Let's talk about replacing GWBush in 2004.

BillW, As a atheist, I see GWBush as the devil himself. He's ready to start a war with people that supposedly threatens the security of the US and our friends. No proof needed, because he's the god-devil. What he says is gospel. c.i.

CI - since you originally brought up replacing our fearless leader...read in the paper today that Howard Dean - in Iowa - is beginning to make an impression. He's speaking against the war with Iraq, against the budget - and getting a reception.

Re the budget and the taxes and all - the back page of the Week in Review section of the NYT has a very interesting, full page ad - signed by Warren Rudman, Bob Kerry, Paul Volcker, Sam Nunn, Lloyd Cutler (among others), protesting Bush's tax plan as being unsound and unsafe. Although I've seen plenty of anti- war -with -Iraq stuff, this is the first I've seen on the budget. It's impressive. I can't give a link because it's an ad.

It's a little encouraging that there is at last some voices with some knowledge and background speaking out against GWBush's "stimulus plan." It's unsound, because it give the majority of the tax breaks to the wealthy, and there's no way they are going to stimulate this economy. Unsafe, because Bush is trying to make his tax plan permanent - just about as stupid as his tax cuts planned for the next ten years. No economist or fiscal expert can predict the economy for ten years in the future. That's plain dumb. c.i.

"If we're an arrogant nation, they'll resent us. If we're a humble nation, but strong, they'll welcome us."
--Dubya, explaining why the whole world hates us now

Gees, that just about sums it all up!

(from David Neiwert's Orcinus:)

Joan Didion makes a noteworthy point:

"I made up my mind," he had said in April, "that Saddam needs to go." This was one of many curious, almost petulant statements offered in lieu of actually presenting a case. I've made up my mind, I've said in speech after speech, I've made myself clear. The repeated statements became their own reason: "Given all we have said as a leading world power about the necessity for regime change in Iraq," James R Schlesinger, who is now a member of Richard Perle's Defence Policy Board, told The Washington Post in July, "our credibility would be badly damaged if that regime change did not take place".

This encapsulates Bush's entire approach to governance. In Bush's view, the president has -- by virtue of holding the office, even without the actual mandate of the voters -- almost godlike powers, able to decide the fate of entire nations by virtue of his election, or in this case, installment by court fiat. (It's becoming clear why they hated Bill Clinton so much -- liberals aren't supposed to possess such power.)

Or, as Bush told Bob Woodward: "I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being the President. Maybe somebody needs to explain to me why they say something, but I don't feel like I owe anybody an explanation."

This approach is clear not merely in such brusque asides as "Who cares what you think?", but also in the administration's refusal to hand over documents related to Enron and Halliburton's influences in the Oval Office, as well as a host of domestic issues ranging from the environment to economic and tax policies. It also plays a major role in Bush's messianic militarism.

Most of all, it's an important part of the administration's aggressive acquisition of new and wide-ranging powers for the executive branch. Most of this is being masterminded by Solicitor General Ted Olson, who has been making it his mission since the mid-'80s, when he worked for Reagan's Justice Department, to overturn the losses of executive power that came with the post-Watergate reforms of the 1970s.

But the powers this administration has been acquiring go well beyond even that range (much of which had to do with executive privilege and open governance). They now extend into entirely new areas, wrought mainly by Bush's "Military Order" that allows the administration to arrest and detain American citizens as "enemy combatants" without counsel or even notification of arrest -- powers that appear to have been dreamed up by Kafka, but in fact were a product of the internment of Japanese-Americans in World War II.

The administration's assertion of these powers flows out of Bush's godlike view of himself, and his minions' simultaneous promotion of that view. That was especially clear in Olson's explanation for the Washington Post (in a Dec. 2 story by Charles Lane titled, "In Terror War, 2nd Track for Suspects," which is no longer available online) why Bush, and not the courts, should be given these powers:

"At the end of the day in our constitutional system, someone will have to decide whether that [decision to designate someone an enemy combatant] is a right or just decision," Olson said. "Who will finally decide that? Will it be a judge, or will it be the president of the United States, elected by the people, specifically to perform that function, with the capacity to have the information at his disposal with the assistance of those who work for him?"

Of course, Ted -- who argued Bush v. Gore before the Supreme Court -- well knows that to hold the presidency, one needs not even be actually elected.

One need only have an unquenchable thirst for power. Perhaps the most dangerous such thirst in American history.

Note also his post 9-11 claim that he could not think of a decision he regretted during his entire administration. Sane people who have positions of responsibility are constantly confronted with their own limitation and fallibilities. Imagine, the worst terrorist attack proceeds without hitch during his watch and he has no wish that he looked into anti-terrorism more, or followed Hart-Rudman, or ...

Precisely. It's this very blindness that makes his unfitness for the office just so distinctly manifest.

It seems that a palatable fiction is often preferable to an unsavory fact.

Bush won. Gore tried to ignore FL law and perform recounts that were not allowed by law. The rest is very messy history.

What with all the recounts and court decisions, it might well be argued that Bush The Younger is the MOST ELECTED President in our history. Despite Herculean Post-Election effort, The Democrats were unable to override the electoral process.



timber

MOST UNELECTED - <sigh> Bush lovers will live on in fantasy! But history knows - the unPresident survives and continues to spread his unworth!

are we flogging dead unicorns again?

Can we include his brother Jeb "do not re-elect" campaign ??? Oops, never mind, he's been re-elected, and I can't imagine why!

None so blind as those who will not see.

Still, it is important to remember we have a Two-Party System. Sooner or later, The Democrats may be expected to cease whining and obstructing, and begin to contstructively engage the true issues facing Our Nation. Then again, maybe not.



<sigh>



timber

tresspasser will, you are one of the most offensible person's on A2K, please do not respond directly or indirectly to me - you are held in contempt by many a person and I am one.

CEASE AND DECEASE YOUR INTOLERABLE RESPONSES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Obviously, someone removed tresspasser will's intolerable reply!

BillW
And I was under the impression I was the only one that felt that way.

None so blind as those who will not see.

Still, it is important to remember we have a Two-Party System. Sooner or later, The Rebublicans may be expected to cease whining and obstructing, and begin to contstructively engage the true issues facing Our Nation. Then again, maybe not.



<sigh>




bw

Ten posts back, the one small paragraph taken out of my post has derailed the topic.

Here we go again:

Secretary of State Colin Powell, bidding for U.N. support, is set to present evidence that Iraq has hidden large caches of weapons of mass destruction from international inspectors and defied calls on it to disarm.

Powell's public presentation Wednesday to the U.N. Security Council in New York will be the centerpiece of a strenuous campaign to enlist support from Russia, France and other skeptical governments as well as from the American public.

Powell Prepares Evidence on Banned Iraqi Weapons

I'll keep an open mind that he has something damning enough to justify their planned invasion. I still won't be in favor of it, but then, that's just me.

Once Colin makes his case, how soon after that will we attack? Next week?

Surely they won't wait to allow global opposition to bubble up again, will they?

PDid, Bush said not months, but weeks. That's probably the correct time line for an invasion. c.i.

The 2000 Florida Statutes: 102.166 Protest of election returns; procedure.--


Check the record; the original 3-county recount did not indicate "an error in the vote tabulation which could affect the outcome of the election". Given that, Gore had no legal access to further recounts.