...just to be fair, you need to read the story to the end. Rhetorical Question:

A father has two sons. He asks the first son to perform a task. The boy refuses and storms out. He then asks the second son to perform the task, and the second son says he will do it. The father leaves, and the second son changes his mind, and then begins to undermind his father and the legitimacy of the task. He even tells the other workers the task is unjust and they should not perform it either. As a result, the business suffers a terrible loss, and a number of workers are laid off.

The first son thinks about his refusal, recants, and begins to perform the task and convinces the other workers that the task is legitimate after all and even vital, and he convinces the other workers to join him. He rebuilds the business and rehires most of the workers. When the father returns, which son will he say has honored his father?

On January 31, 1971, members of Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) met in a Detroit hotel to document war crimes that they had participated in or witnessed during their combat tours in Vietnam. During the next three days, more than 100 Vietnam veterans and 16 civilians gave anguished, emotional testimony describing hundreds of atrocities against innocent civilians in South Vietnam, including rape, arson, torture, murder, and the shelling or napalming of entire villages. The witnesses stated that these acts were being committed casually and routinely, under orders, as a matter of policy.

In April, the VVAW stormed Washington in a week-long protest. At the height of it, spokesman John Kerry went before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations to accuse the United States military of committing massive numbers of war crimes in Vietnam. The appearance launched Kerry's political career. The charges he made shocked and sickened a nation, changed the course of a war and stained the reputation of the American military for decades.

But the mass murder of civilians was never American policy in Vietnam. War crimes were the exception, not the rule. And the Winter Soldier tribunal itself -- which John Kerry had helped moderate -- turned out to be, in the words of historian Guenter Lewy, "packed with pretenders and liars."

Massachusetts elected John Kerry to the U.S. Senate in 1984. Now he is seeking the most powerful job in the world....

Read the full story, and even watch the videos and hear the audios of John Kerry testifying -- don't just take my word or anyone else's word for what happened. Then you can decide for yourself about John Kerry then and now.

http://www.wintersoldier.com

Controversary has been raised about the medical records and the Fitreps posted by John Kerry, we all know the Fitreps were inflated during that period, mine included -- I even have endorsements from Generals --, but mine never claimed actions I didn't perform. The only way to resolve the lingering questions is for John Kerry to sign an SF 180 allowing the complete record to be released. Enquiring minds want to know.

http://www.archives.gov/facilities/mo/st_louis/military_personnel_records/standard_form_180.html

Unlike Bush, Kerry actually served. That is indisputable and a matter of public record. The trolls should simply keep their mouths shut about the military service of the political opponents now engaged in the presidential race. They can only loose on this one.

George W has stonewalled and lied about his service. Kerry's service was extensive and is open to public inspection. DumbYa is still concealing his records, ie discplinary and medical. Why? Because he has something to hide.

Passions ran hot in the 1970s. Many of us who served did not want to think our sacrifices were for nothing. We didn't want to accept that so many of our comrades had died needlessly. But they did and so people of great courage, like John Kerry, spoke out. This did not make them any less patriots, it made their patriotism stronger. They spoke for thousands of us still serving who couldn't speak for ourselves for fear of retaliation.

BushCo might as well seek some other dirt to dig up. He can only loose on this one. He is a coward. He volunteered to NOT go to Vietnam and he never fulfilled his obligation to his military service. Bush should address the issues, not attack the character of John Kerry. I want to know what Bush's battle plan is, his environmental goals, his plan for economic revival and health care, not listen to his stupid, blind followers attack the record of his opponent.

Of course then when you have no plans and are clueless I guess the only thing you can do is attack the opposition. Bush and his band of secretive, manipulative thugs need to be thrown out. Don't send them back to Texas, prosecute them for the crimes they have committed while in office. They have done more to undermine democracy in this country than any previous administration. It is time we took our country back.

DaNanger,

"A father has two sons. He asks the first son to perform a task. The boy refuses and storms out. He then asks the second son to perform the task, and the second son says he will do it. The father leaves, and the second son changes his mind, and then begins to undermind his father and the legitimacy of the task. He even tells the other workers the task is unjust and they should not perform it either. As a result, the business suffers a terrible loss, and a number of workers are laid off."

that doesn't seem quite right. Wouldn't this description be more accurate:

The second son says he will do the task. Then he goes out and does the task. Heroically. Co-workers admire and benefit from his courage. Peers support his work. Superiors rate his performance with high marks. The second son recieves several accolades associated with the task, and even a few injuries. And after his involvement with the task is finished, he has grown as a man and begins to question the task. He shows introspection and moral courage. He gathers others around him who are also troubled by actions that were taken associated with the larger purpose associated with the task. He then speaks out against the larger purposes.

If the father is enlightened (and as a proxy for our Nation I'd like to believe we think it is), he will honor the second son for firstly his physical courage during the task, and secondly for his moral courage in questioning the larger purpose driving the task.

"As a result, the business suffers a terrible loss, and a number of workers are laid off."

