I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
We need to adopt the mantra that Bush is lying. How can we tell? His lips are moving!
Forget it. This press is bought and paid for like some cheap whore. Impeach Scalia and Bush now!
sure, Bush will cut the deficit in half, if we just elect him in November.
I believe him. I really do. Because in 2000 he promised to restore honor and integrity, to adopt a humble foreign policy, to be a uniter not a divider...
... and he kept all those promises, right?
This administration would lie even if the truth fit better.
I bet he lies in the new plan too.
Friends:
I am, forthwith, sending the following letter out to every news organization I possibly can:
I, Jeff Sternstein, of Brooklyn, New York, am hereby offering a reward of $20 whole American dollars to any persons or news organizations which can, actually and without malice of forethought, prove to me that George "W" Bush served out his complete National Guard service in the state of Alabama.
Would that be so difficult? Would it be so hard to interview all the other members of the Alabama Air National Guard in the months concerned?
And why, pray tell, was this not done four years ago?
And, while we're at it, stop asking idiotic questions at debates about Michael Moore, and do your friggin' jobs, for the sake of the world.
I spent September 11, 2001 at the corner of Church and Vesey Streets in lower Manhattan, and a chunk of the second plane landed twenty feet from where I was standing.
This is personal to me. For some reason, I would rather not have a lying deserter leading my country.
Thank you.
Great piece in this week's New Yorker, on the SOTUS, by Hendrik Hertzberg. He rips the speech and all of Bush's lies and bullshit. He ends it this way:
"Were teams of inspectors to fan out across Bush's domestic policies in search of solutions to the nation's problems, they would be less likely to return empty-handed if they settle for environmental-related program activities (such as logging in national forests), education-related program activities (such as requiring tests without providing the funds to help kids pass them), and health care-related program activities (such as forbidding Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices). Like the speech itself, all this comes under the heading of winning the election-related programs activities. Here's hoping it will prove equally effective."
Note the heavy sarcasm.
No matter what Bush says, when you're talking to Bush followers and undecideds, just keep telling them over and over:
"Bush lied. And he's still lying."
Make this the meme of '04.
Jeff of Park Slope... Jeff of Piping Rock here.
Damn, that's a good idea. I think I am going to write a variation on the same letter, offering $20 from my very limited budget, to the first person who can prove Bush served.
Then let's start a site, take contributions, offer all the damn money to anyone that can prove it.
And around October or so, when nobody has, and the point has been made, we give all the money to the Democratic candidate so finish him off.
Jeff of Piping Rock:
I'm all for it!!!!!!!
I'm not too techno-savy myself - if anyone wants to grab the ball here (where hearts and minds follow, methinks), I gladly, gladly welcome it!!!!!!!!
Jeff of Brooklyn
He keeps annoucing more programs plus the new HMO welfare bill is hugely more expensive than predicted. My thinking is that they inflate growth numbers and claim as a percentage of the GDP of this imaginary America the defict will be half what it is now. Not in real dollars but in dollars as a percentage of a predicted GDP. It's going to be quite a tap dance.
Read his lips: he's lying.
From The Economy Takes a Ribbing and Other Bush Reruns (Milbank, WaPo, Jan 27, 2004)
In his 2001 address, Bush declared: "We owe it to our children and grandchildren to act now, and I hope you will join me to pay down $2 trillion in debt during the next 10 years. At the end of those 10 years, we will have paid down all the debt that is available to retire." In saying that only $2 trillion in debt was being retired, Bush was arguing that $1.2 trillion in debt could not be retired readily because the government securities were not scheduled to mature until after 10 years.
When O'Neill learned on the day of the address of the argument Bush was going to make, he checked with aides and learned that the true amount that could not be retired readily was no more than $500 billion -- $700 billion less than Bush was claiming.
Suskind writes: "Treasury staffers called the White House. Excerpts of the State of the Union, which included the flawed calculus, had already been disclosed to the press. O'Neill was incensed. How could the White House political staff 'decide to do things like this and not even consult with people in the government who know what's true or not? Who the hell is in charge here?' he ranted. . . . That night, Bush stood before the nation . . . and said something that knowledgeable people in the U.S. government knew to be false."
No wonder Bushocchio is in no hurry for an outside investigation to find the real WMD kille--- I mean, look into the CIA's "flawed" intelligence. Or ask his own staff who the Plame leakers are. Or let the 9/11 Commission have its own notes back, instead making the Commission go to court to get them.
I'll contribute coz I can't remember where I wuz.
Tricksy Dubyas! He lied to us. We hates him!
