RKMBs Forums .::Important::. Politics and Current Events DEMS in '04

quote:

---

Donnie Fowler resigned Tuesday night as campaign manager for Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark.

Fowler, a South Carolina lawyer who was political director in 2000 for the losing Democratic presidential team of Al Gore and Joseph Lieberman and son of onetime party chairman Don Fowler, only met Clark for the first time five weeks ago, a senior campaign aide said. According to CNN's other source, he had had few conversations with the candidate.

---

quote:

---

"Donnie became upset that his power had been usurped and left. It is as simple as that," a source close to the campaign said.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by the G-man:
Ah, you guys never listen to conservatives anyway...even when we're clearly correct.

More evidence of Clark's political flip flop appears in the latest issue of Time magazine:

"I tremendously admire, and I think we all should, the great work done by our commander-in-chief, our president, George Bush," Clark said in a January 22, 2002 speech

---

And Ronald Reagan flip-flopped when he declared he was a Republican after having spent time supporting Harry Truman's run for President and working as a DEMOCRAT for Eisenhower. It wasn't until almost 2 decades as a democrat that Reagan changed party affiliation. Sort of a double standard if you ask me......

As a matter of fact, the mere fact that a person congratulates and admires someone from the opposing party should be a sign to be applauded in this age of entrenched party politics. I'm sure though, if i take a minute to conduct a good internet search, I can find notable people of both parties who have applauded members of "the other side" in the past.

But then, as I said above, i'm just glad we have Republicans putting aside their party differences and looking out for the Democrats lest they make a fatal mistake and choose the 'wrong' guy. God knows we need the "right" guys like Kerrey and Leiberman to be the front runners.

quote:

---

As for Clark, I think he would make a good VP, if he could shake the negative bull shit that the Republican party is spewing out of their mouths.

---

quote:

---

And, as far as being fired by the Clinton Administration, just b/c President Clinton fired him doesn't mean it was the right thing to do. From what I've read, Clark is actually the Clinton's candidate in this election. Whatever that means.

---

quote:

---

I am a pragmatic person. I understand what Brownstein is saying. However, as a true blue-state, big-city liberal, I am tired of having to kowtow politically to the most regressive part of the nation (the South) and defer to its most conservative constituency (white evangelical Christians).

Again, I understand it's all about numbers (votes and money) — who has them and who doesn't. But I consider the analysis of the problem here to be pointing in the wrong direction. The problem isn't that the moderate and liberal policies of the Democrats do so poorly there; it's that the retrograde mind-set embraced by the GOP and those voters does so well. As always, the South is an anchor dragging the rest of the country down.

Paul Giorgi

Culver City

---

quote:

---

Brownstein discusses the loss of the South to the GOP. Good riddance, I say, until the South escapes its disgusting past. As a longtime liberal who grew up in the Depression and got to vote for FDR, I was always embarrassed by most elected representatives from the South, especially the Dixiecrats. The sad thing is that President Bush is a real mumbling Bubba who attracts the worst of what the South remains.

William Blanchard

Arrowbear

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by wannabuyamonkey:
Althought, I can't say I condone the haircut.

---

I just finished seeing an Ultimate TV replay of tonights democratic debate.

GREAT GREAT TV.

Dean did fumble about with the Iraq question didn't he? But then so did Leiberman. I think Gen. Clark was the most impressive in that regard.

But overall a lot of conviction and passion for change and returning America to it's rightful masters, us, rather than the corporations.

quote:

---

Originally posted by whomod:
a lot of conviction and passion for change and returning America to it's rightful masters, us, rather than the corporations.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by whomod:
2 letters yesterday that made me laugh.

It's funny cuz it's true.

quote:

---

I am a pragmatic person. I understand what Brownstein is saying. However, as a true blue-state, big-city liberal, I am tired of having to kowtow politically to the most regressive part of the nation (the South) and defer to its most conservative constituency (white evangelical Christians).

Again, I understand it's all about numbers (votes and money) — who has them and who doesn't. But I consider the analysis of the problem here to be pointing in the wrong direction. The problem isn't that the moderate and liberal policies of the Democrats do so poorly there; it's that the retrograde mind-set embraced by the GOP and those voters does so well. As always, the South is an anchor dragging the rest of the country down.

Paul Giorgi

Culver City

---

quote:

---

Brownstein discusses the loss of the South to the GOP. Good riddance, I say, until the South escapes its disgusting past. As a longtime liberal who grew up in the Depression and got to vote for FDR, I was always embarrassed by most elected representatives from the South, especially the Dixiecrats. The sad thing is that President Bush is a real mumbling Bubba who attracts the worst of what the South remains.

William Blanchard

Arrowbear

---

My sentiments exactly. I think i've made a comment once about how political experts say that only southerners can win elections because southerners will only vote for their own. Kinda makes you wonder who actually won the civil war, eh?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ZOD:
ZOD is curious, why does Dean have his records as Governor hidden? ZOD thinks he spent time in a mental institute because he acts like he's only two cents from not having any!

Oh yeah, no mention of Dean's little racist comment, ZOD sees... Or his even worse explanation for it on Rock the Vote. ZOD is just amused by whomod's own editing of the guy who's going to take the government back to the KK.. people!



KNEEL BEFORE ZOD!!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by whomod:
Talk is that he sealed them because he feared the Republicans would use them to attack Dean on the Civil Unions bill he signed. I guess he feared the rights ascendancy using peoples bigotry and homophobia to win votes.

Frankly, I don't know what he's so afraid of, the right has never used bigotry as a weapon.....

---

Yeah, those silly Republicans. They could learn a lot about emotionally exploiting the issues from Democrats.

You know, where anybody who doesn't fall in line with the politically correct liberal notion of gay rights is labelled a "homophobe" or otherwise closed-minded, racist, goose-stepping nazis.

Liberal Democrats sure know how to promote freedom of expression and not mock, demonize, and otherwise suppress non-liberal views.

quote:

---

For Dean, 'captive' insurance a Vt. boon
By Michael Kranish, Globe Staff, 12/12/2003

Howard Dean is fond of criticizing politicians who provide tax breaks to "large corporate interests," and one of his favorite campaign lines is a blast at the Bush administration for doling out tax cuts to top executives of Enron Corp.

But during Dean's 11 years as Vermont governor, he enacted tax breaks that attracted to the state a "Who's Who" of corporate America -- including Enron -- to set up insurance businesses. Indeed, Dean said in 2001 that he wanted Vermont to "overtake Bermuda" as the "world's largest" haven for a segment of the insurance industry known as "captives," which refers to firms that help insure their parent companies.

With little notice then -- and barely any mention now in the Democratic presidential campaign -- Dean succeeded in turning Vermont into the kingdom of captives. Vermont has more of these companies than the other 49 states combined. As part of the enticement, Dean led efforts to cut state taxes of such companies, and he helped defeat a Clinton administration effort that would have eliminated $100 million worth of federal tax deductions given to the industry.

