ok, i’ve been avoiding writing journal entries about politics, but today north korea revealed that they definitely have nuclear weapons.
so, to put it in perspective, while the u.s has spent 2 years and $300 billion dollars waging a war in iraq where there are no weapons of mass destruction, north korea has happily proceeded to produce nuclear weapons while we looked the other way and were busy waging a pointless war in iraq.
and it was also revealed the other day that the bush administration lied about the cost of their medicare bill.
they had said that it would cost $300 billion over 10 years and now they’re admitting that it will cost over $700 billion.
if these were different times there would be an angry mob at the gates of the white house waiting to run the bush administration out of town.
-moby

ok, i’ve tried to avoid angry journal entries about politics, but i feel like today i can’t help myself.
how much fucking money did the republicans spend on the inauguration?
$50 million?
$100 million?
$150 million?
and what else could have been done with that money?
armor for soldiers in iraq?
relief for victims of the tsunami?
money for local schools?
money for darfour?

and in his inauguration speech president bush made it seem like the world is rosy and everything is fine.
dear president bush, the world is not rosy, everything is not fine.
the war in iraq has resulted in:
the erosion of our relationships with our allies.
3,000 dead american soldiers.
15,000 wounded american soldiers.
125,000 dead iraqis.
instability throughout the middle east.
a waste of $150 billion dollars.

and this president has the gall to party and dance like everything is fine.
he is like nero, fiddling while rome burns.
america and the world should be outraged and finally call for his impeachment.
-moby

the bush administration are trying to dodge questions about the theft of 380 tons of high-grade explosives from the weapons depot at al qaqaa.
but here are the facts as we know them:
1-a tv crew from a minneapolis tv station documented that the explosives were in al qaqaa after the invasion.
2-the administration knew about the explosives.
3-the administration gave no order to secure the explosives, so now 380 tons of high-grade explosives are in the hands of the terrorists.
4-when the administration says that they’ve destroyed a lot of weapons they are being disingenuous, because 98% of what they’ve destroyed are conventional weapons like bullets and old rifles. the 380 tons of explosives that are now in the hands of the terrorists are the sort of explosives that are used to blow up airplanes and detonate nuclear weapons.
and they were stolen under the administrations nose, after the bush administration were told of their existence.

these are the facts as we now know them.
let’s see if the media hold george bush accountable or if, once again, they let him get away with dodging responsibility for a tragic lapse and oversight that will have unbelievably serious repercussions for all of us, including our soldiers.
moby

bush and his minions are trying to deflect blame for the missing 380 tons of explosive that were stolen under bush’s watch.
but here are some salient pieces of info:

in an oct. 25 ap story, a pentagon official said, “”us led coalition troops had searched al qaqaa in the immediate aftermath of the march 2003 invasion and confirmed that the explosives, which had been under iaea seal since 1991, were intact.”” iraq’s top science official, mohammed al-sharaa, confirmed these reports, saying, “”it is impossible that these materials could have been taken from this site before the regime’s fall. the officials that were inside this facility (al qaqaa) beforehand confirm that not even a shred of paper left it before the fall.””

-moby

i wonder what’s going to happen on november 3rd?
i wonder if there’ll be a clear outcome to the election?
i wonder who will win?
i wonder what the ramifications will be for:
a-the country
b-the world
c-the respective parties
d-you
e-me
i wonder what a 2nd term bush administration would do?
i wonder what a 1st term kerry administration would do?
i wonder why so many wealthy new yorkers are concerned with issues that don’t affect them?
i wonder why so many rural and suburban americans are not concerned with issues that do affect them?
it is funny, if you think about it…
new yorkers are concerned with issues(minimum wage, rights of the poor, health care, veterans pay, etc)that don’t concern them, and middle america is concerned with issues(terrorism, national security)that don’t really affect them.
i mean, why are new yorkers making $500,000 a year be so concerned with health care for the poor? and why are people in iowa be concerned with the threat of terrorism on u.s soil?
it’s nice that people are so, seemingly, altruistic and selfless as to be concerned with issues that don’t necessarily affect them, but it’s really odd, too.
one of my selfish reasons for not supporting president bush is that i strongly believe that the bush administration has made me less safe.
i believe that bush’s foreign policy might play well in an abstract, jingoistic sense, but in a very real sense it has pissed off a lot of people who will do their very best to hurt america.
and when they hurt america they will probably try to hurt new york city. which is where i live.
so i refrain from supporting bush for many reasons, but one of the most important is that i believe that his presidency has made my friends and me less safe.
call me selfish, but there it is.
and yes, ‘my friends and me’ is grammatically correct.
wait. is it?
i think it is.
you know me, a stickler for grammar.
what’s the etymology of ‘stickler’?
if i have kids will they make fun of me for using words like ‘stickler’?
‘yo, dad, don’t be so damn corny all the time.’
ok, goodnight.
moby

you know what is a complete waste of time and energy?
mainstream presidential polling.
i know that i’ve talked about this before, but these polls are so flawed and so subjective that they are essentially irrelevant.
here’s a recap on why the polls are irrelevant:

1-the biggie: cell phones. all polling is done on land-lines, thus skewing the poll results older and more conservative. there is no directory for cell phones, so no polling can be done over cell phones, and most people under the age of 35 communicate primarily on a cell phone.
2-caller i.d. most relatively savvy people don’t pick up the phone if they don’t know who’s calling. and who, apart from the most bored/fanatical, is going to return a call to some strange survey organization?
3-the electoral college. saying that kerry is ahead nationally or that bush is ahead nationally literally means nothing. in 2000 al gore recieved 500,000 more votes than george bush but yet bush won the election based on the terrible and anachronistic electoral college. so polling only matters when it’s done on a state-by-state basis, and even then it’s flawed due to the fact that polling is never done on cell phones.
4-voter registration. hundreds of thousands of new voters have been added to voter registration rolls this year. the polling doesn’t take this into account. in fact the polling can’t take this into account.
and a significant percentage of newly registered voters are under the age of 35 and primarily communicate with a cell phone.
5-subjectivity on the part of a pollster. pollsters try to base their polls on ‘likely voters’ aka- someone who has voted repeatedly in the past. this leaves out young voters and newly registered voters and registered voters who might not have voted in the last election.

we can’t ignore the polls, but we can recognize that their methodology is inherently flawed and their results are inherently irrelevant.
and this cuts both ways, especially in this current election cycle, as some polls show kerry in the lead and some polls show bush in the lead and most polls show them tied.
the truth is that no one has a clue as to how the election is going to turn out.

moby

do you know about the boycott of sinclair broadcast group?
ok, in brief…sinclair broadcast group are an egregiously right-wing company who own a bunch of tv stations, and they are going to be airing a slanderous anti-kerry movie.
they have refused to air ‘going upriver’ or ‘fahrenheit 9-11’, but they are going to air this movie, even though it’s full of slander and lies and probably violates fec regulations.
i, and many others, are participating in a boycott of the companies who advertise with sinclair broadcast group.
the goal of the boycott is not to penalize the companies who advertise with sinclair, but rather to get sinclair broadcast group to cease their illegal, right -wing, partisan activities.

here’s a sample letter that i will be sending to sinclair’s advertisers:

“”i’m a patron and a supporter of your company, but i cannot in good conscience support any company that contributes advertising dollars to sinclair broadcast group, especially as sinclair broadcast group have shown themselves to be partisan in the extreme.
i will happily support your company so long as you do not advertise with sinclair broadcast group, or when sinclair broadcast group desists from their right-wing, anti-democratic partisan activities.
thank you,
richard m. hall””

and here is a web-site that links you to the companies who contributed ad dollars to sinclair:

http://www.boycottsbg.com/advertisers/default.aspx

please take the time to support this boycott.
moby

i have to say that the bush campaign are pretty remarkable at manipulating the media.
during the vice-presidential debate john edwards mentioned that dick cheney’s daughter was gay and that john edwards was touched by the way in which the cheney’s have stood up for their daughter and dick cheney said ‘thank you’.
on wednesday john kerry said pretty much the same thing and now dick cheney is all up in arms that his daughters sexual preference has been politicized.
so in the course of 2 weeks having his daughters sexual preference mentioned has gone from being something that merits a ‘thank you’ to something that merits umbrage and bluster and outrage?
or could it possibly be that this week has been disastrous week for the bush campaign and they are doing everything in their power to get people to focus their attention elsewhere?
to recap:
george bush lost all 3 debates.

george bush’s lead in the polls has evaporated

the budget numbers just came out showing that the federal deficit is at an all time high.

violence in iraq is increasing, with attacks in the u.s protected ‘green zone’.

gasoline and oil costs have reached an all time high.

tom delay, bill o’neill, and senior members of the administration are all under investigation for various ethical and legal lapses.

28 soldiers are under investigation in afghanistan for possible murder charges.

in other words, it has been a politically disastrous week for the bush campaign, and rather than deal with the electoral fall out from a politically disastrous week they get the media to collectively salivate over an issue that is prurient and irrelevant and, judging by dick cheney’s reaction to this issue during his debate with john edwards, wasn’t an issue 2 weeks ago.

yes, the bush campaigns ability to manipulate the media is pretty remarkable, although disturbing in that they can get a nations media to shift their focus away from the issues that are relevant and salient and focus on something that is, by dick cheney’s own admission, a non-issue.

i guess there’s a part of me that wishes that the media weren’t so easily led astray, or at the very least that someone in the media would ask the simple question, ‘how does this issue merit a “”thank you”” from dick cheney 2 weeks ago and “”i’m outraged!”” from dick cheney now?’

-moby

i wonder if george w. is going to have a breakdown this week.