You are implying that Kerry is responsible for the state of our military during the 70s and 80s. This is quite the stretch, to say the least. Not to mention the fact that this is the same military that is the best in the world. something doesn't add up.

"The first son thinks about his refusal, recants, and begins to perform the task..."

Presumably W is the first son. When did he recant? Show me some quotes where he shows he thought "about his refusal"? Begins to perform the task? When? where? by invading Iraq? you must be kidding me.

"War crimes were the exception, not the rule." This is a kind of disconnect. It was only the exception if your life wasn't effected. The majority of soldiers did not committ atrocities and the ones that did, many times were acting under orders. We'll never know the whole truth. Surfice it to say that Viet Vets went through hell. That was Kerry's concern then as it is now. He's an imperfect hero, most are.
.......The Army "conducted 242 war-crimes investigations in Vietnam, [that] a third were substantiated, leading to 21 convictions... according to a review of records at the National Archives" – facts of dubious value that obscure the scope and number of war crimes perpetrated in Vietnam and feed the exceptionalist argument.
the massacre at Son Thang -- sometimes referred to as the "Marine Corps' My Lai"; and the war crimes allegations of Lt. Col. Anthony Herbert -- most famously chronicled in his memoir Soldier. This short list, however, doesn't even hint at the scope and number of similar criminal acts.
......After review of thousands of classified Army documents, National Archives records, and radio logs reveals [the "Tiger Force"] ... carried out the longest series of atrocities in the Vietnam War [from May and November, 1967]...." Unfortunately, this seven month atrocity-spree is not nearly the longest on record. Nor is it even the longest string of atrocities by one unit within its service branch. According to formerly classified Army documents, an investigation disclosed that from at least March 1968 through October 1969, "Vietnamese [civilian] detainees were subjected to maltreatment" by no less than twenty-three separate interrogators of the 172d Military Intelligence (MI) Detachment. The inquiry found that, in addition to using "electrical shock by means of a field telephone," an all too commonly used method of torture by Americans during the war, MI personnel also struck detainees with their fists, sticks and boards and employed a form of water torture which impaired prisoners' ability to breath
......Sam Ybarra, a "notorious suspect," who was named in seven of the thirty "Tiger Force" war crimes allegations investigated by the Army -- including the rape and fatal stabbing of a 13-year-old girl and the brutal killing of a 15-year-old boy. Yet, Ybarra's notorious reputation may well pale in comparison to that of Sergeant Roy E. "the Bummer" Bumgarner, a soldier who served with the 1st Cavalry Division and later the 173d Airborne Brigade. According to a former commander, "the Bummer" was rumored to have "personally killed over 1,500 people" during a forty-two week stretch in Vietnam. Even if the number was exaggerated, clues on how Bumgarner may have obtained high "body counts" came to light in the course of an Army criminal investigation of an incident that took place on February 25, 1969. According to investigation documents, Bumgarner and a subordinate rounded up three civilians found working in a rice paddy, marched them to a secluded area and murdered them. "The Bummer" then arranged the bodies on the ground with their heads together and a grenade was exploded next to them in an attempt to cover-up their crime. Assorted weapons were then planted near the mutilated corpses to make them appear to have been enemy troops
....An August 1967 atrocity in which a 13-year-old Vietnamese child was raped by American MI interrogator of the Army's 196th Infantry Brigade. The soldier was convicted only of indecent acts with a child and assault. He served seven months and sixteen days for his crime
.....A September 1967 incident in which an American sergeant killed two Vietnamese children -- executing one at point blank range with a bullet to the head. Tried by general court martial in 1970, the sergeant pleaded guilty to, and was found guilty of, unpremeditated murder. He was, however, sentenced to no punishment
An atrocity that took place on February 4, 1968, just over a month before the My Lai massacre, in the same province by a man from the same division (Americal). The soldier admitted to his commanding officer and other men of his unit that he gunned down three civilians as they worked in a field. A CID investigation substantiated his confession and charges of premeditated murder were preferred against him. The soldier requested a discharge, which was granted by the commanding general of the Americal Division, in lieu of court martial proceedings
.....A series of atrocities similar to, and occurring the same year as, the "Tiger Force" war crimes in which one unit allegedly engaged in an orgy of murder, rape and mutilation, over the course of several months.

Apache nation,

Thanks... of course winning a Pulitzer doesn't make the story true -- just ask Janet Cook and the Washington Post...

