Comment: Would never want to accuse our beloved Pres. of telling a falsehood, but the bulge story can't be true as he tells it (down further in the text.) Can it?
Righties tell the Cheneys Mary can be curedWe're sure that Republicans will be shocked and appalled to learn that Mary Cheney is once again being dragged forward to make a partisan political point about homosexuality. Today, Concerned Women for America, the veteran right-wing organization founded by Beverly LaHaye, released "About Mary: An Open Letter to Dick and Lynn Cheney." Under the guise of praising the Vice President's daughter -- "Mary is, I'm sure, a fine young woman with many wonderful qualities," it says -- the missive actually uses her to make an argument about whether or not homosexuality is a choice.
Authored by Regina Griggs, executive director of a group called PFOX, or Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays, the letter nods to the Cheney's paternal love, saying, "As parents, we can and do love our children unconditionally no matter who they are attracted to. Loving unconditionally allows us the freedom to maintain our values and viewpoints while keeping a bridge open to our children." But loving isn't the same as accepting. "Homosexual activists like those working on the Kerry-Edwards team want 'gay marriage' and civil unions in order to gain public affirmation," it says. "They think this will make them happy. Happiness requires hope, and real hope is the knowledge that many men and women overcome unwanted same-sex attractions every year, even those who believed at one time that they were born that way and had no choice." When Kerry mentioned Mary -- far more sympathetically -- her mother blasted it as "a cheap and tawdry trick," William Safire wrote an outraged column entitled "The Lowest Blow," and William Kristol vituperated against the Democratic nominee's "cheap, cold, calculating cynicism--and cruelty."
Granted, Concerned Women for America doesn't have anything near the same platform or responsibilities as a presidential candidate. But it is influential. One of its major figures is former Bush senior speechwriter Janice Shaw Crouse, who consults with the second Bush administration on UN family planning issues. If CWFA is just a fringe outfit that no one should pay attention to, we urge Republicans to say so. Otherwise, we eagerly await demands that the group apologize for once again pulling Mary from her non-existent closet.
-- Michelle Goldberg
[12:57 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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Katherine Harris makes friends in CongressFour years after making her star turn on the national scene during the Florida recount fiasco, Katherine Harris has been busy making friends in Washington, serving as a Republican Congresswoman from the state's 13th district. It seems Harris has brought a fresh and friendly approach to legislating.
As captured on this CSPAN video earlier in the month, Harris always has time to socialize. While Rep. Bob Simmons, R-Conn., drones on two rows ahead of her about the need for open source intelligence, Harris has all her attention focused on telegenic Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., who is sitting inches away from her. (Could she sit any closer?) The two share light moments as Harris alternatively tosses her hair back, giggles, leans in close for a whisper, and simply cannot leg go of Renzi's left arm. "Congressman Renzi and Congresswoman Harris are good friends. They exchanged a laugh on the [House] floor. Nothing more," says Renzi's spokesman, while a spokswoman for Harris declined to "dignify" War Room's inquiry with a response, insisting it was "dirty politics."
-- Eric Boehlert
[12:15 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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The battle for the SenateEarlier this year many analysts agreed that the Democrats' only chance of winning control of the Senate was to win by such a large margin in the presidential election that it would filter down-ballot. While a big Kerry win may seem unlikely, Democrats still have a chance to take a majority in the upper house, thanks to some remarkably incompetent Republican opponents.
Top honors in that category, of course, go to Illinois GOP contender Alan Keyes, of whom the National Review magazine has said "there is not a worse candidate for a major office in America this year." But he's not the only who is flailing: In Alaska, South Carolina and Oklahoma, three states that President Bush is expected to dominate by 15 to 30 points, Republican candidates are struggling to stay afloat.
In South Carolina, Congressman Jim DeMint is still backing away from earlier support of a national sales tax and his comment that unmarried, pregnant women aren't morally fit to teach children. His opponent, State Superintendent of Education Inez Tenenbaum, has managed to cut DeMint's lead in the race down to four points, according to the most recent poll released shortly before the candidates' final debate on Monday night.
In Alaska, former Democratic Governor Tony Knowles narrowly leads Republican incumbent Lisa Murkowski, who was appointed by Governor Frank Murkowski. Apparently, Alaskan voters don't agree that the most qualified candidate the Republican Governor could've found for an open senate seat was his own daughter -- and they may elect their first Democratic senator in 23 years. With one week to go, Knowles holds a slight 2-point lead -- in spite of the fact that Ted Stevens, Alaska's popular Republican senator, is pushing for Murkowski's reelection.
In Oklahoma, one of the most solidly Republican states in the country, Democrat congressman Brad Carson is leading Republican Tom Coburn, a physician and former U.S. representative who has been sinking under allegations of fraud and medical malpractice. On Monday Coburn told an Oklahoma radio station that his faith in God helps him survive the attacks on his character, but he's still losing to Carson 47-40 in the most recent poll.
Republican candidates in some other key races are faring better. In South Dakota, Republican Jim Thune is gunning for Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle's seat in what is the most heavily funded contest in the country, with more than $31 million poured into the race between the two parties. A Daschle loss would be a big blow to the Dems; the latest Rasmussen poll shows Thune has tied the race, 49-49.
In Florida, State Education Commissioner Betty Castor is fighting former Bush administration HUD Secretary Mel Martinez for the seat currently held by Bob Graham. The White House is said to have handpicked Martinez, a Cuban-American they hope will bolster President Bush in the state. But Democratic turnout is expected to be strong, in part due to a ballot measure that would hike the minimum wage. The candidates are tied at 44, according to a Miami Herald/St. Petersburg Times poll.
In Colorado, Democratic State Attorney General Ken Salazar is campaigning against millionaire beer brewer Peter Coors. Zogby's most recent poll puts Salazar ahead by 9 points -- though other recent polls have given Coors the lead.
In Louisiana, the Republican candidate, David Vitter, is losing by a slight margin -- even while running against a party that hasn't settled on its own contender. Louisiana's unique election system allows for multiple candidates from the same party to compete, and Vitter is opposed by several Democrats. He currently polls at 35 percent; his top two Democratic opponents poll at a combined 36 percent. If, as expected, no candidate receives a majority of the vote in November, Louisianans will vote in a runoff in December.
Finally, former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles is battling Republican representative Richard Burr for John Edwards' North Carolina senate seat. After months of trailing just behind, Burr has now tied Bowles 45-45, according to a Mason-Dixon poll released last week.
That makes a total of eight, and if Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning continues to fall apart, nine truly competitive senate races -- of which Democrats would have to win at least six to gain a true majority. This year's fight to the finish is by no means only for the White House.
