Debate II: Bush's mind on full display (It's a messy room with dust bunnies under the bed)

I watched tonight's debates twice. Kerry is so much more literate, so much more coherent than Bush I don't really understand how one can proclaim Bush the winner. Kerry won on the basis of his cogent, connected answers. If language is the dress of thought, the President needs a new tailor.

Both candidates played to their bases. The President's vaunted tough-guy steadfastness was on high display. But I thought the President lacked new answers. If you had followed his stump speeches leading up to the debate this week, you would have heard his first few responses. A few particulars:

How can Bush continue to ask:

And what is he going to say to those people that show up at the summit? Join me in the wrong war at the wrong time at the wrong place. Risk your troops in a war you've called a mistake.

As I have pointed out, invading Iraq was a mistake. Now it is the largest terrorist training camp in the world. Solving the crisis Bush created is the number one priority ifor nations everywhere. There will be plenty of national service and death required to resolve it. Allies will join because it is now in their national interest to do so. But only Kerry can ask them to join us. They will ignore Bush because he walked insulted most of them in his hurry to invade.

There is nothing unreasonable about Kerry's vote to give the President authority to take military action to enforce broken UN resolutions in Iraq. There is nothing unreasonable about his utter dismay at how Bush used that authority. When you give your kid the keys to the car, do you expect him to use it to drag race down main street? When you give your spouse a credit card do you expect him/her to run to the casino and run it up to the limit? Based on the recent comments of Rummsfeld, Bremmer and the unequivocal findings of the Duelfer report that Iraq was empty of WMD for a decade before the invasion, there is now absolutely no justification for the invasion of Iraq. Bush abused the trust of the congress and the American people.

Listen very carefully to as President Bush describes his views on picking new Supreme Court Justices:

I wouldn't pick a judge who said that the Pledge of Allegiance couldn't be said in a school because it had the words "under God" in it. I think that's an example of a judge allowing personal opinion to enter into the decision-making process as opposed to a strict interpretation of the Constitution.

Another example would be the Dred Scott case, which is where judges, years ago, said that the Constitution allowed slavery because of personal property rights.

That's a personal opinion. That's not what the Constitution says. The Constitution of the United States says we're all -- you know, it doesn't say that. It doesn't speak to the equality of America.

There are three things drastically wrong, actually scary, with this response. First, the President said he would apply a religious litmus test to his appointees to the Supreme Court. Where, in the strict interpretation of the Constitution does the word "God" appear? I think the President is implying that he does not believe in the separation of church and state, like other prominent republicans. Secondly, Dred Scott [via Atrios] had everything to do with racism, not property rights. Third, listen carefully folks, Bush believes the constitution "does not speak to the equality of America." Funny, I thought the consitution enshrined equality in America.

Bush is incapable of constructing reasonable compromises. I am very uncomfortable with this quality. In this exchange, Kerry explained very clearly why he voted against the partial birth abortion bill. The proposed legislation did not include an exemptions for protecting the life of the mother and for parental notification protecting incest victims.

Bush's response is telling:

Well, it's pretty simple when they say: Are you for a ban on partial birth abortion? Yes or no?

And he was given a chance to vote, and he voted no. And that's just the way it is. That's a vote. It came right up. It's clear for everybody to see. And as I said: You can run but you can't hide the reality.

My way or the highway. Yes or no. With us or against us. This mentality may be perfect for bumper stickers and fairy tales. But it is why our international relationships are in tatters. It is why the country is divided so passionately along partisan lines. Bush has demanded we choose a side. He will brook no disagreement.

And how about this gem:

I vowed to our countrymen that I would do everything I could to protect the American people. That's why we're bringing Al Qaida to justice. Seventy five percent of them have been brought to justice.

75% of Al Qaeda has been brought to justice? Oh really. Prove it.

Finally, in a nod to the third-world country to our north, Canada, Bush seems to say that their drugs will kill us:

I haven't yet. Just want to make sure they're safe. When a drug comes in from Canada, I want to make sure it cures you and doesn't kill you.

Oh my. Candadian drug killers commin at ya.

Enough said. Kerry won tonight and will win on Nov. 2. I simply believe a plurality of Americans are ready for a President with an keen, organized mind, loyalty to the constitution and international, yet thouroughly American sensibilities.

Are you afraid enough to vote for George?

They finally admit it: Bush is using terror as a political tool:

The strongly worded speech, which indicted Kerry as a "tax-and-spend liberal," was timed to deflect criticism of Bush's Iraq policy from such key sources as former Iraq administrator L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. weapons inspector and the State Department. A Bush adviser said the president hopes to change the dynamics of the race with more biting attacks on Kerry's record and trustworthiness and on what Bush charges is Kerry's reluctance to use U.S. military force to defeat terrorism. The strategy is aimed at stoking public fears about terrorism, raising new concerns about Kerry's ability to protect Americans and reinforcing Bush's image as the steady anti-terrorism candidate, aides said.

In a sane world, nobody would vote for a politician like that.

Adjust monocle, tell the truth

I say, old chap, isn't that fellow George Bush rather good for Al Qaeda, what? Yes, awfully.

Tom Delay aborts ethics

The Washington Post has a good run down on the three rebukes given Tom Delay by the House Ethics Comittee this week. Wouldn't it be nice to see the back end of that clown? Five Republicans and Fice democrats thought so.

