I don't think the "president" has a choice any more about "moving on." We choose whether to let him move on. And the media seem to have their teeth in his coat tails at the moment...
Tartarin
The American public is fickle and has a very short memory span. This will be forgotten by both the public and the media as soon as the next big story comes along. Did you ever notice that politicians only respond to their constituents needs and wants when election time approaches. Why, because they know the voting public has a short memory. I could almost liken it to a boxing match. Boxers try to finish each round with a flurry because they know that last impressions carry the most weight.
I have a very specific example thereof, AU . . . the 27th amendment, proposed in September, 1787, had no time limit for ratification as do modern proposed amendments. It was ratified in May, 1992. It reads:
No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of representatives shall have intervened.
In the last decade, those suckers pass pay raises as quickly as possible after the new Congress sits, and hope like hell it is all forgotten in two years. Of course, it is, and the media find it too boring to chase after. It has slowed down the pace at which they'd previously been accustomed to vote themselves benefits--the language of the amendment doesn't admit to hidden pay raises in the form of perquisites.
Now that CIA boss Tenet 'confessed' that he's to blame for not removing the statement from the president's speech of the uranium purchase from Africa, what's next? c.i.
c.i.
The pissed-off underlings in the CIA start leaking contrary evidence to the Media, that's what happens next (I hope).
BumbleBeeBoogie
well now that we sorta know that Bush lied or didn't lie, was misinformed by the CIA or not informed by Powell, or Cheney was informed or not, the info came from the Brits who may or may not have gotten it from the CIA who may or may not have gotten it from the Italians and the issue is closed by Bush via Ari. I know that I am feeling a lot more secure...
Though I agree in general about the short attention span, it seems to me that negative items about the administration have ceased to be pinpricks -- here today and gone tomorrow -- but have become something closer to a snowball rolling relentlessly, picking up weight and speed. Also I just picked up today's NYTimes and hope it will have the full Tenet statement because, yesterday, the quotes I heard show a statement in which he starts out kind of taking the blame and then, in detail, denying it. I take seriously the commentator who said yesterday that Bush's teflon has chipped away.
Tartarin wrote:I don't think the "president" has a choice any more about "moving on." We choose whether to let him move on. And the media seem to have their teeth in his coat tails at the moment...
Awfully idealistic there, Tart - "we choose"? If it wasn't a story that was considered sellable by whoever shuffles and deals the "top stories of the day", I don't think we have a plug nickel's say whether what leads is George Bush or Martha Stewart. With the namby-pamby press licking Bush's boots the way they do, I just feel fortunate the lies have gotten the coverage they have.
au1929 wrote:It appears that Tenet drew the short straw.
And after that, they asked him to bend over to insert the other end of the broom up his ass.
Published on Friday, July 11, 2003 by the Berkshire Eagle (Pittsfield, Massachusetts)
Why Does 9/11 Inquiry Scare Bush?
Editorial
The Bush administration has never wanted an inquiry into the intelligence and law-enforcement failures that led up to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and it is doing its best to make sure we never get one. Even the tame commission of Washington insiders, led by men of the president's own party, is now complaining that its work is being hampered by foot-dragging from the Pentagon and Justice Department in producing documents and witnesses, in an effort to run the clock out on it before it can complete its work. The commission's leaders have taken the extraordinary step of accusing the White House of witness "intimidation," insisting that sensitive witnesses testify only in the presence of a "monitor" from their agency. The parallel to Saddam Hussein's refusal to let Iraqi scientists talk to U.N. weapons inspectors without a similar monitor is too glaring to miss and begs the obvious question: What has Mr. Bush got to hide?
The crudeness of his tactics suggests that whatever it is, it must be pretty bad. The Internet is full of wild theories -- that Mr. Bush knew in advance of 9/11 and allowed it to happen so he could exploit it to get his way in domestic and international politics is the most notable -- and while cyberspace is the natural home of the improbable and the far-fetched, the administration's stonewalling only lends credence to those who believe a cover-up of something is going on.
September 11 was the most traumatic incident in recent American history. Three thousand people died in New York, billions in property was destroyed, the national economy tanked and Americans' sense of security was shattered. The men responsible for the attacks are still at large and openly threaten to attack us again. Yet the commission's budget is only $3 million, a pittance compared to the $100 million that was wasted getting to the bottom of Bill Clinton's Whitewater investment and his extramarital affairs. The hearings in the Republican-dominated Congress were a perfunctory affair that attracted even less attention from a sensation-oriented media than is being paid to this commission.
The American people deserve a thorough investigation. They want to know why the fighter jets weren't scrambled after the first plane hit the tower, what the Clinton and Bush administrations knew about threats from al-Qaida and what they were doing about them, what citizens of our allies Saudi Arabia and Pakistan financed Osama bin Laden and his hijackers, how the FBI and CIA missed obvious clues and let suspects they were following slip away, why airline security was so lax, what is the meaning of a suspicious pattern of stock transactions that occurred before the attacks, whether law enforcement efforts were subordinated to diplomatic priorities and the needs and desires of American oil companies. Americans want the answers to two basic questions: What went wrong? And what is being done to make sure it never happens again? They should be satisfied with nothing less than an honest effort to get those answers, no matter who they embarrass, and the White House should not stand in the way.
...pisses me off so bad...
The skullduggery going on in this administration is making Clinton look like a saint.
LW, It's not so much that this administration makes Clinton look like a saint, but that this administration resembles the devil. c.i.
It's bad when the hidden agendas have hidden agendas.
Ah! how I long for the good old days when all we had to worry about sex in the White House and treasury surpluses.
Yeah. Those were hard times! Remember how the world admired our president? Remember booming mutual funds? Remember the, us, what were they called, oh right, surpluses? As a New England Calvinist, I know that this period in our history is punishment for the good times. But c'mon -- does it have to be THIS bad??
Got this in my email box this morning. "By RICHARD W. STEVENSON
After the C.I.A. director took the blame for approving unsubstantiated information about Iraq's nuclear program, President Bush said he considered the matter closed."
GWBush hopes "this matter is closed." c.i.
