Playing Politics with Terror Alerts

Common ground is a beautiful thing.. :wink:

It is amazing how misinformed that all you, hate-Bush, air-head America believers are. Again, I am not a Republican, I did vote Democrat in the past two elections. That is the fact you all choose to ignore. All you people do is ignore the facts, I suggest you do a little more research. It is not helpful to anyone who is searching for the truth to see your left-wing mantra, HATE BUSH message. Your joking about the most important mission our military could be on. You spit on the fight we are in, just because you hate Bush. It is disqusting.

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THE FACTS ON VETERANS

President Bush's Record:

Annenberg Public Policy Center: Kerry's Claims About Veterans Health Cuts Are Not True. The University of Pennsylvania's Annenberg Center stated in a FactCheck, "[F]unding for veterans is going up twice as fast under Bush as it did under Clinton. And the number of veterans getting health benefits is going up 25% under Bush's budgets. That's hardly a cut. … FactCheck.org twice contacted the Kerry campaign asking how he justified his claim that the VA budget is being cut, but we've received no response." (FactCheck.org Website, www.factcheck.org/article.aspx?docid=144 , Accessed 2/18/04)

Increased VA Funding. The President's FY 2005 budget proposes to increase funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs to $68 billion from the 2001 level of $48 billion. The President's budget requests $29.5 billion for VA's medical care for next year, more that 40 percent above the 2001 level. The past four straight VA budget increases have provided more than a 40 percent increase in VA health care alone since 2001-- enabling a million more patients to receive treatment.

Increased Health Care Service to Veterans. In the past four years, President Bush's budgets have allowed the VA to enroll 2.5 million more veterans for health care services, increase outpatient visits from 44 million to 54 million, increase the number of prescriptions filled from 86 million to 108 million and open 194 new community-based clinics available for veterans. The number of veterans registered for health benefits increased 18 percent under President Bush and will increase by almost 26 percent by October 2004. ("Funding For Veterans Up 27%, But Democrats Call It A Cut," FactCheck.org Website, www.factcheck.org, Accessed 2/18/04)

Concurrent Receipt Of Benefits. President Bush has twice signed legislation effectively providing "concurrent receipt" of both military retired pay and VA disability compensation for combat-injured and highly-disabled veterans, reversing a century old law preventing concurrent receipt.

Cutting The Disability Claims Backlog. President Bush promised to reduce the disability claims backlog, and at his request, Congress has provided VA with the resources it needs to reduce claims. Claims backlogs have dropped from a high of 432,000 and are approaching the goal of 250,000 while the volume of claims decisions per month has increased from 40,000 to 68,000. The average length of time to process a veteran's compensation claim has dropped from approximately 230 days to 160 days and the VA expects to meet its goal of 100 days this year.

Help For Homeless Veterans. As a result of the President's 2003 budget, community grants were expanded to all 50 States and Washington, D.C. for the first time in history, ensuring that homeless veterans have access to housing, health care and shelter.

Additional Prescription Drug Coverage. Last year, President Bush took the unprecedented step of allowing veterans waiting for a medical appointment who already have a prescription from their private physician, to have those prescriptions filled by the VA. This is saving veterans hundreds of dollars in drug costs.

VA Expansion. The President is seeking to improve outpatient veteran's health care services through the CARES improvements, which will result in the construction of two new medical centers in Orlando, Florida and Las Vegas, Nevada; over 100 major construction projects to revitalize and modernize VA medical centers in 37 states; creation of 156 new community-based outpatient clinics; potential creation of four new - and expansion of five existing - spinal cord injury centers; and opening up two new blind rehabilitation centers.

John Kerry's Record:

Kerry Voted Against Last Year's Supplemental Defense Funding, Which Included Extra $1.3 Billion For Veteran Health Care. Kerry voted against the fiscal 2004 supplemental package of $86.5 billion for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Senate version included an additional $1.3 billion for veterans' medical care.

