1) Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's
daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him and
a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can't find Bin Laden" diversion.
2) Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is communist, but trade
with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.
3) A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but
multi-national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind
without regulation.
4) Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.
5) The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay.
6) If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex.
7) Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy. Providing health care to all Americans is socialism.
8) HMOs and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart.
9) Global warming and tobacco's link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools.
10) A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable
offense. A president lying to enlist support for a war in which
thousands die is solid defense policy.
11) Government should limit itself to the powers named in the
Constitution, which include banning gay marriages and censoring the
Internet.
12) The public has a right to know about Hillary's cattle trades, but George Bush's cocaine conviction is none of our business.
13) Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you're a
conservative radio host. Then it's an illness, and you need our prayers
for your recovery.
14) You support states' rights, which means Attorney General John Ashcroft
can tell states what local voter initiatives they have the right to
adopt.
15) What Bill Clinton did in the 1960s is of vital national interest, but what Bush did in the '80s is irrelevant.
George
Bush is trying to suggest that John Kerry's criticism of the policies
that led to the Al-qaqaa explosives debacle is actually a veiled
denigration of the American troops in Iraq. Via email from the Kerry
campaign, here's what General Merrill McPeak, former chief of staff of
the Air Force, has to say about this:
The President seems to
think Senator Kerry could not possibly be criticizing him since the
President thinks he has never made a mistake. Let’s be perfectly clear:
it is the President who dropped the ball. Senator Kerry is being
critical of George Bush, not the troops. By embarking on the line of
attack, George Bush is deflecting blame from him over to the military.
This is beneath contempt.
He's right. It's the Bush
campaign pushing the line that criticism of the president's policies is
criticism of the troops. It really is beneath contempt.
...but to us ANIMAL HOUSE fans, it is quite obvious that Bush is actually employing the time-tested Otter Defense:
Otter:
Ladies and gentlemen, I'll be brief. The issue here is not whether we
broke a few rules or took a few liberties with our female party guests
-- we did. But you can't hold a whole fraternity responsible for the
actions of a few sick, perverted individuals. For if you do, then
shouldn't we blame the whole fraternity system? And if the whole
fraternity system is guilty, then isn't this an indictment of our
educational institutions in general? I put it to you ... isn't this an
indictment of our entire American society? Well, you can do what you
want to us, but we're not going to sit here and listen to you badmouth
the United States of America!
Once it became clear that after the fall of Baghdad the
securing of WMD sites wasn't a top prioirty (though finding them was),
I knew that the Bushies weren't genuinely concerned about WMDs as a
threat. They wanted to find them for propaganda purposes, but they
weren't actually worried about them.
And, then, they seemed uninterested in securing even the conventional sites.
But,
here's the deal. The Bushies wanted to prove they could kick ass
quickly and easily. The al Qa Qaa issue isn't about a failure of Bush
to be omniscient. It's about a failure of the administration to commit
sufficient troops to cover all bases.
