What if Bush Wins?

Perish the thought.

A panel of 16 writers over at the Washington Monthly chime in on what they think a 2nd Bush term would look like. Check it out.

(shiver)

Comments

[Luke]

Ugh. I've just noticed the new Electoral Vote projection down there. This thing's going to give me an ulcer.

[Chrish]

Take some Pepto Bismol Luke, it will help.

Oh the doom and gloom, the End of the World as we
know it, Armageddon.... :o)

Galbraith:
"a progressive Republican who fought the monopolies and favored the environment, and then by Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat who brought us the income tax."

Isn't it interesting how it was a Republican who
took on the monopolies, stood up for the environment? And isn't it equally interesting that it was a Democrat who brought us the income
tax; the Bastard! And look what the Democrats,
our party leaders, continue to do with those taxes.

Are you sure you wanted to include the one by Grover Norquist, "The Democratic Party is Toast"?

Sad to say perhaps this is exactly what the Democratic Party really needs. Every election it's the same old rhetoric; the race card is brought into play, social security scare, health care scare. Never mind that they've had more than
enough time and control to fix or correct all of these issues but, have done nothing. Excuse me
they did give themselves a nice pension plan, health care plan when they retire and let's not forget that they also gave themselves an automatic pay increase every year and We, who pay their salary, have nothing to say about it.

Seems to me what the Democratic Party, specifically the leadership needs is a good, solid, swift kick in the ass. I'm all for that. "Sometimes you need to take a bat upside the head of a Jackass to get its attention.", and they, the party leadership, really needs a bat upside their head.

[jj]

speaking of doom and gloom, I once (actually quite frequently) predicted exactly that and was chided, of course, for being pessimistic and all of that, you know the spiel. In fact, I believe I was accused of single-handedly losing the Iraq war because of my pessimsm. Well, when is it ok to say, "I told you so"

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1305360,00.html

pay attention in particular to the analogies to WWII Germany. Doom and gloom coming right at you! And to think, that Bush is leading the election! Geez, maybe the Brits are right, not only are we incredibly simple, we are downright ignorant and dumb beyond belief. But that's ok, as long I run around waving the flag, everything will be ok.

Czesc!! Any expats against Bush living in Poland out there? Check out warsawstation.blogspot.com: The definitive site for Kielbasa Democrats. Post a comment, contact me, Gustav, or join our group!

Hey wait a second ... now even the Intelligence services are predicting doom and gloom in Iraq?

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/16/politics/16intel.html?hp

Well blow me down. The only thing left for our Bush loving friends to do now is somehow twist this into a problem that Clinton is responsible for. That seems to be the tactic for avoiding any accountability in the Bush administration.

[Jim]

Wow, the New York Times said something bad about the war. Shocker. Next we might hear Rush Limbaugh saying bad things about the Democrats.

Those poll #'s reflect what happens when you run your campaign on two things 1) You're not the President (Anybody but Bush) and 2) You served in a war 35 years ago.
Why this guy made Vietnam the central point of his campaign nobody will ever know.

[Chrish]

Jim,

You forgot:
1) Kerry said he would have voted for the resolution authorizing force against Iraq even if he had known then no weapons of mass destruction would be found.

2) Kerry told the Wall Street Journal on July 16 that he is afraid Bush might pull U.S. troops out of Iraq sooner than a Democratic administration would. Kerry has promised, if elected, to keep U.S. troops in Iraq through the end of his first term - January 2009!

3) Kerry is also calling for adding 40,000 more active-duty soldiers to the army, doubling the number of Special Forces soldiers, and increasing the Pentagon budget.

So who is or who wants to be the War President?