Kerry Skipped Vote That Funded VA With $28.6 Billion For Fiscal 2004, Including $1 Billion To Expedite Processing Of VA Benefits Claims. Kerry skipped the vote on Fiscal 2004 Omnibus Appropriations, which included $28.6 billion for the VA. The amount was an increase of $2.9 billion over the previous year, and included $1 billion to "expedite claims processing at the Veterans Benefits Administration." (U.S. House Committee On Appropriations, "House Passes FY04 Consolidated Appropriations," Press Release, http://appropriations.house.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&PressRelease_id=342, 12/8/03)

Kerry Voted Against McCain Amendment To Require Equal Access To Health Care For All Veterans. Kerry was one of only 18 Senators to vote against the measure. (H.R. 3666, CQ Vote #268: Adopted 79-18: R 50-0; D 29-18, 9/4/96, Kerry Voted Nay)

Kerry Voted Against Last Year's Supplemental Defense Funding, Which Included $1.3 Billion For Veteran Health Care. (S. 1689, CQ Vote #400: Passed 87-12: R 50-0; D 37-11; I 0-1, 10/17/03, Kerry Voted Nay)

In 2001, Kerry Voted Against Amendment That Would Have Increased Funding For Veterans' Medical Care By $650 Million. (H.R. 2620, CQ Vote #263: Motion Rejected 25-75: R 8-41; D 16-34; I 1-0, 8/1/01, Kerry Voted Nay)

In 1999, Kerry Voted To Kill Amendment That Would Have Reallocated $210 Million For Veterans' Medical Benefits And $10 Million For Construction Of Veterans' Extended Care Facilities. (H.R. 2684, CQ Vote #286: Motion Agreed To 61-38: R 16-37; D 45-0; I 0-1, 9/22/99, Kerry Voted Yea)

Kerry Skipped Vote That Funded VA With $28.6 Billion For Fiscal 2004. (H.R. 2673, CQ Vote #3: Adopted 65-28: R 44-4; D 21-23; I 0-1, 1/22/04, Kerry Did Not Vote; U.S. House Committee On Appropriations, "House Passes FY04 Consolidated Appropriations," Press Release, http://appropriations.house.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=PressReleases.Detail&PressRelease_id=342, 12/8/03)

Kerry Missed Two Votes In 2003 That Extended Military Health Coverage To National Guard, Reservists And Their Families If Called To Active Duty. (H.R.1588, CQ Vote #447: Adopted 95-3: R 51-0; D 44-2; I 0-1, 11/12/03, Kerry Did Not Vote; S.1050, CQ Vote #185: Adopted 85-10: R 39-10; D 45-0; I 1-0, 5/20/03, Kerry Did Not Vote)

Xena, you strike me as exactly the kind of woman that needs to enlist!

Sign up and head for Iraq quick, girl!

I'll sleep so much better at night knowing you're on the front lines defending my freedom.

Xena
Xena wrote "You spit on the fight we are in, just because you hate Bush. It is disqusting."

I agree with this portion of what Xena said except we DON'T spit on the fight we are in. It is disgusting that Bush's policies have brought him so much hatred from people around the world and from the US. If I'd been responsible for such policies, I would earn their hatred, too. What Xena doesn't seem to understand is that we support our troups regardless of how they got there. I'm glad everyone is mad at Bush and not the rest of us who hate his policies, including our military men and women in Iraq. They didn't ask to be sent to Iraq and I support their safe return home.

BBB

I can tell Xena will be a major joy....welcome to A2K......

Hear Hear! welcome to a spirited lass. Foxfyre is doing cartwheels I imagine

If you don't understand how we got there and why, I don't know how you can do justice to your "support" of the troops. You've come to your conclusions with no understanding of the lead up to the war and how Bush did just what I would have expected of any leader. It is because of the seperation of the Iraq war and the war on terror that divides us. The anti-Iraq war, anti-Bush crowd is misinformed and are being mislead. It is not Bush's fault we are in this fight it started long before he came to office. One of the first things he did was to begin talks with Pakistan in anticipation of deposing the Taliban. That was before 9-11. It was exactly what he needed to do. He knew Afghanistan harbored Al-Queda and he took the initiative as soon as he took office. A fact you left-wingers like to ignore. Ignorance is bliss!! This is not an unjust war.

We are not reliving the 60's, this is not Vietnam. This is them against us and there is no room for error. All the anti-this and anti-that are based on nothing but lies and propaganda. Maybe that is why some of you would vote for Kerry. He's good at deception and lies. Talk about your frauds! If you don't support the war, you aren't supporting our troops.


(The following op-ed column by National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice was published in the Washington Post on March 22. The column is in the public domain. No republication restrictions.)