-- Jeff Horwitz
[12:05 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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First Sinclair, now PappasIs it just us, or are Republican media moguls becoming increasingly brazen down the campaign homestretch, as they ignore decades worth of broadcast guidelines in order to use the public airwaves in blatantly partisan ways? First, the Sinclair Broadcast Group tried to order its 62 stations nationwide to air an anti-Kerry hit piece. Now in another unprecedented move, Pappas Telecasting, one of California's largest broadcast owners, is donating $325,000 worth of airtime exclusively to Republican candidates locked in tight local races.
According to the Associated Press, the company's CEO, Harry J. Pappas--a big GOP donor--decided to make the contributions "because they reflect his political views in support of the Republican Party." The privately-held company owns 28 TV stations, with outlets in most of California's major markets, including Bakersfield, Fresno, Los Angeles, Modesto, Sacramento, and San Francisco. Pappas' give-ways to Republican candidates are good on seven of his television and two radio stations, most of which are based in California's Central Valley
In order to skirt federal regulations that require broadcasters to give major candidates "equal time" during campaigns, Pappas is donating $25,000 to seven local GOP committees--not to the candidates--and setting aside broadcast minutes for Republicans only. Pappas' spokesman told the Sacramento Bee, "We're not denying (Democrats) any opportunity. They have the opportunity to purchase an equivalent amount of airtime. I think Mr. Pappas has the right to express his political opinions as much as anyone else."
In a statement this afternoon, Josh Silver, executive director of Free Press, an advocacy group that battles media consolidation, denounced the Pappas move: "This is yet another example of a huge media company abusing the public's airwaves to advance their own political agenda. Pappas is making a bogus claim that the ads are not contributions, that they're 'buying' ad time from themselves. This is nothing but smoke and mirrors to avoid what appears to be a violation of federal laws requiring equal time." Free Press, which helped mobilize protests against Sinclair in recent weeks, vows to press its fight against Pappas.
-- Eric Boehlert
[11:53 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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Hillary goes Hollywood -- in BrooklynIt was an odd moment, just a week and a day before the election, when Hillary Clinton, in a black-belted coat, sparkly earrings, and boots so spiky they could be classified as weapons, made her way down a paparazzi-lined red carpet into the arms of Miramax co-chairman Harvey Weinstein. Odder still was that this scene took place in the middle of Brooklyn -- not a borough typically littered with red carpets or paparazzi.
As far as we could tell, Clinton was taking an evening's break from her tour of swing states in support of John Kerry to fulfill a promise she'd made to menschy Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. She'd promised the enthusiastic Markowitz that she'd try to exercise her considerable influence over Democratic work-horse (and donor) Weinstein to persuade him to have a national premiere in this outer-borough. So here they all were at the Brooklyn Museum, at the premiere of "Finding Neverland," a movie about Peter Pan playwright J.M. Barrie starring Johnny Depp, Kate Winslet, Julie Christie and Dustin Hoffman. Hoffman and Winslet, along with Ben Stiller and Christine Taylor, Glenn Close, novelist Paul Auster, former Monkee Mickey Dolenz and Tony Danza were all making their way past crowds of locals shouting "Thank you for coming to Brooklyn!"
Don't ask. War Room lives in Brooklyn, and we didn't get it either.
Inside, Mr. Markowitz took the stage, claiming improbably that "in days ahead, Brooklyn will be known as Hollywood East!" He gave local shout-outs to Weinstein and his brother Bob, "two Brooklyn boychiks" and introduced the junior senator by proclaiming that he had two wishes: "Hillary in the White House and Chelsea a Brooklyn resident!"
Clinton's husband always did show business well. Like he might as well have been discovered at the milkshake counter at Schraffts. But the language of the industry does not trip as lightly from Hillary's tongue. Speaking of Weinstein, Clinton called him her "dear friend" and said that he's someone "I really admire and really respect for his craft." Uh-huh. Still, she made a (strange) case for the Hollywood-Brooklyn connection -- perhaps prepping her Brooklyn constituents to support her in her next race, which could be against local favorite Rudy Giuliani. "There are countless movies about people from Brooklyn," she explained. So naturally, "Brooklyn deserves a national premiere!" Clinton did not mention John Kerry's name.
But Weinstein -- who has lost so much weight that he is almost unrecognizable -- wasted little time. Though first, he (naturally) was forced to dispense with his Brooklyn credentials. "I know how to make an egg cream; I could probably name the last line-up of the Dodgers," he said. And that has earned him the right to invoke what he called "the chutzpah rule." He made the audience the following offer: "If you don't like this movie, you can hang my brother and me in effigy." Weinstein also generously offered the opportunity to hang a third producer, Richard Gladstein. "But if you like the movie, you have to call ten undecided voters in swing states and get them to vote for Senator Kerry." He paused. "Or you could do it Brooklyn style and go to the swing states and vote ten times for Kerry, which is probably one less time than Dick Cheney is going to vote for himself.
Weinstein couldn't stop himself. "I love the Republicans," he said. "They keep talking about free voting in Afghanistan and they're trying to prevent people from voting in this country. But that's OK, cause all the young kids are going to come out and kick their butts."
Weinstein laughed. "I promised my staff I was not going to be political tonight."
-- Rebecca Traister
[11:36 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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Bush weighs in on his bulgeWhat does the president himself think of the whirlwind of speculation that his staff was secretly piping him instructions during the debates? For one thing, he might be preparing to fire the White House tailor. From the Associated Press today:
"Please explain to me how it works so maybe if I were ever to debate again I could figure it out," Bush said Tuesday on ABC's "Good Morning America," regarding speculation that the bulge in his suit jacket was an electronic device.
"When asked about the bulge that appeared as he and Sen. John Kerry debated Sept. 30 in Coral Gables, Fla., Bush tantalized conspiracy theorists by saying, 'Well, you know, Karen Hughes and Dan Bartlett had rigged up a sound system ... '
"'You are getting in trouble,' responded host Charles Gibson.
"'I don't know what that is,' Bush said. 'I mean, it is -- I'm embarrassed to say it's a poorly tailored shirt.'"
Bush denied the use of any sound system or electronic signal, according to the AP. He added that there was no hidden presidential dog collar, either.
"'I guess the assumption was that if I were straying off course they would ... kind of like a hunting dog, they would punch a buzzer and I would jerk back into place,' Bush said. 'That's just absurd.'"
-- Mark Follman
[11:25 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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In the pollsTwo new national polls today give Bush a lead. The Los Angeles Times shows Bush with the slightest of leads among likely voters, 49-48, and has the candidates tied at 47 each among registered voters.
Gallup is calling it 51-46 for Bush among likely voters, and 49-47 among all registered voters.
In national likely-voter tracking polls, TIPP looks the most favorable for Bush, putting him up 48-41. Zogby has Bush ahead 47-45, the Washington Post has Kerry by a 49-48 margin, and Rasmussen gives the Democratic ticket 48 to the Republicans' 46.