1-he lost all 3 debates.
2-his lead in the polls is gone
3-gas prices and oil prices are going higher
4-the budget office just announced that his administration has, once again, created the largest deficit in the history of the united states
5-americans and american soldiers were killed by a bomb blast in the u.s protected ‘green zone’ in bagdad

john kerry won all 3 debates.
he won the first debate by a landslide.
the second date was almost a draw, but john kerry still won.
and john kerry won this 3rd debate hands down.
i’m not being partisan, and i’m trying not to be biased, but it just seems to me that john kerry won these debates.
he was better informed.
he was more direct.
he answered more of the questions.
he was calm and dignified.
he was very well spoken.
he made his points clearly.
in short, he won the debates.
the american people can choose whomever they want to in the election, but at least now the american people can clearly see the difference between the candidates.
john kerry is bright and dignified and experienced and informed.
george bush is, well, how to say it without indulging in slander…george bush just comes across as a shifty, disingenuous, insecure man.
in the debates bush was defensive and smirking and deceitful.
and again, the american people can make their choice.
but now we’ve seen the candidates. so at least we can only hope that people will make an informed choice.
moby

well, it actually gets more interesting when you get into the instant polling regarding the substance of the debate last night.
john kerry won every category except for likeability(where pres. bush beat him by 1 point).
so as regards: economic policy, job creation, command of the issues, vision, etc, john kerry was the clear winner.
it can’t be a happy day on the republican campaign trail today, seeing as an incumbent president has never been re-elected after losing all of the debates.
moby

i was reading an opinion piece in the ny times about the differences between the candidates, and one quote stood out among all the rest:

“”at andover, his boarding school in massachusetts, mr. bush was head cheerleader. at st. paul’s, his boarding school in new hampshire, mr. kerry helped found a political club to debate current events.””

in some ways it seems that this election hinges not on ideology or belief, not on partisan affiliation or on socio-economic background, but rather on where the candidates sat in the lunchroom when they were at school.

pres. bush sat with the frat boys and john kerry sat with the academics.

last night a friend of mine(a bush supporter)said, ‘president bush may not be very bright, but he has the ability to simplify the issues and that’s why americans like him.’
to which i responded, ‘maybe we deserve a president who doesn’t simplify the issues, as we live in a world that is increasingly complicated and nuanced.’

doesn’t it seem odd that john kerry’s intelligence and erudition are almost seen as liabilities?

-moby

george bush talks often about making up his mind and not wavering, as if that’s a sign of strength.
well, let me ask you a question, mr president:
if you wake up in the morning and you think that it’s going to be a sunny day do you refuse to put on a hat or open an umbrella if it starts to rain?
my point being that when circumstances change our responses to said circumstances should change as well.
to not change ones behavior in the face of changing circumstances is a form of pig-headed hubris that is dangerous and counter-productive, as we’ve seen in this president.
moby

dammit.
in 1994 bill clinton passed a law banning the sale of automatic assault weapons.
now under george bush the law has lapsed, so it is now, as of today, legal to buy fully automatic assault weapons in the u.s.a. yes, now there can be more mass murders at the hands of lunatics with fully automatic ak-47’s purchased legally over the internet.
dear president bush, you claim to be a christian. do you think that christ would be:
a-in favor of lunatics with automatic weapons shooting schoolyards full of children
or
b-opposed to lunatics with automatic weapons shooting schoolyards full of children.
?
but i guess the same questions could be asked of supposed right wing republican christians:
would christ be in favor or opposed to executing the mentally retarded?
would christ be in favor or opposed to the killing of thousands of innocent iraqi civilians?
would christ be in favor or opposed to allowing polluters to foul our water and air and thus increase the rate of birth defects in the united states for the first time in 75 years?

maybe some of these supposed right wing christian should do themselves a favor and actually read the teachings of christ that they purport to follow.
-moby

p.s-and, oh, call me heretical, but my feeling is that christ would not be in favor of lunatics with assault weapons killing schoolchildren…

from a campaign stop yesterday…

‘too many ob-gyn’s are unable to practice their love with women all across this country’

-george w. bush

and this is a real quote(i saw it on msnbc).
what the hell is wrong with this man?
moby

today donald rumsfeld described the 1,000 american soldiers who’ve been killed in iraq as a ‘small’ number.
i would like for him to visit the friends and families of every person killed in iraq and tell them that their sons or daughters death is part of a ‘small’ number.
god, what the hell is wrong with him?
moby

i can’t not write about politics.
i’d love to not write about politics, but the republicans are lying sacks of shit(yes, harsh language intended)and i can’t just sit back and let them lie and lie and lie.
they lie. then they lie some more. then when they’re done lying they relax by lying even more.
now they’re saying that the recession was ‘clintons recession’.
fuck them.
the recession(according to business week and the washington post)started in march, 2001, 3 months after george w. bush took office, and bush’s economic record has been terrible. 2 million jobs lost millions of people falling below the poverty line largest deficit in the history of the united states millions of jobs exported overseas the largest federal government in the history of the united states. etc.
the economy sucks, and the republicans are the ones responsible.
they haven’t helped new and small businesses. they’ve created an environment wherein bio-tech and hi-tech investments have gone overseas. and they’ve given tax breaks to people who are old and sclerotic and who are not putting their money back into the economy.
the economist, business week, the new york times, and the washington post have all come out and said that the recession started under george w. bush and it’s only been made worse by his flawed economic policies.
the republicans have proven themselves to be lying, loathsome, foul individuals with no integrity or decency.
republicans who’ve never served in the military criticize john kerry’s war record.
republicans who weren’t in new york on september 11th have come here to look patriotic by exploiting other peoples personal tragedy.
i hate to write journal entries when angry, but the repulicans have proven themselves to be the most foul, deceitful, dishonest, unscrupulous politicians that this country has seen in the last 100 years.
if americans who believe lies over truth elect bush/cheney then americans will get the lying, deceitful leaders that they deserve.
bush lies. cheney lies. republicans lie. i hate to be negative, but the republicans are lying sacks of shit with no honor and no integrity.
moby