9/11: For The Record
By Condoleezza Rice

The al Qaeda terrorist network posed a threat to the United States for almost a decade before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Throughout that period -- during the eight years of the Clinton administration and the first eight months of the Bush administration prior to Sept. 11 -- the U.S. government worked hard to counter the al Qaeda threat.

During the transition, President-elect Bush's national security team was briefed on the Clinton administration's efforts to deal with al Qaeda. The seriousness of the threat was well understood by the president and his national security principals. In response to my request for a presidential initiative, the counterterrorism team, which we had held over from the Clinton administration, suggested several ideas, some of which had been around since 1998 but had not been adopted. No al Qaeda plan was turned over to the new administration.

We adopted several of these ideas. We committed more funding to counterterrorism and intelligence efforts. We increased efforts to go after al Qaeda's finances. We increased American support for anti-terror activities in Uzbekistan.

We pushed hard to arm the Predator unmanned aerial vehicle so we could target terrorists with greater precision. But the Predator was designed to conduct surveillance, not carry weapons. Arming it presented many technical challenges and required extensive testing. Military and intelligence officials agreed that the armed Predator was simply not ready for deployment before the fall of 2001. In any case, the Predator was not a silver bullet that could have destroyed al Qaeda or stopped Sept. 11.

We also considered a modest spring 2001 increase in funding for the Northern Alliance. At that time, the Northern Alliance was clearly not going to sweep across Afghanistan and dispose of al Qaeda. It had been battered by defeat and held less than 10 percent of the country. Only the addition of American air power, with U.S. special forces and intelligence officers on the ground, allowed the Northern Alliance its historic military advances in late 2001. We folded this idea into our broader strategy of arming tribes throughout Afghanistan to defeat the Taliban.

Let us be clear. Even their most ardent advocates did not contend that these ideas, even taken together, would have destroyed al Qaeda. We judged that the collection of ideas presented to us were insufficient for the strategy President Bush sought. The president wanted more than a laundry list of ideas simply to contain al Qaeda or "roll back" the threat. Once in office, we quickly began crafting a comprehensive new strategy to "eliminate" the al Qaeda network. The president wanted more than occasional, retaliatory cruise missile strikes. He told me he was "tired of swatting flies."

Through the spring and summer of 2001, the national security team developed a strategy to eliminate al Qaeda -- which was expected to take years. Our strategy marshaled all elements of national power to take down the network, not just respond to individual attacks with law enforcement measures. Our plan called for military options to attack al Qaeda and Taliban leadership, ground forces and other targets -- taking the fight to the enemy where he lived. It focused on the crucial link between al Qaeda and the Taliban. We would attempt to compel the Taliban to stop giving al Qaeda sanctuary -- and if it refused, we would have sufficient military options to remove the Taliban regime. The strategy focused on the key role of Pakistan in this effort and the need to get Pakistan to drop its support of the Taliban. This became the first major foreign-policy strategy document of the Bush administration -- not Iraq, not the ABM Treaty, but eliminating al Qaeda.

Xena
Alas, another "true believer" has decided to improve our education on A2K. What a blessing, after being a member for a short time with a record of 13 posts, that she is fully informed of the opinions and knowledge of long time, frequent A2K posters.

Gosh, I wish that I was as smart as Xena. I'm so ashamed I'm such an ignoramus. How lucky we are that Xena is here to correct my and other's deficiencies.

BBB

Ifthere is no room for error, why do you make so many, xena?

The other side to the VA claims by the Bush adminstration.

http://www.democrats.org/specialreports/veterans/health.html

As for condi's 9/11 testimony; hogwash. Others in the administration have told the real story and it is more believable. (O'Neil, Clark)

Yeah, I believe the DNC! I got my information from Factcheck.

Right, I forgot Condi is a liar like Bush! Where is the coverage that she lied? Did the commission condemn her testimony? I haven't heard anything about that? Do you have anything other than your marching orders from the far left? Again, you guys are great at attacking and making fun of the truth. You have little in the way of being the least bit credible.

Xena
Xena, it takes one true believer to know another of the opposite opinion.

BBB

Re: Xena


You can ignore the facts, but that's not any way to go through life. I base my reasoning on facts not smoke and mirrors. You enjoy the fight against America... the less of the truth you know the better off you are. It would mean you'd have to rethink your life. Must be nice, ignorance is bliss. You lose eveything you hold dear, like the fun of the protest, the happiness when your friends get together and put down our military efforts and our President, and excitment in thinking we are living the 60s all over again.

