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Politics : Moderate Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: rrufff who wrote (7665)	3/8/2004 12:31:21 PM
From: TigerPaw	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 20773

You got it all wrong. The voters of Haiti put Aristide in power. Clinton championed the concept of democracy in Haiti. Clinton, Kerry, or Chirac are nowhere near where Bush is, which happens to be in Crawford on another of his extended vacations. In the meantime the neocons are trying to wrap up as many coups as they can before Bush is defeated. TP

To: rrufff who wrote (7665)	3/8/2004 12:58:13 PM
From: American Spirit	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 20773

Republican Insiders Deeply Worried about GWB Campaign NewsweekMarch 15 issue - The controversy over President George W. Bush's new TV ads featuring firefighters and fleeting images of the 9/11 attacks threw campaign officials on the defensive—and raised questions about the Bush team's ability to effectively spend its massive $150 million war chest, some GOP insiders say. The president's ad team, led by Austin, Texas-based media maven Mark McKinnon, had carefully road-tested the spots in focus groups, and Bush himself signed off. But the rollout of the ads, which argue that Bush has made the country "safer, stronger," was quickly marred by charges from some 9/11 families that the Bush team was seeking to exploit the attacks for political gain. One scene shows footage of a flag-draped coffin of a terror victim; another has an American flag waving in front of World Trade Center wreckage. Publicly, Bush aides were dismissive and insisted the flap had only strengthened their plan to make 9/11 "a central topic of the campaign." "There's no way you can talk about George W. Bush without talking about September 11," said one campaign adviser. "It's like talking about Franklin Roosevelt without mentioning World War II." But privately, some GOP strategists were disturbed by the backlash and suggested the ad team had misjudged how the imagery would play. "It's quite shocking to a number of Republicans to watch them stumble out of the block like this," said one veteran GOP consultant, who added that the big question in GOP circles is "Do they [the Bush-Cheney campaign] know how to spend" their huge budget? advertisement Another, less publicized aspect of the ad flap: Everyone but the firefighters were paid actors. The firefighters posing in a firehouse was "stock" film footage of volunteer firefighters -- shot and available for purchase to the general public. The flap is likely to put renewed attention on the White House's continuing wrangle with the 9/11 Commission. Kristin Breitweiser, a leader of a 9/11 family group, charged it was "hypocritical" of the Bush team to use September 11 when the president has refused to turn over sensitive intelligence documents to the full commission and, more recently, insisted that Bush himself will meet with the panel's chair and co-chair for only one hour. Even some GOP panel members are miffed at the White House stand—and blame it on administration lawyers. In what appears to be an attempt to defuse some of the controversy, NEWSWEEK has learned, White House officials have privately signaled to the commission that Bush will not rigidly stick to the one-hour time limit. When time is up, Bush won't walk out if there are still more questions, an aide said.

To: rrufff who wrote (7665)	3/8/2004 1:06:11 PM
From: The Philosopher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 20773

If anything has gotten old, it's blame everything on Bush. The problem is, the Democrats have so little positive to run on, that for the most part their only stragegy is to run against Bush. This is clear from the "anybody but Bush" language. Now, I have some serious issues with Bush. I'm not sure he's the least bad candidate. (It's been years since I had a candidate I could get positively excited about. Now I'm generally not trying to look for a good candidate, but for the least worst alternative.) But at the same time, there are worse people out there than Bush looking to be President. (Who, you ask? Start with Lyndon LaRouche, go on to Sharpton, and go down a laundry list of dozens of other candidates.) If one really means "anybody but Bush" one has to mean any of those. Which is downright dumb, IMO. But back to the point, if you have no positive message of your own to put forward, the only strategy is to blame everything on the other person. So that's what the Dems do. And, pretty soon, when Bush gets to campaigning in earnest, it's what he'll be doing, too. Mark my words.