Feeling safe yet? This won't help.

[whometense]

As shock-hardened as I am these days, the sheer stupidity of the Bush administration's counterterrorism methods continues to horrify. Via Josh Marshall, Sidney Blumenthal writes in the Guardian,

International counter-terrorism is running foul of Bush's imperatives for what has become a "dirty war". Though Bush's "war on terrorism" is a phrase his administration declared obsolete last month (only to have Bush reimpose the slogan), the dirty war remains very much in place. Since September 11, Bush proposed a sharp dichotomy between "war" and "law enforcement". In his 2004 State of the Union address, he ridiculed those who view counter-terrorism as other than his conception of war: "I know that some people question if America is really in a war at all. They view terrorism more as a crime, a problem to be solved mainly with law enforcement and indictments ... The terrorists and their supporters declared war on the United States, and war is what they got."

During the presidential campaign, vice-president Dick Cheney contemptuously criticised the application of law enforcement as effeminate "sensitivity". In June of this year, Bush's deputy chief of staff, Karl Rove, attacked the very idea of "indictments" as a symptom of liberal weakness.

<snip>

But the dirty war that damages the difficult work of counter-terrorism continues unabated. It goes on for reasons beyond domestic political consumption. At its heart lies the drive for concentrated executive power above the rule of law.

This is just sickening.

(cross-posted at ToughEnough)

[ginnyinWI]

1. and seeing *'s comments yesterday

...really don't help.
Watching him stand there in front of his field, struggling for words---he is treating this whole thing as some kind of huge cowboys-and-indians kids' game, if you ask me. A complex thought has never occured to that brain! It's like nobody is really in charge--just a bunch of bullies and third-rate lackeys.

Now I bet you feel even less safe... :pals:

[whometense]

2. Misery loves company, right?

:hug:

I managed to avoid seeing his photo op yesterday. Can you imagine how enraged Kerry must feel about this? I mean, this is the world his very own daughters are going to be living in. I know it's ridiculous to expect him to care about my children, but wouldn't you think he's give a thought to his own?

I know, he's a true believer and never had a doubt in his life. Did you see that USA Today poll chart?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-08-02-christian-cover_x.htm

Look at the part where they list "By candidate quality that mattered most". How many people confused stubborn willfullness with leadership. How many people confused thoughtfulness with indecision. It baffles me.

[ginnyinWI]

3. that graph is--appalling

Those who wanted intelligence, caring and a change voted Kerry; those who wanted faith, honesty, strength and "clear stands on issues" voted *. All I can say is * must be a very good actor.

Honesty? Like when he told us all about the WMD's? Strength? Like when he headed for the hills, literally, on 9/11? Clear stands? Well as JK said, you can be certain and be wrong.

The big church-goers show themselves to be pretty gullible, if you ask me.


The * stand-up yesterday showed a man who mistakes anger for effectiveness. He is losing that damned war, and all he can think of now is to yell about it. Impotent little bastard. (Sorry--I have no patience with this administration today!)

[whometense]

4. Don't need to apologize to me.

There aren't enough negative words in the language to describe what I think of him.

Those churchgoers - are they gullible or deliberately blind? I think that's a fair question, since they are presumably part of the 42% who still think * is doing just a wonderful job. How is anyone still able to think that way? I guess if you watch nothing but Fox News it's possible. And if you're put together like *, who clearly thinks that never revisiting any decision is a mark of manliness. He makes me sick.

[karynnj]

5. They may be neither gullible or blind,

just looking at the world in a very narrow way. It takes a certain independence to question the goodness of your own society. Most people in this country have grown up believing that the United States is a uniquely good country that really has been a force to make life better in other parts of the world.

Their perception of the radical left seems to be that they blame America for everything - not seeing that they are blaming America for what they perceive it has done - and would willingly criticize other countries as well, but real a special obligation to speak out when the offender is their own country. (Oddly, some people who condemn all Germans for not speaking out - refuse to examine our actions dispassionately.) Their sensitivity to criticism of our actions has been magnified by the feeling that we are under attack.

After 911, the Republicans and the media both extended the public's tendency to rally around our country and troops to rallying around the President. To me it was odd when the Republicans went crazy when Kerry used the phrase "regime change here" - clearly talking about the election. They screamed that in a time of war you can't criticize the President, which does make it hard to campaign against him. Kerry (as he did in 1971) thought his patriotism, and love of his country would be obvious to people.

For some people, believing Kerry would mean accepting hard truths about our country's actions. This may be why, so often Kerry preferred to offer solutions going from where we were to listing Bush lies. (contrary to all the DU arguments, I think a Dean yelling about all the Bush misdeeds would have ended up with McGovern type numbers.) Kerry did get nearly enough people to see that he offered an alternative approach that was more promising.

For others, there may have been no way to get them yet. They didn't want to hear or believe that Bush had unnecessarily taken actions that killed so many people and mortgaged our future. Others, who scare me more, thought in a war with terrorists, you need to have the strength to destroy Fallujah, let people torture others, break inconvenient international laws, and kill 100,000s of innocent people to get "those who attacked us". These people were correct in saying Kerry wouldn't do this like Bush did.

Although they wouldn't use the words, it was Kerry's basic decency and morality as well as his intelligence and diplomatic skills that would stop him. It takes optimism and trust to go with diplomacy and international cooperation - especially when you are the strongest nation. Kerry's life story that made us respect, admire, and trust him makes them uneasy even when they saw it accurately.

On a completely different point, polls like this have the problem of putting words in people's mouths. It's also important to know what the questions were and in what context they were asked. (In particular, the % of people saying honesty for Kerry seems off - if it's suppose to be his voters - even on DU Kerry is not called a liar, nor were any lies (by Kerry) an issue in the campaign.)

[ginnyinWI]

7. I see your point

People were conflicted between "support-the-president-we-are-at-war" and trying to think about choosing between him and another candidate. The first thought made the second thought "taboo". I heard it more than once: "we can't change presidents in the middle of a war". Problem is the PNAC wants to keep us always at war. This war is different because they actually started it; but then there is the false 9/11 connection with Iraq, so that settles that connundrum! Sigh.

I think when people thought Bush more honest, what they were really saying is that his message was getting through more of the time. We know what a problem the media was for Kerry.

[jillan]

6. That stupid * keeps talking like we have to keep doing what we are doing

IT'S NOT WORKING!!!

Wake up people.