Take Back Your Country

A new Web video ad from BradBlog. Go check it out. His stuff is good. Read the rest of this post...

Bush begins using hand puppet to deliver difficult news to the nation

From AmericanIdle.net - very funny site:

"On Monday, President Bush introduced Kibbles, a cuddly and furry hand puppet, which he will use to soften bad news about the economy, Iraq, domestic security, and other difficult topics. Kibbles instilled a light and playful mood during the president's recent press conference on the mounting casualties in Iraq, and plans on wearing a little yellow hard hat when the August job numbers are released later this week."

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More Young People Registering to Vote

And according to something I read last month, they're 2:1 voting for Kerry. More from AP. Read the rest of this post...

We're now up to 24 different reasons Bush has given for Iraq war

UPDATE: It's now up to 27, I've documented them in a separate post here.

Bush defended the war by saying even though weapons of mass destruction were not found, Saddam had a desire and ability to make them and an ability to work with terrorist organizations. This was "a threat we could not afford to take," he said. - Reuters

An "ability" to work with terrorist organizations? Ok, I think that's a new one. This weekend we found out about the "hope" to "someday" get WMD, and today we find out about the "ability" to work with terrorist organizations. Not actually WORKING WITH terrorist organizations, but simply the ABILITY TO DO SO. Well, every one of us 6 billion people on the planet have the "ability" work with Al Qaeda if we wanted to, so that pretty much gives Bush open season on anybody he wants. Read the rest of this post...

GOP Sen. Won't Commit to Voting for Bush

AP:

Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee said Monday he plans to support his party in November but may write in a candidate instead of voting for President Bush.

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Bush is fucking READING TALKING POINTS

Has anyone noticed that Bush can NOT speak about Iraq at a public event WITHOUT LOOKING DOWN AND READING TALKING POINTS? He has done this EVERY day for the past week, plus - including today. He simply can NOT speak about his position on Iraq without READING it from a NOTECARD. Good God, the man is using a cheat sheat. Read the rest of this post...

American beheaded in Iraq

1,000 US soldiers dead, for this?

The militant in the center read out a statement, as the hostage rocked back and forth and side to side where he sat. After finishing, the militant pulled a knife and cut his throat until the head was severed.

The victim gasped loudly as blood poured from his neck. His killer held up the head at one point, and placed the head on top of the body.

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Bush campaign admits gay-baiting for votes

The message: If you're gay and you voted for Bush in 2000, you just got traded in for a trophy bride. Reuters:

Privately, one Bush-Cheney official said the campaign hoped the gay issue would mobilize religious conservatives who did not show up as strongly as some expected in 2000.

"Say you lose a thousand voters over the gay issue, you could be possibly mobilizing hundreds of thousands of voters by staying strong on this issue," the national campaign official said.

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Pentagon blocks overseas Americans' access to voter reg. Web site

Pigs. Read the rest of this post...

Kerry blasts Bush

It's an excellent speech. Some excerpts:

The first and most fundamental mistake was the President’s failure to tell the truth to the American people.

He failed to tell the truth about the rationale for going to war. And he failed to tell the truth about the burden this war would impose on our soldiers and our citizens.

By one count, the President offered 23 different rationales for this war. If his purpose was to confuse and mislead the American people, he succeeded.

His two main rationales – weapons of mass destruction and the Al Qaeda/September 11 connection – have been proved false… by the President’s own weapons inspectors… and by the 9/11 Commission. Just last week, Secretary of State Powell acknowledged the facts. Only Vice President Cheney still insists that the earth is flat.

The President also failed to level with the American people about what it would take to prevail in Iraq.

He didn’t tell us that well over 100,000 troops would be needed, for years, not months. He didn’t tell us that he wouldn’t take the time to assemble a broad and strong coalition of allies. He didn’t tell us that the cost would exceed $200 billion. He didn’t tell us that even after paying such a heavy price, success was far from assured.

And America will pay an even heavier price for the President’s lack of candor.

At home, the American people are less likely to trust this administration if it needs to summon their support to meet real and pressing threats to our security.

Abroad, other countries will be reluctant to follow America when we seek to rally them against a common menace -- as they are today. Our credibility in the world has plummeted....

The President’s insistence that he would do the same thing all over again in Iraq is a clear warning for the future. And it makes the choice in this election clear: more of the same with President Bush or a new direction that makes our troops and America safer. It is time, at long last, to ask the questions and insist on the answers from the Commander-in-Chief about his serious misjudgments and what they tell us about his administration and the President himself. If George W. Bush is re-elected, he will cling to the same failed policies in Iraq -- and he will repeat, somewhere else, the same reckless mistakes that have made America less secure than we can or should be....

In Iraq, this administration’s record is filled with bad predictions, inaccurate cost estimates, deceptive statements and errors of judgment of historic proportions.

At every critical juncture in Iraq, and in the war on terrorism, the President has made the wrong choice. I have a plan to make America stronger....

Today, because of George Bush’s policy in Iraq, the world is a more dangerous place for America and Americans.

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Bush threatened to VETO legislation providing body armor to our troops

Here's something I REALLY hope John Kerry and Senate Democratic candidates will use in their attack ads. EVERY GOP SENATOR save one voted AGAINST legislation sending body armor to our troops, and George Bush threatened to VETO the body armor legislation TWICE.