There is no way I could possibly keep up with correcting all the misinformation I see here, nor do I have any desire to. I have tried to keep to the topic, but the subtitle of each topic seems to be "Bush and the evil Republicans are bad, and whatever Kerry says or does or said or did is wonderful and acceptable" stated 1000 different ways. I have to keep repeating myself, and I am certainly no fan of Bush or the "Geldings On Parade", but the topic is Kerry, not Bush. Does anyone else besides me find the continuous attack on Bush's military record nowadays to be hypocritical, considering that John Kerry and a number of other Democrats screamed "foul" and jumped to the floor of the Senate to give speeches defending Bill Clinton's lack of military experience -- which was highlighted by dodging the draft and then writing a scathing letter to a Bataan death march survivor who went out on a limb to offer him an ROTC slot? Anybody interested in Clinton's legacy of antiwar and pro-Communist activities in Europe and Russia? Do I need to post Kerry's speeches, too? Naw. The mantra is "Hate Bush" and "Bush lied". John Kerry wants to highlight himself as a hero in the Vietnam war -- even trot out his medals (can't show the ribbons because he tossed them in protest) at every opportunity and showcase them in his Senate office -- fine. Yet he also wants to highlight how evil that war was and how he was a deciding force to bring it to an end (forget that he helped it end in defeat when it was heading toward victory when he began his crusade). Which is it? Kerry the war hero or Kerry committing war crimes or Kerry the anti-war activist? How can he brag about valor in action and at the same time say he was awarded those very medals for committing war crimes? Now that I read what I just wrote, it looks like another Kerry flip-flop on whether service in Vietnam should be an issue in a presidential election. For Clinton, nope. To make Bush look bad, yep. To make Kerry look good as a warrior and as a pacifist, yep. Did someone use the word "hypocrisy" somewhere?

At that point in time, the only way to avoid service in Vietnam was to register as a "Conscientious Objector", obtain a "student" or "family" exemption, dodge the draft like Bill Clinton and many of the VVAW "Band of Brothers", or desert if you were already in the military like many of the other VVAW posers did. Nevertheless, Bush joined and served in the National Guard. Like it or not, he served and met enough of the obligation to obtain an honorable discharge. That put him in the military pipeline and eliminated any "college or family deferment" options. Many of us joined the military through the ROTC program at college -- not to avoid the draft, but to enter as an officer or to enter a career field open only to officers. Since I was working on NASA research projects in college and had thoughts of becoming an astronaut, I had to fly airplanes, and that is why I completed Air Force ROTC, received a commission, and completed 53 weeks of Undergraduate Pilot Training. Most of the pilots I flew with in Vietnam were Reservists or Air Guardsmen, by the way. Next time you fly on an airliner, chances are a Reservist or Guardsman will be in the cockpit. You might be surprised to know how many Reservists and Guardsmen earned the MOH and how many of them are listed on the Vietnam Memorial Wall. One hundred and forty Medal of Honor recipients were in the National Guard. Six thousand seventy-seven members of the National Guard or Reserves died in Vietnam. John Kerry has equated Guard service with draft dodging. Pretty unfair comparison, don't you think?

Kerry put in for a year deferral to study "French" in Paris. Do you find that in the records posted on his website? If you want to quote Admiral Zumwalt, quote the good and the bad he said about Kerry. We all know the brass try to say good things when it suits them, but quotes in staff meetings about a potential trouble maker are probably more telling of how that commander really feels about an individual. Zumwalt also called Kerry a "loose cannon" and was angry that he beached his boat so he could put one wounded VC out of his misery. I have posted a few other points that may cause reasonable thinkers to at least pause to examine the record, and I posted a link to the www.WinterSoldier.com website where you can review original documents and current news articles and commentary from some of his peers and decide for yourself. There is also plenty of researched data to show that most of the claims of "atrocities" are false and that they were never U.S. policy in Vietnam or anywhere else. They still aren't. When discovered, they were severely prosecuted. Ask the POWs forced to listen to John Kerry's perjury before the U.S. Senate piped into their cells while they were being beaten to sign "confessions" if they think his was an act of courage speaking on their behalf. Ask the survivors of the millions murdered in Cambodia or the hundreds of thousands in Vietnam forced into death camps or executed because we abandoned them just on the brink of victory how they feel about him. Ask them how life has been for the past 30 years. Read how General Giap and Col. Bui Tin, who served on the general staff of North Vietnam's army, and received the unconditional surrender of South Vietnam on April 30, 1975, praised John Kerry and the VVAW and Jane Fonda and the rest of the anti-war movement and credited them greatly for victory in Vietnam.

My aim is simply to expose Kerry's actions after he returned from a war we were winning, slandered those still serving and being held as POWs, and helped undermine the war effort to the point where we abandoned millions of Vietnamese, Laotians, and Cambodians and dishonored the status and reputation of the United States before the world -- all to build a political career, and not for the noble reasons others claim for him. If elected President, it is clear he would repeat the same acts, but this time the stakes are much higher. A defeat in the war against fanatical Muslim extremist terrorists would be fatal.

I guess I have to explain the parable I used. You got the two sons right, but you missed the significance of the two eras. Vietnam was the business at the time the father gave the two sons the task of fighting Communism and America's enemies. Bush chose to defer direct engagement and take his chances in the Air National Guard. Kerry first tried to get a deferrment to study French in Paris but on advice from the Kennedys chose to serve in the Navy. His assignments are a matter of record, and now his actions once assigned to Swift Boats has come into question. Back to the parable. Once Kerry got his early return, he tried to run for Congress as a Hawk and was defeated. Again the Kennedys advised him he had to become a Dove, and the rest is recorded at www.WinterSoldier.com as I have stated before. Not only did he reject the task his father gave him, he joined forces with those trying to defeat the task, and we ended up losing a war we could have and should have won. Sadly, Kerry is the same today as he was 30 years ago.

