Bush Cabinet Moves Seen as Stifling Dissent

[Moloch]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Bush (news - web sites) is moving to concentrate power as he begins his second term, placing trusted members of his inner circle in key positions, but some analysts believe he risks stifling healthy debate within his administration.

"It is understandable that this president, like any president, wants his decisions to be taken as writ," said William Galston, a government professor at the University of Maryland, who served as a domestic policy adviser to former President Bill Clinton (news - web sites).

"However this president is running the risk of restricting the range of debate within the administration very seriously," Galston said.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=578&e=8&u=/nm/20041123/pl_nm/bush_dissent_dc

[shoelace414]

1. Risk!?!?

[Goldmund]

3. I was just going to say the same thing...

What fuckin' "healthy debate"? What "stifling"??? Risk?!?! Fucking tools...

[freedom_to_read]

2. Sultan Bush

Hiding within the Porte, surrounded by his eunuchs...

[louis-t]

4. "range of debate"??????

What debate? There is no 'debate' in this cluster-fuckistration. Chimp rules. End of story.

[Lerkfish]

7. actually, I think its "cheney rules" myself.

I don't think Chimpy is really pulling the important strings. I just think they let him think he does.
IMHO

[Career Prole]

5. They should have bitched about "stifling dissent" way back when

Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill got the ax.
He made the mistake of telling shrub that his tax cuts were over the top and unworkable and got canned for being an honest broker.
Instead of warning about stifled dissent the media jumped all over O'Neill for writing a book about it.

[jobycom]

6. At least he didn't stiffle it with Anthrax this time

Not that he did last time. I'm sure it was a coincidence that military grade anthrax was mailed to liberal journalists, or editors who had published embarrassing photos of Bush's daughters, or just enough senators to switch control of the senate back to the Republicans...

Probably just some wacko Limbaugh supporter, who happened to have military grade Anthrax lying around. I'm sure there are thousands of those, which would explain why no one has been caught yet.

[meti57b]

8. karl rove runs our entire government.

[damntexdem]

9. Yeah, that deprives them of the opportunity to ...

ostracize the cabinet disenters.

[Supersedeas]

10. what is healthy debate...when's the last time you've seen it?

[struggle4progress]

11. Well, George won't be screaming so often if ...

... there's nobody around who disagrees with him.