But while the nearly 500 captive insurance companies have been a windfall for Vermont -- providing 2 percent of the state's general funds from tax on the $7 billion worth of premiums that go through Vermont annually -- the industry also is highly controversial. Some analysts believe that while Vermont profits, other states lose corporate tax revenues because of the way a company's taxable income may be reduced if it uses captives.

"Dean apparently has no problems with tax havens as long as they are in the state of Vermont," said University of Connecticut Law School professor Richard Pomp, author of the textbook "State and Local Taxation." "He can't have it both ways, because Vermont is acting like a little Bermuda."

In fact, Dean has often complained about Bermuda's tax haven status, saying that the United States needs a president "who doesn't think that big corporations who get tax cuts ought to be able to move their headquarters to Bermuda."

Dean spokesman Jay Carson said there is no contradiction between Dean's complaints about President Bush's corporate tax breaks and the former governor's own efforts to help the captive insurance industry. "This is a legitimate industry, perfectly legal. It helped the economy here, and Governor Dean is going to make no apologies for that," Carson said.

As governor, Dean saw his competitor for this business as Bermuda, which hosts nearly three times as many captives as Vermont. "We consider our competition to be Bermuda or the Cayman Islands," Dean said in a 2001 article published by the A.M. Best Co. "We feel pretty good about what we are doing, but it is competitive. Our goal is to overtake Bermuda as the world's largest captive domicile." Carson, the Dean spokesman, said yesterday the governor was referring at the time to his desire to "bring jobs and revenue back to the United States."

While the captive insurance industry began arriving in Vermont before Dean began his 11-year term as governor, Dean heavily promoted the industry and it grew dramatically under his administration into a key revenue source.

"In terms of benefits to the state, this is one of the crown jewels in the state's tiara," said Lisa Ventriss, who until last year ran the Vermont Captive Insurance Association and is now president of the Vermont Business Roundtable. "There is maple syrup and skiing and cheddar cheese and captive insurance. What more could you want from life?"

Molly Lambert, who served from 1998 to 2002 as commerce secretary under Dean, said he played a key role in attracting captive insurance business. "The governor would meet personally with captive owners when they came to the state on many occasions," said Lambert, who now heads the Vermont Captive Insurance Association. "If he knew the managers or owners would be in town, they went to his office, or he went to them. He went to all the association gatherings. The accessibility to the governor for the industry has been just incredible."

The companies owning captives in Vermont range from Microsoft to Dupont to Enron, according to a list provided by Vermont officials in response to a request from the Globe.

As a presidential candidate, Dean has attacked Bush for giving tax breaks to "Ken Lay and the boys who ran Enron." But Enron apparently was attracted to Vermont because of the benefits offered under Dean's administration. Dean, who became governor in 1991, cut taxes in 1993 by up to 60 percent on the premiums paid by the parent companies to the captives at the same time he was raising the state sales tax and cutting spending. Dean's tax cuts on captives set off Vermont's boom in that industry.

In December 1994, Enron set up a captive insurance company called Gulf Company Ltd., which is managed by USA Risk Group, a company in Montpelier that specializes in managing captive insurance companies. Indicating the closeness of a captive to its parent corporation, Enron's former chief financial officer, Andrew Fastow, was on the Gulf board and made one appearance at USA Risk's Montpelier office, a company official said. (Fastow is no longer on the Gulf board, and Enron has filed for bankruptcy.)

Becky Aitchison, the account manager for Gulf Company Ltd., which is still in operation, said that Enron created a captive insurance company in Vermont as a way to make up for the high deductibles demanded by traditional insurance companies. While she could not discuss the Enron specifics due to a confidentiality agreement, she provided the hypothetical example of a company that has a $1 million deductible on a traditional insurance policy and decides to create a captive to be responsible for paying the $1 million. The company would pay premiums to its own captive, which in turn could invest the premiums, to generate more income. Under Vermont law, she said, the premiums are subject to a top tax of 0.4 percent, but the profits on the captive's investment of the premium are not subject to Vermont's corporate income tax, which a state official said ranges from 7 percent to 9.7 percent.

Depending on how the captive was set up, such profits also might not be subject to corporate taxes in the firm's home state, according to Pomp, the University of Connecticut tax specialist. Moreover, the premiums paid by the parent company to the captive might be deductible from federal taxes if the entity is set up according to certain guidelines, which in turn could also reduce a company's home-state taxable income. It is this potential for diminished tax revenues in a company's home state that has led some analysts to criticize the way captive insurance companies have become so popular in Vermont.

Companies use captives instead of traditional insurance because of the tax advantages, an inability to get insurance from traditional insurers, and a reluctance to share the higher premiums that might be set due to a riskier pool of client.

"If set up properly, they get deductions on the premium, they pay a low rate on the premium in Vermont, and then they take their premiums and they invest them and there is no further tax on them in Vermont or any other state, so it is a triple whammy," said Pomp.

Leonard Crouse, Vermont's deputy commissioner of captive insurance, agreed there may be cases in which the parent company pays less taxes in its home state because the captive operation in Vermont reduces taxable income.

"That is true," Crouse said. "They pay less taxes, I'm sure, in those states . . . Periodically you hear different states bringing that up." But he said the tax situation was only one of many reasons that companies choose to set up captive operations in Vermont, noting the state's friendly regulatory climate and its staff of 20 employees devoted to serving the business.

In 1996, the Clinton administration tried to end the deductibility of some captive premiums as part of its effort to reduce the federal deficit. The measure, which would have imposed $100 million in federal taxes and might have killed much of the US captive industry, was opposed by Dean, who wrote a letter to President Clinton complaining that the idea was "bad public policy," according to a 1996 article in Business Insurance.

The captive insurance industry is the type of clean, high-paying industry sought by Vermont. The state receives $18.5 million in premium taxes and licensing fees, amounting to about 2 percent of the state's general fund, according to Daniel Towle, Vermont's financial services director. In the most recent year, captive companies had deposited about $1 billion in Vermont banks, and about $7 billion in premiums annually flow through Vermont, Towle said. About 1,000 people are directly or indirectly employed by the captive industry, and they earn two to three times the typical Vermont wage, a state official said. Competition is on the horizon. Some states, such as Arizona and Hawaii, have no tax on premiums, and the Vermont Legislature this year lowered its premium tax by 5 percent and capped the overall tax on any captive at $200,000 per year. Massachusetts has no captive insurance companies, partly due to requirements for capitalization, state officials said. Michael Kranish can be reached at kranish@globe.com

© Copyright 2003 Globe Newspaper Company.


© Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company

---

quote:

---

"The Council on Foreign Relations...
is the American branch of a society which organized in England... (and)... believes national boundaries should be obliterated and one world rule established."
- from WITH NO APOLOGIES by Senator Barry Goldwater, Berkley Books, NY, p. 126

---

quote:

---

"The Trilateral Commission...
is international... (and)... is intended to be the vehicle for multinational consolidation of the commercial and banking interests by seizing control of the political government of the United States."
- from WITH NO APOLOGIES by Senator Barry Goldwater, Berkley Books, NY, p. 293

---

quote:

---

During the 1980 presidential campaign, for example, the History Channel reports that Ronald Reagan repeatedly expressed a distrust of secret societies and promised that Skull and Bonesman, Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) member and Trilateral Commission alumni George Bush would not be offered a position in his administration. Yet during the Republican Convention, Reagan broke tradition by making a late-night dash from his hotel room to the convention floor and declaring George Bush his running mate. The Iran hostage situation was miraculously resolved the day Reagan was sworn in.

---

As Johnny Rotten coined, "it's a system of shit, a shitstem".

All you can do is elect the selected canidate that will do the least damage and may actually do a bit of actual good.

Liberals, conservatives, left, right. It's all just scenery. (yes, it does sound rather Nader-ish as a matter of fact ) Look for good people rather than rah rah-ing for your 'side'. I'd vote for Richard Riordan for Governor in a heartbeat. Davis knew that a lot of people felt the same when he orchastrated his defeat to Simon in the primaries during our Gubenatorial election a while back. I'd even vote for McCain, as I've said before. They exude an honesty and compassion for people that can't be ignored.

'Neocons' is just a novel was to say 'Military Industrial Complex'. And the Bush clan is historically dripping in it. It's not that I hate Republicans. It's just that I think it would be honest to seperate 'republican' from neocon'. I think Goldwater would agree with this, i beleive, judging from the quotes above. I think Reagan did too despite them manipulating events during his term (right in the White House basement even!).

I'll choose DEMS rather than REPS because they are as far from the M.I.C. and monied corporate corruption and influence as we can get (and can actually win) in our system. Notice how I never said Democrats are exempt from this influence. At the present though, the M.I.C. IS the Republican Party (at least in the executive branch)!

Finally, just one more quote which I found ironic.

quote:

---

"While there is something to be said for the proposition that spending will never be reduced so long as there is money in the federal treasury, I believe that as a practical matter spending cuts must come before tax cuts. If we reduce taxes before firm, principled decisions are made about expenditures, we will court deficit spending and the inflationary effects that invariably follow." -Barry Goldwater.The conscience of a Conservative (p. 65)

---

quote:

---

By early 1980, the accumulated exposure of the Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations, the two most identifiable Insider organizations, had begun to produce some dramatic effects. For one, these organizations became well enough known to be "hot topics" on the campaign circuit. Informed voters from coast to coast, especially those who were disenchanted with the Carter Administration, began to seek candidates who were not tied to either of these groups.

In New Hampshire, for instance, where the first presidential primary is held every fourth February, most of the candidates for the Republican nomination were happily responding to voters that they were "not now and never have been" members of Davld Rockefeller's Trilateral Commission or his Council on Foreign Relations. But Republican candidates George Bush and John Anderson could not join in such a response because each had connections to both of these elitist organizations.

This issue was not confined solely to New Hampshire either. It was a nationwide phenomenon. Witness a February 8, 1980 article in the New York Times. (26) Reporting on a Ronald Reagan campaign trip through the South during the first week of February, the article stated that Mr. Reagan had attacked President Carter's foreign policy because he had found that "19 key members of the Administration are or have been members of the Trilateral Commission." It also noted that when Mr. Reagan was pressed to back up his charge, an aide listed the names of President Carter, Vice President Mondale, Secretary of State Vance, Secretary of Defense Brown, and fifteen other Carter officials.

The report further stated that Reagan advisor Edwin Meese told the reporters: "...all of these people come out of an international economic-industrial organization with a pattern of thinking on world affairs." He made the very interesting comment that their influence led to a "softening" of our nation's defense capability. Both he and Mr. Reagan could have added that practically all of these Carter Administration officials were also members of the Council on Foreign Relations. But neither chose to do so.



Anti-Elitist Reversals
The history of that period shows that Ronald Reagan exploited this issue very capably. On February 26th, in New Hampshire where the matter had become the deciding issue in the primary, voters gave him a lopsided victory. His strong showing and the correspondingly weak showing by George Bush delighted the nation's conservatives and set a pattern for future victories that carried Mr. Reagan all the way to the White House.

But something else happened on February 26, 1980 that should have raised many more eyebrows than it did. On the very day that Ronald Reagan convincingly won the nation's first primary, he replaced his campaign manager with longtime Council on Foreign Relations member William J. Casey. Mr. Casey served as the Reagan campaign manager for the balance of the campaign, and was later rewarded with an appointment as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

The selection of William J. Casey in the strategically important position of campaign manager was highly significant. He is a New York lawyer who served the Nixon Administration in several positions including Under Secretary of State for Economic Affairs and Chairman of the Export-Import Bank. In those two posts especially, he gained a reputation as a crusader for U.S. taxpayer-financed aid and trade with communist nations.

During this same period, while serving as an official of the State Department, Casey declared in a public speech given in Garden City, New York, that he favored U.S. policies leading to interdependence among nations and to the sacrificing of our nation's independence. (27) These attitudes are thoroughly in agreement with the long-term objectives of the Insiders, but are not at all consistent with the public positions taken by Mr. Reagan. But very few made note of the Casey appointment because very few knew anything about Mr. Casey.

With CFR member William J. Casey on the team, the Reagan campaign was still able to focus attention on the Trilateral Commission and on fellow Republican George Bush's ties to it. But nothing was said about the older, larger, and more dangerously influential Council on Foreign Relations.



Rockefeller Ties
In April 1980, Mr. Reagan told an interviewer from the Christian Science Monitor (28) that he would shun the directions of David Rockefeller's Trilateral Commission. But George Bush, who had recently resigned both from the Trilateral Commission and from the Board of Directors of the Council on Foreign Relations, could not shake the stigma of his Insider connection.

In Florida, understanding about the Trilateral Commission led to widespread use of a political advertisement which claimed, "The same people who gave you Jimmy Carter want now to give you George Bush." (29) An identical ad appeared in Texas. The Reagan bandwagon, propelled in part by its attack on the Insiders, began to score one primary victory after another.

Eventually, Ronald Reagan convincingly won the Republican nomination. Conservatives across the nation were delighted That is, they were delighted until he shocked his supporters by selecting George Bush as his running mate. George Bush was the very epitome of the Insider Establishment type that had made so many of these people strong Reagan backers in the first place. That night, at the Republican convention, the word "betrayal" was in common usage.

