L'Etat, C'est George W. (LATimes editorial) ZOWIE!!

[baby_bear]

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-foreign3oct03,1,772969.story?coll=la-news-comment-editorials

<snip>

When Bush and Kerry debated Thursday, they focused so narrowly on Iraq that they didn't really answer this fundamental question: Is the U.S. safer than it was four years ago? Even allowing that our country was less safe four years ago than we realized at the time, the answer is no.

When Bush entered office in January 2001, the United States was not just a dominant power in the world, it was an unrivaled one. Europe cheered as U.S.-led airstrikes toppled Slobodan Milosevic's tyranny in the Balkans. China backed down from threatening Taiwan when President Clinton sent warships into the region. Around the world, the American model was seen as the only path to prosperity and freedom.

Now all that is gone. The military is stretched to the breaking point, with more than 100,000 troops tied down in Iraq and more than $90 billion having been spent on behalf of a war that was based on a massive intelligence failure. The Israeli-Palestinian peace process has been willfully abandoned by the Bush administration. North Korea and Iran are constructing nuclear weapons with impunity. Russia is reaching back to its czarist past as Vladimir V. Putin tightens his grip on power, while Bush utters feeble pieties about how he will continue to push for democracy and human rights.
...
The message Kerry's criticisms send is that, even in wartime, the United States is a democracy. The message Bush sends is that he need not defend his stewardship because criticism is invalid, whatever its merits. L'etat, c'est moi, as one of those French fellas put it. So much for the modesty of true strength and the humility of real greatness.

</snip>
Gotta read the whole thing. I think this is the article I have been looking for to share with my four male friends who don't particularly like Bush but haven't warmed to Kerry.

POW!!!

s_m

[Upfront]

1. No Not Failer

It was fucking lies!!!!!!

[patricia92243]

2. I think this is the best summing up of the situation i have read so far.

Hope Kerry camp reading and usung these points. Thanks for posting this.

[punpirate]

3. Helps define the underlying reasons...

... why Bush always says "my military" and "my government," doesn't it?

:think:

[teach1st]

4. Thanks. Great article!

Honest Conservatives have begun to admit that Iraq is a mistake. Perhaps they'll also wake up to the ill effects of other aspects of the Neocon foreign policy being played out during Bush's adventures in Wonderland.

[baby_bear]

5. I agree, teach1st

I think the editorial also presents a cogent reason to change horses mid-stream, as it were. I can't believe how so many people think we have to keep the Bushies in there just because they got us in this quagmire.

I am sending this to a lot of people, and making hard copies for those I want to make SURE read it.

s_m

[ixion]

6. what's with that opening sentence disclaimer?

"George W. Bush has campaigned on a foreign policy that is, for the most part, appropriate and wise. "

Uh, excuse me, but what part about alienating our allies and pissing off the entire world is appropriate and wise? What part of escalating a new arms race and siding with the rogue nation Israel is appropriate and wise?

I wish these people would stop praising the little Ceasar before they try and tear him down, because it really loses the effect.

[muriel_volestrangler]

7. They are referring to his campaign in 2000

their whole point is that what he has done for the last 4 years bears no relation to what he said he would.

[baby_bear]

8. Yeah, it took me aback for a sec until I realized it

It's actually quite an effective use of words...sort of a bait and switch...kinda like W!!

In other words, Gotcha!!

s_m