ok, so i guess that my brief time(about 8 minutes)spent not writing journal entries about politics has come to an end.
i just watched bush’s acceptance speech and i was left with the following impressions:
1-he is a socialist. his speech was straight forward socialism, all filled with plans for government to spend more and get more involved in peoples lives. funny, i thought he was a republican, but all he does in his speeches is talk about how the government can spend more of the taxpayers money.
2-he’s had 3 1/2 years so far, and he hasn’t yet shown an iota of interest in most of the things that he addressed in his speech(health care? retraining workers? home-ownership for the middle classes?). how can anyone trust this man?
3-he looks like a cross between mad magazine’s alfred e. neuman and howdy doody, but dumber and on drugs. when he smiles it makes me want to flee in terror, like i’m looking at an evil clown-elf.
4-i couldn’t help but notice that he just barely mentioned the state of the economy. could that be because he’s ruined the economy and that he’s presided over the loss of 2 million jobs? he said that things are getting better. well, actually they’re not. they’re a little bit better than a year ago, but the economy is just a sad, pale thing when compared to the robust economy that we had when clinton was president(remember clinton? created a government surplus? re-structured welfare? knew his way around foreign policy? clinton was a better republican president than george w. will ever be…).
5-not to be tautological, but he really does look like an weird and demented clown-elf. and i know that it’s juvenile to call someone names, but can’t we expect more from our president? shouldn’t we have a president who doesn’t lie and who can string two sentences together and doesn’t look like an evil clown elf?
yes, that’s mean of me(the clown-elf part), but it’s true.
he just looks like howdy doody on ketamine.
i’ll take a break from the political journal entries at some point, in the meantime i’ll at least try to make my ranting and raving a little bit more entertaining.
-moby

p.s-where the hell was colin powell? they let fucking zell ‘i’m an insane person from georgia and i probably have dead hookers buried in my basement’ miller speak, but not colin powell?

good economic news?
oh no, just smoke and mirrors, and here’s why…

“”under bill clinton 16 percent of all american wage and salary payments came from the government, but under the bush administration 18 percent of all american wage and salary payments have come directly from the government.””
-new york times

in other words, bush is buying jobs with borrowed money.
didn’t republicans used to believe in small and responsible government?
feel free to forward this to your republican friends, see what their response is…
-moby

p.s-if you think that the difference between 16% & 18% is small, well, it’s not. a 2 point difference represents billions and billions of dollars in increased federal spending. couple that with the tax-cut-for-old wealthy-people and you have the largest federal deficit in the history of the u.s.

ok, now this is really going to be the last political update for a while…
you know what politics is/are like in the united states?
it’s like pop-music and/or dating.
example a: pop-music.
republicans are like ashley simpson, and democrats are like radiohead. radiohead fans will forever be mystified as to why someone would buy an ashley simpson cd, but ashley simpson’s handlers/managers understand what the lowest common denominator are looking for and they give it to them. radiohead fans think ‘that disposable pop music is terrible, and someday people will see the error of their ways and buy radiohead cd’s instead of ashley simpson cd’s’, meanwhile ashley simpson and her managers are selling millions of records.
example b: dating.
democrats are the bright, conscientious, responsible guy in the corner of the party and republicans are the loud, boastful, arrogant guy in the middle of the room. the bright guy in the corner thinks ‘that loud guy in the middle of the room is a jerk and eventually everyone will see him for what he is’, but the loud guy goes home with the hot girl and the bright guy in the corner goes home alone.

my point?
yes, radiohead are better than ashley simpson.
and yes, the bright, interesting guy in the corner is better than the loud jerk in the middle of the room. but ashley simpson and the loud jerk in the middle of the room know what people want, and that’s why they(and the republicans)are winning.
democrats are nuanced and complicated and republicans are simple and sound-bitey.
people want bright shiny simplicity, not dark obscure complexity.
the democrats put their trust in people’s better instincts whereas the republicans put their trust in people’s basest instincts.
and that’s why the republicans are winning, because they’re not governed by ideals, they’re governed by results. the republicans want to win no matter what, whereas the democrats want to win because the public will, hopefully, recognize the primacy of their ideas.
and that’s why democrats are the step-child party. that’s why democrats are the avis to the republicans hertz. that’s why democrats are the runners up. because the republicans know how to sell and they know how to win.
of course my hope is that the democrats will learn from the republicans and learn how to win.
but too often it seems that democrats take the ‘high road’ when the noble and effective thing would be to join the battle in the trenches.
republicans are dirty, and will stop at nothing to win. we saw in 2000 that when democrats take the ‘high road’ that they lose.
so that’s the choice, democrats: take the ‘high road’ and lose, or learn how to compete in the real world and run the risk of winning…
bill clinton did it, and he won.
al gore didn’t do it, and he lost.
i hope that john kerry learns from bill clinton…
-moby

the last year of bill clinton’s presidency the united states had a budget surplus of $127 billion dollars.
when george bush was elected he promised a budget surplus of $262 billion dollars by 2004.
on friday the bush administration presented a budget that has the largest deficit in the history of the united states, $445 billion dollars.
so in 3 years the bush administration have taken a $127 billion dollar surplus and turned it into a $445 billion dollar deficit.
that’s a difference/loss of $572 billion dollars.
or:
$572,000,000,000.00

