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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: geode00 who wrote (169432)	8/20/2005 12:46:32 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 281500

Bush Plans Sept. 11 Reminders guardian.co.uk By RON FOURNIER AP Political Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - What began as one mother's vigil on a country road in Texas two weeks ago has grown into a nationwide protest, putting a grieving human face to the miseries of war and the misgivings about President Bush's strategies in Iraq. It's still not clear whether Cindy Sheehan's effort was the start of a lasting anti-war movement or a fleeting summertime story fueled by media-savvy liberal interest groups. Sheehan left the camp Thursday, rushing to the side of her mother, who had suffered a stroke in California. She said she would be back if possible before Bush leaves his ranch for Washington on Sept. 3. While her backers maintain the vigil in Texas, Republican Party leaders are worried that the so-called Peace Mom has brought long-simmering unease over Iraq to a boil by galvanizing anti-war activists. They fear that protests will strike a chord with the large number of Americans who have long felt uneasy about the war yet have been giving Bush the benefit of the doubt. The president's falling poll numbers - less than 40 percent approve of his handling of Iraq - could drop further, threatening his military plans in Iraq, his agenda at home and Republican political prospects in the 2006 congressional and gubernatorial elections. But will that happen? Will one woman's demand to meet the president outside his vacation home be viewed someday as a tipping point against the war? ``It's really hard to tell whether this will be a blip on the radar screen or whether it reflects a deep change in public opinion,' said John Green, director of the University of Akron's Ray C. Bliss Institute for Applied Politics. ``A lot will depend to what extent Sheehan and her vigil link up with the disquiet we're seeing in public polls, especially with the people who haven't been opposed to the war in the past.' It also depends on factors outside the control of Bush, Sheehan and their supporters. A reduction in violence in Iraq or a legitimate, new constitution for the government would help Bush. More bloodshed and no political progress in Iraq would probably give momentum to Sheehan and her supporters. Changing the subject would help Bush, and he has a chance to do that with the upcoming fourth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist strikes. Aides say the president plans to invoke Sept. 11 in his weekly radio address Saturday as he begins a weeklong push to remind Americans why he believes the United States must stay on the offensive in Iraq and not bow to terrorists. He plans to address the Veterans of Foreign Wars on Monday and a National Guard group on Wednesday. Whether or not she has sparked a lasting anti-war movement, it can't be denied that Sheehan has thrust herself and her cause into the spotlight at near-record speed. The vigil began Aug. 6, when she showed up outside Bush's ranch with 50 demonstrators to demand a meeting. ``I want to ask the president, Why did you kill my son? What did my son die for?'' she said. Her son, Casey, 24, was killed in Sadr City, Iraq, on April 4, 2004. Less than a week into the vigil, the president gave Sheehan's protest a public relations boost by talking about it. He told reporters that while he sympathized with her, her call to withdraw U.S. troops "would be a mistake for the security of this country." MoveOn.org and other liberal interest groups used the Internet, e-mails and cable TV news coverage to keep the protest in full view. Normally slow news cycles of August were filled with stories about Sheehan and her fallen son - an altar boy, Eagle Scout and church youth troop leader. Even before the vigil, public opinion was shifting against Bush and the war. An AP-Ipsos poll showed a majority of people questioning the president's honesty. A Gallup Poll suggested that nearly six in 10 wanted some or all U.S. troops to be withdrawn. Bush's own advisers began to privately acknowledge that Americans were finding their views on Iraq out of sync with his upbeat rhetoric. Confronted by anxious constituents during their August recess, a few GOP lawmakers joined several Democratic ones in denouncing the war. Some Republicans who favor the war urged Bush to do a better job defending it. Others say Bush made a mistake in refusing to meet with Sheehan again (he met her along with other soldiers' family members in 2004). "The better course of action would have been to immediately invite her in the ranch," Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., a 2008 presidential prospect, said on CNN's ``The Situation Room.' Bush's backers argue that anti-war groups would have found another way to maintain pressure. As it is, they organized 1,600 candlelight vigils Wednesday night calling for an end to the war. One activist has called Sheehan "the Rosa Parks of the anti-war movement," a reference to the civil rights heroine who refused to give up her seat to a white man on a city bus in Montgomery, Ala., in 1955. What happens in Iraq the next weeks and months may determine whether the "Peace Mom" finds her own place in history, or becomes a footnote.