New Medicare numbers were known for months
...and then Bush said it would only take 12 years to restore dignity to the White House.
Take it away, Jeb!
"Like the speech itself, all this comes under the heading of winning the election-related programs activities. Here's hoping it will prove equally effective."
Yes, Tena, and it's all attributable to BushCo.'s Lying-Related Program Activities.
LRPA (or Lerpa, that rhymes with sherpa, that starts with "s", that's next to "t," which rhymes with "p" and that stands for pool!!!!!
We got trouble my friends.
God Bless Dick Gephardt, who gave us the best mantra:
This President is a miserable failure.
He bankrupted every business he ran.
Then he bankrupted the country.
He rushed into a war based on lies, and now we're stuck there, bleeding money and lives.
Don't reward failure.
Jeff & Jeff,
What proof will you accept that someone served with Bush? He says so? Undated photo of the two together at base? What sort of evidence will a colleague guardsman be able to present that will actually prove Bush was there?
Jeff & Jeff,
What proof will you accept that someone served with Bush? He says so? Undated photo of the two together at base? What sort of evidence will a colleague guardsman be able to present that will actually prove Bush was there?
Thanks haloscan.
Reviving procedures making it harder for lawmakers to increase spending without paying for the costs with budget cuts elsewhere. Tax cuts would not have to be paid for.
Whew, I was worried there for a minute!
In the past, the government would get partly bailed out by stock market rises like the one we have recently had. But they have cut capital gains taxes to the point where they can't capture it.
Jeff of Park Slope: A college classmate (who was just a really great guy) was on that second plane, while the 28-year-old son of family friends was in the north tower. So, yeah, 9/11 does feel personal. Can't imagine what you went through that day.
Love your offer! Reminds me of when Lorne Michaels on SNL in the 70s offered the Beatles $4,000 to reunite!
By now the lying is pathological, shameless, and arrogant. The Bushies really believe the American people will swallow all of it whole. I pray to God we prove Karl Rove wrong in November!
I just pray the proposed $1.5 billion for the sanctity of marriage program is safe.
His comments are the same as his 'I am a uniter' and others.
Well guess what?
I too could be a uniter if I killed off all the dividers?
I too could bring back integrity to the white house if I killed off everyone who said we had no integrity?
I too could cut the deficit if I cut spending this year down to $0 dollars?
I too could liberate Iraq if I dropped a few hundred nukes on the country?
I too could stop terrorism is I killed every non-white, non-christian in the world?
See? It's easy to do all of this stuff. Why does Bush have to take the hard road to success?
MYOB'
.
No matter what Bush says, when you're talking to Bush followers and undecideds, just keep telling them over and over:
"Bush lied. And he's still lying."
Make this the meme of '04.
Jeff of Piping Rock - I think we should all ante up and make it a pool, and all send out those letters. I love it.
BobNJ: I'm praying right along with you. We must fight to preserve the bazillion-dollar wedding-industrial complex!
The only way W. is going to cut $250B out of the budget is to go after defense. The domestic programs don't even total that much, except for Social Security and Medicare (which he just expanded).
And we all know with Cheney in charge, there's no way they're cutting Defense (a.k.a. Halliburton).
I'm sorry, but I must vote for Bush. He's the only one I feel can keep me safe from big, muscular terrorists on steroids who might kidnap me and force me into a gay marriage with Rick Santorum.
I'm sorry, but I must vote for Bush. He's the only one I feel can keep me safe from big, muscular terrorists on steroids who might kidnap me and force me into a gay marriage with Rick Santorum.
Jeff, the challenge has already been out there for some time.
A bunch of veterns made it and offered far more money.
They got nowhere. Nobody took them up, or was able to win it.
Alabama Vets:
http://tinyurl.com/x4yd
Texas Vets:
http://tinyurl.com/25ru4
MYOB'
.
Damn. Double post. It's the CIA's fault. They gave me faulty Haloscan information.
Jeff, you might also want to check here:
http://www.awolbush.com/
and for more info, if there is any.
Here:
http://www.investigate911.com/
bu...ushwentawol.htm
Or here:
http://www.tompaine.com/feature....ure.cfm/ID/
3671
Enjoy the truth.
MYOB'
.
Shaw Kenawe - I likes it - LRPA -
Yeah, you really should pick up a copy of the Feb. 2 New Yorker. Joshua Micah Marshall has an article in it too, on American imperialism. The New Yorker has been steadily chipping away at the lies that this train wreck of an administration tells. Their overall contempt for Bush is very obvious.
