Nutjobs Ranting About Politics.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
You can't be talking about Vietnam. Do you mean his charging up the hill to his massive electoral defeat in november? "someone had to do it, and damnit, I'm not passing the buck."

Wow. I've learned that the point is always conceded when they send the clown in with a lame little quip, but that was fast - not even a half-assed attempt to salvage the position.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
Wow. I've learned that the point is always conceded when they send the clown in with a lame little quip, but that was fast - not even a half-assed attempt to salvage the position.

23. How To Be a Hero


After Gilligan is unable to save Mary Ann from drowning in the lagoon, the Skipper must jump in and rescue both of them. The Castaways then devise schemes to boost Gilligan's ego, and help him feel like a hero.


b: 06-Mar-1965 pc: 0724 w: Herbert Finn & Alan Dinehart d: Tony Leader

NOTE: you can go to philly eds did series to see a picture

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by bilmore
You complain that I don't treat you "individually". That I treat all libs here as fungible. That I don't take your viewpoint seriously.

That's been my perception too (The first two points).

Originally posted by bilmore
Maybe it's because you all use old, slanted info to make your partisan points. Maybe it's because you all (you, too) rip what's happening in Iraq, based on ignorance. Yes, effin' IGNORANCE.

Do you include Dick Lugar and John McCain in this group? Check the news.

Originally posted by bilmore
Got any really close rels in Iraq?

Yes, and a friend or two.

Originally posted by bilmore
But I bet a dollar you don't even make it this far. Read what someone on the ground has to say that knocks down your view? Heavens, no. But, slander the effort for the sake of a doomsdayer? Sure. He's in your party.

What do you mean by "slander the effort"? It is no "slander" to suggest that the Bush administration's job in post-war Iraq has been in many important respects fucking incompetent. At a senior civilian level, I'd say it is an extraordinary showing of misperceptions and misjudgments which leads me to question the judgment of the man who appointed those folks and backs them to the hilt.

You yourself have acknowledged some "serious tactical problems" in a recent post, but reiterated your support for Bush based on his vision and approach. (Basically -- "He may be incompetent, but I like the way that boy thinks.")

Each side needs to remember that when a glass in half-full it is also half-empty, AND VICE-VERSA. If you think you know how this will turn out, you're wrong. Anecdotal evidence of progress from first-person sources is fine -- but no more or less valid than the anecdotal negative evidence from other sources that you seem to despise.

Originally posted by bilmore
I never thought I'd say this, but it IS correct to attack the patriotism of the Dems. You'd rather we lost, just so your party wins. My god, how you guys must hate Bush. I can't imagine hating that much.

What sparked this diatribe, anyway? You sound like a fucking idiot. We've gotta get you out of Minnesota before you go insane.

S_A_M
(P.S. If you have any questions about irrational hatred, ask your GOP activist buddies about Bill, Hillary, Whitewater, etc.)

[sgtclub]

Interesting article by Novak today. He says that his sources tell him that the Bush administration plans to withdraw from Iraq in the next year, whether or not it has been rebuilt.


http://www.townhall.com/columnists/r...20040920.shtml

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Say_hello_for_me
From the article:
I don't buy into the whole Rove thing, but I've gotta wonder if the anonymous mail was postmarked GA (i.e., maybe 4 hours was a bit quick... I'm dying to see if anyone knows how quickly the documents were even made available for inspection over the internet). It looks like the two positions are dovetailing nicely, for the moment. As a guess at the broader picture though, I'd suggest the evidence only implicates Burkett in the end.

Hello

Keep your eye on the newswires. Even CBS now thinks Burkett was the source of the documents. Looks like your GA lawyer is just a really sharp guy. Probably a copyright lawyer who knows techniques to authenticate documents and pictures like he knows the back of his hand because its a big part of his job.

[Aloha Mr. Learned Hand]

Statements from Rather and CBS News that they were misled as to the documents' origin and would not have run story knowing what they now know.

Burkett admits he provided the documents to CBS but "deliberately misled" CBS as to where he got them from to protect another unnamed individual...



CBS Link

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Aloha Mr. Learned Hand
Burkett admits he provided the documents to CBS but "deliberately misled" CBS as to where he got them from to protect another unnamed individual...

What are the odds that the unnamed individual was a Dem?

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
What sparked this diatribe, anyway?

The fact that many Dems would in fact like to see us fail in Iraq so that it will harm GWB and increase the chance of a Kerry presidency. They want to be able to say "I told you so."

[Not Me]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Interesting article by Novak today. He says that his sources tell him that the Bush administration plans to withdraw from Iraq in the next year, whether or not it has been rebuilt.


http://www.townhall.com/columnists/r...20040920.shtml

I agree with the strategy of pulling out quickly. If it disintigrates into civil war, the Shia will likely kill off many of these insurgents and I'd rather see dead Shia and Sunnis than dead US soldiers. After they kill each other for awhile, we can come back in if necessary and it will be a much safer place for US soldiers because more of the terrorists will be dead.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

from Tapped (internal links omitted):

ROPE-A-DOPE. Here's an interesting part of the Washington Post's most recent report on the CBS memos (which, according to The New York Times, will be the subject of some sort of retraction or apology later today):

• In the early-morning hours of Sept. 8, Dan Rather was preparing to fly to Washington for a crucial interview in the Old Executive Office Building, but torrential rain kept him in New York.
  White House communications director Dan Bartlett had agreed to talk to "60 Minutes," but only on condition that the CBS program provide copies of what were being billed as newly unearthed memos indicating that President Bush had received preferential treatment in the National Guard. The papers were hand-delivered at 7:45 a.m. CBS correspondent John Roberts, filling in for Rather, sat down with Bartlett at 11:15.
  