Ronald Reagan had repeatedly and publicly promised that he would pick a running mate who shared his well-known conservative views. But, of all the Republicans available, he picked the man who was the darling of the Rockefellers. Nor was the Rockefeller-Bush relationship any secret.

Campaign finance information had already revealed that prior to December 31,1979, the Bush for President campaign had received individual $1,000 contributions (the highest amount allowed by law) from David Rockefeller, Edwin Rockefeller, Helen Rockefeller, Laurance Rockefeller, Mary Rockefeller, Godfrey Rockefeller, and several other Rockefeller relatives and employees.

Staunch Reagan supporters frantically tried to stop the Bush nomination. But political considerations quickly forced them to go along. One after another, they began to state that their man was still at the top of the ticket. "It was Reagan-Bush, not Bush-Reagan," they said. But all had to admit that the issue of Trilateral domination of the Carter Administration could hardly be used with a Trilateralist veteran like Bush on the ticket.

From the time William Casey joined the Reagan team in February, the issue of CFR domination of America could not be used. And when George Bush was tapped as the Reagan running mate, the Trilateral issue was also dead. Only a very few realized that when those two issues were lost, the hope that future President Reagan would keep Insiders from key positions in government was also lost.

As the summer of 1980 faded into fall, Insiders were showing up in every conceivable part of the Reagan campaign. In September. a casual "Prelude to Victory" party was given by the Reagans at their rented East Coast home in Middleburg, Virginia. A photo taken at the party shows that the place of honor, at Mr. Reagan's immediate right, was given to none other than David Rockefeller, the leader of the CFR and the Trilateral Commission. Guests at this party included Dr. Henry Kissinger and other CFR and Trilateral members. (30)

Two weeks before the election, the front page of the New York Times carried a photo showing the future President campaigning in Cincinnati. Alongside him as his foreign policy advisors who the President said would answer questions for him, were Senator Howard Baker, former Ambassador Anne Armstrong, and former Secretaries of State William P. Rogers and Henry Kissinger. All were members of either the CFR or the Trilateral Commission or both. (31)

http://reformed-theology.org/jbs/books/insiders/part_2.htm

---

quote:

---

Excerpts from a talk given by Lt. Col. "Bo" Gritz in Mesa, Arizona on April 4, 1992. (who is "Bo" Gritz you may ask?:

U.S. Presidential Candidate 1992.

most decorated Green Beret Commander in American history.

Commander, U.S. Army Special Forces, Latin America.
Chief, Delta force )

In Mesa, I met with him [Cleon Skaas(?)] and I said, "Why in the world did Ronald Reagan sell us down the tube by taking George Bush as his running mate?" And I really didn't know that Cleon knew Ronald Reagan rather well. But he told me: He said, "Bo, George Bush was Ronald Reagan's greatest opponent," (if you'll remember, back in the 1980 elections), "and Ronald Reagan said he would never have him. Then, Ronald Reagan was invited to New York to go see Rockefeller. When he saw Rockefeller, he was told, 'If you do not take my head of the Trilateral Commission'" (remember, the Council on Foreign Relations, George Bush) "'as your running mate, the only way you'll see the inside of the
White House is as a tourist.'"

Two months after he was inaugurated, two months is all that Ronald Reagan lasted. March 30th, 1981, two months after his inauguration in January of 1981, he was shot -- was he not? And the news said that he was shot by John Hinckley, Jr., and that John Hinckley, Jr., was some kind of a Jodie Foster freak. And that he came out of nowhere, and that he shot Brady in the head, and he shot a policeman in the neck, and he shot a Secret Service man and blew him back over the vehicle, and he shot Ronald Reagan. Right?

Well, remember the hardware. That's why I gave you a little introduction... I did. [Gritz had talked earlier about some sophisticated "tools of the trade."] Soon as I see this stuff I begin to wonder, because I've been a part of these kinds of operations. Let's just go back and review. It's all in the book [*Called to Serve*(?)], and so, very quickly I'll run down through you.

When Brady was shot, no question. Here we've got John Hinckley, Jr., Oh, by the way, is John Hinckley, Jr., just some kind of a "weirdo?" Isn't it strange that John Hinckley, Sr., is the owner of Vanderbilt Oil? And, of course, George Bush is the owner of Zapata Oil. Was it a coincidence, then, that John Hinckley, Sr., and George Bush are neighbors *for years* in Houston, Texas, working together? Is it any coincidence that John Hinckley, Sr., when you go back through the FEC, the Federal Election Commission, his own record of giving maximum donations every year
to Mr. Bush even when he started running for Congress. Well now, does that make his son, John Hinckley, Jr., seem a little bit less of a coincidence? I think it does. Here's why:

When the President was shot, if you'll remember, he was pushed into the car by a man named Jerry Parr(sp?) that was his Secret Service guard. Jerry Parr fell on top of him and, I just saw in the *Reader's Digest* where Jerry Parr was telling his "valiant story." And the limousine tore off, didn't it? Now it was *five minutes later* that the ambulance arrived and they put the Secret Service man, the Washington, D.C. policeman, and Brady in the ambulance and *it* roared off. Using normal time-rate/distance, who should have arrived at George Washington University Hospital
first? The President should have. Well, who did? You know it's a trick question. The ambulance arrived 15 minutes before the President. When asked, "What happened?" the Secret Service simply responded, "We got lost."

The Secret Service does not get lost in Washington, D.C. They don't get lost in most places of the world. And so, now the investigation starts to get a little interesting. When they take Ronald Reagan in, they can see that he... matter of fact, his heart almost stopped. And he is convulsing; there's blood on his lips. They know he's hurt... seriously. But they can find no wounds. They X-ray him *3 times* and can find nothing.


Finally, a nurse notices a tiny entrance wound right at the seventh rib, underneath the armpit. And a doctor takes a probe, and by... very carefully, because they couldn't see it on X-ray, the doctor is able to extract what he said was a planchet, thinner than a dime, that was one-quarter inch from Ronald Reagan's aorta.

Now, Ronald Reagan says... as a matter of fact, let me just see if I can just read it to you... best what Ronnie says. I've got all this in the book... This came right out of a newspaper:

"I knew I had been hurt, but I thought that I'd been hurt by the Secret Service man landing on me in the car. As it was, I must say it was the most paralyzing pain. I've described it as if someone hit you with a hammer. But the sensation, it seemed to me, came after I was in the car and so I thought that maybe his gun or something had broken a rib. I set up on the seat, and the pain wouldn't go away -- and suddenly, I found I was coughing up blood."

Now you see, to almost anyone else you might say, "Well, just some kind of a fluke." But I'm a skeptic. Because I know how these things have happened ever since they "took out" John Fitzgerald Kennedy. I think maybe JFK was the last honest President that we had...