[Jim]

Chrish,
You're right, he has said those things. But he has also contradicted himself many times too. He was only 1 of 12 senators to not vote for the $87 billion - most of which was for the troops. Even the Clintons told him to vote for it. I know the reason he didn't was because he wanted the anti-war people's support for the primaries against Dean and Edwards. But that almost makes it worse. I think he's been in the senate so long, he doesn't even know where he stands on things.
He picked the wrong issues to fight. Hey, I'll concede he did more than Bush in Vietnam 35 years ago. But what about since he returned, his record in the senate, etc etc. He had a better chance at winning on the economy and health care (even though I'm personally against government sponsored health care, at least he believes in it).
The fact is, most people who are voting for Bush are voting for Bush, while most people who are voting for Kerry, aren't voting for Kerry, they are just voting against Bush. That kind of passion dies out when you find out you're just left with a handful of nuance of somebody who doesn't know where they stand on things.
Kerry has said, "I would do almost everything differently on the Iraq War", but like you said, knowing what he knows now, he would still go in. To say he would do almost everything differently is the biggest piece of Monday morning quarterbacking I have ever seen. He says he would build a bigger coalition (presumably meaning France and Germany), but he doesn't say how. By just speaking French?

Watching Kerry is like the scene in the movie Airplane, where the air traffic controllers are following the plane in trouble..."he's at 32,000 ft., now he's at 19,000 ft., he's all over the place. What an as-hole"

[Chrish]

How true Jim, I've ignored the claims about Kerry's action or non-action in Vietnam as heresay but, can't ignore his actions before Congress when he testified against the rest of us as being war criminals. That one is a matter of
on the record.

Come to think of it he also claimed he had committed atrocities in Nam so why hasn't he been brought up on charges of war crimes? Special treatment perhaps?

From one day to the next you don't know where Kerry stands. It all seems to depend upon whom he
happens to be speaking to at that moment or he can't seem to make up his mind where he stands.
That, to me, speaks very loudly of his lack of character, integrity, honesty, and non-committal
positions. One would suspect that he'd be looking towards France, Germany, Russia, or the UN for guidance on what his actions should be as regards Iraq or if we were to get hit again.

I'm not very impressed with Bush but, at least the man has been consistent in his statements, direction, and position these past 3+ years. With Kerry we don't know what we would be getting,
where we'd be going, nor what he would do if we were to get hit again. If Kerry is going to take a position on anything then, damnit, he should stand by it irregardless of where or to whom he is speaking to. At least he should have the cajones to stand by his position and be a man about it.

[jj]

never mind that while you guys debate Kerry, Iraq has turned to shit. That subject seems to have fallen off the table - kind of surprising for a couple of guys who care so much about the everyday well-being of Iraqis.

[Jim]

I know JJ. I can't believe we've been ther for 18 months and things still aren't absolutely perfect. It really irks me that they have sovereignty, have had numerous regional elections and are still on schedule for national elections in the next few months.

[Luke]

Jim,

Pretty much nobody that's not politically motivated to do so is saying that the January elections are going to go forward as planned (who gets to run the Fallujah poll station?) or that the situation isn't dire.

But don't take my word for it, ask the CIA and their most recent National Intelligence Estimate (from http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/16/politics/16intel.html?ei=5090&en=f2344cc156ca79c7&ex=1252987200&partner=rssuserland&pagewanted=all&position=):

"A classified National Intelligence Estimate prepared for President Bush in late July spells out a dark assessment of prospects for Iraq, government officials said Wednesday.

The estimate outlines three possibilities for Iraq through the end of 2005, with the worst case being developments that could lead to civil war, the officials said. The most favorable outcome described is an Iraq whose stability would remain tenuous in political, economic and security terms.

....Its pessimistic conclusions were reached even before the recent worsening of the security situation in Iraq, which has included a sharp increase in attacks on American troops and in deaths of Iraqi civilians as well as resistance fighters."

