The Pinocchio presidency | Joe Wilson | Salon

[nostamj]

non-subscribers will need to do the 'day pass' but it's worth it...

The Pinocchio presidency
<snip>
Our international leadership is also on the wane, as those who might otherwise follow instead resent our having unleashed the dogs of war and confused the exercise of power with the abuse of force. The collective security arrangements enshrined in the United Nations system, and in the Western alliance of NATO (which we helped create and which has served our interests well over 60 years), are now threatened as leading administration supporters like Richard Perle delight in predicting its demise, without any notion of what might replace it other than American boys and girls in uniform.

In these perilous times the president should be held accountable for his stewardship. He should run on his record. But what do we see from him and his campaign? First, a political ad that desecrates the memories of our dead at the World Trade Center, using flag-draped bodies as political props. Now we see an ad that racially profiles olive-skinned men as terrorists while mendaciously suggesting that the Democratic candidate and war hero John Kerry is soft on terrorism. Some have rightly made the connection between that ad and the infamous Willie Horton ad of the Bush/Dukakis campaign of 1988, an ad that exploited racial fear, but a better comparison might be with the negative ad run against triple amputee and Vietnam veteran, Max Cleland. In that one Cleland was made to appear as part of a trio whose other members were Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. When not running nasty ads, Bush's attack dogs are busy launching vicious attacks on the characters of those who would dare to point out where this administration has failed the American people. Who will soon forget Ann Coulter's two articles defaming Max Cleland? It's worth noting that not a single supporter of Bush had the decency to defend Cleland and criticize that smear. Instead Coulter's libel was widely circulated by conservatives. And just the other day, Max Boot, a neoconservative publicist who coined the "jodhpur and pith helmet" term to promote his imperialistic view of America's future, decided to smear former Air Force officer Karen Kwiatkowski, as well as retired CIA officer Ray McGovern and myself. These smears must be understood as part of the Bush campaign strategy of "slime and defend."

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[nostamj]

1. kick n/t

[Bandit]

2. It is okay we are building a reich to last a thousand years

Seventy years ago a man made a speach saying those words. That man is hated today. We seem awful close to following in his footsteps today.

[Fridays Child]

3. Kicking for the afternoon

:kick: