Where feminine hygiene is no laughing matter ...Rick's Cafe Americain

1. Our air, water and food will become increasingly contaminated, with devastating health consequences in the coming decades.

2. The income gap will continue to widen, jobs will continue to be outsourced, and class conflict will become more pronounced.

3. The conflict in Iraq will increase in intensity as the Arab world begins to rally around the Iraqi insurgents.  More Americans will die in Iraq than died in 9/11.

4. As Bush & Co. continue to funnel resources into “taking the fight to the enemy”, our domestic security will get even worse, leaving us exposed to another terrorist attack.

5. Bush & Co. will threaten military action against a third country, probably Syria, possibly Iran.  This will further galvanize the Arab world against the U.S.

6. There will be an attempt to detonate a nuclear device in either Israel or the United States.

7. The Democrats in Congress will be even bigger pussies than they were after 9/11 and George W. Bush will appoint at least 2 ultra-conservative judges to the Supreme Court.  Separation of Church and State and Separation of Powers will no longer function as they once did in our democracy.

8. The internet will become the primary source for news—an increasing amount of TV coverage will be coverage of what the “internets” are saying—and this will result in an electorate even more polarized and misinformed than they are now.

9. We will lose England’s support in the Coalition of the Willing.

10. No matter what happens, George W. Bush will not admit , take the blame for, or attempt to correct mistakes.

Here’s the quote from Bush’s speech in Colorado:

Now my opponent is throwing out the wild claim that he knows where bin Laden was in the fall of 2001, and that our military passed up the chance to get him in Tora Bora. This is an unjustified criticism of our military commanders in the field.

What’s interesting to me about this is the subtle abdication of responsibility hidden within the retort.  Bush and his team are some of the most sophisticated campaigners (that is to say, liars) around.  Even as it becomes harder and harder to deny the clear failures in the war in Iraq, I don’t think we will see Bush admitting any mistakes.  What I think we will see more of, however, is this sort of deflection of blame couched in a denial of wrongdoing.  You can see its reflection in the blogosphere, as Bushbloggers who used to say Bush was doing a great job in Iraq now are beginning to admit certain failures, but adding, “you can’t blame Bush for that.”

Bush wants us to believe that there is some inherent quality that Bush has—and that Kerry lacks—that is essential to fighting terrorists.  Kerry never would have had the . . . conviction? steadfastness? determination? I’m not sure what the word de jure is . . . balls to go after Osama, but Bush did.  Nevermind that Bush hasn’t caught Osama—that was the responsibility of “military commanders in the field”.

Bush supporters like to mock Kerry for not being as “manly” as Bush.  Well, I learned what I know about being a man from my father, the son of a West Virginia coal miner, and I can tell you it has nothing to do with riding horses or mountain bikes, what costumes you wear, or how you talk.  A real man takes responsibility for his actions, and for the safety and well-being of those who depend on him.  A real man doesn’t run from conflict, and will defend what is his with his life—but doesn’t go picking fights.  A real man knows the difference between brave and stupid, and that the line that separates them is sometimes razor-thin.  A real man makes the hard decisions—the ones others are too weak to face—and takes the consequences head-on.  A real man owns his mistakes, learns from them, is proud of them, like he’s proud of a scar earned in hard work or hard fighting. 

When I was a kid, my dad took me out to teach me how to fire a gun.  I remember him unwrapping the silver six-shooter, and me being eager to touch it, to feel its weight in my hand, and to fire it.  I’m sure my dad saw this eagerness, and before he let me touch the gun, he told me—in that almost angry tone he gets when he’s talking about something deadly serious—that I needed to understand what this was.  Not a toy, no, not even a tool.  This is a weapon, he told me, and its only purpose is to kill.  He told me the that I should never, ever point a loaded gun at any living thing I did not intend to kill.  And that even when I was aiming for a non-living target, as we were about to, I should keep in mind that the slightest mistake could result in the taking of a life.  I remember asking him about shooting someone in the arm or leg, to stop them without killing them.  He shook his head.  When you shoot, he said, you shoot to kill.  I was not allowed to touch the gun until my father was satisfied that I understood the seriousness of what he was about to teach me, and the importance of paying attention—closer attention than I had ever paid to anything else in my life—because if I didn’t learn exactly how to safely handle the gun, if I wasn’t 100% aware and in control every second that gun was in my hands—someone could die.

What my father taught me then was basically a variation of the NRA catchphrase, “guns don’t kill people, people kill people”.  When you take up a gun, you take on a mantle of extraordinary power—literally, the power over life and death.  And with great power comes great responsibility.  George W. Bush never learned that lesson, and that makes him too dangerous to be allowed near a gun—much less the greatest army the world has ever known.

George W. Bush is a big man with a big gun.  But he is not a real man because he is not willing to take responsibility—only credit.

A majority of Bush supporters believe that

A majority of Bush supporters also believe, however, that if Iraq did not have WMD’s or was not providing support to al Qaeda, the U.S. should not have gone to war with Iraq.

In other words, if Bush supporters knew the facts, a majority of them would not be Bush supporters.

Here are some other things a majority of Bush’s supporters incorrectly believe:

The Bush supporters support all these things, but the President does not.

Some of this can be blamed on the administration itself (particularly the Saddam/al Qaeda connection), and on the mainstream media, but most of this goes way beyond that.  It would appear that Bush supporters simply want to believe that Bush stands for the things they support, even though he does not.