[Jim]

Thanks for the link, Luke. There's a lot of speculation in the article. I know the Iraqi's here, http://english.iraqdemparty.org/ are planning on elections. But you know, a lot of people said we couldn't hand over sovereignty until the whole country was secure.
The truth is, if we wait until there is no violence whatsoever, there will never be elections. Yes, there will be attacks. However, delaying elections only empowers the terrorists. Having elections gives people hope, and a say in their future and thus less of a reason to resort to terrorism. Nobody ever said this would be easy. Nobody ever said it would happen overnight. But delaying elections would halt progress. When delays are officially announced, rather than speculated about, please let me know. I'll be sure to read it.

[Chrish]

What's also of interest is what the Iraqi people,
themselves, have to say regarding the situation
in their country. Aren't they what the whole thing is all about? Determining their own destiny, deciding for themselves what they want
for their future not what the outsiders or interlopers (terrorist groups and Hussein hanger's
on)want.

What do the Iraqi people say?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2004/03_march/16/iraq_polls.shtml

What do Iraqis think:
http://www.epic-usa.org/Default.aspx?tabid=166

More on what the Iraqi people think:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/world/GoodMorningAmerica/Iraq_anniversary_poll_040314.html?INTERNATIONALad=true

The media constantly and consistently paints a bad
picture of what's going on in Iraq; the terrorist attacks, the kidnappings and brutal murders of innoncent civilians. They never, if ever, report
on the other side of the story. If they do it's buried deep within their websites or newspapers.

The schools being built, the rebuilding that is going on, the children returning to the new schools, the growing number of Iraqi's joining the police force and military, the hospitals being restored or rebuilt. All of this being done by both Iraqi and coalition forces led by Our troops, Our people.

For every horror story reported by the news media
there are more stories of the good being done, the hope for a better future, the hard work being done by both the Iraqi people themselves and the coalition to rebuild a country and her people. The stories are out there but, the news media is
either hung up on the ghoulish and horrific stories or they're reporting with bias; take note Dan Rather and CBS News.....

[Jim]

Chrish,
You can't just go around citing actual facts of what the Iraqi's themselves think. I mean, why should their opinions matter? I find it odd that that 86% say their most important need is a democracy. But didn't they vote Saddam to stay in office by 100% of the votes just before the war? Why didn't they vote him out.
Remember, it's more important to show only what is wrong at all costs, in order to get Bush out of office, than it is to actually help the Iraqi people.

On a less sarcastic note, thanks for the links. I'm amazed at how many people want to see Iraq fail, just to prove Bush wrong.
You'll have to excuse me now. I'm getting ould my old IBM Selectric so I can send a fax to Dan Rather.

[Jeff]

There are some people who want Iraq to fail just to prove Bush wrong, just as there are people who want Iraq to succeed just to prove Bush right. So I believe we should all try to stay out of those two camps because it really isn't helpful.

I don't want Iraq to fail. I want our president (the CEO) and his administration to use the best possible intelligence to make the best possible decisions and be honest when telling the American people (the shareholders) about it so we can make an informed decision. That's all. Do you really believe that we're getting that?

It all starts with the selling of the war. All the Bushies told us that they were certain that WMD were there and we were all warned of mushroom clouds, biological weapons, dirty bombs, selling nukes to terrorists on the open market, etc. Were we told that there were serious doubts from extremely knowledgable and credible intelligence? No. Were we told that the CIA thought the uranium sale in Africa was fake? No. Did they admit that they had the info once it was revealed as a fake. No. The list goes on and on...

So exactly why should we trust Bush now? Anyone who opposed the war was painted as a French ass kisser. Now anyone who opposes is painted as being unpatriotic or not supporting our troops. When asked about WMD, Bush never once answered the question, instead he responded with what you always say, the world is better without Saddam.

That's all good for you since you believe that it was worth the sacrifice that we've made and the sacrifice that we have yet to make. Don't you think we should have had the opportunity to make that choice for ourselves when the stakes are this high, i.e. our lives? Since he didn't tell us the truth before, why should we believe him now?

