

From the interesting link provided just below by Peedeecee, and excerpt from the editoria of the "Bush hometown paper":

"Four items trouble us the most about the Bush administration: his initiatives to disable the Social Security system, the deteriorating state of the American economy, a dangerous shift away from the basic freedoms established by our founding fathers, and his continuous mistakes regarding Iraq," the editorial said.


The Iconoclast, established in 2000, said it editorialized in support of the invasion of Iraq and publisher W. Leon Smith promoted Bush and the invasion in a BBC interview, believing Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.


"Instead we were duped into following yet another privileged agenda," the editorial said.


The newspaper praised Kerry for "30 years of experience looking out for the American people" and lauded his background as "a highly decorated Vietnam veteran

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 30 Sep 04 - 08:27 AM

The actual editorial from the Crawford, Texas Iconoclast is well worth reading.

Iconclast endorses Kerry.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 30 Sep 04 - 11:29 PM

Why We Must Not Re-elect President Bush
    By George Soros
    George Soros.com

Definitely worth the read. http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/093004D.shtml

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 03 Oct 04 - 09:48 AM

The New York Times discusses the President as Agent of God Almighty hypothesis which appears to be more wide-spread than just a few asylums, and also appears to agree with Bush's self-image.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Amos
Date: 03 Oct 04 - 06:49 PM

In a fascinating article from tomorrow's New York Times, David Barstow analyzes false claims made by the Bush administration concerning nuclear capabilities in Iran:

An excerpt:

In 2002, at a crucial juncture on the path to war, senior members of
the Bush administration gave a series of speeches and interviews in which they asserted that Saddam Hussein was rebuilding his nuclear weapons program. In a speech to veterans that August, Vice President Dick Cheney said Mr.Hussein could have an atomic bomb "fairly soon." President Bush, addressing the United Nations the next month, said there was "little doubt" about Mr. Hussein's appetite for nuclear arms.

The United States intelligence community had not yet concluded that
Iraq was rebuilding its nuclear weapons program. But as the vice president told a group of Wyoming Republicans that September, the United States had "irrefutable evidence" - thousands of tubes made of high-strength aluminum, tubes that the Bush administration said were destined for clandestine Iraqi uranium centrifuges, before some were seized at the behest of the United States.

The tubes quickly became a critical exhibit in t he administration's
brief against Iraq. As the only physical evidence the United States of Mr. Hussein's revived nuclear ambitions, they gave credibility to the apocalyptic imagery invoked by President Bush and his advisers. The tubes were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs," Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, asserted on CNN on Sept. 8, 2002. "We don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud."

But before Ms. Rice made those remarks, she was aware that the
government's foremost nuclear experts had concluded that the tubes were most likely not for nuclear weapons at all, an examination by The New York Times has found. As early as 2001, her staff had been told that these experts, at the Energy Department, believed the tubes were probably intended for small artillery rockets, according to four officials at the Central Intelligence Agency and a senior administration official, all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the information.

The article is on this page.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Oct 04 - 07:18 PM

Dr. Rice Today

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Ebbie
Date: 03 Oct 04 - 07:20 PM

Huzza! My first blicky.

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Leadfingers
Date: 03 Oct 04 - 08:06 PM

Wish I could do Blickies !

Subject: RE: BS: Popular Views of the Bush Administration
From: Leadfingers
Date: 03 Oct 04 - 08:07 PM

But I will do post 300 just to stop El Ted doing it.