Fast forward to the present. Bush -- like the Prodigal son who sank to the bottom and then got his head on straight as he matured -- has had a successful political career and was forced by the fanatical Muslim terrorist attack on 9/11/2001 into a position to perform the task his father had given him earlier but now with much higher stakes. So far, he has performed the task at great political risk, but this will be a long war, and the outcome is not certain. Giving the task now to the son who said he would do it and then reneged would be a disaster.

"There is no way I could possibly keep up with correcting all the misinformation"..there's so many lies, distortions, and tortured logic in nadanger's remarks it would take up too much of this bloggers space and bandwidth to refute them all. But let's take a qiuck look at his hero G.W. Bush.
Despite being born with tremendous advantages, Bush couldn't even manage to achieve even mediocre success. He sees money and privledge as his birth-right as part of the Bush dynasty. He barely graduated from Yale. he used family connections to avoid a war that he supposedly believed in. Then he skipped out on the complete fulfillment of his Guard obligations. Like many of that elitest min set, he felt he was aboove the the same rules that govern working class americans, many of whom died in Vietnam either because they really thought that they were fighting the soread of commuism or didn't have the Bush-like connections required to get out of going. Bush then squandered any of the responsibility that goes with wealth wondering around in an alcoholic haze until he was 40, getting busted for cocaine possession when he was 26( a team of connected lawyers managed to get him "youth offender" status to avoid jail), he went to go ruining a number of businesses he was given, via sweetheart deals, finally sobering up enough to run the Texas Rangers into the ground and make a fortune at taxpayer expense. Bush the all american spoiled brat. he managed to buy his way into the governorship of Texas, where he cooked the books on education, the environment, and giving the shaft on healthcare to the working poor. He generally acted like Tony Soprano; giving huge favors to his cronies and punishing those that wouldn't tow the line. He managed to get appointed to the presidency by the Supreme Court, damn waiting for recounts and letting democracy work. By his own admission he spent little of first year in office evn thinking about terroism, but Bandar Bush and the private Defense Policy Board and spent a lot of time obsessed with Iraq. After 9-11 he had to be convinced by Powell to go after OBL first as their were " no good targets" in Afghanistan. As much as liberals and coservatives want to give Bush credit for Afghanistan, it simply doesn't tahe great leadership to call the Pentagon and say find where OBL is and attack; more common sense then great leadership. Cosidering Bush's background of failure of his family proping him up, many were just surprised that he showed any common sense at all. It's called living up to low standards.
Bush quickly assumed his rabid pursuit of ineptitude by declaring that we would preemtively attack those that had WMD or strong connections with terrorists. So informed folks assumed he would attack North Korea, or Iran, or Pakistan, or even Hamas, but no he chose to attack the nation that was the least threat, Iraq. Amazing, Iraq could not do any real damage to the U.S. or even it's neighbors. The U.S. spent twelve years flying sorties over Iraq without a single casualty. Saddam was smart enough to know that any foolish actions on his part would result in being bombed to hell and back. What did Bush accomplish; he made Iraq a haven for terrorists, he made our troops easy targets, he made at least the next two generations of americans owners of Iraq and providers for their future; in exchange for which america is no more safer then before the invasion and may someday get a full tank of moderately priced regular gas. Worldwide terrorism is spread fasting then ever. Most liberals have little love for american religious fanatics much less Muslim religious fanatics, so we would have preferred that Bush and the neo-cons had acted more like surgeons and acted with precision in cutting out terror at it's roots rather then running over the patient with a bull dozier. Can Bush beat Kerry? Bush can only beat Kerry by continuing his smear campaign, by lying about his own miserable record and distorting Kerrys.

Kerry Was Right
Don't look now, but is the Bush administration creeping toward John Kerry's position on Iraq?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9757-2004Apr13.html

Time for some humor -- with a point -- from a Libertarian expert.

http://boortz.com/images/funny/kerry_medals.gif

YOU WANT A PIECE OF ME? NO! WAIT! LEAVE ME ALONE!

James Taranto's Best of the Web Today column had two interesting quotes from The Poodle and The Poodle's handler yesterday.

Quote No. 1

"If George Bush wants to make national security an issue in this campaign, I have three words for him that I know he'll understand. Bring it on!"--John Kerry, quoted in the New York Times, Feb. 1

Quote No. 2

"Call off the Republican attack dogs."--Democratic National Committee chairman Terry McAuliffe, responding to Dick Cheney's speech on John sKerry's defense record, quoted by the Associated Press, April 26

OK, guys. Make up your minds. Are you really ready to debate sKerry's record on national defense, or do you want to spend the rest of the campaign whimpering and crying?

THE POODLE'S $1,000 GROOMING

http://boortz.com/images/funny/kerry_poodle.jpg

WHY DO I REFER TO JOHN sKERRY AS THE POODLE?

Simple:
He's French.
His hairdresser also grooms poodles.
He's a rich woman's pet.

That pretty much cover's it.