What you say about the media may well be true, they may not be reporting about all the good that our troops are doing there. But 250 people died this week. I'm pretty sure that's bad. We've only been there 18 months. Are you really sure that things will be that much better 18 months from now? What makes you sure? I don't think optimism or pessimism has anything to do with my position. The CEO has been telling me business is great every single quarter for the last two years and every time, the results fall short of the expectations.

So from a leadership standpoint, it really doesn't matter what happens in Iraq. If it goes poorly, but Bush offers me full honesty, disclosure, and shows that he really understands the risks and consequences of his actions, I would vote for him. If on the other hand, it goes well and he misleads, lies, and is otherwise incompetent, then he still needs to be replaced.

What we have here of course, is much worse. People are dying and our leader pretends that he is staying the course while disguising the fact that he flip flops whenever popular dissent (threatening chances of re-election) sways him (see forming Homeland Security, 9/11 Commission, WMD Commission, testifying before 9/11, Rice testifying before 9/11, etc.)

jim and chrish (short for christian i'm guessing), when you get through patting each other on the back could you answer this question? why did we go into iraq? was it to give iraqis free elections? funny, i don't remember colin powell mentioning that when trying to get UN approval.

the neocons keep twisting and twisting the debate further and further away from what should be discussed. was iraq a real threat to the US before the war? is the US safer now than it was before bush became president? i think the neocons know the answers are both a resounding "no" and hence choose to discuss elections. no one gave a rat's ass about democracy in iraq before, but now it's a battle cry. what a joke!

[Jim]

I think after the Iraqi elections, people on this site will say, "oh it's not really an election because the US rigged them."
How many people did Saddam kill on a per month basis?
Jeff,
If it goes poorly and Bush admits mistakes you will vote for Bush, but if it goes well and he doesn't admit mistakes you won't? That sounds so backwards. Aren't the results more important than how we get there? I know you will tear that last sentence up, but the results are what's important.
Voting based on spite. I've never seen it lauded so much.

[Jeff]

Jim, nice try at quoting me, but you're a bit off. I just want Bush to be honest with me. Is that so much to ask from my president?

If it goes poorly, but Bush fully disclosed the situation to us at the beginning (many doubts on WMD), told us that he still believed Saddam had them, admitted mistakes on WMD instead of answering "progress" or "the world is better without Saddam", and offered a realistic plan going forward, I would vote for him.

Look at it another way Jim, going back to the CEO analogy, just because a company does well does not mean that you have a good CEO or vice versa. If the company is in a great business with no competition, it might do well in spite of a terrible leadership. On the other hand, if the company is in an ultra competitive business, it might do poorly with even the best CEO (though it may cease to exist without him).

If results were all that mattered, then one might conclude that Clinton was a great president because he presided over the greatest economic boom of all time. In fact, that's what many people perceive, with no factual basis other than he was there at the party. I happen to disagree... I think he set us up for a fall (and that Bush is setting us up for an even bigger fall).

At any rate Jim, if you're standing on the results, I really hate to tell you this... they suck. 20,000 dead people, 1,000 of whom are our own, original elimination of WMD purpose of the mission ridiculous... the default is that it sucks. You can build a million new schools and it won't make up for that loss of life that continues every single damn day.

You've already told me before that you think that WMD and trusting bad intelligence from people like Chalabi were huge mistakes. Why shouldn't Bush be fired for them? Given that he messed up before and was not truthful with us, what makes you sure that anything else he says is true?

You ridicule CBS and Dan Rather for not doing their homework... rightly so. How is that different than not doing homework on an obviously forged document about a uranium purchase in Africa? WMD is about a billion times more important than some shady document about something that happened 35 years ago, isn't it? Even worse, after not doing homework on it, Rice lied to us about not having any warning, even though she held a CIA memo in her hand.

As I've said before, it's great if you're happy with the results. Just don't tell me that you're happy at being mislead and lied to. You want a Republican President? Nominate McCain instead of offering me an administration that sends our troops to battle while ignoring strong evidence against WMD and hiding it from us.