  Half an hour later, Roberts called "60 Minutes" producer Mary Mapes with word that Bartlett was not challenging the authenticity of the documents. Mapes told her bosses, who were so relieved that they cut from Rather's story an interview with a handwriting expert who had examined the memos.
  
  At that point, said "60 Minutes" executive Josh Howard, "we completely abandoned the process of authenticating the documents. Obviously, looking back on it, that was a mistake. We stopped questioning ourselves. I suppose you could say we let our guard down."
  
  CBS aired the story eight hours later, triggering an onslaught of criticism that has left Rather and top network officials struggling to explain why they relied on a handful of papers that even some of Rather's colleagues now believe to be fake.

There's little doubt in my mind that the White House is in posession of every relevant document from George W. Bush's National Guard record, and knew more or less as soon as CBS provided its memos that their authenticity was questionable. Dan Bartlett and Karl Rove knew what they were doing. It was quite smart of the White House to let CBS shoot itself in the foot, because it shifted attention away from the indisputable evidence that Bush pulled strings to get into the Guard and then skipped out on his obligation. Thanks in part to the media's obsession with itself and individual reporters' eagerness to take 60 Minutes down a notch, the controversy over whether CBS relied on fake documents has received far more ink and attention than the rather more interesting questions regarding Bush's Guard duty. The irony is that the rap on Bush's service doesn't really rely on anything aired during the 60 Minutes segment.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
from Tapped (internal links omitted):

I guess Ty has Aloha on ignore and didn't read that Burkett admits to providing CBS with the documents and misleading CBS as to the source.

[Hank Chinaski]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
from Tapped (internal links omitted):

massiveelectoralvotelosersezwhat

The WH is hardly in a position to challenge or know about what might have been in a memo between two supervisory officers. The very nature of the memo is such that it wouldn't have been copied to Lt. Bush. How could he possibly be in a position to challenge.

[Say_hello_for_me]

Originally posted by Not Me
I guess Ty has Aloha on ignore and didn't read that Burkett admits to providing CBS with the documents and misleading CBS as to the source.

I think the implication of Ty's post is not that Rove or R's provided the information. Rather, the implication is that after several hours, Bartlett & Rove decided they were likely not authentic but figured if they said nothing that CBS would take the rope and hang themselves with it.

I think the post is off base. In particular, whether Bartlett and Rove have every NG document related to Bush's service is immaterial... they would be irrational to quickly dismiss documents that purportedly came from someone's private files on the premise that they'd have known about them if they were authentic. That would be politically very dangerous.

On the other hand, I'm not sure your answer isn't off base either. Burkett says he got them from someone else. Once shown to be a liar, why in the world would we take his word on anything now?

I'll put 70% odds that he (or someone very close to him) manufactured the documents, and 30% that someone manufactured them gave them to him essentially anonymously in an effort to have him (Burkett) as a somewhat credible source pass them on.

As to the second, I'd put even odds on whether it was a Dem thinking no one would figure it out or a R lawyer (or something like that) in GA thinking it would be great to debunk the whole thing and cloud the entire issue of Bush's service with the issue of liberal bias and misleading/lying Democratic sources.

Geezus, those are some long sentences.

Bottom line:
70% Burkett alone
15% Burkett protecting a lying Democrat/anonymous Democrat;
15% Burkett protecting a brilliant GA Republican or something similar.

I'm putting 0% on Rove or anyone in the WH. It would be disastrous if they were caught, and its just not worth it to try.

Hello

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
The WH is hardly in a position to challenge or know about what might have been in a memo between two supervisory officers. The very nature of the memo is such that it wouldn't have been copied to Lt. Bush. How could he possibly be in a position to challenge.

What Hello just said. And I'm not endorsing the theory -- I just thought it was an interesting variation on what Hello posted.

On Burkett, I don't remember all the particulars, but Drum was posting extensively months ago about stories that Burkett was pushing, including the claim that Bush's National Guard files were cleansed. You can find them if you go to Drum's search page and type in "Burkett."

[Aloha Mr. Learned Hand]

Originally posted by Hank Chinaski
massiveelectoralvotelosersezwhat

The WH is hardly in a position to challenge or know about what might have been in a memo between two supervisory officers. The very nature of the memo is such that it wouldn't have been copied to Lt. Bush. How could he possibly be in a position to challenge.

Not to mention that the memos purportedly came from a file other than Bush's, which would not be governed by Bush's request to release records nor included in a search for such records.

ETA: Ty, you ignore me? I think you're a raving Leftie half the time but I at least read your stuff and find some of it interesting. To paraphrase Penske -- I'm wounded.

j/k