What do you do when you're about to appear on 'Meet The Press' and you need to groom your Poodle in a pinch? You call up your rich owner (er...wife) and have her fly out your Christophe hair stylist to meet you for a $1,000 touch-up, of course. Boy...this John sKerry is a real man of the people, isn't he? Ridiculous.

Actually ... since The Poodle's groomer was flown in and back on a G-V, an airplane that costs no less than $4,000 an hour to operate, we can put the price of this little touch-up at around $10,000, not the $1,000 reported in the press. John sKerry, the man of the people, will fork over ten grand of the family fortune for a trim. Now that's identifying with the common man.

If the name Christophe sounds familiar, this is the same outfit that held up an entire airport while President Clinton got his hair cut during his time in office. In addition to sKerry, this particular stylist, Isabelle Goetz, also grooms the Hildabeast. What is it with liberals and hair styles?

Oh, and by the way, in keeping with tradition, The Poodle's hair stylist was born and raised in France, maintaining the presumptive Democratic nominee's status as an authentic French poodle.

http://boortz.com/images/isabelle_goetz.jpg

Neil Boortz

So, how does "the man of the people" treat his volunteers? If the links aren't as dead as his personality, read it for yourself in their own words.

Kerry Leaves Local Dems Hanging
Author: Tracy Lotz and Mary Fauth
Tuesday, March 23, 2004
http://www.sunvalleyonline.com/news/article.asp?ID_Article=22

...and what did the local DEMOCRAT editor of the paper think?

From the Editor: Kerry Volunteers Deserved Better
Wednesday, March 24, 2004
http://www.sunvalleyonline.com/news/opinion.asp?ID_Opinion=28

...and this man wants to be President? Maybe he doesn't. It could all be a trick to make the Republicans spend all their campaign money on a non-candidate only to have Hillary emerge at the Convention to save the party. Pretty smart. Bill releases his "memoirs" 3-4 weeks before the Convention, that consumes all the media attention, Kerry gets the boot or "decides to withdraw for the good of the party", Hillary steps forward as either the top or VP candidate, and she misses all the blood letting and scrutiny of the primaries and most of the campaign. She just has to survive till November, and she's home free. The manuver is called an "end run". Could work.

What's that smell? Utter desperation, more distortions, lies, and now shameless pettiness. The right apparently has a hair fetish.

Bush is delusional or a serial liar: "I think we should learn a lesson from the previous engagement in the Afghan area that we should not just simply leave after a military objective has been achieved."
Fact:
"Insecurity caused by terrorist activities, factional fights and drug related crime remain the major concern of Afghans today...Attacks against non-governmental organizations is contributing to the slowing of reconstruction...Individuals and communities suffer from abuses of their basic rights by local commanders and factional leaders...[There are] terrorist attacks from suspected members of the Taliban and Al Qaeda." - U.N. Report, 11/11/03
Speaker: Bush, George - President

Date: 1/29/2002

Bush exploits First responders for photo-op: “We’ll increase funding to help states and communities train and equip our heroic police and firefighters….”
Fact:
"With deficit-stricken states unable to assist municipalities with homeland defense, many large police and fire departments say they have been forced to postpone the purchase of protective suits, biochemical detectors and communications equipment that would be used to respond to a terrorist attack. And a recent National League of Cities survey of 322 cities finds that 25 percent are cutting the ranks of their police forces or plan to shortly for economic reasons." - AFL-CIO Report "President Bush's new budget would cut by one-third the money that thousands of fire departments rely on to keep their communities safe. The nation's firefighters are outraged by the White House plan, which would take $250 million away from grants that help rural agencies buy firetrucks, protective clothing, breathing apparatus, water tanks and other equipment."

National Guard Service

Tim Russert – "Would you authorize the release of everything to settle this?" Bush – "Yes, absolutely. We did so in 2000 by the way."

Fact:
"[A]s Bush has risen in public life over the last several years, Texas military officials have put many of his records off-limits and heavily redacted many other pages." To date we still do not have all of Bush's records which he has now promised twice to provide. Why was Bush abruptly grounded from flying? Why did he leave the Texas Guard two years early? A key report answering those questions is still missing from George W. Bush's records.

Bush morphs 9-11 into Iraq War: “Iraq [is] the central front in the war on terror.” --UN speech
Fact:
Military experts experts now say the "Iraq war is diverting resources from war on terror." Specifically, "a growing number of counter-terrorism experts are questioning whether the U.S. invasion of Iraq has hurt rather than helped the global battle against al Qaeda." Republican and Democratic experts "are increasingly suggesting that the Iraq war has diverted momentum, troops and intelligence resources from the worldwide campaign to destroy the remnants of al Qaeda." Similarly, the U.S. Army War College reported that the Iraq war "diverted attention and resources away from the security of the American homeland against further assault by an undeterrable al Qaeda."