Today's state polls aren't great news for Kerry. The last four nonpartisan Ohio polls show Kerry down between 1 and 4 points, and the last six Florida polls are split: Kerry is up in 1, tied in 2, and down in 3. In Minnesota, however, Zogby says KE '04 has increased its lead to 5 points, 48-43.
-- Jeff Horwitz
[09:28 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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RNC pretends newspapers lean leftAs the mountain of newspaper endorsements pile up in favor of Sen. John Kerry, including dozens from dailies that backed Bush in 2000, the Bush/Cheney campaign is dismissing the trend as no big deal. "Look, the Republican candidate will never win the contest for editorial board endorsements. The major dailies across the country tend to skew liberal," RNC chairman Ed Gillespie told CNN last week. That spin comes straight out of the GOP handbook that insists the mainstream press tilts to the left, so of course newspapers love Democrats come Election Day.
Only problem is, it's not accurate. In fact, the complete opposite is true. Since 1940 when industry trade magazine Editor & Publisher began tracking newspapers during presidential elections, only two Democratic candidates -- Lyndon Johnson in 1964 and Bill Clinton in 1992 -- have ever won more endorsements than their Republican opponent. That's because newspaper publishers, who usually sign off on endorsements, tend to vote Republican (like lots of senior corporate executives), which means GOP candidates pick up more endorsements. A lot more. In 1984, President Reagan landed roughly twice as many endorsements as Democrat Walter Mondale in the president's easy reelection win. And in 1996, despite his weak showing at the polls, 179 daily newspapers endorsed Republican Bob Dole, which easily outpaced the Democrats' tally by nearly a 2-to-1 margin.
In 2000, the overwhelming trend toward Republicans continued. According to estimates, candidate Bush enjoyed a huge newspaper advantage, picking up nearly 100 more daily endorsements than Gore. On the eve of the election four years ago, Editor & Publisher spelled out the newspaper love affair with Bush in a Nov. 6 article: "The nation's newspaper editors and publishers strongly believe the Texas governor will beat Al Gore in Tuesday's election for president. By a wide margin, they plan to vote for him themselves. And, to complete this Republican trifecta, newspapers endorsed Bush by about 2-to-1 nationally."
E&P's results come from industry-wide surveys it conducted among 800 top newspaper executives one week before the election. Asked how they were going to vote in 2000, 59 percent of newspaper publishers signaled they were voting for Bush, compared to just 20 percent for Gore. And even among newsroom editors, Bush won support among 33 percent, compared to just to 24 percent for Gore.
As E&P noted in 2000, "One has to wonder: whatever happened to the so-called 'liberal press'?" The better question for the Bush/Cheney team is, why have all those GOP publishers abandoned the president this time around?
-- Eric Boehlert
[06:38 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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Seven-days-and-counting Tuesday must-readsLos Angeles Times: With one week to go before Election Day, voters still maddeningly and evenly divided between Bush and Kerry, who are tied with or without Nader as a factor; and the race is divided along lines of cultural values rather than class. To make things even more interesting, the Times says, with the race this tight, it could be tipped "by almost anything -- a misstatement on the campaign trail, favorable or unfavorable news for either side or the two parties' competing efforts to turn out the vote."
Washington Post: More bad Iraq-related news for Bush, more fodder for Kerry. The Bush administration plans to seek about $70 billion in emergency funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which would make total war costs $225 billion since the invasion of Iraq. "The new numbers underscore that the war is going to be far more costly and intense, and last longer, than the administration first suggested."
USA Today: "Concerned that they won't get enough new troops from allies to help provide security for Iraqi elections in January, Pentagon officials are considering increasing the current U.S. force by delaying the departures of some U.S. troops now in Iraq and accelerating the deployment of others scheduled to go there next year." But wait, they forgot Poland! Actually, if you missed it, Poland will start pulling its troops out of Iraq as of January 2005, and in the words of the Polish Prime Minister, won't stay "an hour longer than needed."
New York Times: Another scientist compelled to speak out against Bush. This time, it's a top NASA climate expert who twice briefed Vice President Dick Cheney on global warming who says a "senior administration official" told him last year not to discuss dangerous consequences of rising temperatures.
Reuters: America learns 380 tons of explosives are missing in insurgent-swarmed Iraq, and where was Condi? On a swing through Florida promoting her boss' foreign policy, naturally.
Reuters: Army Corps of Engineers' whistleblower Bunny Greenhouse demands investigation into contracts given to Halliburton, citing "repeated interference" on behalf of Kellogg Brown and Root for work in Iraq and the Balkans.
-- Geraldine Sealey
[06:25 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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Supreme scenariosWeek after week, groups like People for the American Way have tried to remind reporters -- and through them, the public -- that control of the Supreme Court is at stake in next Tuesday's election. It's almost certainly true, but concerns about the judicial branch have a hard time getting air in a race consumed so completely by the economy and the war.
You might have expected that to change with Monday's news that Chief Justice William Rehnquist has thyroid cancer. But the Kerry campaign said nothing about it. Kerry didn't mention Rehnquist or the court on the stump, and Mike McCurry repeatedly told reporters traveling with the campaign that he didn't know enough about Rehnquist's health to comment.
Here's what we know.
1. If Rehnquist were to resign or -- how to put this gently? -- otherwise leave the court before Jan. 20, Bush would have the constitutional power to nominate someone to replace him.
2. Whether the Senate would act on Bush's choice before Jan. 20 depends on who wins next week. If Bush wins, there's no reason to delay consideration (assuming, of course, that there's no significant shift in Senate power on Nov. 2). If Bush loses, he could send up a nominee, but Senate Democrats would certainly stall consideration in order to let Kerry make his own pick.
3. If the election ends up in the courts and Rehnquist is either temporarily or permanently indisposed, well, who knows? An election case can't get to the Supreme Court unless four justices vote to grant certiorari. Without Rehnquist, the Republicans would have only four of the five who stepped in to save George Bush from the Florida Supreme Court in 2000. You can get a case before the Supreme Court with four votes out of eight, but you can't win one. If the Supreme Court hears a case with only eight justices and those eight split 4-4, the decision from the lower court stands. If that had happened four years ago, President Al Gore might well be running for re-election today.
-- Tim Grieve
[05:31 PDT, Oct. 26, 2004]
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Inevitable Jon Stewart backlashIt's eight days till the election and the media has whipped itself into such a frenzy of cannibalistic blood lust that we have completely reversed the effects of our Paxil prescriptions and are charging blindly after anyone we can sink our teeth into.
Case in point: Jon Stewart.
We have had weeks of unrelenting, masturbatory press congratulating "Daily Show" host Jon Stewart for being the most trusted man in journalism. He's been deified in Newsweek, canonized in Rolling Stone, and his new volume, "America: The Book," is at the top of bestseller lists. Journalists and wisecracking couch-monkeys alike fantasize that he is just the kind of dry, observant political commentator they would be if they were good-looking and had their own show. By early October, the story that Jon Stewart was Aristophanes reborn -- by way of Edward R. Murrow's gene pool -- was about as revelatory as the news that bloggers were a major journalistic force on the election landscape.