How did that happen? It happened when John Kerry voted FOR the legislation but the Republicans almost unanimously voted against it, and Bush threatened to veto it twice. The legislation (Biden amendment #1796 to S. 1689) had everything President Bush and the military wanted for Iraq, but on October 2, 2003 the Senate Republicans opposed it and President Bush threatened to veto it because it gave new federal employees union rights, something that has NOTHING to do with the body armor our troops dearly needed.

Oh, but it gets better than that. Bush also threatened to veto the final legislation EVEN AFTER the Biden amendment was defeated. Yes, Bush threatened to DENY BODY ARMOR TO OUR TROOPS simply because he disagreed with some arcane loan mechanism in the bill - see for yourself, from the administration's own letter threatening the veto:

[T]he Administration strongly opposes the Senate provision that would convert a portion of this assistance to a loan mechanism. If this provision is not removed, the President's senior advisors would recommend that he veto the bill.

So Bush threatened to veto the same bill he's now criticizing Kerry for not supporting.

Memo to Kerry... When Bush brings up the $87 billion, respond: "That would be the same body armor legislation that you threatened to veto." And when Bush says "well, I was opposed to something else in the bill, not the body armor," then you answer "so was I."

These are all the Senators voting AGAINST providing body armor to our troops:

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Daschle is an idiot

Meet the Press, 9.19.04

MR. THUNE: Didn't Senator Kerry vote against $87 million for aid to the troops?

SEN. DASCHLE: He did. I disagree with that.

No, Mr. Daschle, John Kerry did not vote against aiding our troops. John Kerry voted FOR aiding our troops. That's the simple answer. Did the legislation he voted for get passed? No it didn't. That's because a majority of Republicans VOTED AGAINST aiding our troops, and voted AGAINST the package John Kerry voted for. Jesus people, why has NO ONE pulled up that other bill and argued that the GOP Senators voted AGAINST aiding our troops? In fact, I'm doing it right now. See the next post above (shortly). Read the rest of this post...

British Ambassador: "Bush is al-Qaida's best recruiting sergeant"

Reuters:

“If anyone is ready to celebrate the eventual re-election of Bush, it’s al-Qaida.”

Corriere della Sera newspaper said Roberts also told the meeting of British and Italian policy-makers, “Bush is al-Qaida’s best recruiting sergeant.”

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Republican 1950s dream land...

where no one has benefits, except for the chosen few. Also known as the middle class squeeze. Four more years.

It's his road because, at 3:43 a.m. on a Wednesday, no one else wants it. Clark is nearly two hours into a workday that won't end for another 13, delivering interoffice mail around the state for four companies -- none of which offers him health care, vacation, a pension or even a promise that today's job will be there tomorrow. His meticulously laid plans to retire by his mid-fifties are dead. At 51, he's left with only a vague hope of getting off the road sometime in the next 20 years.

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Portrait of a young Georgie, 1972

Sacrifice is for others. Let them eat cake.

Still, a wider examination of his life in 1972, based on dozens of interviews and other documents released by the White House over the years, yields a portrait of a young man like many other young men of privilege in that turbulent time - entitled, unanchored and safe from combat, bouncing from a National Guard slot made possible by his family's prominence to a political job arranged through his father.

Mr. Bush first tried to join the 9921 Air Reserve Squadron in Montgomery, which was classified as a "standby reserve unit." Unlike his unit in Texas, the Alabama unit had no planes and its members were neither paid nor required to attend monthly drills.

In July, though, senior Guard officials rejected Mr. Bush's transfer, saying he had to continue with a "ready reserve unit," which requires monthly attendance.

When Mr. Bush applied, in 1968, one of the forms he filled out asked if he would volunteer for overseas duty; he checked "I 'do not' volunteer for overseas."

But there are no records from the 187th indicating that Mr. Bush, in fact, appeared on those days in October and November, and more than a dozen members of the unit from that era say they never saw him. The White House said last week that there were no records from the Alabama unit because Mr. Bush was still officially part of the Texas Guard. But Mr. Hodges, the former Texas commander, said the 187th "should have a record of his drills."

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GOP strongholds in AL, LA & MS refuse federal aid after hurricane damages region

Because they know that federal tax money only goes to lazy terrorist-lovin', America-hatin' Blue State Democrats and certainly not Red State-by-a-landslide, "no federal taxes and no federal handouts allowed" Republicans. Down the line, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana have held firm and formally rejected federal taxpayer money. I am just so proud that they have all stood firm in their convictions about federal money and that they refused all handouts. What a proud day for all solid Republicans in the south for taking this position. Thank goodness there was no "unseemly scramble" for federal money like those folks of NYC who experienced a little problem on 9/11 and then requested federal aid.
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Abductions of foreigners in Iraq jumps to over 135, no problems though

American-hater and Vietnam vet Sen. Chuck Hagel clearly doesn't know what he's talking about when he said "the fact is a crisp, sharp analysis of our policies is required. We didn't do that in Vietnam, and we saw 11 years of casualties mount to the point where we finally lost" yesterday. He should instead listen to Allawi who instead believes that "we are squeezing out the insurgency" and probably will also tell us that we're on the road to democracy.

Facts are just facts. All for a war of convenience that had nothing to do with the War on Terror though now provides a recruitment poster for terrorists everywhere.

• 135 foreign abductions
• 1032 US soldiers dead in Iraq
• 7125 US soldiers wounded
• Between 12,778 - 14,820 Iraqi dead

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Quick suggestion to Kerry

When Bush accuses you of voting 97 (or whatever) times to raise taxes, respond:

"You mean like the time I voted for your father's 1990 tax increase in order to cut the deficit?"

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