just show that to anyone who dares to suggest that the bush administration and the republicans have been good caretakers of the economy.
-moby

wow.
michael moore’s ‘fahrenheit 9-11’ was the highest grossing movie in the u.s last week, even though it only opened on 800-ish screens.
that’s amazing.
and bush’s approval rating is at a new low, 42 percent.
and most pollsters believe that an incumbent president with an approval rating below 50 percent at this stage in the election cycle can’t expect to win re-election. it’s nice to have some good news.
but we can’t get complacent, cos the bush camp have hundreds of millions of dollars to spend and they’re not in any way restrained by any notions of decency or civility.
so, with the bush camp like a cornered dog, it’s safe to say that they’re going to get as awful and vicious as they did with john mccain in south carolina in 2000 and with max leland in 2002.
we can all relax in november when the democrats have re-taken the house and senate and when john kerry has won the election, but for the next four months we need to be diligent and vigilant, and we need to work even harder to get rid of bush and his nefarious administration.
and if you haven’t seen fahrenheit 9-11 then please go see it.
the most disturbing scene for me is still the raw footage of bush sitting for 10 minutes doing nothing after being told that terrorists had flown a plane into the 2nd tower of the world trade center.
oh, sorry, he wasn’t doing nothing, he was reading a book about a goat that was intended for 6 year olds.
moby

so here’s a dumb question…
if iraq becomes a sovereign state on june 30th as the president is proposing, and the u.s still has 150,000 troops in iraq on july 1st, as the president is also proposing, then won’t these 150,000 troops be taking orders from a barely legitimate iraqi government?
is that the way to win over the hearts and minds of americans, george?
to let a barely legitimate iraqi government, who will most likely be hostile to the united states, give orders to 150,000 u.s troops?
and now bush wants to build new prisons in iraq?
how about a few new police stations or schools here in the u.s?
moby

from our genius-in-chief…

“”the bob jones policy on interracial dating, i mean i spoke out on interracial dating. i spoke against that. i spoke out against interracial dating. i support the policy of interracial dating.””
-george w. bush

㊠– cbs news; february 25, 2000

i know that i’ve posted a lot about the prisoner abuse and torture that’s happened at the hands of americans in iraq, afghanistan, and elsewhere.
do you fully understand the implications of this?
america has lost whatever moral high ground it ever held.
as the purported ‘bringers of democracy’ we have now been seen by the world community as sadists and torturers and as a nation that seemingly only gives lipservice to humanitarian efforts and the spread of democracy.
even bush’s chief of staff, karl rove, has said that the torture in iraq and afghanistan and elsewhere has set american diplomacy back by 25 years.
and now we find out that not only did rumsfeld and bush know about the use of torture as a means of a coercion, but that they actively pursued policy that encouraged it.
american foreign policy has always been marred by inconsistency and hypocrisy, but up until now it had seemed that the balance swung towards well intentioned efforts that even sometimes yielded positive results.
but now, thanks to the efforts of the bush administration, america has, sadly and officially, become a pariah among other nations.
we criticize other nations for not being democratic and for sponsoring torture, and yet we shut down newspapers in other countries and encourage torture as an official means of intelligence gathering.
as i said in another journal entry: rumsfeld needs to be fired and tried by the world criminal court, and bush needs to be impeached.
moby

i do wonder, and maybe ask your right-wing friends, if there were a democrat as president who:
a-had been captain of his cheerleading squad in high school
b-had missed 1 year of his questionable, privileged military service
c-had lost 3 million jobs during his presidency
d-had started a war that no one supported and that cost $150 billion dollars and hundreds of lives
e-had alienated all of our allies
f-had created the largest federal deficit in the history of the u.s
g-had created the largest federal government in the history of the u.s
h-had a hard time telling the truth and routinely embarrassed himself and his country and his office during interviews and press conferences due to his inability to coherently string two sentences together.
would they still support him(aka gw bush)if he were a democrat?
please, ask your right-wing friends.
and no deflective rhetorical answers from them, please.
mo

in the last few weeks the news has been filled with accusations from richard clarke that the bush administration did very little to prevent 9-11 and accusations that the war in iraq was waged under false and spurious and frivolous pretenses and that the bush administration have been deceitful in most of their dealings in issues of national security.
objectively inclined democrats and progressives in the u.s have known for years that bush and his administration are deceit-mongers. and we’ve known for years that bush and his administration are inept and short-sighted. but do you know what’s great?
even bush’s staunch supporters have started to doubt, as well they should.
as i’ve said, bush is a terrible president by anyone’s criteria, be they democrat or republican.
if bush were a democrat the republicans would’ve torn him apart, and the only reason that bush has any republican support is that most republicans are still blindly, tribally loyal and perhaps ashamed to admit that they’ve made a huge mistake in supporting such an extremist and inept administration.
my only hope is that a majority of americans finally wake up to the fact that bush and his administration have been inept, deceitful, and corrupt in their dealings with the american people.
as i’ve said before, i’m not opposed to the dialectic that exists between the right and the left in america. when balanced it’s healthy. but the bush administration have perniciously skewed this dialectic as a result of their short-sightedness and their ineptitude.
and i hope that a majority of americans eventually wake up to this fact.
moby