[Jim]

Jeff said:
"I don't want Iraq to fail. I want our president (the CEO) and his administration to use the best possible intelligence to make the best possible decisions and be honest when telling the American people (the shareholders) about it so we can make an informed decision"
Jeff, we don't make these decisions - the President and Congress do. The President and congress saw the evidence. They agreed Saddam was a threat.
But Jeff, I have conceded the WMD agrgument to you time and time again. Why do you keep beating a dead horse? Logic says you can't prove something does NOT exist. However, we haven't found them, so I will concede this. But Jeff, the President always listed numerous reasons for this war - even if it wasn't his biggest point when speaking to the U.N. (whose members had no problem violating the Oil for Food program).
Are 20,000 (alleged) Iraqi's and 1,000 Americans worth getting rid of Saddam. The reason I say alleged about the Iraqi deaths, is I wonder how many have come at the hands of their own army, terrorists and other suicide bombers. People who are willing to murder their own people because they really hate freedom. I can understand not wanting to be occupied and hating Americans, but targeting Iraqi's just shows hatred of freedom.
Regarding the economy, the stock market had already started to fall big time under Clinton. Fortunately in America, which has a pretty free economy, Presidents have very little impact on the economy. They get too much credit and too much blame. Yes, they do some things that help or hurt to a degree, like implementing regulation, or placing tarriffs or making tax cuts. But for the most part, our economy is cylcical. It always has been. Then there are some things that exaggerate the ecoomy like the fake dot.com boom and bust. Oh and 9/11 did have some effect on our economy too.

Anyway, despite what you may think, I'm glad there are people like you who will always question. We need that. Isn't it great that we can disagree without going to jail or being censored? Isn't it great that Iraqi's can now question their government now too?

Best of luck.
Removing Saddam and his government will have positive consequences for the LONG TERM future of the Middle East and the world. And please don't say you are glad Saddam is gone, unless you agree that it was worth it to get rid of him.

[Jeff]

Jim, are you sure that both the President and Congress saw the evidence? I don't know that all the members of Congress had access to all the evidence against the existence of WMD and the imminent danger from Saddam. Further, I'm not all that certain that the President saw all the evidence either.

What I do know is that the war was sold to the American public. The administration offered information that was completely one sided and left out most if not all of the counter arguments, credible or not. A good example is President Bush citing the testimony of Hussein Kamel, saying that Saddam had produced 30,000 of anthrax. Of course, Kamel also said that all the WMD had been destroyed, but Bush failed to disclose that to us. Why?

Time and time again, Bush failed to tell us the truth, again by lying, misleading, or omitting evidence against his position. No, we don't get to make those decisions about war, but we do decide who gets the power to make those decisions. When people in power do a crappy job, they should get fired.

Jim, you say that you have conceded the WMD argument many times, but that's not what I'm after. There are many scenarios to me where it would be disappointing, but acceptable if we didn't find WMD. If the evidence pointed towards WMD, strong connection with 9/11, strong evidence of nuclear pursuit by Saddam, and we were wrong, how could I fault my President?

Not so. Instead, after we send our troops to war, we find that much of the cited evidence is complete crap and contradicted by better connected sources. We find that there are piles and piles of material against WMD, against, Saddam having anything to do with 9/11, against Saddam's nuclear capabilities.

These are all undeniable facts, yet the Bushies chose not to share with us, and instead exaggerated and even relied on crap evidence to send our troops to war! If CBS had one IBM Selectric, just how many do you think the Bushies had? It's almost insulting how poor the evidence is and how easy it was to doubt.

It's not a dead horse Jim, rather it goes to the heart of the matter as we decide who to vote for. Who did a good job? Who can we trust? Consider one very simple example. Dick Cheney told us and I quote:

"I've severed all my ties with the company, gotten rid of all my financial interest. I have no financial interest in Halliburton of any kind and haven't had, now, for over three years."

