September 7, 2004

Exactly What I've Been Saying

Jim Geraghty at the Kerry Spot (which you should be reading!) says this in reaction to the Kitty Kelly book:

We've had Howard Dean spreading the rumor that the Saudis warned Bush about 9/11. Ted Kennedy contended - in an argument that defies logic - that the war on Iraq was "planned in Texas" to benefit the president politically. We've had Michael Moore making the case that the war in Afghanistan was about a natural gas pipeline and oil company profits. We've had Paul Krugman arguing in the pages of the New York Times that Bush is trying to destroy democracy. We've had the antiwar left arguing, again and again, that Bush is the second coming of Hitler. I suspect that after a while, the public just tunes out this stuff.

I mean, once you've killed thousands in a war to boost Halliburton's profits, repealed the Constitution, and destroyed democracy, isn't cocaine use kind of mild?

Posted by Ithildin at September 7, 2004 4:22 PM | PROCURE FINE OLD WORLD ABSINTHE

Moreover, "old dirt" like coke use doesn't hurt the President because it's already out there. As they say of markets, the electorate has already discounted it: it's incorporated in the "price" (approval rating).

Posted by: Dave J at September 7, 2004 4:44 PM

But let's not forget that there are lots of wild and incorrect theories about Kerry circulating on the right. Since he's not president, they're not quite as spectacular, but I'd estimate that about 10% of what I hear about Kerry from the right is actually a decent summation of where he stands or what he's done. Should I draw from that, hey, don't vote for Bush? I don't think so. I don't think you can say much one way or the other based on the guys who come up with wild theories.

We need to examine the two candidates based on what we anticipate each of them will and will not do for the country. I personally believe that Bush talks a much better game than he actually implements. He talks big on terror, but we were attacked on 9/11 by bin Laden and al-Qaeda, and Iraq had no significant connection to either. Meanwhile the war is perpetuating anti-American anger in the Middle East, which helps terrorists recruit there, and is distracting us from our solemn mission of focusing on al-Qaeda: we owe that to the 3000 (!) people who lost their lives on 9/11, and to the towering symbols of New York that bin Laden leveled.

The war is costing us hundreds of billions of dollars, while homeland security experts are telling us we are neither spending enough on homeland security nor focusing enough energy on it. Of course we're thinking about it more, but that's not because of Bush. No matter what, after 9/11 we'd be thinking more about homeland security. But as Republican Warren Rudman of the bipartisan Hart-Rudman commission said, we're "not doing enough." If we spent the Iraq money on homeland security, we would be doing WAY more than anyone suggests we should; instead, we're doing too little.

The State Department listed 45 countries in which al-Qaeda was operating on 9/11, and Iraq wasn't one of them. It is now, and recent polls out of the Middle East suggest that anti-Americanism has skyrocketed there (so much so that there isn't really such a thing as pro-Americanism in Egypt, for instance, anymore).

If we catch bin Laden tomorrow, it will have taken us three years, way too long. His assistant, Ayman al-Zawahiri, is still at-large. Mullah Omar, the leader of the Taliban, is still at-large. Al-Qaeda has had no trouble recruiting new people, but thanks to international cooperation, they are having a much tougher time coordinating their efforts. However, THAT has nothing to do with Bush, who has undermined international cooperation, not enhanced it!

Al-Qaeda is a privately-sponsored organization, and yet we've got this blustry military-centric "war on terror" that is only stirring up new anger. 9/11 could have been an isolated incident, but partly because of Bush's response, it's very unlikely to be.

I don't love either candidate this year, and I'd like to support Bush more than I do, but I simply believe his policies are some of the more dangerous policies I've ever seen. He's really confident about them, but when I dig beneath the surface of his rhetoric, what I find greatly concerns me. My loyalty is to trying to figure out what's best for this country, not to any one guy, so that's why I can't in good conscience support Bush.

I went off-topic, it's true. My other largest complaint with Bush is the way he's handled the economy. I think his economic policy is crude and has set America back unnecessarily. And at the same time, his fiscal policy is dangerous too because we're now piling up more debt that we will be able to sustain if something happens to us.

The problem is that Bush just isn't conservative at all. We're in two wars, stretched so thin that if we're attacked again -- God forbid -- we'll be in trouble. And our fiscal policy is so dangerous that if we hit an economic obstacle, it may be tough for us to extricate ourselves. When you spend all your rainy-day money before it really starts pouring, you sometimes regret it later.

Kerry's not perfect, but we need a change of course.

Posted by: trl10 at September 9, 2004 2:10 PM