To: geode00 who wrote (169432)	8/20/2005 1:01:30 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Russert Watch Preview: Back, Rested, and Ready to Come Clean ? By Arianna Huffington 08.19.2005 After turning the no-tough-question-left-unasked chores over to Andrea Mitchell last week, Tim Russert appears ready to return to his hosting duties. Let’s hope he used the time off for a little soul-searching, and will take the opportunity on this week’s show to finally come clean about his still-unexplained involvement in Plamegate. Now, I don’t mean to gnaw on a bone (actually, I do mean to gnaw on a bone -- isn’t that what blogging is all about?) but I still think Russert owes it to his viewers to put himself in the Meet the Press hot seat. Or, if not, then at least yell “bullshit!” on the air, get himself suspended, and go into hiding. But as long as Russert continues to remain visible, he needs to fess up about the mystery everyone in Washington is talking about. If Scooter Libby did in fact tell Pat Fitzgerald that he first learned of Valerie Plame’s identity from Russert, and Russert continues to stand by his August 2004 claim that “he did not know Ms. Plame’s name or that she was a CIA operative and that he did not provide that information to Mr. Libby”, the inescapable question is: Is one of them lying or can both of these things be true? Could Russert have just told Libby that “Joe Wilson’s CIA agent wife” was the one who suggested her hubby be sent to Niger? In that case, as Tom Maguire puts it: “No name, no ‘operative’ -- and no comment from NBC”. So, come on, Tim: Did you or did you not -- in any fashion -- discuss Plame with Libby? And if you had that info, who had given it to you? Two simple questions. Won’t take up too much air time. Then you’ll be able to go on with your show... which actually looks like a good one, with Sen. Russ Feingold coming on to discuss his bold decision to be the first U.S. Senator to offer a specific target date -- Dec. 31, 2006 -- for all U.S. troops to be withdrawn from Iraq, followed by Trent Lott talking about Iraq and the harsh words he has for Bill Frist and others in his new book. Russert will also discuss Iraq with two former advisors of the Coalition Provisional Authority -- Larry Diamond and Dan Senor -- who see the White House’s handling of the war very, very differently. So, after providing us with some answers, here are a few of the questions I’d like to hear Russert ask his guests: “Sen. Feingold, you’ve said that you decided to propose the Dec. 2006 deadline after holding 15 town hall meetings this month and being met with a wave of public disenchantment with the war in Iraq... yet many of your fellow Democrats -- including a number who might, like yourself, be considering a run for the White House in 2008 -- continue to side with the president’s contention that setting a deadline would make it easier for the insurgents to wait us out. Are these other Democrats out of touch with the concerns of the American people? Have they been spending too much time inside the Beltway -- or on Martha’s Vineyard?” “Sen. Lott, in a speech this week you said that when it came to Bosnia and Kosovo, you often asked President Clinton, ‘What’s the exit strategy? Why are we doing all the heavy lifting? Why do we have to always be on the point of the spear?’ And you suggested that you should be asking President Bush the same set of questions. So why haven’t you?” “A follow-up: In that same speech, you expressed the hope that the president will begin developing an exit strategy and said that ‘within the next six to nine months’ we’re going to reach a point where we basically put the fate of Iraq in the hands of the Iraqi people, saying to them you can ‘govern yourselves or you can go on killing each other like you have for 2,000 years’. Six to nine months? Are your GOP colleagues beginning to fear that Iraq is going to be a losing issue for your party in 2006?" For Diamond or Senor: “Can either of you tell us where that missing $9 billion the Coalition Provisional Authority can’t account for might have gone? As you know, there are American soldiers who could use armor for their vehicles and American vets who could use the benefits.” huffingtonpost.com