The threatened veto of the supplemental to fund the Iraq War contains ALL the money Bush requested to support out troops through the end of the fiscal year. Now Bush is telling the American People that if Congress passes the supplemental with restrictions on the War, he will veto the bill and Congress will have failed to fund the troops. That is not correct Mr. President! If congress had not included the needed funding such a claim would be valid. However, if you veto the bill that co...
Last night John McCain showed WHY he should NOT be the GOP candidate for President in 2008. In a CNN interview Sen. McCain made some outrageous statements that show he, like Bush and Cheney, refuse to accept the reality of Iraq and look at that conflict as they want it to be not as it is!! McCain said the surge had made it possible for Americans to walk safely in some sections of Baghdad outside the Green Zone. He also claimed that Gen. Petraeus regularly went into Baghdad in an “Unar...
Republican Senator Chuck Hagel said the following about the possibility of impeaching Bush over his refusal to listen to the will of Congress and the American people about ending our involvement in Iraq: “The president says, ‘I don’t care.’ He’s not accountable anymore,” Hagel says, measuring his words by the syllable and his syllables almost by the letter. “He’s not accountable anymore, which isn’t totally true. You can impeach him, and before this is over, you might see calls for hi...
Last night Gen. Powell spoke in SW Florida and was asked about Iraq. Gen. Powell said that mistakes made by the Bush Administration allowed the insurgency to develop into a Civil War in Iraq. He also admitted that Bush does not like him to call the situation in Iraq a “Civil War” but that is what he believes. That brief comment clearly demonstrates the difference between these two men. Bush and his side kick Cheney talk about how they did the right thing in Iraq even though t...
The issue causing the violence in Iraq is for CONTROL. Political control and for control of the oil wealth. Reducing the violence for a time in Baghdad by this surge will not alter this basic objective. Both the Sunni’s and Shea want to control the future of Iraq. We may see some reduction in attacks because of the increased military forces or because the factions want to lay low until U.S. Forces finally leave. However, what the Surge will not accomplish is to cause the factions to giv...
We very often hear that the private sector is more efficient then government. That is one of the GOP axioms. In an earlier Blog I provided data that showed the cost to provide support in combat zones to our military is several times MORE expensive when provided by private companies then by military manpower. Now the same thing exists in the Medicare program. Some years ago the claim was that it would be less expensive to have Medicare administered by private companies then the traditi...
The Pentagon has admitted that only ½ of the added Iraq Forces sent as part of this new surge are reporting for duty. This is down from 85% that reported for duty when the surge started about a month ago. This clearly shows that the Iraqi Government is NOT keeping the promises they made as part of the so called NEW Bush plan in Iraq. The time has come to turn the fighting in Iraq over to the Iraqi Military and police. If they choose not to control the sectarian violence it will be becaus...
If I had a dollar for every time I heard a Republican complain about INCREASED Federal Spending I would be a multi-millionaire. I looked at the changes in the federal budget over the past 6 years. Guess what? Interest on the debt is the biggest increase in federal spending followed by the Iraq War. The increased federal Spending on interest is about $150 Billion per year since 2000 and the increase in spending on the Iraq war is about $125 Billion per year. Every time a Republican c...
Every time George W. Bush visits a foreign country the people of that country protest and very often riot. We have had similar situations in the past but not to the extent and degree of the violence that greets Bush every time he travels. The riots in Brazil and the unrest anticipated in Columbia, Mexico and possibly the other stops on the Bush trips are an imbursement to our country. Bush should stay home and use video-conferences to talk with other world leaders. I wonder what Bush ...
Every politician that says we must CUT SPENDING to solve the fiscal problems of the U.S. should be required to list their top 10 spending cuts with the amounts they would propose to cut. I am very tired of listening to the meaningless statement that we hear from most GOP candidates and some Democrats that we are spending TOO MUCH . Fine then tell us just WHAT and HOW MUCH you propose to CUT to solve our fiscal problems!!!
Hardly a day goes by when evidence of just how inept the Bush Administrations has been in almost every area of their responsibility. Today the Congressional Commission evaluating the National Guard released its report. That report said 88% of National Guard Units are ineffective. The Iraq war has destroyed the effectiveness of the Guard units which are not capable of being deployed in combat and are unable to perform their state missions to deal with natural emergencies . They lac...
Last night Seymour Hersh was on Hardball. The discussion was about the consequences of the Bush policy in Iraq. Before some of you get ready to explain what was said was “Opinion”, understand the discussion was about “Results” not “Opinion”. Mr. Hersh listed the results of our invasion of Iraq. The results are: Enabled the People of Iraq to select a government. The new government is dominated by the majority Shies. The new government is closely allied with the faction that m...
I have spent a lot of my time documenting the consequences of the Fiscal policy we have been following. The reason is that in the world today without financial resources NOTHING can be accomplished. It takes resources to increase the military by 100,000. It takes money to hire the 10,000 border guards needed to help secure our border. It will take money to pay the Social Security and Medicare to the Baby Boomers as promised. Our fiscal policy is pledging FUTURE tax revenues to pay the ...
Today Ben Stein, a regular on Fox news, was being interviewed. He was discussing the need to begin saving early for retirement. The discussion then turned to taxes when one of the Fox Commentators’ asked Stein if it was true that about 75% of Income taxes are paid by the top 20% of the taxpayers. Mr. Stein responded that was correct. He then said that is because most of the wealth is held by the top 10% in this country. He went onto say that 90% of the securities are owned by 10% of t...
As the Congress debates the Bush war policy in Iraq Bush himself provides a strong argument to withdraw troops from the areas in Iraq that are engulfed in a Civil War and move them to Afghanistan. The quest for another 25-30,000 troops in Afghanistan from NATO is falling on deaf ears. The European members of NATO like Germany and France refuse to send more troops and will not allow any of their forces into the areas where the fighting is taking place with al Qaeda and the Taliban. The dru...