see, one of the problems with liberals in america is that they have this naive belief that people will respond to the truth.
as a result, liberals believe that by talking about the truths of gw bush’s record, that right-wing republicans will choose to reject gw bush.
but liberals are naive and they don’t incorporate the variables of tribalism and subservience into their understanding of their counterparts.
see, most conservative-leaning americans desperately want to believe, regardless of the actual facts. so rather than looking at the truth objectively(i.e-gw bush has presided over a net job loss of 3 million jobs, gw bush has lied to congress and the american people about wmd’s and terrorists in iraq, gw bush has alienated all of our allies, gw bush has created the largest federal government and the largest federal deficit in the history of the u.s, gw bush’s largest campaign contributor was enron, gw bush did nothing to prevent 9-11 and he even cut funding to counterterrorism during the first 8 months of his presidency, etc, etc), most conservatives choose to blindly pledge allegiance to the current leader-in-chief.
maybe it’s a misplaced daddy-complex, maybe it’s the inability to admit that they’re wrong, maybe it’s evolutionary-psychology and the allegiance to percieved status, maybe it’s the willful suppression of disbelief.
who knows?
but the fact that bush currently enjoys a 52% approval rating either means, quite simply, that:
a-people are not paying attention to the news.
or
b-people are blindly pledging allegiance to gw bush regardless of his screw-ups.
i mean, when people from bush’s own cabinet take the unprecedented step of saying that gw bush is a failure and a screw-up, and most american still don’t negatively assess gw bush, then something other than an objective assessment of the facts is at work.
i guess my only hope at this point is that america wakes up from it’s collective political hypnogogia and collectively recognizes that gw bush and his administration have failed us in every single way that the executive branch could fail the american people.
moby

until condi rice publicly testifies before the 9-11 commission and until they declassify richard clarke’s prior testimony and correspondence while he was the head of counter-terrorism for george bush the dominant question of the next 6 months will be:
‘what is the white house hiding and why?’
it’s not too hard to figure out, really.
the ex-head of counterterrorism for the bush administration, richard clarke, has said that the bush administration didn’t pay attention to terrorism and terrorist threats before 9-11 and that the bush administration has used 9-11 to wage a completely unrelated war against iraq. when the head of bush’s counterterrorist department says that(and another high ranking bush cabinet official, paul o’neill has said the same things)then you can pretty safely bet that it’s true and that the bush administration is terrified at what the truth will show: that they didn’t pay attention to terrorist threats before 9-11 and that they waged a war against iraq even though they knew that there was nothing connecting iraq with al qaeda.
maybe i’m just being overly hopeful, but i do believe that this has the potential to sink bush’s chances for re-election.
moby

to the right wing conservatives who visit moby.com and read my journal entries, how do you defend the bush administrations contradicting themselves and making advertisements using images from 9-11 when they said that they wouldn’t?
-moby

before:
on 1/23/02, president bush said “”i have no ambition whatsoever to use [9/11 or national security] as a political issue.””
on 5/17/02, vice president cheney said using 9/11 for political gain is “”thoroughly irresponsible and totally unworthy of national leaders in a time of war.””
on 3/4/03, senate intelligence committee ranking member richard shelby (r-al) is asked if republicans should use the war for political gain and responded, “”absolutely not. and as a republican, i would deplore such tactics.””
[sources: ap, 1/23/02; washington times, 5/17/02; cnn, 3/4/02]

now:
ny daily news:

the bush reelection campaign yesterday unveiled its first three campaign commercials showcasing ground zero images, angering some 9/11 families who accused president bush of exploiting the tragedy for political advantage.

㊠“”it’s a slap in the face of the murders of 3,000 people,”” said monica gabrielle, whose husband died in the twin tower attacks. “”it is unconscionable.””

paul krugman from the new york times wrote:

people are saying terrible things about george bush. they say that his officials weren’t sincere about pledges to balance the budget. they say that the planning for an invasion of iraq began seven months before 9/11, that there was never any good evidence that iraq was a threat and that the war actually undermined the fight against terrorism.

but these irrational bush haters come from strange places, such as the executive offices of alcoa, and the halls of the army war college.

i was one of the few commentators who didn’t celebrate paul o’neill’s appointment as treasury secretary. and i couldn’t understand why, if mr. o’neill was the principled man his friends described, he didn’t resign early from an administration that was clearly anything but honest.

but now he’s showing the courage i missed back then, by giving us an invaluable, scathi

ron suskind’s new book “”the price of loyalty”” is based largely on interviews with and materials supplied by mr. o’neill. it portrays an administration in which political considerations ã‘ satisfying “”the base”” ã‘ trump policy analysis on every issue, from tax cuts to international trade policy and global warming. the money quote may be dick cheney’s blithe declaration that “”reagan proved deficits don’t matter.”” but there are many other revelations.

one is that mr. o’neill and alan greenspan knew that it was a mistake to lock in huge tax cuts based on questionable projections of future surpluses. in may 2001 mr. greenspan gloomily told mr. o’neill that because the first bush tax cut didn’t include triggers ã‘ it went forward regardless of how the budget turned out ã‘ it was “”irresponsible fiscal policy.”” this was a time when critics of the tax cut were ridiculed for saying exactly the same thing.