You know, they might as well line up all of us disabled poor people and shoot us, it would save a lot of money and pain for all of us.
This sucks so much.
And at this point, even if a Democratic president sits in next year, I have zero faith that they are going to undo the cuts to programs for the disabled and poor (except for the children, because nobody gives a flying fuck about disabled and poor adults).
Section 8 is half-dead as it is. Bush will squish what is left of its half-mangled road-kill half-squished head. There won't be anything to re-fund, and no Dem president is going to be able to re-fund it to the levels that are desperately needed, let alone what the program would need to be an actual viable program, instead of one that is simply limping along.
And that's just Section 8.
They're going to fucking starve us to death, or let us die of lack of medications, or leave us out in the streets where they can create a whole new career of people whose job it is to clean up the corpses of dead disabled and poor people.
The children will go into orphanages -- the cute baby white ones will be adopted and the rest of them will be kept in what is basically a prison camp until they can be thrown out into the streets to become criminals (and then to feed the prison-industrial complex) or derelicts just waiting to die and be swept up by our new AmeriCorpse Cleaners.
Fuck this. It's getting really close to the day where I strap a bomb on myself and walk to the nearest federal building.
In the past, the government would get partly bailed out by stock market rises like the one we have recently had. But they have cut capital gains taxes to the point where they can't capture it.
Wow. Everything is going great if your goal is to drown the government in the bathtub. Or put a pillow over its face. Or abandon it on an ice floe. Or whatever.
Speaking of lying sacks of shit...
Bush keeps lying - people keep dying.
The slacktivist has a really good article about this:
Over the next 10 years, cumulative deficits are likely to add almost
$2.4 trillion to the national debt, the CBO estimate said.
The forecast comes as Democrats campaigning to run against President
Bush charge that he has turned a surplus into a deficit.
"The key here is Democrats ... charge. After the first two sentences,
this is a rather strange attribution. During President Bush's tenure,
the surplus has, in fact, been turned into a deficit. Despeignes seems
uncomfortable simply stating fiscal statistics relating to the
incumbent administration when those facts may seem unflattering. So, to
avoid any appearance of bias, the reporter attributes any unflattering
facts to the 'charges' of the president's political opponents."
a
Maybe if everyone bought ribs that would fix the economy.
By the way, for those who read the transcript of Bush's rib restaurant appearance, they left a bit out when Bush spoke to a pregnant female reporter:
"You want some ribs or do you want some ribs? Does your baby need a rib or are you going to buy some food? Or would you like some cheese cake?"
and
"BUSH: Baby need a rib?
"UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The baby's fine, thanks."
Near the end of this link
Another great letter to the editor in the Dallas paper this morning. These have been coming in regularly. Guy says he is a fiscal conservative and lifelong Repug and he has been totally betrayed by the Bush Repugs. He always used to believe that it was wrong to vote for the "tax and spend" Democrats, but the Republicans are now the "borrow and spend" party. He ain't voting Repug in November.
I'm telling you guys, Bush is in terrible trouble.
That would be the same press that did such a sterling job of analyzing his economic plan during the 2000 campaign?
Magnum --
Why don't we start with one iota of proof that he was there in Alabama, and go from there.
This is breathtaking:
Under fire from Republicans alarmed at the growth of the federal budget in recent years, Mr. Bush called Saturday for new statutory limits on spending.
"To assure that Congress observes spending discipline, now and in the future, I propose making spending limits the law," Mr. Bush said in his weekly radio address. "This simple step would mean that every additional dollar the Congress wants to spend in excess of spending limits must be matched by a dollar in spending cuts elsewhere."
I'm all out of satyrical analogies. Y'all's turn. Tena, maybe you can pass this along to your Texas fiscal conservatives?
Fuzzy math. Say it over and over.
"Fuzzy math".
Brian C.B.: surely Bush's approach is just simplistic.
If he wants to muck about with Congressional spending, why doesn't he abandon the quantitative approach (pare away a dollar here for every overspend over there) for a qualitative one (i.e. see what's being spent on individual projects and why)?
But that may just be too much for a man who isn't so much full of ideologies as of idees fixes...
The Paper of Record, by the way, does what the New York Review of Books did (Thomas Powers' article) to the Powell presentation of 5 February 2003: fact-check it against what we know now. It's actually generous to the Administration. But not much.
Also, in the Bush quote I posted above, notice who it's Congress that's doing the spending.
I just love that he's blaming the free spending on Congress, as if they haven't just been passing his proposals for the past three years.
