P.B.S. FRONTLINE aired a documentary on 2/26/04 , that offered new insight into the war in Iraq. I seems that Ashcroft & Wolfowitz "over-ruled" Pentagon experts regarding the number of troops to deploy. Previous experiences in Kosovo showed that FAR greater numbers of troops were needed to invaed & secure Iraq. Such shortages put American troops in grave danger, and created the resulting chaos, anarchy & looting following the in vasion. Often , American troops were "out-of-fuel"& ammunition, and suffering from severe lack-of-sleep. On more than one occassion, "dumb-luck" resulted in American battle-victories. ( the capture of the Saddam airport occured when American troops were obscured by smoke & noise from nearby battles, & un-observed by sleeping Iraqi troops. They awoke to find also-sleeping American troops within yards of them). The Bush administration believed that Iraqi troops would "Lay down their weapons, and greet us as liberators". Such bragadosio & obvious posturing is exident in the quotes: " Bring em on!", and "Axis of Evil". It seems that George is truly "clueless", and chooses to imitate John Wayne & the Texas Rangers. And, incidentally, what ever happened to the investigation of the "White House leak" that disclosed the identity of a C.I.A. operative; the wife of an ambassador who divulged the LIES about "Yellow-cake uranuim" being shipped to Iraq??? Treason is a "capital-offense", punishable by death!!! The investigation has slipped into obsurity, by such issues as "same-sex-marriages" . Ther are FAR MORE IMPORTANT matters than Gay-marriages to consider: "incompetance, fiscal-irresponsibility, disregard of international-law, erosion of the Constitution & the Bill Of Rights, etc. Yet the Republican Congress chooses to concen itself with Janet Jackson's breast, and "obscene" language on T.V. & radio. It seems that their priorities are VASTLY out of order!! John Ashcroft spent tax-dollars to cover the exposed breast of Lady Justice in front of the Supreme Court.../ Are these people MORON??? Every one has breasts... GET OVER IT!!! WE MUST TAKE BACK OUR GOVERNMENT FROM "GEORGE-THE-LESSER, PRETENDER-TO-THE-THRONE"; AND THE CORPORATE SPECIAL-INTERESTS THAT CONTROL IT !! IF YOU THINK "WHAT DIFFERENCE CAN I MAKE??? " JUST REMEMBER THAT GHANDI & MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. WERE EACH JUST: "ONE MAN"..
Alan Greenspan, announced today that we must expect "cutbacks" in the Social Security Administration's budget & ability to make future payments. If you refer to a book called" It's Still The Economy, Stupid!", you will find details of how the Bush "Tax Plan" has given a 35% tax break to the weathiest 1% of Americans. An ammount that would have EASILY paid DOUBLE THE EXPECTED "SHORTAGES" of Social Security. This is OUR MONEY!!! We have paid into this system for years, and George W. prefers to give it back to his wealthiest supporters. This ammounts to a refund of over $53.000 to these same tax-payers; many of whom prefer to "shelter" their income in foreign countries. Bush has NO fiscal-plan; other than to "trot-out" Greenspan to manipulate the stock-market. This time, however, Greenspan has maded his announcement far in advance of the elections, to de-fuse the resultant outrage. Un fortunately, American voters have very-short attention-spans; chosing to rely on the latest 30-second T.V. "spin".; and most will remember ONLY the capture of Saddam, and George's vague, patriotic ramblings & references to "National Security". He done NOTHiNG to stem-the-tide of "out-sourcing" American jobs & the obscene loss of more than 3 MILLION AMERICAN MANUFACTURING JOBS in his tenure. His tax-breaks to the wealthy , (at more than $53K) , are more than millions of Americans earn in a year! Meanwhile, his tax-cuts to "working-class" taxpayers ammount to about $1.75 PER WEEK!!! It is unfortunate that many Americans sought to "avoid" military-service during the Viet Nam era; another "unjust" war. At least two of our presidents have, and millions of others as well. Americans who had a "conscience" at that time, went to Canada, Mexico, college, or became "consciencous-objectors"; as well as joining other " draft-exempt " forms of service. It is now, however, a "moot" point; Is it more "patriotic" to blindly follow elected leaders into war? or is it more patriotic to question their motives, and decisions??? Many patriotic, brave Americans chose to oppose the Viet Nam war. We must not allow various "red-herrings" to deflect us from the TRUE issues. The Republican-Right-Wing has recently chosen to oppose "same-sex" marriages, debate the immorality of "cloning", and make vague plans to "Go to Mars"; all in attempts to avoid the REAL issues that concern us. How do they propose to PAY for a trip to Mars? We have a 50% success-rate with sending un-manned ROVERS to Mars, and they were funded years ago. I, for one, will not support sending a human to a