But the moody chasm between early October and late October is vast. And in late October, the media is exhausted, frustrated, scared and eager to lash out. Conveniently, they also happen to be shocked, shocked by Stewart's dead-serious scolding of "Crossfire" hosts Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala last Friday. And so they have turned.
"Has Jon Stewart jumped the shark?" Tina Brown asked on last night's episode of "Topic A." Brown's plummy query sounded downright cheerful, though that might have been her relief at having finished an interview with anal sex memoirist Toni Bentley, which Brown had concluded by darkly predicting that Bentley would "meet some very interesting new friends after writing this book." Brown was practically licking her lips as she played a clip of Stewart on "Crossfire" and asked her panel of media experts, "Is he taking himself a bit too seriously?"
New York Times reporter David Carr thrashed Stewart in response, cracking that he would have been better dressed for his "Crossfire" appearance had he shown up in a nun's habit. "His decision to go church lady start to finish, absent any sort of levity and humor ... was a little hard to figure out and probably not good in the end for his own personal franchise," said Carr.
A Sunday New York Times "Week in Review" story by Damien Cave led with the question, "Is Jon Stewart being coy?" and quoted the Boston Pheonix's Dan Kennedy, a Stewart fan who has criticized the "Crossfire" appearance. On Oct. 19, Kennedy wrote that Stewart "came off as something of a bully and a bore" as well as "slippery and disingenuous." Kennedy also argued that in the confrontation, "Stewart became what he criticized."
In Saturday's Washington Post, Howard Kurtz quoted Wonkette – aka Ana Marie Cox -- saying that Stewart had painted a target on his own chest, and that "The Jon Stewart backlash should start right about now." "To say his is just a comedy show is a cop-out in a way," Cox told Kurtz. "He's gotten so much power."
But in case you weren't sure that Cox's predicted backlash was upon us as of this weekend, we woke up this morning to a damning piece in the new issue of New York magazine. "The notion of Stewart as the Joker Who Speaks Truth to Power has now gotten away from the joker himself. His cult success on Comedy Central has become bloated and excessively esteemed," wrote Ken Tucker, going on to argue that Stewart's postmortem rehash of the "Crossfire" fight on his own show was just "nyah-nyah, can't catch-me baiting." Tucker writes that Stewart "tries so hard to be the anti-anchorman that he ends up being a disdainfully mediocre one, tossing verbal Twinkies and Ho Hos at everyone from John Kerry to Ralph Reed, ending up with sugary, jittery segments." Tucker also writes that Stewart "has developed this bad habit of wanting it both ways: Hey, I just tell jokes! and You can't handle the truth!"
Everyone has a point, and it seems that everyone -- including War Room -- has a blog, or a column or a guest spot on a talk show.
But maybe we should all just ratchet back the blood lust, rechannel the aggression. I strongly doubt that Stewart -- a man whose show I do not regularly watch because I do not have real cable -- ever asked to become the biggest story of this election season. He has seemed fairly content to host his show, publish books and nurture a comparatively literate fan base by squeezing this blood-chilling political climate for all the laughs the rest of us are too ethically bound to milk.
It's been his fans -- or at least his ideological fellow travelers, the culturally privileged and socially alienated media -- who have hoisted him into the stratosphere of political commentary, where he apparently now makes a fat, juicy goose at which to aim our shotguns. New York's Tucker admits to agreeing with Stewart's politics; the Pheonix's Kennedy to being a devoted fan. And yet they just can't help themselves.
None of us can. We are all jittery and bloated ourselves, overfed on coverage, statistics, polls, trends, heroes, villains, conspiracies, lies and anger. We have overfeasted on our own cleverness, on our own ability to gather information and process it instantly. We are sick of ourselves and sick with worry about what will happen next week. We can barely stomach the idea of the eight more days -- or God knows how long -- to come before we know who the next president will be. And so, wandering aimlessly, crazily looking for any piece of fresh meat to rip from the bone, the addled, self-loathing media have caught our own tail and are dumbly gnawing on it.
So let's just breathe in and breathe out. Drink a cool glass of water and maybe throw back a stiff drink. Head home early and get a good night's sleep. We are a week away from this thing. Jon Stewart is no one's enemy any more than he was anyone's savior: He is a funny guy with a funny show who happens to be a smart guy who had a smart point to make on a not-funny show. I think that most politically interested people -- including that "dick" Tucker Carlson, who has admitted as much -- have enjoyed a few belly laughs thanks to Jon Stewart. That doesn't make him Walter Cronkite; but it doesn't make him Jayson Blair either.
So let's chill out a bit before we condemn our only decent jester to death.
-- Rebecca Traister
[15:20 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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The bulge lives!The presidential debates may be over, but the Bush bulge controversy won't die. In today's Doonesbury, cartoonist Garry Trudeau takes up the question: What was under Bush's jacket anyway? Maybe in tomorrow's strip the President will tell all. We can't wait.
-- Katharine Mieszkowski
[15:14 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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A Bush win? Lefty journos contemplate the unthinkableIt's something many liberals can barely stand to think about, much less talk about -- what if Bush wins? Today in the Washington Post, Howard Kurtz surveys prominent progressive journalists and pundits about that rancid possibility, and finds curdling, apocalyptic fear. Quoting from a Washington Monthly cover story, Kurtz relays CNN's Paul Begala's prediction that Bush would immediately seek to purge his enemies. "He and his allies are likely to embark on a campaign of political retribution the likes of which we haven't seen since Richard Nixon," Begala says. As Kurtz notes, the Monthly also quoted Todd Gitlin, a Columbia professor and liberal activist, saying, "I would not be surprised to see outbursts of political violence the likes of which we haven't seen since the Weather Underground of the 1970s."
In a recent Vanity Fair piece, media columnist Michael Wolff suggested that liberals might actually thrive during a second Bush term, since the president serves as such a galvanizing force. Kurtz pushes this insouciantly nihilistic hypothesis. After quoting Nation editor Katrina van den Heuvel speculating about "the dismantling of our democracy," Kurtz writes, "But her liberal magazine has grown from 100,000 in circulation to 170,000 in the past four years. 'Bush has been bad for the nation but good for the Nation,' she admits."
Later, he writes, "[J]ust as Rush Limbaugh and Fox News thrived during the Clinton years, the Bush era has given rise to liberal blogs, Air America Radio and a slew of Al Franken-like bestsellers. And Bush would remain a fabulous target for outraged liberals who might have to modulate their rhetoric during a Kerry presidency."
The people Kurtz quotes, though, are less than giddy at this possibility. "I think journalists will accept the judgment of the public and read the victory as an acceptance that the rules are now changed," Washington Monthly Editor Paul Glastris tells him. "The way they've been treated, the way the administration buries information and misrepresents almost anything they want to would just be an accepted fact of life. There will be a defining down of the acceptable standards of what government can do."
-- Michelle Goldberg
[14:34 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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Bush searches the Tora Bora hills for latest attackThere he goes again. In a stump speech at a Colorado rally today, one of George W. Bush's most popular lines of attack against John Kerry was to "quote" the senator from December 2001 saying he thought the search for Osama bin Laden, underway at the time in Afghanistan, was being run "effectively." Kerry, of course, now criticizes the president for his handling of the search and bin Laden's escape. After reading off the Kerry quote, Bush looked up mischievously at his Colorado audience and said to loud cheers, "I am George W. Bush and I approve this message," as if he had really caught that flip-flopping John Kerry in another one.
But just what were the circumstances of Kerry's quote? Funny you asked. It appears that, and we know you'll be shocked by this, the Bush campaign has taken Kerry's remarks out of context. At the time Kerry spoke about the bin Laden search -- on the Larry King Live program on Dec. 14, 2001 -- the Pentagon believed bin Laden was hiding in the hills of Tora Bora, and the Washington Post that morning published a report stating that "highly trained commandos" had been dispatched there to find him. The strategy of sending special forces in is what Kerry promoted.
And so while a guest on Larry King Live, Kerry was asked to respond to this (no link, sorry):
"CALLER: Hello. Yes, I would like to ask the panel why they don't use napalm or flamethrowers on those tunnels and caves up there in Afghanistan? KING: Senator Kerry? CALLER: My golly, I think they could smoke him out.KING: Senator Kerry?KERRY: Well, I think it depends on where you are tactically. They may well be doing that at some point in time. But for the moment, what we are doing, I think, is having its impact and it is the best way to protect our troops and sort of minimalize the proximity, if you will. I think we have been doing this pretty effectively and we should continue to do it that way.KING: Congressman Cunningham, what do you think of that question?CUNNINGHAM: I think Senator Kerry is right on the mark. To use a flamethrower, you've got to get right into the area close in. And plus, it doesn't penetrate that deep in those tunnels. You've got to go in there after him. So I think you have to neutralize that threat. And then you can get him out in a lot of different, various ways including what the gentleman spoke about."
With his answer, Kerry was politely explaining to the caller that maybe it wasn't time to whip out the napalm. As far as Kerry knew then, the U.S. was actually doing what he supported, which was sending in special forces to get the job done. But we've learned alot since then about what went down. In this campaign, Kerry has criticized the president for having relied too heavily on Afghan forces, or in Kerry's words, "outsourcing the job." Kerry didn't change his position; but saying so fits into the tiresome Bush-Cheney flip-flopping meme, no matter how far the truth needs to be stretched.
-- Geraldine Sealey
[14:16 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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Touch-screen voting ruled OK in FloridaOf the many pre-election lawsuits hanging over the race in Florida, one of the most important has been resolved. On Monday morning, a federal judge in Fort Lauderdale dismissed Congressman Robert Wexler's lawsuit demanding that electronic voting machines used in the state produce voter-verifiable paper trails that can be manually recounted in the case of a close election. In a lengthy opinion (PDF), U.S. District Judge James I. Cohn said that based upon the evidence he heard during three days of hearings last week, he saw no legal basis for scrapping paperless machines in the state. But in a clause that pleased many paper-trail advocates, Cohn, a Bush appointee to the federal bench, added that "the preferable voting system would include a paper printout reviewed by the voter to ensure that it contains his or her selections."
In an interview after the decision was handed down, Wexler, a Democrat whose district includes Palm Beach and Broward Counties, said that despite the loss, he took comfort in the judge's conclusion that machines that produce a paper trail are better than machines that do not. "For legal reasons he doesn't believe that we established the requisite legal case to warrant the court to intervene," Wexler said of Cohn's decision. "I think the court was reluctant to act seven days before the election. And that's really the fault of Governor Jeb Bush, who effectively ran the clock out for meaningful reform for 2004."
Wexler plans to appeal the decision to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, but he concedes that nothing will come of that effort before next Tuesday. This raises another question: For several months, Wexler and his supporters have been telling voters not to trust paperless machines -- so what should people do now that they have no choice but to use these systems?
They have to make do, Wexler says. "If they have requested their absentee ballots they can use those, but if they haven't, which is the situation I'm in -- I will go and vote on the electronic machines," Wexler told War Room. "I encourage everyone to go and vote on the electronic machines. The one thing that needs to be the result of all of this focus on these machines is, there needs to be the largest turnout in history in South Florida. And I think there will be. Yesterday in Boca Raton, there was a 20,000 person turnout for John Kerry at an outdoor rally in hot weather. As far as I know it was the largest reported political rally in Palm Beach County in the history of the world." Whatever worries people may have about the voting machines, Wexler says, nobody wants to miss out on a chance to vote in this election.
One additional note on electronic voting machines: Since late last week War Room has received several warnings of a serious problem with the touch-screen machines being used during the early voting period in Travis County, Texas. Our correspondents inevitably cite the experiences of friends of friends of friends who've been to the polls in the county -- a progressive bastion that includes Austin -- and, while attempting to vote a straight-party Democratic ballot, somehow, to their shock and everlasting suspicion, ended up selecting George Bush in the presidential race. To many online, the Travis County story is being seen as proof that touch-screen voting systems aren't to be trusted at the polls this year.
But don't panic; there's nothing wrong in Travis County. Dana DeBeauvoir, the county clerk, told War Room that only one voter has reported this mysterious vote-switching problem, and that voter seems to have just been a bit clumsy with the machine's buttons (the voter managed to cast the correct ballot in the end). "If you look at the e-mail it seems like a hundred people had this problem," she says, "but I only got one report." While local media debunked the story last week, DeBeauvoir's office continues to receive calls from concerned voters. Indeed, the story might say more about the psychic health of the electorate than the mechanical health of the machines. "People are so passionate and nervous, there's just such high emotion running around this election," she notes. "I don't think at this point it takes much to put people on edge."
-- Farhad Manjoo
[13:09 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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Fatuous FinemanThank God for James Wolcott, scourge of press poodles. His blog on the insufferable Howard Fineman is a must read. You can't escape Fineman's smug puss whenever you're channel surfing cable news world. The fact that the NBC cable empire has deemed his every hackneyed, lifeless observation to be worthy of our attention is yet one more sign of the utter collapse of American journalism. On Sunday morning Wolcott caught Fineman dispensing yet another vacuous piece of conventional wisdom on Chris Matthews' weekly show -- "the one where Matthews doesn't sound as if he's bouncing off the walls of his own brain," as Wolcott puts it.
Fineman, surrounded by his usual "translucent shell of professional narcissism," was commenting on the growing passion of John Kerry's crowds, but immediately felt compelled, of course, to assume the Beltway-approved tone of condescension toward the Democratic candidate.