"To assure that Congress observes spending discipline, now and in the future, I propose making spending limits the law," Mr. Bush said in his weekly radio address. "This simple step would mean that every additional dollar the Congress wants to spend in excess of spending limits must be matched by a dollar in spending cuts elsewhere."
This isn't breathtaking. This is stage two of "starve the beast."
Obviously those "cuts" won't come from any monies that flow to corporate pockets. And the spending limits won't apply to any monies that flow to corporate pockets.
So "social spending" loses all of it's oxygen. And it's all because of a spendthrift Congress.
That's the idea, anyway. You have just heard the announcement of a campaign theme for 2004.
Jeff and Jeff - you have the idea.
As for nitpicking the AWOL proof - doesn't matter. Bush has gotten away with ZERO nitpicking of anything. Why? Because of energetic nazi brownshirts who are more energetic than we are in the art of energetic incessant assault.
What if everyone on these threads made a pledge to him/herself - that for EVERY comment made to the choir here they will send at least FIVE EMAILS TO THE RELEVANT NAZI FUCKS ON THE TOPIC AT HAND. And not stop there, but follow up these emails for a week. And any other time the topic resurfaces. In other words, be fucking incessant and in these people's faces.
What made Clinton a "moral disgrace"? The goddamn incessant agitations of a very few.
People, let's get on the stick. Do we fight or do we sit here as the SCLM absolutely drowns us and our precious democracy. Mike Moore gave us a gift with the resurrection of AWOL - and are each of us seeing to it that Peter Jennings alone is inundated with truth for his little Rovian stunt?
I'm sick of feeling like this colossus of idiocy and shallowness can't be dented. I'm sick of this passive give-up bullshit. I herewith pledge myself to the above - FIVE EMAILS plus snail mails plus follow up, for EVERY comment made on these blog boards. Enough self-amusement and comfort. It's time to ROLL these bastards! Who else are we waiting for to drive a stake through the heart of Dick Cheneyism and its enablers?
Off to email. And buy stamps.
Travis,
I suppose all they need is someone who has records showing he belonged to the same Guard outfit as Bush during his time of AWOL, and name a couple of other guys or the CO or someone, and get them to verify.
Here's an idea:
- Someone set up an online escrow account.
- Anyone who wants to put his money where his mouth is about Bush being AWOL paypals money into the account.
- Wait until the start of November for someone to come forward with National Guard records showing he served at the same unit as Bush did during the time of Bush's missing records, and get him to name the CO and anyone else there at the same time to confirm or deny that Bush was there.
- When no-one pops up, everyone gets their money back (minus fees).
Magnum - I'm definitely in. I think that is a great idea. Let's get this out in the open once and for all.
Bill Mahr interviewed Max Clelland by video last night on Real Time. This issue was talked about.
'Bout frigging time Bush started acknowledging that spending was a problem. May be too late for him to win a second term, and if so, so be it. As a conservative, I think I'll be plenty happy with a Dem in the White House and a Republican congress. Less gets done, less gets spent.
'Bout frigging time Bush started acknowledging that spending was a problem. May be too late for him to win a second term, and if so, so be it. As a conservative, I think I'll be plenty happy with a Dem in the White House and a Republican congress. Less gets done, less gets spent.
Cuts in 60 programs? RUN FROM THE PHOTO OPS!! How many of those will be (1) social and (2) science. Social for obvious reasons, science because it says inconvenient things like global warming is for real, hydrogen is bullshit and a trip to Mars costs $1 trillion.
Get rid of the tax cuts for the rich.
Incidentally, many parents in Iowa have been begging the legislature to raise our taxes, so we can pay for our schools.
Ive always maintained that the balanced budget amendment will be the sword that is used to sever social programs from the nation.Sold to the people as a cure for the unsustainable deficit,it will pass in the middle of the night.And then we will have Jeb to kill more Iraqi and American people.
TO - the tax cuts have got to go. People in Texas are completely disgusted with Bush's hand picked Repug replacement gov, too, over education. All he proposes is exactly what Bush proposes - more tests, no money to prepare teachers or students to take the tests. There is going to be a wide spread parent-teacher revolution over the state of public education if something doesn't give. I think parents and teachers have had it with those stupid tests. People want real solutions, and one of the real solutions that is needed is money for the schools.
What Tena said.
Perry is reduced to talking about building more toll roads, and making toll roads of existing roads, all to prevent "new taxes." One thing Texans expect from their gummint is good roads. They don't expect to pay twice for 'em, or to pay for 'em as toll roads in perpetuity.
