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Politics : The Donkey's Inn -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Patricia Trinchero who wrote (3508)	3/31/2002 12:59:44 PM
From: Mephisto	Respond to of 15516

Bush does have a vision for solving trouble abroad. It is: WAR! War feeds his ego, makes him feel important and most of all gives him a reason to be president. Plus, neither he nor his family has a personal risk. Recently, I read the Republican Party attacked the junior senator from Oklahoma or the junior senator from Daschle's state. They claimed he was soft on defense. Well, this junior senator has or had a son in Afghanistan. That's more than the Bushes can ever claim!

To: Patricia Trinchero who wrote (3508)	4/1/2002 2:25:39 PM
From: Mephisto	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15516

Politics in Wartime The Washington Post Sunday, March 31, 2002; Page B06 THE BUSY PACE of fundraising and politicking that President Bush and Vice President Cheney have set for themselves this spring raises questions about the proper role of a commander in chief in wartime. Mr. Bush did not cease to be a Republican on Sept. 11, nor did he forfeit his right to work toward retaining a Republican majority in the House and regaining a Republican majority in the Senate. But as he mixes his presidential and political agendas, there are risks. Some of those risks are purely political, and if the president wants to shoulder them, that's his business. In recent days, for example, he's taken the issue of judgeship confirmations on the political road. "First, we've got to get good, conservative judges appointed to the bench and approved by the United States Senate," he said at a Republican event in Texas. "We need people like [candidate] John Cornyn in the United States Senate, who will work with the White House to have a solid judiciary, to make sure that the judges do what they're supposed to do in the United States and not overstep their bounds." The more judicial appointments are a matter of political ideology for the president, the more justified Democratic senators will feel in considering ideology as they give or withhold their consent to his nominations. But that, as we say, is a risk the president can weigh for himself. On matters of national security, the stakes are larger. As the Bush-Cheney team sets a Clintonian pace for political fundraising, there's a danger of belittling the war as a priority, simply by virtue of schedule. How essential could it be for Mr. Cheney to spend nights in a secure undisclosed location if he spends so much of the rest of his time at well-publicized events on the political circuit? More seriously, when it comes to the war on terrorism, Mr. Bush has asked for, and by and large received, bipartisan support, and rightly so. Now he is telling Republican audiences that "we've got a lot more to do . . . and that's what John [Cornyn] understands." At a political event for Senate candidate Lindsey Graham in South Carolina, the president gave thanks that "our nation is united and determined." But he also implied that Mr. Graham would make a better supporter of the war than any Democratic candidate: "And I look forward to working with Lindsey as we fight this war on terror." On their own there is nothing objectionable about such statements, but the more the president seems to be using the war against terrorism as an issue in political contexts, the more he puts at risk the unity and determination that he rightly cites as a national asset. © 2002 The Washington Post Company