Saturday, October 07, 2006
Poor Tony Snow. He whines that the president wants to speak about serious issues, but the press is focused on a pedophile gay Republican who was sheltered by the leadership of the Republican controlled House. The short term memory span of the GOP is alarming. How can they not remember that for 8 years we were forced to listen to accusations, and investigations about Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky. Apparently issues were not so important back then.
I am awaiting the release of George Tenet's book. It will be interesting to see if the ex-CIA chief has balls. His "slam dunk" comment has been taken completely out of context and he is the only person who might set the record straight. The talking point is that when asked about the CIA's intelligence case that Iraq had WMDs, Tenet replied it was a slam dunk, is false. The phrase was uttered in a meeting that focused on deciding what rationale to use to convince the American people that invading Iraq was necessary. The options that were floated were the brutal tyranny of Saddam Hussein, ties to al Qaeda, or the risk that an Iraq with WMDs might transfer them to terrorist organizations which could use them against the USA. Tenet believed that it was a slam dunk to sell the WMD threat to the American people.
It will be curious to see how the GOP justify their holding power in both Houses after the 2006 elections. The cabal that is truly in control is not going to surrender power easily. There is a definite risk that if the Legislative power shifts, there could be serious investigations which would lead to the impeachment of both Bush and Cheney, and possibly prison time for members of this administration.
Karl Rove blundered in 2004 and was able to get away with it. At 8pm election night, conservative Tucker Carlson was on CNN saying that Kerry would win easily. Over night this changed. I thought that the GOP would cite the timely release of the bin Laden tape as the reason Bush was able to be reelected in spite of all the political indicators which made that seem unlikely. By citing the mobilization of the religious right and the moral values voters, Rove erred. If that was the tipping point in the election it would have been evident in the early returns. The religious right would typically tend to be early voters. They would not likely to risk arriving late and not being able to cast their vote. The religious voters also live in states in the heart of the country, whose polls close much earlier than in California. The point being that based on the Rove theory, at 8pm Bush should have had a huge lead which would have been reduced by the left coast votes which would have been reported later.
I am awaiting the release of George Tenet's book. It will be interesting to see if the ex-CIA chief has balls. His "slam dunk" comment has been taken completely out of context and he is the only person who might set the record straight. The talking point is that when asked about the CIA's intelligence case that Iraq had WMDs, Tenet replied it was a slam dunk, is false. The phrase was uttered in a meeting that focused on deciding what rationale to use to convince the American people that invading Iraq was necessary. The options that were floated were the brutal tyranny of Saddam Hussein, ties to al Qaeda, or the risk that an Iraq with WMDs might transfer them to terrorist organizations which could use them against the USA. Tenet believed that it was a slam dunk to sell the WMD threat to the American people.
It will be curious to see how the GOP justify their holding power in both Houses after the 2006 elections. The cabal that is truly in control is not going to surrender power easily. There is a definite risk that if the Legislative power shifts, there could be serious investigations which would lead to the impeachment of both Bush and Cheney, and possibly prison time for members of this administration.
Karl Rove blundered in 2004 and was able to get away with it. At 8pm election night, conservative Tucker Carlson was on CNN saying that Kerry would win easily. Over night this changed. I thought that the GOP would cite the timely release of the bin Laden tape as the reason Bush was able to be reelected in spite of all the political indicators which made that seem unlikely. By citing the mobilization of the religious right and the moral values voters, Rove erred. If that was the tipping point in the election it would have been evident in the early returns. The religious right would typically tend to be early voters. They would not likely to risk arriving late and not being able to cast their vote. The religious voters also live in states in the heart of the country, whose polls close much earlier than in California. The point being that based on the Rove theory, at 8pm Bush should have had a huge lead which would have been reduced by the left coast votes which would have been reported later.
# posted by Billing Anders @ 11:39 AM 