It was a disgrace then and now.

xena
xena, you really should get your meds prescription refilled.

BBB

O neil was in the administration and so was Dick Clark. Both had different slants about the whole Iraq/Bin Laden deal. I never said Bush or Condi lied. I have said that they have stretched and shaded and arranged words to come out the way they wanted them to.

Bin Laden's Mystery Man



full report

It is sad some people can disregard any of the truth about Saddam. That is what most people are unsure about, there shouldn't even be a debate about what Bush did and why.. Too many people would rather ignore the facts regarding Al-Queda and Iraq and it is not helping in the war on terror. It hurts it.

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Saddam tied to bin Laden? You don't say
Monday, April 28, 2003
Well surprise, surprise. Documents found in the headquarters of the Mukhabarat, the Iraqi intelligence service, show that Saddam Hussein's people were talking to Osama bin Laden's people, according to a story in the Toronto Star.
Actually, make that "STAR FINDS DOCUMENTS LINKING BIN LADEN, IRAQ" -- at the Toronto Star, the Toronto Star is always the story. The minor detail that a reporter for the Daily Telegraph was also present when the documents were found, or that the crucial reference to bin Laden was spotted by their interpreter, played rather below the fold.

Still, it is fortuitous that the Star, of all people, should have stumbled upon evidence of Saddam's links to bin Laden, since for the past year- and-a-half the Star, like most of the media, has been scoffing at the notion there was any such link. Had another paper discovered the incriminating documents, at least without the Star also being present, the paper's editors might have been inclined to bury the story as just another one of those bits of "inconclusive" evidence. But Star Finds Documents was apparently too good to resist.

The documents show that an emissary from bin Laden was secretly invited to Baghdad in March of 1998, to discuss "the future of our relationship" -- based, according to the Telegraph, "on their mutual hatred of America and Saudi Arabia" -- and to lay the groundwork for a later visit by bin Laden himself. This was just months before the embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania that were to establish bin Laden as America's public enemy number one. Imagine that: Saddam, the avowed secularist, in bed with the world's leading Islamic terrorist, notwithstanding the sage advice from a thousand Western experts that this could never happen. Apparently, neither man reads the Star.

But this is hardly the first piece of evidence linking the Iraqi regime to al-Qaeda, among the many other terrorist organizations on Saddam's client list. Just the day before, American forces had captured Farouk Hijazi, the Mukhabarat's former operations director. Aside from masterminding the famous 1993 assassination plot against George Bush Sr., Hijazi is believed by U.S. intelligence to have met with bin Laden in Kandahar, the southeastern region of Afghanistan, in December of 1998.

Nor is Hijazi the only name of note linking Saddam to bin Laden.

Remember Abu Musab al-Zarqawi? He's the al-Qaeda operative who, according to Colin Powell's testimony before the UN Security Council, headed a cell of some two dozen terrorists in Baghdad, and set up a chemical weapons facility at a camp run by an affiliated outfit. Perhaps Mr. Powell will get a better hearing now than he did then.

Or what about Ahmed Khalil Ibrahim Samir al-Ani? He was the Iraqi spymaster in Prague who allegedly met with Mohammed Atta, the lead plotter behind the Sept. 11 attacks, in April of 2001. The allegation had supposedly been discredited, based largely on CIA denials. But the Czechs, who ought to know, have never wavered in their insistence that indeed the two men did meet. As the Observer newspaper reported recently, "in a signed statement dated 24 February, 2003, Hynek Kmonicek, the Czech ambassador to the UN, says his government 'can confirm that during the stay of Mohamed Atta ... there was contact with Mr. al-Ani, who was on 22 April, 2001, expelled from the Czech Republic on the basis of activities not compatible with his diplomatic status [the usual euphemism for spying].' " Then there's Ahmad Hikmat Shakir, the Iraqi embassy employee who, according to Newsweek, attended the January, 2000, al-Qaeda "summit" in Malaysia, along with two of the Sept. 11 hijackers. There's Yusuf Galan, now awaiting trial in Madrid on charges of having helped to plan the Sept. 11 attacks. Galan's links to bin Laden are not in doubt: He was photographed with him at an al-Qaeda training camp. But Spanish investigators also have documents showing he was invited to a party by the Iraqi ambassador there, under his al-Qaeda code name.

