In the wake of the worst natural disaster to hit the United States since the great 1906 earthquake in San Francisco, Bush decided to fiddle with an acoustic guitar. "Please, people... relax. Let me sing for you. I wrote this one last week, while sitting on my ranch doing nothing."
Image: Yahoo! News
Anyone with half-a-brain (okay, maybe that was too harsh) envisioned the city of New Orleans being flooded at some time. And that time may have been tomorrow. Engineers, with no doubt, proposed time-after-time to increase the capacity of the levees; the cost was too expensive, the city could not afford it, the federal government cut funding, we don't really need to, are the probable reasons the proposals weren't accepted. A city, any city, that is located under sea level must live with the simple fact that water flows downhill. The greatest problem with the flooding of New Orleans, engineering wise, is that the water has no where to go. The water must be pumped out, and until the levees are fixed, and/or the water recedes to a level low enough that the existing levees can sustain the receded water level, the water will flow right back into the city. Should the city of New Orleans be rebuilt? No; it is against all logic, and it attempts to defy physics. And with time, the laws of physics tend to govern.
Please don't tell me the difference between finding and looting is race. (Wonkette led me to these photos, and she is right: the Associated Press needs to apologize.)
Images: Yahoo! News
Bush has, as I have long stated, spoken out of both sides of his mouth (to be true, I have said that Bush speaks out of one side of his mouth, and spits out the other). But Bush has not so-concretely contradicted himself as he did this weekend speaking on the subject of the Iraqi constitution. On Saturday...
"What is important is that Iraqis are now addressing these issues through debate and discussion -- not at the barrel of a gun."Source: Washington Post
And the following day...
"The negotiators and drafters of this document braved the intimidation of terrorists and they mourn the cowardly assassination of friends and colleagues involved in the process of drafting the constitution."Source: Washington Post
And on the same subject, Bush has attempted over and over again to liken the Iraqi constitution process to the American founding father's over 200 years ago. I mean, Bush does have a point here: we declared ourselves independent of England in 1776, and we did not have the Constitution until 1787. Right? Well, Bush is partly correct. One aberration, notes Steven R. Weisman of the New York Times...
"What he [Bush] left out of his analogy is that while the Constitutional Convention of Philadelphia was convening, there was not an insurgency in the countryside that seemed to be growing because of disaffection with the political process."Source: Washington Post
All's I got to say: "Where's the money, Lebowski?"
In the February 2001 issue of the New Yorker, Karl Rove stated...
"As people do better, they start voting like Republicans -- unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing."Source: Washington Post
Democrats, for the educated.
I have battled the demons before; and I have lost. I own a Dell; it runs Windows XP. To fight from the inside, I run Firefox and Thunderbird; I use iTunes and Picassa. Apple needs to reinvent the workplace computer. Where I am gainfully employed (fulltime, mind you), we, of course, use inferior Microsoft products. Nothing is more frustrating, however, then using Word, the program that was designed with the least intelligence, efficiency, and usability than any other comparably-popular software program on the market. (To be continued; time to go home.)
The Bush administration has hidden behind the mantra, "If we leave Iraq, the results will be disastrous." And it has worked. The press hasn't pressed further, and, in fact, democrats are being attacked for not having a plan. (You know the analogy: the neighbor is responsible for the man who dug a hole for a pool, but then gave up, leaving a large gaping hole in the neighborhood. Well, Mr. Neighbor, what are you going to do about it?)
But isn't this really a question of why the administration is allowed to call the war a flat-out failure, and still not have the press state that it is so? To say that "if the troops leave there would be chaos" is simply a concession that the war has gone badly, or just simply terribly wrong. Over two years ago, on the deck of an air craft carrier in May 2003, Bush stated that major operations in Iraq were over. Bush has now basically said: the U.S. has not done it's job, we have not restored order, and there is no sign of restored order in the future; therefore, the U.S. must stay indefinitely. Bush has chosen failure as the best result for this political war, rather than own up to the pre-war distortions he and his administration made about the weapons capabilities of Iraq, as well as own up to the disastrous planning for post-war Iraq. (And over 1,800 Americans have died because of it.)
Image: ABC News
Lore tells us the presidency cannot be won without winning at least one southern state. This has rung dramatically true in the last two elections as both Al Gore and John Kerry lost in close electoral battles, and spent a lot of time, effort, and money in the state of Florida. Ohio, due to it's strong Christian population is a GOP stronghold, too, has been a state the democrats have fought hard for (and spent considerable money in) the last two election cycles and it was all for naught. The democrats must win the south. This is political fact. Or is it?
A closer look at the Bush-Kerry election in 2004 tells us that the democrats can win the electoral votes needed to ascend to the presidency without winning a single southern state. It is called the "Western Strategy."
What is the western strategy? Had Kerry won New Mexico, Colorado, and Nevada, Bush would be clearing brush on his Crawford, Texas, ranch on his own time, and not on the American people's. However, the western strategy does not discount the importance of winning Florida, Ohio, Iowa, Missouri, West Virginia, or any other "battleground" states that may be up for grabs.
The key here is that we must accept our cultural differences. The majority of southern states will never vote for a "northeastern liberal," and a northeastern liberal is what we are all about. Should we play the southerner's game and nominate a John Edwards, Wes Clark, or even John McCain (or, god forbid, Joe Lieberman)?
And the west still has not been won (no matter what Karl Rove believes). Colorado moved heavily towards the Dems this past election (883,748 votes for Bush, 738,227 for Gore, and 10,465 for Buchanan in 2000; and 1,101,255 votes for Bush, 1,001,732 for Kerry, and 12,718 for Nader in 2004). The dems lost New Mexico in 2004 after Gore narrowly won it in 2000, which means the democrats can win New Mexico again. And Nevada: one of the fastest growing states in the country is finding that most of it's new inhabitants are defectors from the San Francisco bay area searching for cheap land. Hello democrat stronghold!
The "new" west is much like the northeast or northwest. The growing populations tend to support environmental protection, better public schools, and better health care. (Yes, they are liberals.) The states Bush "won" in 2000, Florida notwithstanding, were worth more in 2004, due to the findings in the 2000 census. Had Gore won environment-friendly New Hampshire on that fateful November 2000 evening (and defeat Bush 270 to 267), and won all the same states four years later in his re-election campaign, Gore would have succumbed to defeat in 2004 (274 electoral votes to 264). But looking towards the 2008 election, the parameters are all set, and the western strategy is key for the democrats to focus their efforts and money on winnable states. Yes, Virginia, the democrats can win the presidency without winning a southern state. And then we will decide how the west is won.
Image: CBSNews.com
Image: CBSNews.com