Ex-CIA Director George H. W. Bush became de facto U.S. president in 1981 following the near-death of Ronald Reagan. Reagan feared for his life and allowed Bush to handle key areas of the presidency. This paved the way for a two-way guns and drugs smuggling operation between Nicaragua and Arkansas. Guns were flown by shady pilots to the Nicaraguan Contras. To pay for the weapons, the planes returned to Arkansas loaded with cocaine. Governor of Arkansas at the time was CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) man Bill Clinton. This is carefully explained in the book, Compromised: Bush, Clinton and the CIA by Terry Reed and John Cummings.

---

quote:

---

"...A spider web of 'patriots for profit', operating from the highest positions of special trust and confidence, have successfully circumvented our constitutional system in pursuit of a New World Order. They have infused America with drugs in order to fund covert operations while sealing the fate of our servicemen left in communist prisons." - Lt. Col. James "Bo" Gritz (Ret)

---

quote:

---

December 12, 2003


Steve Lopez:
Points West
It's Been an Unfriendly Year of Business

I've been reading the business pages a little more closely of late, because I keep hearing how important it is to create a more friendly business environment.

On Thursday, for instance, I turned to The Times business page to educate myself, and here's the first headline I saw:

Bank Sues Ex-Global Crossing Executives

Hey, there's one bad apple in every bunch. I moved on to the next headline.

Interscope Gets Credit for Music It Didn't Make

Is there any good news in this section? I turned to Page C3.

Former HealthSouth Exec Gets Prison in Fraud Case

There must be some mistake.

Ex-Execs at Nicor Energy Face Charges

Innocent until proven guilty, I always say.

Medco Defends Itself Against Federal Charges

I should hope so.

Freddie Mac Agrees to Pay $125-Million Fine

Is he related to Bernie Mac?

Ford to Offer System to Curb SUV Rollovers

They're going to weld on Pintos as training wheels.

Goodyear Finds More Accounting Problems

And the blimp just crashed near Carson. Not a good week.

Reliant Expects Result of Probe by February

Yeah, but it's easy to accuse someone of fixing electricity prices. That's why we need fewer regulations, as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger keeps insisting.

Exhausted, I flipped the page but C5 offered no relief.

Quattrone Again Seeks to Admit Evidence

The former Credit Suisse First Boston banker is gearing up for a second trial on obstruction of justice charges.

Grand Jury to Consider Case Against Wal-Mart

The discount chain that's the new model for U.S. commerce is accused of using undocumented immigrants to clean the floor. Will Wal-Mart defend itself with discount attorneys?

If I were an artist, I think my next exhibit would be a collage of headlines from the business pages. I asked Vicki Gallay of our library staff for help in finding corporate scandal headlines from 2003, just from The Times. A partial list was 19 pages.

By the time I finished reading it, I wasn't so sure this business-friendly strategy was the way to go, either in Sacramento or Washington. Maybe we need fewer Chamber of Commerce rallies and more prosecutors.

The parade of headlines began on Jan. 1, of course, when we rang in the year on a familiar note.

Enron Probe Likely to Expand

Turns out Ken Lay was a corporate role model.

Adelphia's Rigas to Give Up Homes

The indicted John Rigas was forced to get by without 34 condos, apartments and vacation homes bought with company money as Adelphia headed for bankruptcy.

I could almost write a Christmas song from these headlines. Forget the maids a-milking and the geese a-laying. We've had:

5 HealthSouth Officers A-Pleading.

4 Ex-Execs at Evergreen Convicted

3 Dynegy Execs A-Lying

2 Ex-Enron, Merrill Workers Conspiring.

And a Tenet CEO Indicted

If corporate thievery and malfeasance haven't already depleted your retirement account, or zapped the kids' college fund, it's hard to know where to put your money. But the mattress is a better bet than a mutual fund.

Spitzer, SEC Charge Invesco, CEO
Other fund companies could face similar action

Yes, including Alliance Capital, Bank of America, Bank One, Charles Schwab, Federated Investors, Janus Capital Group, Pilgrim Baxter, Prudential Securities, and Putnam Investments, all of which were in the news.

Thankfully, I'm with Morgan Stanley.

Oh, wait a second.

Fund Scandal Spreads
Morgan Stanley to pay $50 million over secret payments it received from 14 companies to steer business their way

I got so upset when I read that, I thought I better turn down the lights and play some soft music to lower my blood pressure.

Former Craig CEO Convicted of Fraud
He is found guilty of falsifying records to get a $40-million credit line for stereo maker

Tell me there's still someone out there I can trust.

Tell me that when the day is done, it's not just about greed.

I know I've barely skimmed the surface, but I can't look at another business headline. My eyes are bloodshot, so I'm on my way to buy some Visine.

Former Rite-Aid Exec Is Convicted

Maybe I better go somewhere else.

Ex-Kmart Executives Indicted

I'll tell you what's wrong with this country. We need a more friendly business environment.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by whomod:
Soon, OVERTIME will BE HISTORY. All of the citizens of the US will soon wake up to that fact, as soon as the Spending Bill goes through in January. Included as an INSISTENCE by the White House is the massive change to overtime regulations, meaning 8 million people will no longer be eligible for overtime.

---

quote:

---

The changes...foresee increasing overtime eligibility for low-income service sector workers — those who make between $8,000 and $22,000 per year — while reducing eligibility for high-income workers.

"An additional 1.3 million workers at the low end will now be guaranteed overtime," said Victoria Lipnic, assistant secretary of labor for employment standards.

On the other hand, the changes will cut down on overtime for about 600,000 high-income workers, according to officials.

In effect, white-collar workers who earn more than $65,000 a year would be prevented from collecting extra cash for hours worked beyond the 40-hour workweek.

---

quote:

---

"Howard Dean has climbed into his own spider-hole of denial"
--Sen. Joseph Lieberman, regarding Dean's dismissiveness of the significance of Saddam Hussein's capture on December 13, 2003.

---

Quote:

---

Dean Vermont Energy Group Met in Private
2 hours, 44 minutes ago Add Top Stories - AP to My Yahoo!


By JOHN SOLOMON, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Democratic presidential contender Howard Dean (news - web sites) has demanded release of secret deliberations of Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites)'s energy task force. But as Vermont governor, Dean had an energy task force that met in secret and angered state lawmakers.


AP Photo



Dean's group held one public hearing and after-the-fact volunteered the names of industry executives and liberal advocates it consulted in private, but the Vermont governor refused to open the task force's closed-door deliberations.


In 1999, Dean offered the same argument the Bush administration uses today for keeping deliberations of a policy task force secret.


"The governor needs to receive advice from time to time in closed session. As every person in government knows, sometimes you get more open discussion when it's not public," Dean was quoted as saying.


