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Tue 6 Apr, 2004 11:26 am
Posted on Mon, Apr. 05, 2004
Kennedy says Bush has largest credibility gap since Nixon
By Anastasia Ustinova
Knight Ridder Newspapers
WASHINGTON - Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., accused the Bush administration Monday of making up "facts" and misleading Americans about Iraq and a broad range of domestic policies affecting the economy, education and health care.
"They repeatedly invent `facts' to support their preconceived agenda - facts which administration officials knew or should have known were not true," Kennedy said in a speech at the Brookings Institution, a center-left public-policy research center.
"As a result, this president has now created the largest credibility gap since Richard Nixon."
Kennedy, one of the most prominent and vigorous supporters of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, the other senator from Massachusetts, and a virtual surrogate for him, said the administration intentionally concealed its estimate that last year's Medicare legislation might cost at least $100 billion more than it told Congress. He also accused the administration of spending taxpayers' dollars to advertise falsely about the bill in a bid to strengthen Bush's re-election prospects.
"The administration has every right to try to convince the public that this lemon of a law is actually lemonade, but they have no right to squander millions of Medicare dollars on the effort," Kennedy said, contending that the Medicare bill is a "poster child for how not to write a law."
The senator also charged that the administration left more than 1 million Americans without unemployment benefits and failed to fund adequately the No Child Left Behind Act, all of which he said is undermining public trust in government.
Kennedy's critical focus on Bush's domestic policy came after several months in which he has criticized the administration's foreign policy and the war in Iraq. In his Brookings speech, Kennedy said the administration went to war in Iraq on false pretenses and added that "Iraq is George Bush's Vietnam," pursued in part to divert attention from domestic issues.
"It is a part of a pattern that has been demonstrated again and again ... in the president's handling of policy," said Kennedy. "Saying whatever it takes to prevail has become standard operating procedure in the Bush White House."
Re: Kennedy says Bush has largest credibility gap since Nixo
BumbleBeeBoogie wrote:
WASHINGTON - Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., accused the Bush administration Monday of making up "facts" and misleading Americans about Iraq and a broad range of domestic policies affecting the economy, education and health care.
Kennedy's critical focus on Bush's domestic policy came after several months in which he has criticized the administration's foreign policy and the war in Iraq. In his Brookings speech, Kennedy said the administration went to war in Iraq on false pretenses and added that "Iraq is George Bush's Vietnam," pursued in part to divert attention from domestic issues.
IMO, there are several parallels between the politics of the wars in Vietnam & Iraq. The first and most significant in my view, is that neither war was required to protect the US. In each case a lie started the conflict.
In both cases, the public was made to believe that the war would be short & sweet due to our overwhelming military prowess. In both conflicts this proved incorrect as our opponents were defending their homelands vigorously. In both cases as casualties increased so did American opposition to the wars. In both cases those who expressed their oppostion to the war were branded as unpatriotic.
In both cases the war required more forces and more time to satisfy our vague goals. In both cases the boots on the ground tended to contain the feet of those less well off than the political leadership. Most of the casualties in Vietnam were blacks and poor whites.
Kennedy has alot of nerve to accuse someone of a credibility gap.
Gulf of Tonkin-lie
WoMD-lie
<huge, profane Down With Politicans rant>
If Kennedy told me the time of day, I would ask for a second opinion!
and he would say, "yeah, I got the time of day but not right now"
He would say, " How bout a drink, my child"....and this time not in a river.
Brand X wrote:He would say, " How bout a drink, my child"....and this time not in a river.
LMAO, exactly. Kennedy has a major credibility problem since he is responsibile for the death of his date a few decades ago.
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