Democrats Keeping Bush on the Defensive

[CatWoman]

WASHINGTON - His poll numbers sagging and Democratic criticism unrelenting, President Bush (news - web sites) has responded with abrupt turnabouts over the past 10 days on Iraq (news - web sites) war intelligence, his own military service record and cooperation with a panel investigating the Sept. 11 attacks.


The White House initially declined to open up Bush's National Guard record, saying that lingering questions about his service during the Vietnam War were asked and answered when he ran for president. Then, late Friday, a two-inch stack of his military records were released with a thud.


When it became clear that some of the prewar intelligence on Iraq was flawed, Bush steadfastly defended his decision to go after Saddam Hussein (news - web sites). But when the controversy didn't die, the White House last week appointed a seven-member commission to study the issue.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=544&ncid=703&e=4&u=/ap/20040214/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush

[JPace]

1. But there is sooo much for AWOL to have to defend....

The economy
The missing WMD's
The missing year of National Guard service
The connections and support of greedy big businesses
The fact that he was never elected but selected
The growing national debt
The disappearing jobs
The daily death and disabling of soldiers
and on and on and on....

and now these famous quotes:
"http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/163815p-143464c.html"

G.W. Bush quotes:
<snip>"I'm saying to myself, 'What do I want to do?' I think I don't want to be an infantry guy as a private in Vietnam. What I do decide to want to do is learn to fly."
Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, 1989

"I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment. Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes."
Dallas Morning News, Feb. 25, 1990

"I don't want to play like I was somebody out there marching when I wasn't. It was either Canada or the service. ... Somebody said the Guard was looking for pilots. All I know is, there weren't that many people trying to be pilots."
Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Nov. 29, 1998