Bush, George - President exploiter of death and fear
Date: 1/24/2002
Quote/Claim:
"I have no ambition whatsoever to use [the war on terror or 9/11] as a political issue."
Fact:
"An internal White House document outlining President Bush's re-election agenda starts with "War on terrorism (Con't)" and homeland security." - AP, 12/29/02 "President Bush's top political adviser said today that Republicans will make the president's handling of the war on terrorism the centerpiece of their strategy to win back the Senate and keep control of the House in this year's midterm elections. 'We can go to the country on this issue because they trust the Republican Party to do a better job of protecting and strengthening America's military might and thereby protecting America,' Karl Rove said at the Republican National Committee meeting." - Washington Post, 1/19/02

Bush poses as a puffer fish, full of hot air: "Our nation is waging a broad and unrelenting campaign against the global terror network – and we’re winning."
Fact: Rumsfeld disagrees:
"The United States has no yardstick for measuring progress in the war on terrorism, has not "yet made truly bold moves" in fighting al-Qaeda and other terror groups, and is in for a "long, hard slog" in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a memo that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld sent to top-ranking Defense officials last week." - USA Today, 10/22/03

Bush the international man of mystery, lies, and hypocrisy:
“All governments that support terror are complicit in a war against civilization.” --UN Speech “We have made clear the doctrine which says, if you harbor a terrorist, if you feed a terrorist, if you hide a terrorist you're just as guilty as the terrorist. We're holding regimes accountable for harboring and supporting terror.” -- 9/10/03
Fact: Saudi Arabia, the big U.S. gas station flys under Bandar Bush's radar.
The Administration continues its close ties with the Saudis despite the findings of a bipartisan commission investigating 9/11. The commission found the Saudi government “not only provided significant money and aid to the suicide hijackers but also allowed potentially hundreds of millions of dollars to flow to Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups through suspect charities and other fronts.” - LA Times, 8/2/03

Just keeps lying, like the energizer bunny of liars:
"Our intelligence sources tell us that [Saddam Hussein] has attempted to purchase high-strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons production."
Fact:
"The President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board has concluded that the White House made a questionable claim in January's State of the Union address about Saddam Hussein's efforts to obtain nuclear materials because of its desperation to show that Hussein had an active program to develop nuclear weapons, according to a well-placed source familiar with the board's findings."

Plamegate-Bush admin reveals name of a CIA NOC agent, have they no shame. Impeachable offense one and treason Date: 10/9/2001
Bush said:
"And therefore, I felt it was important to send a clear signal to Congress that classified information must be held dear, that there's a responsibility that if you receive a briefing of classified information, you have a responsibility."
Fact:
White House aides said "President Bush has no plans to ask his staff members whether they played a role in revealing the name of an undercover officer who is married to former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, one of the most visible critics of Bush's handling of intelligence about Iraq." - Washington Post, 9/28/03 "White House officials left open the possibility that the they might assert executive privilege on some materials or withhold all or parts of others to block a full investigation of the leak of classified information." - New York Times, 10/8/03

Medicare, or the minute no one's looking Bush distorts and lies about another issue.
Quote/Claim:
"We must fix the problem of frivolous lawsuits against our doctors and hospitals."
Fact:
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found last year that "malpractice costs account for a very small fraction of total health care spending" and that even radical reform "would have a relatively small effect on total health plan premiums." - CBO, 9/25/02

Bush commits impeacable offense two:
"The budget I submitted earlier this year commits an additional $400 billion over 10 years to implement this vision of a stronger Medicare system. This is enough to meet our commitments to the seniors today and to future generations of Americans."
Fact:
"The government's top expert on Medicare costs was warned that he would be fired if he told key lawmakers about a series of Bush administration cost estimates that could have torpedoed congressional passage of the White House-backed Medicare prescription-drug plan...When the House of Representatives passed the controversial benefit by five votes last November, the White House was embracing an estimate by the Congressional Budget Office that it would cost $395 billion in the first 10 years. But for months the administration's own analysts concluded repeatedly that the drug benefit could cost upward of $100 billion more than that...Bush administration officials insisted they acted legally in ordering the nation's top Medicare cost analyst to keep from lawmakers his estimate that the new Medicare prescription drug benefit might cost more than $100 billion [than what the White House promised]." - Knight Ridder, 3/11/04 and 4/2/04

Bush is a puppet for drug companies: "A lot of this happened -- this bill happened because of grassroots work. A lot of our fellow citizens took it upon themselves to agitate for change, to lobby on behalf of what's right."
Fact:
"Drug companies and their trade associations deployed nearly 700 lobbyists to stamp out any proposals that would result in the federal government negotiating the cost of drugs or otherwise limiting the industry’s astronomical profits." - Public Citizen Report, 6/3/03
Bush has no shame when it comes to lying to seniors, "This new law will ease the burden on seniors and will give them the extra help they need."
Fact:
"[U]nder the new plan, seniors in the middle-income quintile will pay an average of $1,650 a year in out-of-pocket expenses for prescription drugs in 2006. This figure is nearly 60% more than they paid in 2000, even after adjusting for inflation. Expenses are projected to continue to rise so that by 2013 middle-income seniors will be paying more than two and a half times as much for prescription drugs (adjusting for inflation) as they did in 2000." -
Bush, George - President

Bush: lies and flip-flops:
During a gas price spike, "the president of the United States must jawbone OPEC members to lower the price. He ought to get on the phone with the OPEC cartel and say, 'We expect you to open your spigots.'"
Fact:
With gas prices soaring in the United States at the beginning of 2004, the Miami Herald reported the president refused to "personally lobby oil cartel leaders to change their minds." - Miami Herald, 4/1/04
Quote/Claim:
“I said when I was running for President, I supported ethanol, and I meant it. I support it now, because not only do I know it's important for the ag sector of our economy, it's an important part of making sure we become less reliant on foreign sources of energy.” Bush gets photo-op, then flip-flops Fact:
In his 200 3 budget, President Bush "did not include any money for the bioenergy program" that he was touting.