There were rumors Perry would call a special session and impose needed taxes and tax increases to pay for school funding, claiming he'd kept his pledge since it didn't pass in the regular session. Now it seems he doesn't want to do that much, and that stand will make him less and less popular with his constituency.
There just aren't that many private schools to go around, or that many parents willing to vote GOP and pay for private schools, too.
Might I renew my suggestion that we hire Danny DeVito to do an ad similar to the one he does for DirecTV, where he reads off a list of Bush promises and then yells "LIES!"? If you've seen it, you know what I'm talking about.
Yes, but can we get CBS to run it?
Notable similarity alert:
Pre-invasion, planning for the occupation of Iraq was viewed as "anti-war." If Americans understood the cost and duration of an occupation, the nation might not go along with the plan quite so easily. Even of one approves of the invasion, the consequences of the ideology haunt the effort even today, and may scuttle it altogether.
So, revealing the true costs of the Medicare bill, or even estimating them accurately, could have been construed as "anti-passage."
Sensing a pattern here, people. Like, not for the first time.
There is an excellent article on G.W. on Counterpunch.org by Princeton Professor Bernard Chazelle, titled "Bush's Desolate Imperium" - really excellent.
This, along with the spending-limit proposal and the massively stupid tax cuts, is just the natural extension of the modern Republican modus operandi.
They fuck up everything they possibly can, and then when they get booted out, they do their best (and their worst) to obstruct any Democratic efforts to repair the damage. Then they use all those things against the Democrats to get back into office, fuck everything up again, get booted out, and obstruct progress again...
They want politics to be a bloodsport. I say bring 'em on.
Peanut I like the Bushocchio image.
Idea for a political cartoon strip.
Bushocchio tells more and more lies and Cheney whittle them down and the media say, "It's really not bad and point out that Clinton had a big nose too." So no one notices then one day they can't whittle it fast enough and it's so bit the media notices it. Then the nose pole pokes a hole in the back of an American solider.
Bush lies actually have consequences.
lucky for george he has no lips.
how about anything out of his mouth is a lie?
More trouble for the Chimp!!! Kerry still beats him, and his approval numbers continue to drop.
Sure it's early, but these type of poll numbers will force the media whores to at least take notice.
The "most popular preznit" meme is withering on the vine....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4120028/
Hank, you notice this section?
"And despite claims by a former weapons inspector that Iraq had no illegal cache of weapons, half (49 percent) of those polled still believe Saddam Hussein’s regime played a direct roll in the September 11 terror attacks and a majority (55 percent, down from an even larger majority of 71 percent last summer) still believe Iraq had banned weapons prior to the war."
What does Sept 11 have to do with weapons that AREN'T in Iraq, and why ON EARTH is Newsweek from the question that way?
Liberal media.
Did you people skip Economics 101?
"Marge, it takes 2 to lie - one to say it and one to believe it.."
Not the funniest homer simpson one-liner; but my point is that it is not the LIE TELLING; it is the LIE BELIEVING.
Right-wingers are immune to lie attacks since their simplistic, black and white, greed and racist inspired lives are what joe and susie six-pack relate to.
Progressives stand for think it out, get the facts straight, do the right thing, thinking; which in this country in the 21st century goes over like - oh like say actually liking the french...
there WAS a quote - the truth will set you free - who was the moron who wrote that?
Instead a new mantra: Covered up lies are as good as reporters on your payroll!
Somehow the American media has to be shamed into doing it's job.
Which is to tell the truth about Bushboy & the Goopers (or any other politicians who serve at the pleasure of the People).
To date, the Mass media seems to think that so long as they show Bushboy making promises and giving speeches and then allow his Democratic rivals to criticize him in brief telebytes that they are doing their job.
It's as though they have no obligation to see if what Bushboy or the Democrats are saying is true, just by reporting it they need not do anything further.
The Peter Jennings questioning of General Clark about Bushboy being a deserter was a case in point. Why didn't Jennings know the facts when he asked the question?
...here they're claiming it's the case, but they haven't released the details of unspecified cuts in over 60 programs.
-Atrios 2:15 PM
So aWol has a "magic asterisk" in his budget just like Saint Raygun and David Stockman. Everyone remember how that turned out?
You sure are quick to call people liars, racists, and immoral. You single-handedly have lowered (with some help from DailyKos) the entire standard for tolerant debate in the blogosphere, and perhaps even in the country.
There used to be a time when the left prided itself in open-mindedness. Now a stifling conformity is demanded; political intolerance is the name of the game.
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