As if there weren’t enough problems in Iraq, now the Kurds are demanding that two hundred thousand Arab settlers from the Saddam regime pack up and leave northern Iraq. This is reflective of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo by way of exodus. The US commander in the region fears that this political stirring could eventuate a civil war. In addition, Turkey is against “Kurdization” of the major city Kirkuk, which is feared will be the capital of an expanding Kurdistan. Turkey, long opponents of Kurdis...
“If I had known then what I know now, I wouldn’t have used them [unconfirmed data]. I did it; it was a mistake. I’m looking deep within myself, about what I did and didn’t do.” No, this is not a Bush confession in going to war in Iraq, but Dan Rather’s soul searching. … 60 Minutes had definitely lost its confidence and prestige; it cancelled the scheduled report on WMDs. … Why in the world does Florida permit anchored mobile and pre-fab home communities highly vulnerable to hurricane dest...
Theresa Heinz Kerry is fortunate that a 527 hasn’t attacked the Albert Schweitzer Gold Medal for Humanitarianism she received for her dedication and contributions to the environment, education, women, children and health care. … I hope the trust in Allawi is stronger than the faith the administration had in Chalibi. … The tax cuts for the lower and middle class has already been wiped out by the price of gas. … It is feasible that a large part of the insurgency is due to UN and US envoys fav...
Today our darling representatives etched in stone the tax cuts. It reminds me of a hard working couple who just had to have a Widescreen HDTV and dipped into their savings for the children’s future college fund; after all, they can work their way through college. With all the brouhaha about Iraq being the main election issue, apparently congress, unlike Kerry, isn’t worried about where the money is coming from — let our children pay it off. … Where did the idea come from anyway? — if yo...
Fortunately for Bush, the economy has been sucked into a black hole by Swift Boats, Texans for Truth, the CBS blunder, and the luck of the draw that few know what’s going on in Iraq. Unfortunately for Bush, one of the debates will be on the economy and he will have to face issues regarding the economy — disappearing quality jobs, rising health costs, out of range college tuition, erosion of Pell grants, shortchanging NCLB, prescription drug plan designed to increase the profits of pharmaceuti...
Karl Rove in August before the ‘02 election keenly held back his president’s talk of war until October when voters pay attention to elections, particularly since the administration had dropped the ball in Afghanistan which no longer made the headlines, cooling the hot image of Bush as a wartime leader. Rove also knew that dread implanted in the social consciousness above all else in politics is the primary drive and would dwarf the Democrats’ calculation that it was the economy most in ...
Either we choose a strong federation or we depend on divisive states to do what is right for themselves. Either we are Americans first or primarily Texans, Montanans, or New Yorkers — try to imagine an interstate highway without federal cohesion and revenue. As the Europeans are trying to unitize in the face of a thousand years of divisiveness, we with the exception of defense, strive to dismantle our united spirit. It is a matter of arrant pride that Las Vegas is the capital of g...
Indicative of a people in denial is that this, let alone all, presidential campaigns inevitably sidetrack issues. One There is clear cut denial that terrorism is feared at home now that the US has “taken” the war on terrorism to enemy soil. This leads to not taking intelligence and home security seriously as though terrorism has been safely exported. Two Uncontrollable deficits are not ...
A president cannot create jobs, but he can encourage new directions that lead to them. Millions of dissatisfied part-time workers who want to work full time should be deflected to other areas, such as defense against hurricanes by making wind-proof windows and shudders for general construction along our shorelines where demand would be intense, subsequently the prices would become reasonable and replace the mad dash for plywood. Architects and engineers could blueprint roof structure anchorag...
Reagan began a revolution in this country wherein the mythology of conservatism and rugged individualism took over the land driven by the manifesto that big government was the enemy and the only cure was big business unregulated. The Reagan honeymoon cannot continue for much longer; indeed, to some degree it suffered a setback during the Clinton years. Although it was resurrected in 2000 and seemingly its illusory system has reached a crescendo today, there are ominous signs that the manifest...
If girlie-men economics means that it is flexible and not musclebound, I’m all for it. Bush’s economic policy on the other hand is on steroids, which is another way of saying it will collapse from its dead weight of debt. … I wonder if Schwarzenegger in front of Marie Shriver has the guts to call the all the male Kennedys girlie-men. … Afghanistan is ostensibly doing well — tell that to the charitable organization Médecins Sans Frontières that withdrew from there because the new government fa...
Hello? … Either I 've been sleeping for thirty years or there is indeed a nasty war going on today and that Vietnam was finally over. Nevertheless, the war in Iraq does tie in with the war that ended thirty years ago. No, it has no connection with Kerry’s war record or anti-war efforts afterwards; nor, has it anything to do with Bush’ s national guard service. Yet it is certainly connected with the political aspect of the war in Vietnam: come hell or high water, President Johnson was going to...
What with journalists of late relying on dour imagination, hearsay and foggy memories, it does not astonish me that CBS would also engage in selective reporting without carefully checking documentation. [I sound like Draginol now.] Dan Rather, who clearly has no love for ‘41 and ‘43, the CBS executives should have been particularly suspicious. I am not saying that Rather deliberately joined in a conspiracy of fraudulent documentation, but because of his leanings, he probably enthusiastically ...
The current median income for a family of four is about $55,000 or approximately three times that of the poverty line at $19,000 for a family of four. The problem with these statistics when trying to arrive at a “living wage” that often is juxtaposed to the horrific rate of $5.15 an hour or $10,500, which if adjusted for inflation should be at $7.50 or $15,000, is in the difficulty of determining how much of the median and the poverty line owe to two salaries. If those at the four-family pove...
Political analysts are in agreement that presidential campaigns are too long and should be shortened to, say, two months; I maintain that campaigning is continuous from one election to the next. … If there is such a thing as illegal immigrants, what’s to prevent the native American from kicking all of us out? … In the ‘60 presidential debate, pundits claimed that Kennedy won because of Nixon’s five o’clock shadow; this time you can bet the Crawford Ranch that Bush wins on shadowy remarks that...