BunkBlog

I can’t wait to see how the Dems spin this to make it sound like Bush is not doing anything to stop the attack ads.

It’s pretty well documented that Karl Rove is a devious attack dog, so I don’t doubt that there was some backroom encouragement of the Swift Boat Veterans for Political Gain, but now that the President has promised McCain that he’ll sue to stop the 527 ads, it should be interesting to see how the Kerry campaign (and its supporters) react.

I’m sure the fact that the liberal 527s have outspent the conservative 527s by at least an order of magnitude has nothing to do with Bush’s condemnation of them. And the fact that the lie-filled first SBVFTT ad has received national attention that has caused the race to swing a little back toward the Republicans is just a happy coincidence.

This Mackubin Thomas Owens article says things very clearly and cogently that the Swift Boat Veterans for Political Gain have missed. If Kerry is proud of his military service, why was he ashamed of it in 1971? If he thinks of his fellow veterans as a band of brothers, why did he call them war criminals in 1971? Was he cravenly attempting to curry favor with the Democratic party and the anti-war groups then, or is he trying to curry favor now? Which position is his true core belief?

Read the article – it’s good.

VP raises ‘sensitive’ war issue: Jabs at Kerry remarks

bq. Dick Cheney’s desperate misleading attacks now have him criticizing George Bush’s own words.

According to our latest information, al Qaeda has new plans.

Al-Qaeda has a plan to assassinate a world leader either in the U.S. or another country.

“The U.S. or another country” pretty much covers the entire planet except Antarctica. So, they want to kill someone important somewhere, at some unknown time. Great. Get right on that.

In other news, a giant storm may kill some people in the U.S. or another country. Stay tuned to Fears R Us for more useless information.

Could someone who knows more about economics than I please explain how these various indicators are not showing a poor economic plan, or at least tell me how the Republicans are explaining this as a good thing?

Second-quarter growth fell to 3 percent compared with 4.5 percent in the first quarter and about 8 percent in the third quarter of 2003. Personal income growth fell to 0.2 percent; personal consumption expenditures also fell, by 0.7 percent. Housing starts were off 8.2 percent. New-home sales fell 0.8 percent. Industrial production fell 0.3 percent. The July jobs report shows just 32,000 new jobs and a cut of 34,000 in the estimates previously released for June (for a net loss of 2000 jobs in July, when tacked onto the June numbers as originally reported). The Dow Industrials fell 8% in 6 months, and the Nasdaq is down 15% in the same six months.

I know the economy is more than just these indicators, but these sure seem to add up to a bad thing in my perception, and I’m sure in most non-economist minds as well.

I can’t wait to hear what the vast right-wing conspiracy has to say about this one…

International team to monitor presidential election

A spokesperson for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said, “The U.S. is obliged to invite us, as all OSCE countries should.”

Now, this brings to mind two issues – civil rights and sovereignty. On one side, folks will say we need an unbiased outside party to doublecheck certain areas (like, say, Florida?) to ensure that all eligible voters are allowed to vote freely. On the other side, doesn’t this at least lean toward giving some of our hard-won sovereign powers to an outside political organization?

It turns out to be a compromise, really – the Dems wanted the U.N., while the Reps wanted nobody. So they get the OSCE instead. Not sure how we belong to an organization whose stated goal is to deal with things in Europe, but apparently the group just needs a new name.

After reading about the massive job growth in July, it’s especially amusing to hear the Vice President talking about how strong the economy is today. A quick quote that sums up the disconnect between job growth that is 110,000 people fewer than population growth for the month and where the administration lives:

bq. I would have to conclude — and I think it’s a fair judgment — that the economy is back on track, is headed in the right direction.

Which direction is that? The stock market has fallen to a new low for the year, employment has no chance to reach the same level it was when Bush took office, and oil is at an all-time high with no sign of falling. Great direction.

Where is this thriving economy exactly? I don’t know what Greenspan and friends can do to fix it, but the past six months of stock market activity doesn’t make things look good for Bush in November. That record-breaking oil price ain’t so good either.

Good thing we’re in the middle of such a strong economic recovery, hmmm?

From a recent Lou Dobbs commentary:

Bush and Kerry have mostly offered similar policy positions on the most divisive issues of our time.

Both have supported nearly identical plans for winning the war in Iraq. Bush and Kerry also agree on preserving tax breaks for the middle class, demanding greater accountability from our nation’s educators, immigration reform and limiting government spending in an effort to cut the deficit in half by the end of this decade.