Tell me Jim, is this statement true or not? The fact is that it's a outright lie because Cheney has tons of stock options and hundreds of thousands in deferred compensation each year. Why do Bush supporters constantly ignore this type of behavior?

I've posted hundreds of examples of false statements in the past few months. By voting for Bush, you are not voting for a better Iraq. You are voting for an administration who does not believe they are accountable to the American people and who will tell us all sorts of b.s. to keep their jobs.

Regarding Iraqis murdering their own people, look, every type of murder is reprehensible and that includes the type that our military engage in. It's easy to use labels such as radical cleric and insurgents and start believing that while forgetting that we're the foreign occupying power and the government we installed has no popular backing. Who knows what's going on there other than lots of people dying?

When you talk about people killing their own as people who hate freedom, explain exactly how you're so sure about that. Do you really think people kill because they hate freedom? Does that even make sense? Or could it be that we don't understand what we've gotten ourselves into? You keep saying things will get better, but how do you know? With the deadliest week yet in Iraq, can't you at least acknowledge the possibility that things may get much worse (contrary to what our President keeps saying) by looking realistically at the evidence rather than whether we're optimistic or pessimistic? Has the passing of time made the Palestinian conflict improve?

I'm not there and I don't know. What I do know, our President can't be trusted. He has messed up in so many places and continues to try and cover it all up. So how can you find a reason to believe him? Timely news with that new intelligence report... even Bush's Republican friends are saying that he hasn't been straightforward with us. It's about time.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/09/19/iraq.senators/index.html

Yes, it's great that we can say what we want without being censored Jim. But tens of thousands, including a thousand of our own will never get the chance. With the price so high, the very least I can expect from my President is the truth. The only chance I have at that is to hire someone else.

[Jeff]

Last thing... regarding removing Saddam, Jim, Bushies constantly point out that the world is a better place without him. It's a great stump line for a politician because it comes with ands ifs or buts. The world is also better with the tens of thousands of people killed in the conflict, alive rather than dead. The world is also better with 7,000 of our troops healthy rather than injured.

When you say that "it was worth it" to get rid of him, what exactly is it? You can only say what "it" is, after you get the final bill. Is it worth 2,000 American lives? How about 3,000? Is it worth stretching our armed forces thin at the same time we need them against dangers proven far greater than Saddam (i.e. Iran, North Korea, and al-Qaeda)?

I think reasonable people are free to disagree on this. What I don't think reasonable people can disagree on is that we weren't given the choice to consider it. The President presented only one side of the story. When the story fell apart, he substituted a different rationale and couldn't bring himself to admit any mistakes. We've been "making progress" for a while and the number of deaths is only accelerating. What would it be like if things weren't getting better? Republican senators McCain, Hagel, and Lugar seem to want to know too.

[Jim]

Jeff said: "What I don't think reasonable people can disagree on is that we weren't given the choice to consider it."
Jeff, since when do Presidents ask for a vote from the people on whether or not to go to war? You've made this statement a few times. Your choice gets made every four years.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,132682,00.html

[Jim]

Jeff,
I used to think it was just rhetoric when I heard the "they hate freedom" cry too. I really did think that was a way just to get us more behind the war, but that it wasn't really true. But after seeing the insurgents attacking not Americans, but deliberately going after Iraqi's, who only want to live in a free society, I now firmly believe that they want to live in a world where people are opressed and told what to think. It's sick the amount of hatred that is taught by some of these Imams and taken up by people like Zarqawi and bin laden. As long as they are told that America is the root of all evil, there will continue to be attacks. Is it so wrong to believe that all people deserve to live with a representative government? Aren't those the types of governments that provide the most human rights and are least likely to attack their neighbors?

[Jim]

CBS's motto - Get Bush at All Costs.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&e=4&u=/ap/20040920/ap_on_el_pr/bush_guard_questions