Dean's own dispute over the secrecy of a Vermont task force that devised a policy for restructuring the state's near-bankrupt electric utilities has escaped national attention, even though he has attacked a similar arrangement used by President Bush (news - web sites).


In an interview with The Associated Press, Dean defended his recent criticism of Cheney's task force and his demand that the administration release its private energy deliberations even though he refused to do that in Vermont.


Dean said his group developed better policy, was bipartisan and sought advice not just from energy executives but environmentalists and low-income advocates. He said his task force was more open because it held one public hearing and divulged afterward the names of people it consulted even though the content of discussions with them was kept secret.


The Vermont task force "is not exactly the Cheney thing," Dean said. "We had a much more open process than Cheney's process. We named the people we sought advice from in our final report."


Dean said he still believes it was necessary to keep task force deliberations secret, especially because the group was reviewing proprietary financial data from Vermont utilities. "Some advice does have to be given in private, but I don't mind letting people know who gave that advice," he said.


An expert in political rhetoric said it was risky for Dean to attack Bush and Cheney on an issue where he was vulnerable.


"In general, what is good for the vice president should be good for the governor. A candidate who attacks on grounds he is vulnerable is foolish," said Kathleen Hall Jamieson, a University of Pennsylvania professor who helps run a Web site that compares presidential candidates' rhetoric to the facts.


Dean's campaign said it was "laughable" to compare the two. "Governor Dean confronted and averted an energy crisis that would have had disastrous consequences for the citizens of Vermont by bringing together a bipartisan and ideologically diverse working group that solved the problem. Dick Cheney put together a group of his corporate cronies and partisan political contributors, and they gave themselves billions and disguised it as a national energy policy," spokesman Jay Carson said Sunday.


In September, Dean argued that the task force Cheney assembled in 2001 and the Bush energy policy that were unduly influenced by Bush family friend and Enron energy chief Kenneth Lay.


"The administration should also level with the American people about just how much influence Ken Lay and his industry buddies had over the development of the president's energy policy by releasing notes on the deliberations of Vice President Cheney's energy task force," Dean said Sept. 15.


In 1998, Dean's Vermont similar task force met in secret to write a plan for revamping state electricity markets that would slow rising consumer costs and relieve utilities of a money-losing deal with a Canadian company.


The task force's work resulted in Vermont having the first utility in the country to meet energy efficiency standards. It also freed the state's utilities from their deal with a Canadian power company, Hydro Quebec, that had left them near bankruptcy but passed as much as 90 percent of those costs to consumers. Utility shareholders also suffered some losses.


The parallels between the Cheney and Dean task forces are many.





Both declined to open their deliberations, even under pressure from legislators. Both received input from the energy industry in private meetings, and released the names of task force members publicly.

Dean's group volunteered the names of those it consulted with in its final report. While Cheney has refused to formally give a list to Congress to preserve the White House's right to private advice, known as executive privilege, his aides have divulged to reporters the names of many of those from whom the task force sought advice.

The Bush-Cheney campaign and Republican Party received millions in donations from energy interests in the election before its task force was created. Dean's Vermont re-election campaign received only small contributions from energy executives, but a political action committee created as he prepared to run for president collected $19,000, or nearly a fifth of its first $110,000, from donors tied to Vermont's electric utilities.

One co-chairman of Dean's task force, William Gilbert, was a Republican Vermont lawyer who had done work for state utilities. At the time, Gilbert also served on the board of Vermont Gas Systems, a subsidiary of the Canadian power giant Hydro Quebec.

Many state legislators, including Dean's fellow Democrats, were angered that the task force met secretly.

"It taints the whole report," Democratic state Rep. Al Stevens told AP in 1999. "I'd have more faith in that report if the discussions had been open."

Elizabeth Bankowski, who served as the other co-chair of the task force, told the legislature that the requirement the task force meet in secret "was decided in advance by the governor's office and the governor's lawyer." Dean's lawyer argued the secrecy was permitted under a 1988 legal change.

Another secrecy issue has surfaced during Dean's campaign over his decision, before leaving office as governor in January, to seal for 10 years about 145 boxes of his official papers.

Two of Dean's predecessors used executive privilege to seal roughly the same percentage of their documents, but not for so long. A conservative Washington legal group has sued to try to unseal the records.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=6&u=/ap/20031228/ap_on_el_pr/dean_energy_5 />

---

Quote:

---

December 28, 2003


For 2004, Bush Has Strength in the White Male Numbers

His wide advantage in that right-leaning group may trump Democrats' edge elsewhere

By Ronald Brownstein, Times Staff Writer

WASHINGTON — President Bush's overwhelming strength among white men looms as a central obstacle between Democrats and the White House as 2004 approaches.

In an election season heavily shaped by terrorism and national security, several recent polls suggest Bush could dominate white male voters as thoroughly as Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush did during their three successive presidential victories in the 1980s.

"Clearly, it is where the Democrats are going to have their biggest difficulty," said Ruy Teixeira, a public opinion analyst at the Century Foundation, a liberal think tank.

In the modern political era, Democrats never expect to carry white men, who reliably tilt Republican. But the emerging threat to Democrats in 2004 is that Bush will win white men so decisively that the party can't overcome his advantage with other voter groups that lean in their direction, such as minorities and college-educated white women.

Analysts in both parties agree that Bush is benefiting among white men from his aggressive use of force against terrorism and his alternately folksy and blunt "bring 'em on" personal style. Some senior strategists on both sides believe the risk to Democrats with white men could increase if the party nominates Howard Dean, whose opposition to the war, liberal positions on social issues and buttoned-down persona create clear contrasts for Bush.

"That's the best situation for us, and the worst situation for them, with this group," said David Winston, a Republican pollster.

White men compose just under 40% of the electorate, with white women just over 40%, and minorities composing the rest.

White men have given Democrats problems in presidential elections for decades. Since the 1970s, Democrats have won when they kept the Republican advantage within sight and lost when they didn't.

"It's a damage minimization strategy," Teixeira said. "If it's too much of a landslide with white men, it just creates a hole you have to dig out of."

But just reaching that minimal standard of support hasn't been easy for Democratic nominees. Republican incumbents Richard Nixon in 1972 and Ronald Reagan in 1984 carried white men by 35 percentage points en route to landslide reelections, according to network exit polls.

In 1988, George H.W. Bush beat Democrat Michael S. Dukakis by 27 percentage points among white men, the same advantage Reagan enjoyed over Jimmy Carter in 1980.

During the 1990s, Bill Clinton significantly reduced those margins, losing white men by just 3 percentage points in 1992 and 11 points in 1996, according to exit polls. But Clinton didn't win a much higher percentage of the white male vote than Carter, Mondale and Dukakis did; the GOP margins fell in the 1990s because independent candidate Ross Perot siphoned away so many white men from Bush in 1992 and Bob Dole in 1996.