Here's Wolcott: "'Are the (crowds) pumped up about Kerry?' Fineman asked. 'No. His job is to come across as normal and acceptable to --'
"At which point I changed channels.
"First of all, how does Fineman know the crowds aren't pumped up for Kerry? Did he attend these rallies? Did he ask anyone? No, he's assuming, as most of the media elite do, that no one could possibly be 'up' for a Kerry event because the media narrative is that Kerry is a stiff hunk of bark.
"Forgive me for shouting, but this stuff burns my waffles. It's the same junk we heard from Chris Matthews' crew and all the other clique queens in the press about Al Gore as Gore was wowing crowds and closing in for the kill in 2000.
"That's why Jon Stewart's takedown of Tucker Carlson was greeted with gratitude and joy everlasting."
-- David Talbot
[12:06 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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In the pollsOver the weekend, the New York Times announced that both campaigns were working feverishly to win a race that had narrowed to 11 battleground states. Polling data released over the last few days don't agree.
Let's start with the most improbable first: For the second time in the last three days, a poll has shown Hawaii to be in play. The Honolulu Advertiser gave both candidates 43 percent of the vote on Saturday; now the Honolulu Star-Bulletin puts Bush up 46-45 in a poll of Oahu voters. Restricting the survey to only Oahu (even though the island is home to 75 percent of the state's population) isn't great methodology, but the poll is still solid evidence the race is far closer than in 2000, when Gore took the state by 18 points.
Next comes Arkansas, where a survey by Little Rock-based Opinion Research Associates calls the race a dead tie, 48-48. Two weeks back, the same poll gave Bush a 52-43 advantage.
New polls released by Zogby offer some good news for Bush. The president leads in Ohio (47-42), Florida (49-46), Wisconsin (48-45), Iowa (47-45), Nevada (48-45) and New Mexico (49-45), a substantial improvement since the Zogby/Wall Street Journal battleground poll last week. Kerry's up in Pennsylvania (47-45), Michigan (52-42), Minnesota (46-45) and Colorado (49-45).
Finally, two new voting demographic results: Democrats seem to have done very well in mobilizing new voters, according to an AP/Ipsos poll -- among first-time likely voters, Kerry's ahead 60-35.
And a St. Petersburg Times poll showed Bush pulling 19 percent of the black vote in Florida. Considering that the sample size was under 100, that result wouldn't even be worth mentioning if it weren't for two other polls released last week showing Bush pulling 17-18 percent of the black vote nationwide, double the percentage he received in 2000.
-- Jeff Horwitz
[09:44 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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The Zen of the Fox interviewHow do Bush and Cheney have the energy to keep sitting down for those grueling, exclusive interviews with Fox News? So far the network has snagged three sit-downs with the press-shy president and V.P. Here's a sampling of the hard-hitting questions Bush and Cheney have subjected themselves to in recent weeks:
"I've got 15 questions for you. If they're dumb, tell me they're dumb."
"Do you think that when he says these things, John Kerry, your opponent, you were in these three debates with him, do you think he knows he's not telling the truth?"
"In light of the CBS document fiasco, do you think you get a fair shake from the network news and the elite media like the New York Times?"
"A guy over at Newsweek said 80 percent in the elite media favors Kerry. That doesn't surprise you, does it?"
"And you're healthy?"
"What's Chirac's problem? He hasn't been a great ally to the U.S. since 9/11. He doesn't want NATO forces to protect elections in Afghanistan. Come on."
"Do you have any theory on why college professors, pinhead press people why they go into the liberal realm?"
"Has the press given [Kerry] a pass?"
*"Is it a reality that we could turn on our television sets one day -- Fox News Channel, I hope -- and find out that a nuclear weapon has gone off here?"
"You've said one of the things you were most unhappy about is this issue of the tone in Washington. Let me just run down a list of prominent Democrats for a second here, because I can't remember a time in my life where it's been this bad."
"You're the president of the United States. You're also leading troops in harm's way. This is the leader of the opposition party [criticizing you]. Does that bother you?"
"John Kerry has flipped-flopped his way into a dangerous position [regarding Iraq]. So my question is, If John Kerry were president would he make this country more vulnerable and more susceptible to terror attacks?"
"Now, all this was propaganda. All of this that you didn't ... They say you didn't register in Massachusetts [with the National Guard in 1973]. Is that bogus?"
-- Eric Boehlert
[08:28 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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Missing munitions ammunition for KerryThere has been a lot of speculation about what Iraq-related events could affect the presidential race in the last week. Would heavy U.S. military action against insurgents help Bush? Heavy U.S. casualties hurt him? Would Bush pull Zarqawi out of a hat and declare victory? Well, on this Monday morning, Bush is being forced to contend with Iraq news he probably didn't expect -- news that underlines the Kerry campaign's assessment that he makes a mess out of everything he touches. The front page New York Times story about the disappearance of 380 tons of munitions from a military installation in Iraq, despite warnings from the IAEA that the site needed security, is the Democrats' ammunition du jour.
Talk of the missing munitions was the first thing out of Howard Dean's mouth on CNN this morning. And John Kerry wove it into his stump speech at a rally in New Hampshire, saying: "George W. Bush, who talks tough -- talks tough -- and brags about making America safer has once again failed to deliver after being warned about the danger of major stockpiles of munitions in Iraq; this president failed to guard those stockpiles ... Today we learned these explosives are missing, unaccounted for and potentially in the hands of terrorists. Now we know our troops are less safe because this president failed to do the basics. ... This administration has put our troops at risk and this country at greater risk than we oughta be."
Indeed, the Kerry camp has been all over this since last night. We got a mass e-mailed statement from Joe Lockhart time-stamped at 1:15 a.m., and pasted below. (Note the dig at Condi Rice at the end. She is behind the curve on this national security problem, having just learned of the missing munitions in the last month, yet has been completely on top of campaigning for Bush's reelection.)
"Kerry-Edwards Senior Advisor Joe Lockhart issued the following statement on reports of missing explosives in Iraq:
"Today, the Bush administration must answer for what may be the most grave and catastrophic mistake in a tragic series of blunders in Iraq. How did they fail to secure nearly 380 tons of known, deadly explosives despite clear warnings from the International Atomic Energy Agency to do so? And why was this information unearthed by reporters -- and was it covered up by our national security officials?"
"These explosives can be used to blow up airplanes, level buildings, attack our troops and detonate nuclear weapons. The Bush administration knew where this stockpile was, but took no action to secure the site. They were urgently and specifically informed that terrorists could be helping themselves to the most dangerous explosives bonanza in history, but nothing was done to prevent it from happening."
"This material was monitored and controlled by UN inspectors before the invasion of Iraq. Thanks to the stunning incompetence of the Bush administration, we now have no idea where it is."
