Is This America or Brownshirts Redux?

[Wind Dancer]

Mob Mentality

"This team is tough. You cross them and they go after you and raise questions about you and your credibility rather than what you have to say," Thomas Mann ("Newsview: Cross Bush, Face Payback," The Associated Press, March 27, 2004)

"If smear and slander can be an art form, they've perfected it. This is not their first smear rodeo." -- John Weaver ("Bush Martial Art: Attack On Clarke Is 'Smear Rodeo,'" The New York Observer, April 5, 2004)

"These are mean and nasty people, when it comes down to it," -- Richard Clarke (Nightline, March 24, 2004)

"These people are nasty and they have a long memory." -- Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill, ("Confessions of a White House Insider," Time, Jan. 11, 2004)

"The Bush people have no right to speak for my father, particularly because of the position he's in now. Yes, some of the current policies are an extension of the '80s. But the overall thrust of this administration is not my father's -- these people are overly reaching, overly aggressive, overly secretive, and just plain corrupt. I don't trust these people." -- Ronald Reagan, Jr. ("Reagan blasts Bush," Salon.com, April 14, 2003)

"It's a very closed, small, controlled group. This is an administration that determines what it thinks and then sets about to prove it. There's almost a religious kind of certainty. There's no curiosity about opposing points of view. It's very scary. There's kind of a ghost agenda." -- Bonnie Beers ("Former Aide Takes Aim at War on Terror," The Washington Post, June 16, 2003)

"If you want to know the truth, I blame the Bush campaign for the death of Nelson, one of the best journalists in America. Nelson saw what was going on in Florida early on, and he didn't see it with any equanimity: One of his colleagues at the Daily News called him on the day of his death, the afternoon of the televised Florida Supreme Court argument, and recalled Nelson crying out, "I can't believe they said that!" over some outrageous assertion by the lawyers for Ms. Harris and Mr. Bush. A few hours later, he was found in front of his television set, dead of a stroke. No one will convince me it was unrelated." Ron Rosenbaum, ("Of Bush, the Harris Rumor and James Baker's Junta," The New York Observer, Dec. 4, 2000)

"Karen Hughes accused me of lying. And so I called Karen and asked her why she was saying this, and she had this almost Orwellian rap that she laid on me about how things she'd heard -- that I watched her hear -- she in fact had never heard, and she'd never heard Bush use profanity ever. It was insane...the way she lied was she knew I knew she was lying, and she did it anyway. There is no word in English that captures that. It almost crosses over from bravado into mental illness...." Tucker Carlson (Salon.com interview, Sept. 13, 2003)

"I thought I had done a good job for the people of Georgia . I thought they knew me as someone who had served and sacrificed for the country, as someone who was willing to defend the country 35 years ago ... But the White House and the media image makers turned me into some kind of villain," Vietnam veteran Sen. Max Cleland, ("Cleland compares election loss to losing limbs," Associated Press, June 14, 2003)

"Sadly, what we have here is a continuing pattern by this White House. If any member of this Senate, Democrat or Republican, takes to the floor, questions this White House policy, raises any questions about the gathering of intelligence information or the use of it, be prepared for the worst." -- Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) ("Senator fights leak allegation," The Hill, July, 2003)

"It's a shot across the bow. . . that if you talk we'll take your family and drag them through the mud as well," -- Ambassador Joseph Wilson, on the Bush White House's felonious tactics. ("Columnist Blows CIA Agent's Cover," Newsday, July, 22, 2003)

"After Zinni challenged the administration's rationale for the Iraq war last fall, he lost his job as President George W. Bush's Middle East peace envoy after 18 months. "I've been told I will never be used by the White House again.'" - (" GW Bush's America: Americans Pay Price for Speaking Out, Dissenters Face Job Loss, Arrest, Threats But Activists not Stopped by Backlash," The Toronto Star, Aug. 9. 2003)

"Essentially, Mr. Bush and the owners' group he led bullied and misled the city into raising taxes to build a $200 million stadium that in effect would be handed over to the Rangers. As part of the deal, the city would even confiscate land from private owners so that the Rangers owners could engage in real estate speculation. "It was a $200 million transfer to Bush and Rangers owners. . . " -- Nicholas Kristof ("Bush and the Texas Land Grab," The New York Times, July 16, 2002)

"But, it's like saying, are you going to be the president of the people who don't vote for you? Yes, I am. And, there will be a certain sense of discipline." -- President George Bush, (Transcript of the president's comments on whether or not Mexico would back the U.N., resolution authorizing the use of force in Iraq, Copley News Service, March 6, 2003)

http://www.buzzflash.com/farrell/04/04/far04012.html


We, the people, can't allow a government to intimidate and scare us!