This willingness to suspend disbelief, to be willfully ignorant, to “drink the Kool-Aid”, is truly astonishing, and—for reasons that go way beyond my dislike of President Bush and his policies—deeply troubling.

Hat-tip to The Al Franken Show

As you can see, Kerry’s momentum from the debates has reversed, and Bush is trending back upwards.  The reason for this is obvious.  Kerry, while qualified to be president, is a terrible campaigner.  Bush, while a terrible president, is a brilliant campaigner.  Oh, and of course, Mary Cheney is a lesbian.

Seriously, though, one way to read the above chart is to note that Bush’s line rises every time the people are inundated with pro-Bush or anti-Kerry propaganda (association with the Sainted Father Reagan, the RNC, the Swift Boat ads), or when the country gets a chance to see him in an even moderately unscripted uncontrolled environment (debates); whereas Kerry’s line rises with anti-Bush propaganda (Fahrenheit 9/11) or when the country gets to see him in action, instead of in campaign mode.

The answer?  I propose that for the next two weeks the parties cease campaigning.  Kerry will go back to being a Senator, and Bush will go back to . . . um . . . Crawford, probably.  The two will be followed by camera crews 24-hours a day, so the American people can see them actually doing their jobs.  Hell, follow Kerry, don’t follow Kerry.  I’d wager 24 hours of Bush outside of his bubble would be enough to turn most voters into Kerry supporters in a second.

Whereas Kerry has been, particulary in the second debate, quick with facts and figures, quotes and explanations to refute, attack, or point out the absurdity of some of Bush’s statements, Bush hasn’t done nearly as well at exploiting Kerry’s weaknesses in the debates.

I think this stems from two of Bush’s fundamental weaknesses: He is uninterested in and/or incapable of mastering complex policy issues, and he is virtually unable to think on his feet.  Which begs the question, when he is meeting with world leaders, does he need to do it two or three time so that he can go back and have his people tell him how to respond to what the other guy said?  No wonder he is afraid of bilateral talks.

MARK TRAHANT (editorial page editor, Seattle Post Intelligencer, and former president of the Native American Journalists Association):  Most school kids learn about government in the context of city, county, state and federal, and of course, tribal governments are not part of that at all. Mr. President, you have been a governor and a president, so you have unique experience looking at it from two directions. What do you think tribal sovereignty means in the 21st century and how do we resolve conflicts between tribes and the federal and state governments?

GEORGE BUSH:  Tribal sovereignty means that, it’s sovereign. You’re a—you’re a—you have been given sovereignty and you’re viewed as a sovereign entity.

MARK TRAHANT:  Okay.

GEORGE BUSH:  And therefore, the relationship between the federal government and tribes is one between sovereign entities.

The audio is even better.  Like listening to a third grader answer a vocabulary question after he spent all of his study time with his XBox. 

It’s a good thing tribal sovereignty isn’t an issue that effects people like you and me.

The issue came up in 2000, and nearly half of voters voted for Dubya anyway.  The issue came up again during this campaign, appropriately, because Bush was trading on his manufactured image as a soldier and a hero.  But the issue has run its course.

There appears to be no question that Bush traded on his father’s position and influence to get the National Guard assignment in the first place, and then to be re-assigned to Red Blount’s Alabama campaign.  Bush himself has admitted it: “I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment. Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes." Bush didn’t want to go to Vietnam.  Few did, so why try to crucify him?

Because it shows his hypocrisy and duplicity, of course.  How could this man, who not only avoided any potentially dangerous service to his country, but did it in arguably the most passive way possible, have the gall to put on a flight suit and play “Commander-in-Chief”?  to attack Kerry’s anti-war stance? I admit that I do find that galling—but the point has been made.  Indeed, we have over and over again seen that Bush and Rumsfeld are the worst kind of chickenhawks.  They want war, but for political reasons, and they are more than happy to share in the spoils, but not the risks, not the price.  Bush’s military service, or lack thereof, is the least of it.

There are so many examples of Bush’s hypocrisy and duplicity—examples of actions that have and will continue to affect our lives in significant ways—that we needn’t be reaching back to the 1970’s when an understandably frightened and coddled Bush sought to take the easiest way out.  If we’re going to go back that far, let’s talk about Bush’s cocaine use, or his criminal record.  But we don’t need to go back that far.

Bush’s foreign policy has been foolhardy and ill-advised.  Under his presidency, the U.S. has lost enormous credibility both abroad and at home.  He and his advisors have repeatedly been caught lying, and had the gall to keep on lying.  When investigations are called for, the administration has carefully controlled who is running the investigation and what they can see.  Let’s talk about Plame, about Iraq, about the Saudis, about Halliburton, about yellowcake and clean air and clean water and children left behind the Energy Task Force and the 9/11 investigation and the Patriot Act and the deficit and joblessness and all of the things that matter, that need to be addressed and changed and brought into the light.

Even as our nation begins to crumble around us, even as we cry out, “Anyone But Bush!”, the Democrats display a remarkable shortsightedness, playing for perceived political points, and missing the big picture.  There is no question in my mind that the Republicans are better than the Democrats at politics and dirty tricks.  It is their focus on those that is corrupting our government and our country.  We can’t win on that basis, and we shouldn’t be trying.