another is that mr. bush, who declared in the 2000 campaign that “”the vast majority of my tax cuts go to the bottom end of the spectrum,”” knew that this wasn’t true. he worried that eliminating taxes on dividends would benefit only “”top-rate people,”” asking his advisers, “”didn’t we already give them a break at the top?””

most startling of all, donald rumsfeld pushed the idea of regime change in iraq as a way to transform the middle east at a national security council meeting in february 2001.

there’s much more in mr. suskind’s book. all of it will dismay those who still want to believe that our leaders are wise and good.

the question is whether this book will open the eyes of those who think that anyone who criticizes the tax cuts is a wild-eyed leftist, and that anyone who says the administration hyped the threat from iraq is a conspiracy theorist.

the point is that the credentials of the critics just keep getting better. how can howard dean’s assertion that the capture of saddam hasn’t made us safer be dismissed as bizarre, when a report published by the army war college says that the war in iraq was a “”detour”” that undermined the fight against terror? how can charges by wesley clark and others that the administration was looking for an excuse to invade iraq be dismissed as paranoid in the light of mr. o’neill’s revelations?

so far administration officials have attacked mr. o’neill’s character but haven’t refuted any of his facts. they have, however, already opened an investigation into how a picture of a possibly classified document appeared during mr. o’neill’s tv interview. this alacrity stands in sharp contrast with their evident lack of concern when a senior administration official, still unknown, blew the cover of a c.i.a. operative because her husband had revealed some politically inconvenient facts.

some will say that none of this matters because saddam is in custody, and the economy is growing. even in the short run, however, these successes may not be all they’re cracked up to be. more americans were killed and wounded in the four weeks after saddam’s capture than in the four weeks before. the drop in the unemployment rate since

more politics, sorry…
an angry republican friend of mine emailed me and asked ‘if you were president after september 11th, what would you have done??!!’
and i wrote back that if i were president i probably would’ve attacked afghanistan to eliminate the al qaeda presence there, much as george bush had done. but i also wrote back that the u.n and our allies seemed to, for he most part, support the war in afghanistan. where we lost our allies was in waging a war in iraq under unilateral and disingenuous auspices.
bush said that the war in iraq was a war on terrorism. but he knew that there was no al qaeda presence in iraq. bush said that the war in iraq was a war to rid iraq of it’s weapons of mass destruction. but he knew that there were no weapons of mass destruction in iraq.
bush said that the war in iraq was a war to rid iraq of weapons grade plutonium. but he knew that there was no weapons grade plutonium in iraq.

my love of my country and my patriotism compel me to be critical of the bush administration’s waging war against iraq. it’s a war based on lies and fallacies. it’s a war that’s cost 1000’s of lives. it’s a war that’s damaged our relations with our allies. it’s a war that’s further destabalized the middle east. it’s a war that’s going to end up costing hundreds of billions of dollars.
and that’s why i don’t think that it’s incompatible to be critical of bush and the war in iraq and to also be a good american citizen. in fact i believe that to be a good citizen would compel one, regardless of one’s party affiliation, to be critical of the mess that the bush administration have created in iraq.
ok, i’ll give the political updates a break for a while and get back to updates about tacos.
thanks
moby

republican appointed judges today issued a ruling saying that it is permissible for coal companies to bury streams during the coal strip-mining process.
i hope that at least some democrats are keeping track of these sort of republican sponsored environmental tragedies.
it seems like any democrat who runs on the ‘i won’t let coal companies bury streams’ ticket should win the next election without too much trouble.
the environmental record of the bush administration and the republicans speaks for itself in its utter disregard for environmental well-being and it’s shameless pandering to big business. all the democrats need to do is to shine a light on the environmental record of the bush administration and the republicans and they (the democrats) will easily win in 2004.
pictures of dying animals and decimated forests and ruined streams.
moby

you know what?
this is my website, and if i feel like posting political updates, then i’m going to. most of the people on this website i love like they’re my family, but there are a few of you who irritate me very, very much. only one or two of you, but you’re very annoying and i often wonder why you’re here. and if you don’t like my politics, then fine, but i don’t see how you can attack the democrats when our republican leadership does stuff like this:

washington (reuters) – vice president dick cheney said on wednesday his energy policy team was considering the future of u.s. nuclear power and that new nuclear plants could help cut greenhouse gases that cause global warming better than a ”seriously flawed” kyoto treaty.

“if you want to do something about carbon dioxide emissions, then you ought to build nuclear power plants. they don’t emit any carbon dioxide. they don’t emit greenhouse gases,” cheney said on msnbc’s “hardball” program.

because of the fact that we don’t have a democrat in the white house we now have an administration that is using deceit and lies to get nuclear power plants built (like dick cheney actually cares about green house gas emissions…) and to open up the alaskan wildlife reserve for oil drilling.

i’m fed up with ignorance and arrogance on the part of the left in this country. these issues are real, not rhetorical, and you can flame me all you want, but the truth is that the environmental and cultural well-being of our country are being compromised by our current administration.
-moby

you know what?
this is my website, and if i feel like posting political updates, then i’m going to. most of the people on this website i love like they’re my family, but there are a few of you who irritate me very, very much. only one or two of you, but you’re very annoying and i often wonder why you’re here. and if you don’t like my politics, then fine, but i don’t see how you can attack the democrats when our republican leadership does stuff like this:

washington (reuters) – vice president dick cheney said on wednesday his energy policy team was considering the future of u.s. nuclear power and that new nuclear plants could help cut greenhouse gases that cause global warming better than a ”seriously flawed” kyoto treaty.