desolate, distant planet merely to inflate the prestige of our un-elected leader; financed with new taxes and mind-boggling debt. The REAL issues of the upcoming election are the "failure " of U.S. intelligence-agencies; spending 20 Million dOLLARS TO INVESTIGATE Bill Clinton's sex-life, while Al Queda terrorists took FLIGHT-LESSONS! (The F.B.I. had more than 250 people working on the Clinton-impeachment, and 2 people pursued the "flight-training".) It seems that the Republicans are more interested in political "witch-hunts" than REAL National security! Kenn Starr should be tried for "criminal-negligence" in his diversion of much-needed resources in the investigation of Al Queda. He now works as an attorney to promote the secrecy of Dick Cheney's "Energy Policy Meetings", held early in 2000; meetings with energy-corporation-insiders including ENRON. He ardently supports the secrecy of those meetings, and their "notes, tapes, and documents"; the SAME sort of evidenciary-disclosure that fervently fought when it pertained to Bill Clinton & "Whitewater". The lying "weasels" in Washington OWN our government. Corporate leaders & lobbyists no longer work to "persuade" legislators. They are now MEMBERS OF THE BUSH CABINET!!! It is time to do whatever we can to remove Bush , and the Republicans who control our Supreme Court & Congress. Do what ever you can to "take back" our government.
An Open Letter from
Michael Moore to George "I'm a War President!" Bush
Dear Mr. Bush,
Thank you for providing the illegible Xeroxed partial payroll sheets
(or whatever they were) yesterday covering a few of your days in the
National Guard. Now we know that, not only didn't you complete your
tour of duty, you were actually paid for work you never did. Did you
cash those checks? Wouldn't that be, um, illegal?
Watching the press aggressively demand the truth from your press
secretary -- and refusing to accept the deceit, the dodging, and the
cover-up -- was a sight to behold, something we really haven't seen
since you took office (to watch or listen to the entire press
conference, or to read the full transcript, go
here).
More than one reporter pointed out that those pieces of paper your
press secretary waved at them yesterday mean nothing. Even if they
aren't forged documents, getting paid does not necessarily mean you
showed up to do your duties. As retired Army Col. Dan Smith, a 26-year
veteran, told the AP:
"Pay records don't mean
anything except that you're in or you're out," said Smith. "It doesn't
necessarily reflect what duty you've actually performed because pay
records simply record your unit of assignment and then all of your pay
and benefits per pay period."
Mr. Bush, this issue is not going to go away -- and I think yesterday's
actions just dug you into a deeper hole. You're probably wondering why
the heck this story won't just die. You probably thought that after I
brought it up last month and then got slammed by Peter Jennings for
uttering the "d" word, the whole matter would just disappear as fast as
bag of blow being thrown out the window of a speeding car on a deserted
But your "desertion" didn't go away -- and here's the reason why. You
have sent countless numbers of our sons and daughters in the National
Guard to their deaths in the last 11 months. You did this while
misleading their parents and the nation with bogus lies about weapons
of mass destruction and scary phony Saddam ties to al Qaeda. You sent
them off to a never-ending war so that your benefactors at Halliburton
and the oil companies could line their pockets. And then you had the
audacity to prance around in a soldier's uniform on an aircraft carrier
proclaiming "Mission Accomplished" -- while the cameras from your
re-election campaign ad agency rolled.
THAT is what makes this whole business of you being AWOL so despicable,
and makes the grief-stricken relatives want to turn away from you in
disgust. The reason your skipping-out on your enlistment didn't matter
in the 2000 election was because we were not at war. Being stuck in a
deadly, daily quagmire now in 2004 makes your military history-fiction
and your fly-boy costume VERY relevant.
You still have not answered the questions surrounding your National
Guard "service." Let me repeat them as simply as I can for you (all of
them based on the investigative work of the Associated Press and the
Boston Globe):
1. How were you able to jump ahead of 500 other applicants to get into
the Texas Air National Guard, thus guaranteeing you would not have to
go to
2. Why were you grounded (not allowed to fly) after you either failed
your physical or failed to take it in July 1972? Was there a reason you
were afraid to take the physical? Or, did you take it and not pass it?
If so, why didn't you pass it? Was it the urine test? The records show
that, after the Guard spent years and lots of money training you to be
a pilot, you never flew for the rest of your time in the Guard. Why?
