With his party, and possibly his Presidency, about to go down hard next Tuesday, President Bush has been trying just about everything. [snark alert] If Democrats win next Tuesday, we'll be fighting the terrorists on Main Street, USA. If Democrats win next Tuesday, they'll abolish marriage, the Bible, and probably apple pie (my personal favorite kind of pie, by the way...bummer that my party's going to abolish it - ha!). If Democrats win next Tuesday, they'll probably take away all our guns, not to mention puppy dogs and wittle kittens, just cuz they're such bad BAD people! Yeah, and they might even fight for working Americans as opposed to the rich and powerful. We can't have that now, can we? C'mon, now, this is America, after all! [end snark alert]
Seriously, though, faced with big-time, possibly historic losses on November 7, 2006, George W. Bush and his "brain," Karl Rove, apparently have decided to revisit a golden oldie - the 2004 Presidential smearfest/Swiftboating campaign against John F. Kerry.
Thus, we have a highly orchestrated White House strategy to twist, turn, and otherwise torture (waterboarding, anyone?) John Kerry's lame, botched joke about Bush's (lack of) intelligence into somehow showing that Kerry - and, I guess, by "logical" extension, all Democrats - was insulting our soldiers fighting in Iraq. Soldiers like, ahem, Jimmy Webb, I might point out. And soldiers NOT like, ahem, the sons and daughters of most members of the Bush Administration or Republican Congress. What. Ever.
So, Bush is calling Kerry's (wildly distorted and contorted) remarks "shameful?" Hmmmm. How about we review a few things that really ARE shameful.
*Lying to take us to war (WMD, anyone?)
*"Mission accomplished" and "bring it on!"
*Massive budget deficits
*Trashing Social Security
*Trashing the environment
*Trashing America's image overseas
*Torturing people (Abu Ghraib, Gitmo anyone?)
*Trampling our Constitution
*Revealing the identity of a covert CIA agent
*Katrina (HECKUVA job!)
*Essentially calling their political opponents traitors
*Spying on Americans without a warrant
*Robbing from the working and middle classes to give to...ExxonMobil!
*Standing by Dennis Hastert, who was last seen making excuses for knowing about Mark Foley but doing nothing about it for several years.
This is just a short list, so please feel free to add to it. I just wanted to provide a bit of perspective on what these Republicans are doing here, consciously and with malice aforethought. Speaking of "shameful...."
P.S. FLASH update! John Kerry's not running for anything this year!!! Apparently the White House missed that little factoid.
Lowell Feld is Netroots Coordinator for the Jim Webb for US Senate Campaign. The ideas expressed here belong to Lowell Feld alone, and do not represent those of Jim Webb, his advisors, staff, or supporters.
Yes we know its true, the only thing that Bush seems to do well--he certainly can't run a war--the only thing Bush seems to do well is beat up on John Kerry.
Ok, so lets stop talking about it. John Kerry should apologize, because he did say it, even though he meant to say something else, but the words still left his mouth. Say your sorry, get your digs in at bush and get out of the light.
Also have to say that I like the line, Bush is such a failure that the only thing he seems to be good at is beating up on John Kerry, because he certainly can not run a war worth a damn!
I think you're not getting what's going on here. The WH can't talk about the issues, so they just create an issue out of a one word botched joke. Sorry, Americans are smarter than that. But Democrats are foolish if they start buying into the WH spin. It's plain wrong, and I hope you reconsider.
BUSH IS LETTING A FOREIGN LEADER CONTROL OUR TROOPS!!!
THIS IS BIG, why are the Ds not pouncing on this:
"The New York Times leads with the Iraqi prime minister ordering the U.S. military to lift its blockade on Sadr City, which is seen as an attempt by Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to assert his independence from the American forces. U.S. troops seemed to have been caught off-guard by the demands but later went ahead and lifted the checkpoints"
THEY WERE LOOKING FOR A US SOLDER WHO HAD BEEN KID NAPPED AND MALIKI IS NIXING THE OPERATION