With Perot off the ballot in 2000, the Republican advantage among white men ballooned again, as Bush carried them by 24 percentage points over Al Gore. That margin was just small enough to allow Gore to narrowly edge Bush in the popular vote by running strongly with other groups.

But now leading strategists in both parties say Bush has the potential to run even better with white men in 2004 — which could create a deficit too great for Democrats to overcome.

"I don't know if it can get back to the [Reagan] level, but he does have the potential of widening the margin from 2000," said Matthew Dowd, the polling director for Bush's campaign.

Stanley B. Greenberg, the pollster for Gore in 2000 and Clinton in 1992, agreed. "Younger, married white men are disastrously, overwhelmingly Republican," he said. "They are trending more Republican over time. Everything about George Bush speaks to them."

Recent polls underscore the challenge for Democrats with white men. In an ABC/Washington Post survey released last week, white men preferred Bush over an unnamed Democrat in 2004 by 62% to 29%, a head-turning 33-point margin; by contrast, white women gave Bush just a 10-point lead.

Similarly, a Pew Research Center for the People and the Press poll this month found Bush leading an unnamed Democrat by 30 points among white men and enjoying a 68% approval rating with the group.

Democrats note these gaudy numbers reflect the immediate boost Bush is receiving with all groups after the capture of Saddam Hussein this month. But even in September and October, when Pew showed the country divided exactly in half between Bush and a Democrat for 2004, and white women narrowly preferring a Democrat, the president still led among white men by 27 percentage points.

Dowd, the polling director for the president's campaign, said those numbers show that Bush is "solidifying" the support from white men he had against Gore.

"In 2000, he obviously did extremely well, and now on things they care about, these people have seen he's done what they hoped he would," Dowd said. "It is just an affirmation of what they thought they believed about him in 2000."

Bush's strength among white men derives as much from his personal style as his policy choices, most analysts agree. Blunt in his words, comfortable on his ranch, dismissive of ceremony, impatient with diplomacy, Bush fits "an old-fashioned male ideal, deeply embedded in our cultural mythology," said Bill Galston, a former Clinton advisor now at the University of Maryland.

The ideal "is that a real man is a man of few words and determined, resolute action: like in [the movie] 'High Noon.' And Bush captures this almost perfectly and effortlessly."

The president's black-and-white pronouncements on terrorism and war — from his promise to capture Osama bin Laden "dead or alive" to his "bring 'em on" taunt to Iraqi resisters — which generate unease among many women and even some more affluent men, help cement Bush's attachment to blue-collar men, who, recent polls show, support him at higher levels than men with college degrees.

In the latest Pew survey, white men without college degrees preferred Bush to a Democrat in 2004 by 60% to 25%.

"I go back to the bullhorn in New York," said GOP pollster Winston, referring to Bush's speech in the rubble of the World Trade Center just days after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. "There was a sense this was a guy you would want to be in a foxhole with. I'm not sure who on the Democratic side at the moment is someone you would want to be in a foxhole with."

Bush is benefiting, too, from a political environment focused on terrorism and national security issues that highlight the aspects of his personality that many men like best. Men have traditionally been more inclined than women to support military action, and recent polls show white men significantly more enthusiastic about the decision to invade Iraq than other Americans.

"He kind of runs a testosterone-driven White House, in terms of both the rhetoric and the dominant issue, which is war," said John Anzalone, an Alabama-based Democratic pollster. "It's a natural resonance with men, particularly white men. Usually the only thing that knocks that down for a Democrat is the economy."

Indeed, Democrats are depending largely on an economic message to erode Bush's advantage among white men. Paul Maslin, the pollster for Dean, said that if the former Vermont governor wins the nomination, he'll run much better with white men than analysts expect by offering them a fierce populist critique of the president.

"I believe that nobody has made the economic or special-interest case from the Democratic Party in a fundamental way, and we are going to do it," Maslin said. "We are going to go after Bush on deficits, on trade, on cozying up to corporations, on job loss, on all the hard stuff."

The key question for Dean if he wins the nomination will be whether he can establish enough credibility on cultural and national security issues to win white men around economic concerns — the strategy he suggested when he spoke of using health care and job loss to appeal to "guys with Confederate flags on their pickup trucks."

Maslin said Republicans are underestimating Dean if "they think they can characterize us as Vermont, gays, war, and it's game, set, match."

But other Democrats worry that if Dean's liberal positions on social issues, such as civil unions for gays, and his emphatic opposition to the war in Iraq allow Republicans to typecast him as a Northeastern cultural elitist, "he could get wiped out among [white men] not by a 24-point margin like Gore, but by a 30- or 35-point margin," Teixeira said.

Indeed, two polls this month pitting Dean against Bush gave the president crushing 36-point leads among white men.

Some analysts in both parties say Wesley K. Clark's background as a retired general might open doors with white men if he wins the nomination. But many believe that the depth of Bush's connection with these voters will create problems for whomever the Democrats pick.

"The notion that any Democrat is going to be able to close the male gap substantially may be wishful thinking because of Bush's strength," Galston said. "I think it is going to be tough for everybody."

---

Quote:

---

=
Regardless. What Dean did wrong still doesn't justify Cheney doing it as well. They both should be accountable to their constituency. In Cheney's case, that constituency is much larger though.

---

Quote:

---

I dunno. Could the fact that i'm not instantly smitten by Bush have anything to do with the fact that I don't fit the demographic match?

---

Quote:

---

The Republican side is as exciting as watching paint dry, but the DEM race has more drama than a "very special" episode of Rob Kamphausen's favorite show, Boston Public.

I'd like to see everyone who plans on voting in the DEM primaries handicap the field and tell who ya like.

I am going out on a limb and say Whomod is a Dean voter!

Regardless of preference, do you think the DEMs will field a candidate who can beat Bush?

---

Quote:

---

A LOOK AT THE BUSH PRESIDENCY
President charts his own course.
Bush has been bold, even radical. He has more big plans. But Americans still are split in their opinions about him.
.
BY Ron Hutcheson
rhutcheson@krwashington.com




HE HAS PUT HIS MARK ON AMERICA: During his tenure, President Bush has made striking departures from American and Republican traditions in both domestic and foreign policy.