"We need to know what the administration knew about this and when. We need to know why they failed to safeguard these explosives and keep them out of the hands of our enemies. The National Security Advisor should be at her desk in Washington tomorrow to work this problem and answer these questions, instead of giving speeches in battleground states."
[UPDATE: Josh Marshall has more on the Iraq munitions story, pointing out that Iraqi officials say they warned Paul Bremer about the missing explosives back in May, while he was still the head of the U.S. occupation authority and before the "handover" of sovereignty to Iraq. It's unclear whom he told about the disappeared tons of munitions -- but the IAEA was not told while the U.S. was in power, and according to the Nelson Report, the Bush administration pressured the Iraqis to also not tell the IAEA.]
-- Geraldine Sealey
[06:58 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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Monday's must-readsNew York Times: Nearly 380 tons of powerful explosives that were supposed to be safeguarded by U.S. military went missing in Iraq sometime after the 2003 invasion. IAEA had warned U.S. about the need to keep explosives secured, but no one has any clue where they are. Condi Rice just told about the missing explosives within the past month, White House said.
Wall Street Journal: Former Bush administration officials and military officers "increasingly wonder" whether the administration made a mistake months before the start of the Iraq war by stopping the military from targeting Abu Musab al-Zarqawi because, in part, doing so would undermine support for toppling Saddam Hussein.
Boston Globe: As the last full week of campaigning begins, Kerry is ahead in key battleground states, the national numbers are tied or show Bush slightly ahead, and both sides are scrambling to close the deal. On Sunday, Kerry hit Bush for telling Sean Hannity it's "up in the air" whether America can ever be safe from a terrorist attack.
Editor & Publisher: Newspaper endorsement update; Kerry wins over 35 newspapers that backed Bush in 2000, while Bush only gets two Gore papers.
New York Times: Al Gore tours black churches for John Kerry, who's trying to shore up support from black voters as polls show Bush doing better than expected with this group.
New York Times: Clinton's back.
-- Geraldine Sealey
[06:25 PDT, Oct. 25, 2004]
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Bush's hotline to JesusWith little to run on but a flight-suit photo op and threats of lupine mayhem under a Kerry administration, the Republicans' grass-roots campaign has resorted to touting their boy's personal hot line to Jesus. To help, the RNC has employed the services of a Texas theocrat named David Barton, founder of an organization called Wallbuilders, which is dedicated to remaking -- or "restoring" -- America as a Christian nation.
As the Web site Beliefnet reports, Barton has been "traveling the country for a year -- speaking at about 300 RNC-sponsored lunches for local evangelical pastors. During the lunches, he presents a slide show of American monuments, discusses his view of America's Christian heritage -- and tells pastors that they are allowed to endorse political candidates from the pulpit." In fact, such endorsements can cost a church their tax status -- an IRS rule that the religious right is ardently trying to change. This weekend, Barton spoke at a "Patriotic Rally and Celebration" at the Potters House Church of God in Ohio, which served as one of the headquarters of the push to get the anti-gay state constitutional amendment Issue 1on the Ohio ballot.
Beliefnet reports that, in addition to Wallbuilders, Barton is on the board of directors of the Providence Foundation, a Christian Reconstructionist group. The article links to an explanation of Christian Reconstructionism from Political Research Associates, a think tank that tracks the religious right. "Generally, Reconstructionism seeks to replace democracy with a theocratic elite that would govern by imposing their interpretation of 'Biblical Law.' Reconstructionism would eliminate not only democracy but many of its manifestations, such as labor unions, civil rights laws and public schools."
That may sound extreme but Barton is part of the mainstream of today's GOP. Indeed, as Beliefnet points out, he's vice chairman of the Texas Republican Party.
People like Barton are a large part of the reason that the Republicans, for all their optimistic predictions, never get more than a fraction of the Jewish vote. The Jews for Jesus vote, though, is another story. As an e-mail alert from the National Jewish Democratic Council points out, Bush recently reappointed Lon Solomon, a pastor at McLean Bible Church and leader of Jews for Jesus, to the President's Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities (he has a severely retarded daughter, which appears to be his sole qualification in the field).
"Mr. Solomon takes his work proselytizing American Jews very seriously," NJDC writes. "In August, the Washington Times reported on an extremely well-organized effort to convert Jews in the Washington, DC area -- and Mr. Solomon's church was 'the hub of the evangelistic effort.' The Times called it the 'largest evangelistic effort in Washington in the 31-year history' of Jews for Jesus. To add insult to injury, the campaign was timed to coincide with the High Holidays."
Solomon's bio on the government Web site doesn't mention any of this, though it does say, "As a pastor with a strong Jewish and Christian tradition, he values the President's personal courage and interest in promoting his Faith-Based Initiative."
-- Michelle Goldberg
[13:49 PDT, Oct. 24, 2004]
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The mood at BC '04: Not quite 'grim'Nine days to go before the election and safe to say we're all a little on edge. To read the Washington Post this morning, that includes Republican officials as they eye the polls in states where Bush needs a win. Bush aides may be cocky on the outside -- as Ed Gillespie was on Meet the Press this morning predicting a not-even-close Bush victory on Nov. 2 -- but some are nervous nellies on the inside. From the Post:
"GOP officials who talked to Bush-Cheney campaign leaders said the leaders have grown more worried about Ohio, Florida and other key states where Bush lacks a lead with just 10 days until the election. A poll by Ohio University's Scripps Survey Research Center, completed Thursday night, found Kerry leading 49 percent to 43 percent among registered voters, with a margin of error of five percentage points."
"Sen. Pete V. Domenici (R-N.M.), campaigning with Vice President Cheney in northwestern New Mexico, told the crowd that the GOP ticket will lose the state without a lopsided local victory in San Juan County, because of heavy Democratic activity elsewhere in the state. 'Without a huge margin in this county . . . we can't win this election,' he said."
"One Republican official described the mood at the top of the campaign as apprehensive. ''Grim' is too strong,' the official said. 'If we feel this way a week from now, that will be grim.'"
-- Geraldine Sealey
[10:46 PDT, Oct. 24, 2004]
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Newspapers for KerryEditor & Publisher calls today "Super Sunday" in the newspaper endorsement game. And John Kerry is cleaning up. Along with the endorsement of the Washington Post, Kerry won the support of 17 "flip-flopper" newspapers, which supported George W. Bush four years ago but won't make that mistake again. Kerry has now won over 28 newspapers that went for Bush in 2000, while Bush has only won two endorsements from papers that went for Gore four years ago. According to E&P, "Kerry now leads Bush 111-70 in endorsements in E&P's exclusive tally, and by about 14.4 million to 8.6 million in the circulation of backing papers. "
With the endorsement of the Orlando Sentinel, Kerry made a clean sweep of the Florida papers. It was a momentous choice for the Sentinel editorial writers -- not only did the paper recommend George W. Bush for president four years ago, but it hasn't endorsed a Democrat for president in 40 years:
"Four years ago, the Orlando Sentinel endorsed Republican George W. Bush for president based on our trust in him to unite America. We expected him to forge bipartisan solutions to problems while keeping this nation secure and fiscally sound. This president has utterly failed to fulfill our expectations. We turn now to his Democratic challenger, Sen. John Kerry, with the belief that he is more likely to meet the hopes we once held for Mr. Bush."
