Change of heartland (Boston Globe):Indiana waking up to GWB incompetency

[laststeamtrain]

Change of heartland
On the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, many Indianians are no longer strongly behind the war
By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff | March 19, 2006

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- The third anniversary of the Iraq invasion unleashed a surge of pessimism at a local farmers' market here, where stalwart Republicans, standing amid aisles of produce and miracle cures, said President Bush has messed up a war that looks more like Vietnam every day.

''It's chaos," said Roger Madaras, who voted twice for Bush. ''How many more people are going to be killed? We were going in to free the people of Iraq, but as far as I'm concerned, a lot of them are worse off today than they were under the dictatorship."

<snip>

This month, the Indianapolis Star released poll findings that Bush's approval rating among Indiana voters stood at 37 percent -- a drop of 18 points over the past year. The numbers echoed national polls, but were particularly shocking in a state that has not voted for a Democratic presidential candidate since 1964, and where Democratic presidential contenders often do not bother to campaign.

<snip>

As more and more Hoosiers find themselves making the comparison that only liberals and antiwar protesters made a year ago -- Iraq is like Vietnam -- some say they are also starting to doubt Bush's competence to protect America from terrorism on the home front.

<snip>
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2006/03/19/change_of_heartland?mode=PF

[Atman]

1. "We went in to free the people of Iraq." Waking up, but still ignorant.

Jesus Christ, how long will it take? It is nice to know that the people of Indiana are "waking up," but it would be nicer to know that they were not still buying (and parroting) this umpteenth ass-covering incarnation of the excuse for Bush's historic fuck-up.

Our soldiers are not dying because we went in to liberate the people of Iraq! Get that through your fat freakin' heads! George Bush sent thousands of our young men and women to die ON A LIE ABOUT WMD! He cannot be allowed to get away with it, legally, or in revisionist history books!

[rodeodance]

2. repugs will still vote repug. best hope is they stay home.

[salin]

4. article states that... as a concern from a hoosier gop operative

that in the air is the discontent smelled back in 1994, and that while some may not be able to vote dem -there is a good chance that many will just stay home. And when there are THREE close races in this state - that would be a stunning edge for dems... the possibility that the congressional districts could go from 7 reps to 2 dems - to 5 dems to 4 repubs. Not yet a "likely" result - but an increasingly possible one.

[INdemo]

5. 6 Dems and 3 Repubs is also very possible

[kenny blankenship]

3. The problem with "incompetence" is

that it implies that you need someone to do the same things acting from the same principles and values, only doing the same things more effectively.
Bush's problem isn't incompetence, it just that he doesn't care or worse, he's intentionally doing the stuff he does (like ignoring domestic infrastructure and contingency planning, and manipulating the intelligence process, and bankrupting the government, etc.) to achieve consciously criminal ends.

That's what Indiana needs to wake up to. Bush isn't incompetent. Bush is a predator, with all the sense and adaptations a predator acquires through evolution. He knows what he needs to know in order to suck the lifeblood from his prey species: average Americans and huddled masses waiting to be exploited on foreign shores. More importantly the good people of Cornotopia need to wake the hell up and realize that their red state VALUES which they clutched with them in the voting booth when they went to elect Bush as King of the Republican Party, are wrong and mistaken values.

[katty]

6. took them this long to wake up??!!"starting to doubt" ?!