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

To: bearshark who wrote (175047)	11/15/2005 11:14:52 PM
From: jttmab	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Without going back to check, I believe it was in 2003 when the Senate was preparing to move legislation for a Department of Homeland Security and Mr. Bush was still against it. Eventually, he went with it once the political winds were in a clear direction. I think it even originated with the Democrate side of the aisle and at the time I thought it was a stupid idea. It was one of those rare cases where I agreed with Bush and then he had to flop and take credit for the idea. ["Flip" is usually the preferred word, but it's far too elegant for what Bush did, hence "flop"]. And from what I hear from people with good contacts to the DHS it's a disaster. A bunch of political flunkies that don't know what they're doing are in charge. It's not like they streamlined a darn thing. Each federal agency [or military service] now has groups that interface to the DHS, not to mention the joint centers. Buzz word of the decade "Homeland Security". I've also noticed the White House is bolstering its position for invading Iraq by explaining that most supported it. With the Miers nomination they figured out that the change the subject strategy wasn't going to work and turned to the tried and true attack strategy. I'm not sure that's going to work this time around. Major problem is that the majority of the news on Iraq isn't good. And the Dems aren't backing down into defense mode like they usually do. Biden was hitting the news circuit tonight [MSNBC and CNN], so what the Administration is doing is giving a reason for the Dems to get coverage. Let's see if there are any improvments in Mr. Bush's approval ratings from this in the next couple of weeks or so. He's got to at least get a dead-cat bounce. But hanging on to that torture exemption and the alleged secret detention facilities isn't going to help. Is Bush stupid enough to veto a resolution that prohibits torture? I don't think he will because he doesn't do direct confrontation, but if he does he's going to take a political hit for it, domestically and internationally. Mr. Santorum has some problems. In neighboring New Jersey, Mr. Corzine was linking his opponent to Mr. Bush throughout the campaign for governor. I don't think Mr. Santorum missed that. I expect he also noticed what Bush's visit to Virginia did for the governor race. If Mr. Bush's approval ratings are above 50 percent next year, Mr. Santorum will be sniffing around Mr. Bush's posterior with glee. Agreed. Though I think he's going to have to do something along the lines of what you suggested in the SOU. Other than that, I don't see anything good happening in time for the next elections. If they're fighting for the torture exemption would they be willing to announce a troop withdrawl plan for the SOU? Not sure how that Senate resolution will play into that. Two months to the SOU and counting. At the current rate, that's 150 dead US forces and 2250 dead Iraqis. [Seems to be about a 1:15 ratio] jttmab