There's Mamdouh Salim, also known as Abu Hajer al-Iraqi, who is awaiting trial in New York on charges related to the 1998 East Africa embassy bombings. According to former U.S. intelligence officials, Salim was bin Laden's chief procurer of weapons of mass destruction, and served as a liaison to Iraqi intelligence.

And there's Abu Abdullah al-Iraqi, an Iraqi-born al-Qaeda operative, dispatched to Iraq on several occasions in the late 1990s, Jeffrey Goldberg writes in The New Yorker, for help in acquiring poison gases.

Could he have been the unnamed envoy in the Telegraph/Star documents?

All told, David Rose reports in Vanity Fair, the CIA has more than 100 separate reports of Iraq-al-Qaeda co-operation, dating back more than a decade. Perhaps these were not enough to persuade the doubters until now. But as the documents start to surface in Iraq, and as various Iraqi and al-Qaeda officials now in captivity start to talk, how long until "there is no link between Saddam and bin Laden" takes its place alongside "the Arab street will rise" and "the Iraqi people do not want to be liberated" on the ash heap of conventional wisdom?
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Ignore the warnings of the prior administration and only think the Bush administration is at fault for war in Iraq. It is true, the fight is really with Iran. We are fighting Iran in Iraq at this time. The war is bigger than they would like to believe. To think it's Bushs' fault for any of this is not looking at the entire picture and it is unfair to attaak him on his decisions.

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"One way or the other, we are determined to deny Iraq the capacity to
develop weapons of mass destruction and the missiles to deliver them. That is our bottom line." - President Clinton, Feb. 4, 1998

"If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program." - President Clinton, Feb. 17, 1998

Iraq is a long way from [here], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risks that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear,
chemical or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest
security threat we face." - Madeline Albright, Feb 18, 1998

"He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten time since 1983." - Sandy Berger, Clinton National Security Adviser, Feb
18,1998

"[W]e urge you, after consulting with Congress, and consistent with the US Constitution and laws, to take necessary actions (including, if
appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond
effectively to the threat posed by Iraq's refusal to end its weapons of
mass destruction programs." - Letter to President Clinton, signed by Sens. Carl Levin (D-MI), Tom Daschle (D-SD), John Kerry (D - MA), and others Oct. 9,1998

"Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process." - Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA), Dec. 16, 1998

"Hussein has chosen to spend his money on building weapons of mass
destruction and palaces for his cronies." >- Madeline Albright, Clinton
Secretary of State, Nov. 10, 1999

"There is no doubt that ... Saddam Hussein has invigorated his weapons
programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf War status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies." - Letter to President Bush, Signed by Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL,) and others, December 5, 2001

"We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical
weapons throughout his country." - Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"Iraq's search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power." - Al Gore, Sept. 23, 2002

"We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction." - Sen. Ted Kennedy (D, MA), Sept. 27, 2002

"The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are
confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and
biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical and biological warfare capabilities. Intelligence
reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons..." - Sen. Robert Byrd (D, WV), Oct. 3, 2002

"I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority
to use force-- if necessary-- to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security." - Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Oct. 9,2002

"There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years .. We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction."- Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D, WV), Oct 10, 2002

"He has systematically violated, over the course of the past 11 years,
every significant UN resolution that has demanded that he disarm and
destroy his chemical and biological weapons, and any nuclear capacity. This he has refused to do" - Rep. Henry Waxman (D, CA), Oct. 10, 2002

"In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show
that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical and biological
weapons stock, his missile delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including Al
Qaeda members.. It is clear, however, that if left unchecked, Saddam
Hussein will continue to increase his capacity to wage biological and
chemical warfare, and will keep trying to develop nuclear weapons." - Sen. Hillary Clinton (D, NY), Oct 10, 2002

"We are in possession of what I think to be compelling evidence that Saddam Hussein has, and has had for a number of years, a developing capacity for the production and storage of weapons of mass destruction." - Sen. Bob Graham (D, FL), Dec. 8, 2002

"Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal,
murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime ... He presents a
particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to
miscalculation ... And now he is miscalculating America's response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction.. So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real" - Sen. John F. Kerry (D, MA), Jan. 23. 2003

SO NOW EVERY ONE OF THESE SAME DEMOCRATS SAY PRESIDENT BUSH LIED--THAT THERE NEVER WERE ANY WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION AND HE TOOK US TO WAR UNNECESSARILY!
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It is so Hypocritical, it is so unfair.