Let's talk about replacing GWBush in 2004.

This 'larger war on terror' is, of course, merely a subset of the 'even larger war on evil'. Which points out the problems that accrue when you go to war with a word.

Newsview: Cross Bush, Face Payback
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: March 27, 2004


Filed at 2:02 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush is playing supercharged hardball in going after his own former anti-terrorism chief, Richard Clarke. It's a risky strategy that shows the single-mindedness of Bush and his re-election team in trying to deflect politically damaging criticism.

Loyalty is a hallmark of Bush's administration, with the president and his top lieutenants quick to turn on those who stray from the fold.

A week after a broadside that questioned Democratic rival John Kerry's commitment to U.S. troops and fitness to be president -- standard operating procedure for the general election campaign -- Bush's re-election machine unleashed a shock and awe campaign designed to discredit Clarke.

Bush's leadership after the Sept. 11 attacks is the guiding theme of his re-election campaign, intended to suggest the nation is safer with him as president. Clarke's claim that Bush ignored the threat from Osama bin Laden and waged a pointless war against Iraq's Saddam Hussein directly challenges that argument.

In his book ``Against All Enemies,'' Clarke predicted retribution from a White House ``adept at revenge.''

But Bush and his chief political adviser, Karl Rove, are essentially following the same game plan that the late Lee Atwater -- an early political mentor of Rove's -- used to get the first President Bush elected in 1988: define and undercut an opponent early with a fusillade of negative attacks.

``This team is tough. You cross them and they go after you and raise questions about you and your credibility rather than what you have to say,'' said Thomas Mann, a scholar with the Brookings Institution.

Others who have fallen out of favor over Iraq include former economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey, retired Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni and former Army chief of staff Gen. Eric Shinseki. All voiced concerns about either the expense or number of troops needed to occupy Iraq. All were treated dismissively by the White House. All are gone, but their estimates proved accurate.

Former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV drew the administration's wrath by suggesting Bush exaggerated Saddam's nuclear capabilities. A federal grand jury is investigating whether a White House official illegally disclosed that Wilson's wife was a CIA officer to get back at him.

On the domestic front, Paul O'Neill was fired as Treasury secretary in December 2002 after publicly questioning the need for additional Bush tax cuts -- another core campaign issue for Bush.

Administration officials now are waging a behind-the-scenes campaign to discredit Richard Foster, a Medicare accountant who publicly said he was forbidden by his superiors from sharing with Congress a higher -- and more accurate -- cost estimate for the administration's Medicare program.

John DiIulio quit as director of Bush's office of faith-based initiatives in 2002, telling Esquire magazine that ``Mayberry Machiavellis'' led by Rove were basing policy only on re-election concerns. He later apologized for making what he said were rude remarks.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., stood on the Senate floor last week to urge Bush to stop the ``character attacks'' on Clarke, saying they recalled scorched-earth tactics that Bush and his allies used to defeat Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona in the GOP presidential primary in 2000, and Democratic Sen. Max Cleland of Georgia in the 2002 midterm elections.

The risk for Bush in aggressively challenging a former member of his own administration is that it could backfire. Clarke's book instantly became a best seller, and the White House counterattack is helping to give the allegations even wider circulation.

But administration defenders said it was important to rebut the charges quickly to ensure that they wouldn't linger unanswered.

``I think the American people do not believe that the president of the United States is pursuing a folly in the war on terror,'' and it is important to drive that home, said Bush National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

Not every White House attempt at damage-control works. Last summer, White House officials tried to pin the blame on CIA Director George Tenet for not waving Bush off his State of the Union claim that Saddam was seeking uranium in Africa for nuclear weapons.

Political analysts rushed to proclaim Tenet a goner, but those obituaries proved premature. CIA memos suddenly surfaced showing that Rice and her top advisers had, in fact, been given just such a warning by the CIA -- months before Bush's speech.

Tenet, a politically wily Clinton administration holdover, remains on the job.