What I find interesting is the disconnect between what they say and what they do. Kerry voted to help the President fast-track free trade agreements that Kerry now claims should be looked at more closely. So why did you shirk your responsibility to force that closer look, Senator?

The President, on the other hand, has the gall to claim that he wants to reduce government spending, when he’s increased government spending a record amount so far.

Fool me once…

Esquire has an article by the ever-eloquent Ron Reagan discussing his perceived failings in the Bush administration. The “lying for lying’s sake” argument is a good one. What was gained by pretending that Gore spent more in 2000 than Bush, when anyone with a bit of research can find out the opposite was true? There are other examples.

Finland requires their young men to complete a massive six month military commitment. Some of them can’t make it that long without their most prized activity. Sex? Drugs? Nope, the intarweb and Everquest. What’s astounding isn’t that people would try anything to get out of being a draftee, it’s that the military is going along with it!

bq. Finland’s military conscription unit revealed that some of the young men drafted can’t cope with being apart from their beloved PCs and have been booted off their full term of military service.

Old information led to the terror alerts in the financial districts of DC and NY yesterday. Or maybe not so old, but mostly old. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

Democrats have raised questions over the timing of the alert, saying it could be politically motivated ahead of the election.

Politically motivated? I’m sure the Democratic allegation has no political motivation behind it either. Nope. They’re completely altruistic and just thinking of the best thing for the country. Of course.

My snarky comments will be in italics.

Text of President Bush’s speech at Hammons Field on Friday, July 30, 2004:

We will do more to make America more job friendly and America’s workplaces more family friendly. To keep American jobs in America, regulations should be reasonable and fair. To keep the jobs here at home, we must lessen our dependence on foreign sources of energy. To keep American jobs here, we must end the junk lawsuits that hurt our small businesses. And to keep this economy growing so people can find work, we will not overspend your money, and we will keep your taxes low. By “reasonable” regulations, do you mean removing ergonomics, safety, and pollution rules? And we’ll only overspend your money on foreign wars, not anything you might benefit from.

More »

My snarky comments will be in italics.

Text of President Bush’s speech at Hammons Field on Friday, July 30, 2004:

Thank you all very much. Thank you, please be seated. Thanks for coming. It’s great to be in the heartland of our country. And I want to thank you all for being here this morning to help kick off our Heart and Soul of America Tour.

There will be big differences in this campaign. They’re going to raise your taxes, we’re not. The tax cut has not improved the economy so far, and the Dems only want to raise taxes on people making more than $200,000 – probably not most of the audience.

I have a clear vision on how to win the war on terror and bring peace to the world. Maybe you could have started working on that by now, then?

More »

After watching Obama’s speech, attempting to sit still through Kerry’s dronefest is just painful. Fortunately, it’s nothing I haven’t heard before. Could someone get the guy a personality transplant? His wife has some to spare, I think.

Bush back to campaigning in battleground states with a message of “we’ve turned a corner” so we should stay the course. I remember his daddy had a “stay the course” message that didn’t work out so well for him.

My question is, if we’ve turned a corner, are we now in a long dark alley, or is that just the perception of most people I talk to? 🙂

It really sucks that I would ever find myself agreeing with anything that Fidel Castro has to say.

bq. Bush, charged Castro, could be having a difficult time “distinguishing between relevant and inconsequential information.”

Apparently the non sequiturs that the President threw around a few weeks ago regarding how proud Castro is of his healthy prostitutes were (read for it?) plagiarised from a college student’s web site. And, they were paraphrased badly at that. Go figure.

Are there any fact checkers working for the White House? Any at all?

Why is it that I have suddenly begun seeing Ready.gov commercials on television every ten damned minutes? They have been on often enough that I noticed them in the past year, but not so often that I was annoyed by them. I’m sure it has nothing to do with the Democratic Convention or anything. Nope. This administration has never used its executive offices for campaign propaganda purposes before.

Jon Stewart is hilarious. My favorite quote from this piece about Saddam’s hatred of the U.S.:

bq. Democrats – always standing up for what they later realize they should have believed in.

Try to go to this link from a .mil or .gov computer and tell me if you can get there.

I can’t, from my work machine. I can get to Fox News just fine. I can get the amazingly bizarre Protest Warrior site. But not MoveOn. I wonder how that could be. I’m sure there’s nobody making decisions for NIPRnet that would be biased or partisan, because that would just be wrong.