NYTimes 7/12/03.... excerpts
C.I.A. Chief Takes Blame in Assertion on Iraqi Uranium
By DAVID E. SANGER and JAMES RISEN
I'll be interested to see the reaction to that piece, Blatham. I like Tom Oliphant and he made excellent points, but it didn't sway me towards Kerry who seems to be stuck in another time. What Oliphant pointed to as presidential struck me as inert, lacking in imagination as well as the sense that our role in the world should be greater in giving and smaller in taking (to say the very least!)
blatham, Thanks for the link on that interview with Kerry. I place Senator Diane Feinstein in the same league as Kerry; I trust her judgement explicitly, because she has shown ethics and humanity in her decisions. c.i.
Incompetence At It's Worst!
How to turn a huge success into total disaster!
Edited from today's New York Times:
"The budget was in surplus by $127 billion in fiscal year 2001, the last budget prepared by the Clinton administration and the fourth consecutive year with a surplus. In April 2001, shortly after taking office, the Bush administration forecast a surplus of $334 billion in 2003.
Since then, the economy has faltered, taxes have been cut, and government spending has risen, mostly for the military and domestic security in the aftermath of Sept. 11. As a result, the deficit picture has worsened by $789 billion, from a surplus of $334 billion to a deficit of $455 billion, in just two years.
The White House today projected a $455 billion budget deficit in the current fiscal year, by far the government's largest deficit ever and $150 billion higher than what the administration predicted just five months ago."
Not just a real financial debacle - because it ignores all the lives lost achieving it.
Is there a Democrat (or anyone else) who could be such a disaster?
Tartarin
Yes, I really like Oliphant, bright and with a good bullshit-detector. Kerry is lacking in charisma and does come across as stilted and conservative - too establishment for my taste and I doubt he could win it for dems. But I think him a smart, caring, and conscientious civil servant. And don't that just stand at an extreme contrast to Bush.
Count on me to forget something in a timely manner, Blatham, but the other day, probably on NPR, I heard Kerry make a statement which, in tone and language, I agreed with completely. When I get my mind back (I've been busy), I may even remember what it was. Or not. As the case may be...
Since, to many voters image is everything and reality is unimportant, probably the name Kerry (Irish origin?) has greater electoral appeal than Oliphant, which could be subject to constant jokes from day one.
And I think it a given that anyone who wears bow ties would not be considered manly enough for the post.
That's probably true about bow ties. Bow ties belong in the House.
Senator Paul Simon always wore a bow tie, and ran for President, but i think the lack on name recognition was a problem. I was once walking up "old highway 51" in southern Illinois, going to the market, and he and his wife stopped and gave me a ride. We chatted a bit, and he asked if i were a Democrat. I told him i considered myself an independent, but that my grandparents who had raised me were Democrats. He asked my grandfather's name, and when i told him, he replied: "Oh, i remember him, he was a Democratic precinct committeman and a justice of the peace, wasn't he?" This was in 1986, and my grandfather had died 25 years earlier, and it had been thirty years since he had been in politics. You can imagine how impressed i was, given that he remembered a small cog in the party machine, from more than a generation ago, and hundreds and hundreds of miles from his constituency. That man was an old-fashioned FDR Democrat, and was a very canny politician.
I loved to hear him talk. And, a true gentleman. Where have they gone?
(07-17) 06:02 PDT SAN FRANCISCO (AP) --
President Bush's approval rating among Californians has dropped to its lowest level since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and more residents feel the nation is heading in the wrong direction, according to a poll being released Thursday.
The nonpartisan Field Poll found that only 49 percent of those sampled approved of the job Bush is doing, compared with a high of 74 percent in the weeks after the attacks on the East Coast. He was viewed unfavorably by 41 percent; 10 percent had no opinion.
Asked which direction the United States was heading, 48 percent said it was going in the wrong direction while 42 percent said it was on the right track.
For the first time since Bush took office, a majority of those polled, 52 percent, disapproved of how Bush is handling the economy compared with 43 percent who support his economic policies.
I have no doubt that the presidents ratings are falling dramatically in such areas as the Northeast and California. I wonder however if they have changed much in areas such as the solid south, west and south west and areas where his staunchest support came from. A fall in those areas would be significant.
au, Good question; the south has always been a republican strong-hold. c.i.
BillW wrote:I loved to hear him talk. And, a true gentleman. Where have they gone?
both you and Setanta are right on: Simon was so interesting; I'm not surprised about his memory at all ... so sad ... reminds me of "Where Have All The Flowers Gone?" ...
Dys, yes I saw that article as well. Don't remember if I posted on A2K or just another of my sites: but, anyway, "as goes California, so eventually goes the nation"...this gives me hope as we have time before the actual election to work with this, don't you think?
There is no hope for the south, it is still mired in pre-war delusionalism (that war by the way is Civil War).
the South is strange, Dys. While it's true - one can find areas where people just can't get their heads out of their billy-bob asses, the South has also been and continues to be the jumping off place for some of the most dramatic social change.
snood, Isn't one a precursor for the other? Your point is well taken!