3. Can you produce one person who can verify that he served with you in
the Guard during the year that your
4. Can you tell us what you did when you claim to have shown up in
5. Where are the sign-up sheets that would have your name and service
number on them for each weekend you showed up? Aaron Brown on CNN told
us how, when he was in the reserves, he had to sign in each time he
reported, and his guest from the Washington Post said, that's right,
and there would be "four copies of that record" in the files of various
agencies. Will you ask those agencies to release those records?
6. If you were in fact paid for that time when you apparently went
AWOL, will you authorize the IRS to release your 1972-73 tax returns?
7. How did you get an
honorable discharge? What strings were pulled? Who called who?
Look, I'm sorry to have put you through all this. I was just goofing
around when I made that comment about wanting to see a debate between
the general and the deserter. I had no idea that it would lead to this.
And there you were, having to suffer through Tim Russert on Sunday,
saying weird things like "I'm a war president!" I guess you believe
that, or you want us to believe that. Americans have never voted out a
Commander-in-Chief during a war. I guess that's what you're hoping for.
You need the war.
But we don't. And our troops in the National Guard don't either. I know
you see the writing on the wall, so why not come clean now? We are a
forgiving people, and though you will not be returned to White House,
you will find us grateful for a little bit of truth. Answer our
questions, apologize to the nation, and bring our kids home.
Yours,
Michael Moore
mmflint@aol.com
--------------------------------------
To Unsubscribe, please click
here.
In truth, that last post was mine. I set up the account for my father, Dave, to post his political opinions on. The last post was a sort of mock post of him by me. I apologize for any confusion this may have caused.
I got this email from a friend of mine who's apparently a member of MoveOn.org. Here it is:
Dear MoveOn member, We didn't think the hypocrisy at CBS headquarters could get any worse. But it just did. As you know, CBS refused to run MoveOn Voter Fund's "Child's Pay" ad -- perhaps the most tasteful and uncontroversial advocacy ad in history -- during the Super Bowl. CBS executives claimed they had a blanket policy against all so-called "issue" ads. Yesterday, we learned that the network plans to broadcast an ad promoting the Bush Medicare prescription drug law. This is part of a $13 million taxpayer-financed TV campaign to take the heat off the White House for pushing through a drug plan that benefits drug companies and insurance companies more than Medicare recipients. The White House ad features the tagline "Same Medicare. More Benefits." But a report by Consumers Union last month said that most people covered by Medicare will wind up spending more for prescription drugs, as a result of the provisions in the law which favor drug companies. According to the Washington Post, the campaign is intended "to counteract Democratic criticism that changes to the (Medicare) program will harm older Americans." If that isn't a controversial issue ad, we don't know what is. But since CBS appears to be changing its policy, our Voter Fund has submitted our own Medicare ad which exposes the facts behind this spin campaign to run on CBS. So far, we haven't heard back. Please give CBS a call today to let them know that they need to either pull the White House ads or run our Voter Fund ad. You can reach CBS at: Phone: CBS Comment Line (212) 975-4321 Email: newmediasales@cbs.com Web form: http://www.cbs.com/info/user_services/fb_global_form.shtml After you've called, help us track the number of calls that are pouring in by going to: http://www.moveon.org/cbs.html?id=2300-2241341-0gsXib3jC18rQcQ.6sk7Ig We're spreading out the calls across a number of relevant CBS numbers, so hopefully you won't get a busy signal. Also, we have no quarrel with CBS News or any CBS journalists, who have actually given fair coverage to CBS Corporate's unfair decision. Please don't call the CBS news desk. There's another issue involved here that needs to be taken very seriously: if Bush's Medicare ad is intended to function as a campaign ad (and that clearly appears to be the case) then this may constitute a criminal election law violation. In fact, the ad company which made the ad which will air on CBS also works for the Bush/Cheney re-election committee. We've put in a Freedom of Information Act request to the Department of Health and Human Services to begin the process of establishing the facts in this case. For now, help us hold CBS accountable by asking them to stop running the Bush Medicare ad -- or to accept our Voter Fund ad. Sincerely, --Adam, Carrie, Eli, James, Joan, Laura, Noah, Peter, Wes, and Zack The MoveOn.org Team February 5th, 2004 P.S. Our friends at the Center for American Progress have done an incredible job documenting the links between the Bush administration, the ad company which is creating these Medicare ads, and the drug companies. Today's Progress Report is online at: http://www.progressreport.org The Progress Report is a free, daily e-mail by the Center for American Progress. You can subscribe here: http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=3750 ________________ This is a message from MoveOn.org on behalf of the MoveOn.org Voter Fund.?