“if you want to do something about carbon dioxide emissions, then you ought to build nuclear power plants. they don’t emit any carbon dioxide. they don’t emit greenhouse gases,” cheney said on msnbc’s “hardball” program.

because of the fact that we don’t have a democrat in the white house we now have an administration that is using deceit and lies to get nuclear power plants built (like dick cheney actually cares about green house gas emissions…) and to open up the alaskan wildlife reserve for oil drilling.

i’m fed up with ignorance and arrogance on the part of the left in this country. these issues are real, not rhetorical, and you can flame me all you want, but the truth is that the environmental and cultural well-being of our country are being compromised by our current administration.
-moby

fyi:

washington (reuters) – president george w. bush has decided to shut down the white house offices on aids policy and race relations.

i’ve said it before and i’ll have ample opportunity to say it again, the man is an evil dimwit.
what is he thinking?

you might be bored with political updates, but these are really strange and desperate times and they demand out attention.

and, not to be contentious, but if al gore were our president we would still have white house offices on aids policy and race relations and the alaskan wildlife refuge wouldn’t be up for oil development and overseas family planning groups wouldn’t have to worry about having their funding cut and etc and etc and it’s been less than a month since george w. took office and i have to say it again, ‘what is he thinking?’
how is being a militant arch-conservative in any way practicing the politics of ‘unity’.?
moby

i just found out something that is really cool and interesting, but i don’t know if i’m allowed to mention it. sorry, i know that’s annoying, like when someone says “”oh, i was going to tell you that, oh, nevermind”” and they won’t tell you. ok, when i find out if i can tell you, then i’ll tell you. it’s pretty cool. at least i think it is.

and, just a question, but do you think that the devil is the leader of the republican party?
just curious. think about it, the legislative aims of the republicans seem to be:
1-death penalty
2-destruction of parks and wilderness areas
3-redistributing money from the poor to the rich
4-spending heaps and heaps of money on weapons
5-good old fashioned (“”old time””, i love that expression) intolerance
6-obstructing gun control policies
etc
if you were the devil wouldn’t you be proud to allign yourself with the republican party? and, clever devil and his cadres of devil worshippers, call yourself ‘christian’ in the process?!
maybe i’m being swiftian (johnathan swift, a great man), but really, just as the moby-boards are an example of goodness and benevolence in the world, the republican party has to be the party of the devil. i’m sure of it.

if the democrats want to win the next election they only need to make one television advertisement.
photos of:
trent lott
newt gingrich
joe mccarty
richard nixon
beelzebub
rudolph giuliani
jesse helms
etc
with the word ‘republican’ under their faces. once you realize the true, satanic face of the republican party it makes it almost impossible to vote for one of them.

okay, i’m trying to be funny, but i do believe there’s some truth to what i’m saying here. for why would the devil waste his time hanging out in suburban basements with people listening to ‘kmfdm’ and ‘marilyn manson’ records?

wouldn’t his/her time be better spent in the halls of congress hanging out with trent lott and john ashcroft? i bet he’s there now, eating little babies with george bush and listening to john tesh cd’s.
moby

now i know that political discussions on this site have at times been contentious. but we are facing a political crisis in the u.s. with that in mind i’ve sent the following letter to the democratic national committee….

dear democratic national committee,
given the current republican administration i would love to be as financially supportive of your organization as is possible.
but i’m troubled by the democratic senators who are voting in favor of the confirmation of john ashcroft.
i don’t see how any self-respecting democrat could even consider giving a vote of support for a man like john ashcroft. his record is abominable, and although he pretends to be a quasi-moderate, his past statements and positions clearly establish him as a proponent of the pernicious agenda of the extreme right. over the next four years i will do everything in my power to oppose george w. bush and his atavistic and arbitrary agenda. but i cannot in good conscience lend financial support to democratic senators who have in any way supported geore w. bush, who, it is worth remembering, lost the last presidential election.

the republicans are quite good in presenting a unified front. my message to the elelcted representatives of the democratic party is that either they’re with us or against us.
these are troubling times, when an organized republican conspiracy can subvert the democratic process. the republicans who have conspired to steal the election from the rightfully elected candidate need to realize that we democrats will not lie down and be a passive doormat for their legislative goals. and those democrats who facilitate the furthering of the right wing agenda need to realize that they will not have our support, financially or otherwise.
-moby

sen. edward kennedy, a massachusetts democrat, read a 30-page statement in opposite to ashcroft on the senate floor on wednesday.

“”when a president nominates a person to serve in his cabinet, the presumption is rightly in favor of the nominee,”” kennedy said. “”but senator ashcroft has a long and detailed record of relentless opposition to fundemental issues of civil rights…and the people of this country deserve better.””

amen, ted kennedy.
oh please remember, everybody, these republicans are horrible people with a horrible agenda. republicans (henceforth known as ‘the devils party’) are going to do bad things. i don’t mean this as random hyperbole, but the next 4 years could be really bad.
moby