Bush has a deep credibility problem. Bush said about his first tax cut, “Tax relief will create new jobs” and the economy proceeded to shed almost 3 million jobs. He said about his second tax cut, “tax relief means new jobs for Americans” and the economy continued to shed jobs ( the U.S. has had a net loss of jobs of over two and a half million under Bush) . He said about the war in Iraq in May, “major combat operations have ended” and yet more troops have died since that statement than during the war. - George W. Bush, 4/16/01, 9/5/03, 5/1/03

Bushology, how to subvert the language," I think, if I might remind you that in my language I called it a grave and gathering threat, but I don't want to get into word contests."
Fact:
The President made far more dire statements before the war. While Bush did call Iraq a "grave and gathering" threat, that was not all he said. On 11/23/02, he said Iraq posed a "unique and urgent threat." On 1/3/03 he said "Iraq is a threat to any American." On 10/28/02 he said Iraq was "a real and dangerous threat" to America. On 10/2/02 he said, "The Iraqi regime is a threat of unique urgency" and that Iraq posed "a grave threat" to America. - Bush, 10/2/02, 10/2/02, 10/28/02 11/3/02, 1/3/03
*****Anthony Zinni Former Commander in chief of U.S. Central command, Saddam/Iraq : "It was neither imminent nor grave and gathering. It would present a risk if you weren't able to monitor it. Let's say the program moved beyond the framework and he decided to weaponize it. I can't think of any place on earth we had a more concentrated look, intelligence focus. Whether it's satellite, whether it's communication intercept and everything else. If he suddenly decided to take those missiles and weaponize them, if suddenly that L29 program would have flown unmanned at greater ranges, we would have seen it. And actually we had a bank of options short of war that we could have taken." AWOL Bush pretends to know more then General Zinni.

General Anthony Zinni has said:
The worst-kept secret in Washington is that as soon as this administration came in there was talk about taking down Iraq from day one. It's the worst-kept secret in Washington. There were Cabinet meetings where the deputy secretary of defense and others were pushing this. And certainly after 9/11 it was even more intense.

Bush looks into his crystal ball and gets it wrong agian, "Well, the oil revenues are -- they're bigger than we thought they would be at this point in time. I mean, one year after the liberation of Iraq, the revenues of the oil stream is pretty darn significant."
Fact:
Iraq oil revenues are now only "running at a rate of about $14 billion a year" – far less than the $20 billion to $30 billion a year the Bush Administration promised would allow Iraq to "finance its own reconstruction." Recent reports show that progress has slowed even more. Can Bush say "insurgents".
Statements by President Bush. Between September 12, 2002, and July 17,
2003, President Bush made 55 misleading statements about the threat posed by
Iraq in 27 separate public appearances.
These statements constitute impeachable offences.
Further more as these statements have lead to the deaths of hundreds of americans and thousands of iraqis. Some would call that treason.
Behind this is the text of 18 USC 1001.
In subsection (c)(1) it is made clear that a statement to Congress does not have to be made under oath to be perjury. It is sufficient that it is a statement "required by law, rule, or regulation to be submitted to the Congress." The State of the Union is mandated by the Constitution, the supreme law. The State of the Union is provided in advance to Congress members in writing.
Bush violates 18 USC 1001 if he:
falsifies, conceals, or covers up by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact;
makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or
makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry.
Bush did all these things in his State of the Union speeches.

Statements by Vice President Cheney. Between March 17, 2002, and January
22, 2004, Vice President Cheney made 51 misleading statements about the threat
posed by Iraq in 25 separate public appearances.

Statements by Secretary Rumsfeld. Between May 22, 2002, and November 2,
2003, Secretary Rumsfeld made 52 misleading statements about the threat posed
by Iraq in 23 separate public appearances.

After Congress delegated the authority to the President to go to war, it said, "Only, however, if you meet these two conditions. As you prove to us, you come back to us and determine that Iraq was involved with terrorism with al-Qaeda. And that there are weapons of mass destruction." Bush to date has never supplied Congress with that proof.

"One of the first official acts of the current Bush administration was to downgrade the office of national coordinator for counterterrorism on the National Security Council"

Losers are people that play games they can't win without cheating. There is no hope of engaging in constructive discourse with right-wing extremists because their entire worldview is predicated on delusion and fantasy. They are lost in the long discredited philosophy of social darwinism and theocratic fantasy.