WASHINGTON - George W. Bush came to office without a majority of voters behind him, fueling widespread expectations that he would seek to forge a bipartisan coalition and govern cautiously from the center.
Instead he rules as though he had won the White House in a landslide.
He has stamped his mark on America and the world with a big, bold and, in some ways, even radical presidency. Emboldened by self-confidence -- critics call it arrogance -- Bush has made striking departures from American and Republican traditions.
"He's trying to forge a new definition of conservative," said Lee Edwards, an expert on political philosophy at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. "Just as Clinton was trying to be a `new' Democrat, maybe Bush is trying to be a 'new' Republican."
He certainly has charted his own course on foreign policy. Bush scrapped Cold War arms-control agreements, abandoned the global-warming treaty, asserted a doctrine of preemptive war against threats that are only potential, not imminent, and defied global opinion to invade Iraq in search of weapons of mass destruction that no one can find.
The "humble" foreign policy that he talked about during the last presidential campaign was replaced by an us-versus-them style that alienated some traditional allies, led by France and Germany, and called into question America's will to work in partnership with others. Around the world, polls show that many fear he's trying to run the world from Washington. He says he's simply providing the leadership the world needs to confront urgent problems that others prefer to duck.
At home, he slashed taxes while watching the $236 billion federal budget surplus he inherited turn into a $400 billion annual deficit. Faced with a tough choice between guns and butter -- military or domestic spending -- Bush chose both, along with big tax cuts.
Overall government spending is up by 16 percent since he took office, due in large part to the war on terrorism and the invasion of Iraq. But even nondefense domestic spending is up 11 percent, according to a recent analysis by the Heritage Foundation.
"This is a different orientation, that government is not necessarily the enemy," said George Edwards III, director of the Center for Presidential Studies at Texas A&M University. "He wants to use government in a conservative way for liberal ends."
In a move that alarmed fiscal conservatives of every party, Bush expanded Lyndon Johnson's Great Society legacy by adding a big new entitlement -- prescription drug coverage -- to Medicare. Despite efforts to hold down costs, the change is expected to cost at least $400 billion over the next 10 years, and many independent experts believe that estimate is dramatically low.
Bush also greatly expanded the federal government's role in education, a remarkable turnabout from Ronald Reagan's call to abolish the Education Department. That was still a GOP crusade less than 10 years ago, when Newt Gingrich led Republicans to capture control of the House of Representatives in the name of down-sizing government. Republican control of Congress remains, yet so does a now much-stronger federal Education Department.
"We're building in a much lower revenue stream even as we've added big government initiatives. That combination is unprecedented," said Robert Bixby, executive director of the Concord Coalition, a bipartisan budget-watchdog group. "It's an attempt to do big government on the cheap, which comes out as big deficits."

Administration officials and most economists say the deficit isn't a problem at this point because it is relatively small compared with the overall economy. Bush also contends that his tax cuts will spur enough growth to cut the deficit in half within five years. But that's when the baby boom generation begins to retire, which will send federal spending on Social Security and Medicare soaring for decades, making it much harder to avoid deepening government debt.
IN PURSUIT OF TERRORISTS
HOMELAND SECURITY DEPARTMENT CREATED
Forced by the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to put the government on a war footing, Bush also created a Cabinet-level Homeland Security Department in the biggest reorganization of the federal government since World War II.
And with bipartisan support from Congress in enacting the Patriot Act, Bush's Justice Department is testing the limits of constitutional protections for individual liberties in its zealous pursuit of potential terrorists.
Recent court rulings have overturned the administration's efforts to detain terror suspects without filing charges or giving them access to lawyers. And two federal appellate courts issued separate rulings challenging the administration's treatment of U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism, as well as its handling of more than 600 detainees at the U.S. base in Guantánamo Bay.
Bush has other big plans in the works. He has served notice that he'll continue to push for a producer-friendly federal energy policy, an overhaul of the legal system to discourage lawsuits and laws to make his tax cuts permanent. He is also expected to announce plans to revive the manned spaceflight program with trips to the moon or Mars.
His proposal to privatize Social Security by letting workers invest in stocks is at the top of his to-do list for a second term.
"HE'S THINKING BIG",
BUSH HAS AMBITIOUS FOREIGN POLICY AGENDA
Bush's foreign policy agenda is even more ambitious.
Some influential national-security advisors to Bush's civilian Pentagon leaders, such as Richard Perle, call for U.S. pressure to force regime change in Syria and Iran. In addition to the war on terrorism and the reconstruction of Iraq, Bush wants his legacy to include peace between Israelis and Palestinians and the spread of democracy throughout the Middle East.
"This is a guy who really wants to bring about major change. He's thinking big and bold," said Edwards, the Texas A&M professor.
"He has squeezed about as much out of the system as you can. He keeps pushing."

As Bush gears up for his re-election campaign, Americans have a much better fix on the man in the Oval Office than they did three years ago, but they are as divided as ever in their opinions of him. In an era of polarizing politics, Bush is a love-him or hate-him leader.
Loyal Republicans love him, die-hard Democrats detest him. Nearly 40 percent of Americans remain convinced that Bush wasn't elected legitimately, about the same percentage as when he took office.
Swing voters tend to like his personality but aren't so sure about his policies. Bush's approval rating, as measured by the Gallup poll, has shifted from a high of 90 percent after Sept. 11 to a low of 50 percent during the fall amid the difficulties in Iraq. Saddam Hussein's capture sent it up to 63 percent.
If Sept. 11 was a watershed for Bush's popularity, the war in Iraq caused many Americans to reconsider their views.
"After 9/11, he was able to unite the country. And then Iraq came and it just all went away. It just seemed to intensify the anger," said Carroll Doherty, editor of the nonpartisan Pew poll.
But Americans also have become increasingly optimistic about the economy. The recession that started shortly after Bush took office officially ended later that year, but it wasn't until this year that average Americans began to feel the change. Even now, some parts of the country that were hard hit by setbacks in the manufacturing sector seem to be stuck in a jobless recovery.
Recent employment gains haven't been nearly enough to recoup the nearly three million jobs that have been lost since Bush took office. The economic outlook in 2004 may well be the key indicator in determining whether he gets a second term.
"Our economy is strong, it is vibrant, people are finding work," Bush said at his year-end Cabinet meeting.
"But we won't rest until everybody who wants to find a job can find one."
LEADERSHIP IN SPOTLIGHT
GOP CONVENTION WILL
BE NEAR 9/11 SITE
Bush and his advisors also hope to make the election a referendum on his leadership, especially his role as commander in chief. For the first time since the party's founding in 1854, Republicans will hold their nominating convention in New York. The setting in Madison Square Garden, blocks away from the demolished World Trade Center, is tailor-made to evoke memories of Sept. 11.
"My job is to keep America secure," Bush said at his last news conference of the year. "I don't expect people to agree with every decision I make. But regardless of whether they do or not, I'm going to continue making the decisions in the way that I think is best for the country."

---

Quote:

---

Now in defense of Dean, the fact that he is an MD is certainly appealing. Whether we choose to face or ignore the health care crisis in this country, it's coming to a head nonethless. Dean IMO is the BEST suited and probably the one i'd have the most faith in to adress the problem WITHOUT simply making politically 'safe' token solotions and kowtowing to special interests.

---

Quote:

---

whomod said:
You mean Dean's colleagues would manufacture a health care crisis in California??

---