But Bush and his chief political adviser, Karl Rove, are essentially following the same game plan that the late Lee Atwater -- an early political mentor of Rove's -- used to get the first President Bush elected in 1988: define and undercut an opponent early with a fusillade of negative attacks.

Quote:

"My opponent clearly has strong beliefs -- they just don't last very long."

--- George W. Bush, remarks at Fundraising Lunch on March 8, 2004

Bush is against campaign finance reform; then he's for it. * Bush is
against a Homeland Security Department; then he's for it. * Bush is
against a 9/11 commission; then he's for it. * Bush is against an Iraq
WMD investigation; then he's for it. * Bush is against nation building;
then he's for it. * Bush is against deficits; then he's for them. * Bush
is for free trade; then he's for tariffs on steel; then he's against
them again. * Bush is against the U.S. taking a role in the Israeli
Palestinian conflict; then he pushes for a "road map" and a Palestinian
State. * Bush is for states right to decide on gay marriage, then he is
for changing the constitution. * Bush first says he'll provide money for
first responders (fire, police, emergency), then he doesn't. * Bush
first says that 'help is on the way' to the military ... then he cuts
benefits * Bush-"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin
Laden. Bush-"I don't know where he is. I have no idea and I really don't
care. * Bush claims to be in favor of the environment and then secretly
starts drilling on Padre Island. * Bush talks about helping education
and increases mandates while cutting funding. * Bush first says the U.S.
won't negotiate with North Korea. Now he will * Bush goes to Bob Jones
University. Then say's he shouldn't have. * Bush said he would demand a
U.N. Security Council vote on whether to sanction military action
against Iraq. Later Bush announced he would not call for a vote * Bush
said the "mission accomplished" banner was put up by the sailors. Bush
later admits it was his advance team. * Bush was for fingerprinting and
photographing Mexicans who enter the US. Bush, after meeting with Pres. Fox, says he's against it.

``I think the American people do not believe that the president of the United States is pursuing a folly in the war on terror,'' and it is important to drive that home, said Bush National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

Quote:

``I think the American people do not believe that the president of the United States is pursuing a folly in the war on terror,'' and it is important to drive that home, said Bush National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice.

I think Rice and Co protest too much. I wonder why they didn't just say, "oh bother, it's not true" and be done with it. By over reacting, they do indeed look guilty, as I believe they are. Funny how lies can be revealed by denial of them.

National "I'm Embarrassed by My President" Day, April 1st, 2004

Wear a Brown Ribbon to protest the BS
(No, this is not an April Fool's day joke...)
Gathering in D.C. at 4:30 on April 1st
At the corner of 15th and Eye Street to protest in front of the White House

Are you embarrassed by the arrogance, greed, shortsightedness, selfishness, and outright lies told by George W. Bush and his administration?

Join tens of thousands of others across the country and world and wear a brown armband or ribbon to symbolize all the BS coming out of the White House.

It's not just that I disagree with the current administration. I'm outraged. And I'm downright embarrassed to talk to anyone from another country. I'm embarrassed to have a President so arrogant, so dishonest, so hawkish, that in three years he has nearly destroyed any good relations we had before he took office, and worsened those that were already bad.

I find myself apologizing to my friends both in this country and abroad while trying vainly to explain the sheer idiocy and illogic of the current administration's policies.

So this April 1st, April Fools day, join tens of thousands of others who are wearing brown armbands or ribbons to signify the bullshit flowing down from Washington.

I'll use real diplomacy to do what George Bush hasn't - pressure OPEC to start providing more oil," Kerry told a rally in San Diego. "We'll stop diverting oil to the Strategic Petroleum Reserve until gas prices get back to normal. We'll simplify the patchwork of rules on gas all over this country so that we can reduce costs and make fuel supplies while keeping our air clean.

With alternatives like these, what's the point in voting?

To say that the [Bush-Cheney] secret presidency is undemocratic is an understatement,...

Dys the accurate expector. Laughing