Excellent work DaNanger, although I'd suggest typing more S-L-O-W-L-Y so the under-the-porch dwellers who frequent this benighted site can keep up with you.

Btw, speaking of Democrat-Vietnam-Vets-Who-Would-Be-President-But-Can't-Get-Their-Stories-Straight...

...has Weaselly Clark registered as a Democrat yet?

--furious

While I was reading the "nuclear attack" on Bush, Cheney, the Right Wing, and whatever else he could include posted by Apache Nation above, I got a call from an older friend who is a WWII veteran. He said, "Did you see the new memorial was opened today? I wish I could have been there. That was a generation that put America first and politics last. They stood together and they stood behind us and the president even if they didn't like the New Deal. I still have a "key to the city" I got in a Red Cross package from the mayor and the folks of my hometown when I was in North Africa. Boy, have things changed."

He put everything into focus for me. Can you imagine this country with the population we had in the 1940s fighting essentially two world wars at once in opposite parts of the world with the country virtually united behind the President? It resulted in resounding victory. No sniping and whining when we suffered major setbacks one after the other from Pearl Harbor until Midway. They stormed the beaches of Normandy without "impeaching the President" and showing thousands of photos of "body bags". No carrying the enemy's water in our newspapers or on radio. No anti-war rallies or marches. Sacrifices even down to the necessities of life to win the war and help the troops. In a word -- solidarity. We truly were the UNITED States of America.

I see a repeat of the "snatching defeat from the jaws of victory" repeating itself now just as Jane Fonda, John Kerry, and the VVAW did during the Vietnam war. They were apologists for the enemy then, and it appears their treasonous legacy has been passed on to the apeasers of today. I see more effort by many on the Left today to destroy the Administration and the war effort than by Al Qaeda and the terrorists. They couldn't hire a better spokesman to get out their message than Ted Kennedy.

The more who break ranks and show our enemies a divided nation, the more they will be reinvigorated, just as a defeated Communist North Vietnam was. If we lose this war, when the terrorists strike your town, be sure to tell them you helped, so please don't take their rage out on you and your family.

Thanks, furious. I don't think the Clintons have given Clark permission to out himself yet.

Wes Clark stayed in the Army for over three decades after teaching himself fhow to walk again from four wounds in Nam you tort.

He was SAUCER after that, and is distinguished as one of few military leaders to have ever had part in treaty negotiations which set up new Governments and nation states in addition to ones already existing with peaceable result.

So you bragged to us about DaNang how long did you stay in and serve and what kind of rank/merit did you achieve afterward? Wes Clark went back, Wes Clark stayed in the Army to see through a return of the esteem and reputation our Armed Forces and the people who serve in it deserve.

Bash Wes Clark some more, the man has forgotten more about national security than Bush would ever have the opportunity to learn.

Mr. Murder:

You're right, Weaselly Clark has forgotten alot, like if he ever registered as a democrat or not. He also forgot that Iraq had WMDs, too, and that he praised the President and Prime Minister Blair for taking action about it.

And Kosovo is "peaceable"? Is that why our troops are still there and our UN-assigned personnel and minority Serbs are still being murdered by various disgruntled Muslim thugs?

Although he was witnessed mugging and exchanging souvenirs with a known Serb war criminal, Ratko Mladic. That would explain the airstrikes against Serb civilian targets, being made a fool of like that, and all.

Just 'cause he was a war hero once doesn't excuse his twittery later. Or else you've just re-habilitated Oliver North.

Back to you, Mr Mudhead!

Oops, thats...

"... praised the President and PM Blair for taking action about it".

Damn html links, anyway, but how is Mr. Mudhead going to learn, otherwise?

There's more, about how he said one day he'd have voted FOR the Iraq resolution, then the next day said he'd have voted AGIN it, and then for the next two days stumbled around trying to reconcile the two versions.

There's more, but, aw hell, Wuss-lee was such a pitiful and graceless candidate, why waste time beating a dead horse.

--furious

Let's see, Clark prevents soldiers' casualties, establishes a no traffic zone where air support has first dibs on rules of engagement, and keeps a coalition together in cohesion even despite a near catastrophic frienldy fire incident when russian troops overpursued into our objective with shoot first rules and engagement. He disarms the problem by getting on the radio personally and contacting the coalition Russian contigent's leader and speaking the same language fluently as it is his ancestral tongue and this is a proof of his ability to lead in a global coalition with wisdom and tact.

Wise deployment of force is the issue.

One and a half million civilians saved, no American troop casualties. Wes Clark is overqualified to be the next president or vice president.

Iraq HAD WMDs was a lot different than Iraq HAS wmd's. Stop getting historical information confused with relevant, imminent threats. Oh, back to square one for the Bush leaguers.

1. Timely
   
2. Strategery
   
3. Webb wins
   
4. Huh?
   
5. Bunnypants in Bagdad
   
6. Outage
   
7. Filthy Lucre Watch
   
8. Playing the numbers
   
9. My letter to Countdown
   
10. Jefferson's Nigerian Scams