"Our choice was not dictated by partisanship. Already this election season, the Sentinel has endorsed Republican Mel Martinez for the U.S. Senate and four U.S. House Republicans. In 2002, we backed Republican Gov. Jeb Bush for re-election, repeating our endorsement of four years earlier. Indeed, it has been 40 years since the Sentinel endorsed a Democrat -- Lyndon Johnson -- for president."
"But we cannot forget what we wrote in endorsing Mr. Bush in 2000: 'The nation needs a leader who can bring people together, who can stand firm on principle but knows the art of compromise.' Four years later, Mr. Bush presides over a bitterly divided Congress and nation. The unity following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks -- the president's finest hour -- is a memory now. Mr. Bush's inflexibility has deepened the divide."
But it wasn't all bad news for Bush -- he won the endorsements of three out of four Ohio newspapers over the weekend, including the coveted recommendation of the Columbus Dispatch. But the Dispatch endorsement wasn't exactly a rousing expression of confidence or enthusiasm for the incumbent. The paper was "less than enthused about the choices" and said America "desperately needs" strong leadership and didn't trust John Kerry to provide it.
-- Geraldine Sealey
[08:45 PDT, Oct. 24, 2004]
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"Catastrophic success"With the Iraq war and national security at the heart of this presidential election, Michael Gordon's three-part series in the New York Times this past week, "Catastrophic Success," is an essential read. From a series of interviews with high level military, intelligence and administration officials, Gordon offers a sweeping look at the juggernaut that the Bush administration unleashed when it launched the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
If taking the nation to war is "the hardest decision a president has to make," as George W. Bush has said, it is also a series of complicated and critical decisions once set in motion. Gordon surveys those that are the responsibility of the Bush administration in Iraq.
From part 1, on the failure to forsee a "second war" and commit enough U.S. troops:
"In the debate over the war and its aftermath, the Bush administration has portrayed the insurgency that is still roiling Iraq today as an unfortunate, and unavoidable, accident of history, an enemy that emerged only after melting away during the rapid American advance toward Baghdad. The sole mistake Mr. Bush has acknowledged in the war is in not foreseeing what he termed that 'catastrophic success.'
"But many military officers and civilian officials who served in Iraq in the spring and summer of 2003 say the administration's miscalculations cost the United States valuable momentum -- and enabled an insurgency that was in its early phases to intensify and spread. ...
"As the Iraq war approached ... a RAND Corporation study on nation building [concluded that] the larger the number of security forces, the fewer the casualties suffered by alliance troops ...
"'My position is that we lost momentum and that the insurgency was not inevitable,' said James A. (Spider) Marks, a retired Army major general, who served as the chief intelligence officer for the land war command. 'We had momentum going in and had Saddam's forces on the run.'
"'But we did not have enough troops,' he continued. 'First, we did not have enough troops to conduct combat patrols in sufficient numbers to gain solid intelligence and paint a good picture of the enemy on the ground. Secondly, we needed more troops to act on the intelligence we generated. They took advantage of our limited numbers.'"
From part 2, on failures with U.S. intelligence:
"Despite more than a decade of antagonism between Saddam Hussein's government and the United States, the Bush administration was operating with limited information when it began to consider the invasion of Iraq. ...
"[Shortly before the war] the United States gained a detailed understanding of Iraq's oil infrastructure and obtained a secret map of Iraq's Baghdad defense plan. The C.I.A. also helped debunk one threat that the military had worried about: the possibility that Mr. Hussein's government would flood the country to thwart an allied advance.
"The agency, though, turned out to have a less clear understanding of what the United States would face once it invaded Iraq, or of Mr. Hussein's military strategy. In January 2003, the National Intelligence Council issued its assessment of what might happen after the dictator was ousted. The report cautioned that building democracy in Iraq would be difficult because of its authoritarian history. And it warned of the risk that the American forces would be seen as occupiers.
"'Attitudes toward a foreign military force would depend largely on the progress made in transferring power, as well as on the degree to which that force were perceived as providing necessary security and fostering reconstruction and a return to prosperity,' it said. The report also noted that quick restoration of services would be important to maintain the support of the Iraqi public."
From part 3, on the decision to dissolve the entire Iraqi military:
"When Maj. Gen. David H. Petraeus flew to Baghdad on June 14, 2003, he had a blunt message for the American-led occupation authority. As the commander of the 101st Airborne Division, General Petraeus had been working tirelessly to win the support of Iraqis in Mosul and the neighboring provinces in northern Iraq.
"But the authority's decree to abolish the Iraqi Army and to forgo paying 350,000 soldiers had jolted much of Iraq. Riots had broken out in cities. Just the day before, 16 of General Petraeus's soldiers had been wounded trying to put down a violent demonstration.
"Arriving at the huge Abu Ghraib North Palace for a ceremony, General Petraeus spied Walter B. Slocombe, an adviser to L. Paul Bremer III, who headed the authority. Sidling up to him, General Petraeus said that the decision to leave the soldiers without a livelihood had put American lives at risk.
"More than a year later, Bremer's disbanding of the Iraqi Army still casts a shadow over the occupation of Iraq. ...
"'It was absolutely the wrong decision,' said Col. Paul Hughes of the Army, who served as an aide to Jay Garner, a retired three-star general and the first civilian administrator of Iraq. 'We changed from being a liberator to an occupier with that single decision,' he said. 'By abolishing the army, we destroyed in the Iraqi mind the last symbol of sovereignty they could recognize and as a result created a significant part of the resistance.'"
-- Mark Follman
[08:36 PDT, Oct. 24, 2004]
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Nader definitely out in PA
"WASHINGTON, Oct. 23 (AP) - The Supreme Court refused on Saturday to place the independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader on the ballot in Pennsylvania, upholding a state court's finding of flawed signatures on voter petition sheets. Mr. Nader asked the court on Thursday to review the Pennsylvania decision to remove him. A state court cited legal problems with his nomination papers that left him thousands of signatures short of the number required for the Nov. 2 ballot.
"On Tuesday, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court upheld a lower court that had found the petition sheets were 'rife with forgeries.' The lower court determined that fewer than 19,000 of the more than 51,000 signatures submitted were valid; Mr. Nader needed at least 25,697 to be listed on the ballot."
The Nader camp expressed disappointment Saturday and vowed to keep battling. Hopefully Mickey Mouse won't take the court decision too personally.
-- Mark Follman
[17:03 PDT, Oct. 23, 2004]
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