To get the full feel of this slime machine, read a couple of pages of his lovely thinking on various issues. Here's one and here's another.

My personal favorite? It's a toss up. Here's an explanation for the war on Iraq you won't hear in tonight's debate. You see, we invaded Iraq because:

"Because the rabid environmentalists felt it was more important to jeopardize the lives of our brave American servicemen than risk the death of a single snail darter. The greenies have led us into the crisis in the Middle East. Not only are they responsible for the huge amount of American dependence on foreign oil, but if an open war develops in the sweltering heat of the Saudi Arabian desert, the tragic result will be on their heads."

Yeah, that's it. The environmentalists are starving the American economy, forcing us to scavenge the world in ever widening circles for our life's blood, blood I tell you, that is our oil. We must drink! Lead us to the magic well. Damn you Greenies! Curse you all!

Or perhaps your cup of cyanide tea is Mr. Delay's enlightened take on the Columbine High School massacre:

"Guns have little or nothing to do with juvenile violence. The causes of youth violence are working parents who put their kids into daycare, the teaching of evolution in the schools, and working mothers who take birth control pills."

In a later comment, Mr. Delay added that working fathers who had vasectomies were responsible for the aids crisis. He later killed a puppy for the fun of it. Ok that last bit's a lie. But honestly, how can you tell?

More Republicans that make sense

I have to believe that the majority of the country is in the center. We want simple things. We want clean air, clean water, good schools for our kids, relatively low taxes and responsive, high impact services for things we can't do ourselves from our government. We want bang for our buck. We don't want our goverment to tell us what to think or who to sleep with or to which God to pray. We want security. Above all of those things, we want our political leadership to pursue these things in an honest, optimistic way.

For all of us who want those things it is heartening to read the following:

Ex-key aide to McCain gives support to Kerry

Here's a taste:

Bush did not invent our enemies, Wittmann writes. "But, despite all his bravado and swagger, he has made it more difficult to build a domestic and international political coalition to ultimately prevail against our terrorist adversaries. He has bred distrust by driving a cynical partisan agenda that seeks to reward the wealthy, while branding his political adversaries as vaguely unpatriotic."

"Don't get me wrong - this Bull Moose is not completely in agreement with the Democratic donkey," Wittmann writes.

And if Kerry wins, "it remains to be seen whether his administration will be more willing to break with its ideological base than a Bush team that has been slavishly loyal to its corporate paymasters," he adds.

"But there is no remaining shred of doubt that another four years of a Bush presidency would have a toxic effect on American politics. If George W. Bush is re-elected, unlimited corporate power, cynicism and division will ride high in the saddle."

Why Kerry can ask for allied support and Bush can't

John Kerry is criticized by the GOP for not having a plan to extract America from Iraq that is significantly different than the President's. But the criticism itself misses the central point. The central point is that John Kerry did not start the war. Bush started it. Kerry will have to deal with it as president. In order to do that he will naturally have to do some of the same things Bush is doing. Comparing Kerry to Bush on Iraq is like asking yourself who you would like to save your burning house: The fireman or the guy who lit it on fire? Both will use water, but do you really want to trust the guy that started it?

Likewise, the GOP and Bush-backing bloggers seem to think that the President's high point in last week's debate came when the President asked:

"Plus, he says the cornerstone of his plan to succeed in Iraq is to call upon nations to serve. So what's the message going to be: 'Please join us in Iraq. We're a grand diversion. Join us for a war that is the wrong war at the wrong place at the wrong time?'"

That is the President giving us a live demonstration of his vaunted stubborness in the face of overwhelming evidence.John Kerry isn't going to ask our allies to join us in "grand diversion." That's what the President did when he asked the world to join us as he ordered the army to sprint into Iraq with a map made of dreams. The Iraq war was a diversion then.

It isn't a diversion anymore. Now, Iraq it is the largest terrorist training camp in the world. Iraq is almost a completely failed state. These conditions can be directly attributed to Bush's policies. Yet, the President continues to use the same set of failed assumptions to frame his and Kerry's positions. This highlights true differences between the two men.

It is Bush that would be asking our allies to join him in continuing to support the grand diversion, which is that terrorism is best fought through the utopian vision of "spreading freedom." Bush will ask our allies to join him, again, to complete his visionquest:

"And, as well, we're pursuing a strategy of freedom around the world, because I understand free nations will reject terror. Free nations will answer the hopes and aspirations of their people. Free nations will help us achieve the peace we all want."

Most of the world rejects this evangelical notion because freedom isn't spread like butter. The power of freedom is based on attraction rather than promotion. The world now understands that when Bush says he is pursuing a strategy of freedom, he includes an element of transformative alchemy usually found in a revival tent, but is sorely lacking in actual battle and its ensuing power vacuums. The world sees the results of Bush's strategy in Iraq. That strategy is a flop.

In that regard, Kerry would be asking something quite different of our allies. Kerry would be asking already free nations to join him in removing the festering sore on the global body politic incubated by his predecessor. Kerry would make it clear that this fight is not about spreading freedom, it is about fighting terrorism. Kerry could seperate America from Bush's Folly and bind the international community together in a real common purpose: saving our skins.

Republicans that make sense

Republicans blast president on environment

Two steps forward, three steps back

After the US turned the entire country of Iraq into a terrorist training camp, is it any wonder that U.S. Policies Stir More Fear Than Confidence