Middle Class Squeeze is On

"Other than vague generalities about turning corners, you don�t hear a lot these days from the Republicans on how middle-income American families are doing. The strategy of the Bush campaign is to blame most of our economic woes on September 11, which brings the electorate right back to fear and terror, not changing horses, and painting the other guy as too indecisive to take it to the enemy."

Read Jared Bernstein in the American Prospect.

~~~

And now the ikss rants.

OK�I fully admit that I don�t watch the Fox News Channel and so rarely hear the likes of Sean Hannity or Bill O�Reilly spew their vile bullshit across the airwaves. I can�t watch those shows because�well, because they spew vile bullshit across the airwaves. I can�t sit there and listen to Bill O�Reilly yell and yell and yell and never listen to a word that anyone who disagrees with him says (especially when the things he�s yelling are far from accurate). I can�t listen to Ann Coulter when she talks about how all women are airheads or how �God says, �Earth is yours. Take it. Rape it. It's yours�� and stuff because�well, who wants to have a coronary over something someone said on television?

(And let�s be real � anyone who would listen to Ann Coulter and take her seriously is just, plain and simple, a complete and utter idiot. Nothing I can say is going to change the mind of someone who would buy in to anything she {or Bill O�Reilly, for that matter} is saying.)

So what I know of these people is usually second-hand. I hear about what they said, or I read it after the fact, far more often than I hear it from the horses� mouths. At most I may hear excerpts from their programs, via Al Franken�s radio show on AirAmerica.

This is why I don�t speak about the Right-Wing media very often and when I do it�s usually in generalities. Keeping that in mind, I have the following to say about these so-called �journalists�.

Ted Kennedy recently gave a speech at Georgetown University, about the War in Iraq. I had heard the speech and thought it a good one. He didn�t lie � he spoke the truth about what�s happening there. There is no �spin� on the facts � they are what they are. We see them in the paper every day, we see them on the news.

I make mention of this because many in the Bush Administration and many right-wing �journalists� like to take facts and give them a �spin� � a dishonest spin that distorts those facts.

Hamiltonian reprinted Kennedy�s speech in its entirety, if you care to read it. He also pointed out what was said in response to his speech, by some of our more famous right-wing �journalists.�

After Kennedy�s speech, Michael Savage (the �journalist� fired from MSNBC for telling someone who called in to his show that he should �get AIDS and die� because he disagreed with what he said) said, �"Kennedy may as well be Osama bin Laden's P.R. man.�

Sean Hannity called Kennedy�s speech �insane.�

(If you click the Hannity link above, you will find many occasions on which Sean Hannity has lied to his television audience, in order to put his very special kind of spin on issues.)

Here are a few choice excerpts from Kennedy�s speech:

The battle against terrorism is a battle we must win. Even those who opposed the war in Iraq understand that we cannot cut and run, that this is an American issue. But to remain silent in the face of mounting failures by this President and this White House is to weaken our security even further, and we cannot let that happen.

I thank God that President Bush was not our President at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Even after 9/11, it is wrong for this President or any president to shoot first and ask questions later, to rush to war and ignore or even muzzle serious doubts by experienced military officers and experienced officials in the State Department and the CIA about the rationale and justification for the war, and the strategy for waging it.

We all know that Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator. We've known it for more than 20 years. We're proud, very proud, of our troops for their extraordinary and swift success in removing Saddam from power. But as we also now know beyond doubt, he did not pose the kind of immediate threat to our national security that could possibly justify a unilateral, preventive war without the broad support of the international community. There was no reason whatsoever to go to war when we did, in the way we did, and for the false reasons we were given.

The Administration's insistence that Saddam could provide nuclear material, or even nuclear weapons to Al Qaeda has been exposed as an empty threat. It should have never been used by George W. Bush to justify an ideological war that America never should have fought.

Saddam had no nuclear weapons. In fact, not only were there no nuclear weapons, there were no chemical or biological weapons either, no weapons of mass destruction of any kind.

Nor was there any persuasive link between Al Qaeda and Saddam and the 9/11 attacks. A 9/11 Commission Staff Statement put it plainly: "Two senior bin Laden associates have adamantly denied that any ties existed between Al Qaeda and Iraq. We have no credible evidence that Iraq and Al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United States." The 9/11 Commission Report stated clearly that there was no "operational" connection between Saddam and Al Qaeda.

Secretary of State Colin Powell now agrees that there was no correlation between 9/11 and Saddam's regime. So does Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Nonetheless, President Bush continues to cling to the fiction that there was a relationship between Saddam and Al Qaeda. As the President said in his familiar Bush-speak, "The reason that I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and Al Qaeda is because there was a relationship between Iraq and Al Qaeda."

That's the same logic President Bush keeps using today in his repeated stubborn insistence that the situation is improving in Iraq, and that we and the world are safer because Saddam is gone.

The President and his administration continue to paint a rosy picture of progress in Iraq. Just last Wednesday, he referred to the growing insurgency as "a handful of people." Some handful!

Vice President Cheney says we're "moving in the right direction," despite the worsening violence. Our troops are increasingly the targets of deadly attacks. American citizens are being kidnapped and brutally beheaded. But Secretary Rumsfeld says he's "encouraged" by developments in Iraq. . .

The National Intelligence Estimate in July, although not yet made public, made this point as well-and made it with such breathtaking clarity that for the good of our country, unnamed officials discussed it with the press. The New York Times said the estimate "spells out a dark assessment of prospects for Iraq." According to the same New York Times report and other reports, the National Intelligence Estimate outlines three possibilities for Iraq through the end of next year. The worst case scenario is that Iraq plunges into outright civil war. The best case scenario it says-the best case-is an Iraq with violence still at current levels, with tenuous political and economic stability. Yet President Bush categorically rejected that description, saying the CIA was "just guessing." Last week, he retreated somewhat. He said he should have used "estimate," instead of "guess."

In other words, the best-case scenario, between now and the end of 2005-2005--is that our soldiers will be bogged down in a continuing quagmire with no end in sight. President Bush refuses to give the time of day to advice like that by the best intelligence analysts in his Administration, but the American people need to hear it. . .

My own point is this: You are free to disagree with what Ted Kennedy says. But why resort to saying things like he�s �insane� or that he�s in cahoots with terrorists, just because you disagree with him?

This is such a perfect example of how these �journalists� talk all the time. Journalistic integrity cast aside for the moment (well, it seems to have been thrown out with the bath water ages ago anyway), what it shows is that the Right is terribly, terribly desperate. So many of these people can not debate issues like educated and level-headed people, because the facts support what they do not want to admit. Since they can not disagree respectfully, like adults, they resort to name-calling and distorting the truth.

It�s pretty sad when a couple of old punks like me and gutterpoet show more maturity in debating issues than these so-called �journalists.�

Moreover, say what you will about Ted Kennedy. Like him or not. Think he�s far too liberal for your tastes. Continue to condemn him for his actions at Chapa�however you spell it. Whatever. I don�t care.

This is a man who has devoted his entire adult life to serving his country the best way he knows how. That means you, Sean Hannity and Michael Savage. He has worked tirelessly and fought for decades, now, to do what he can to make this country a better place to live in. You may not agree that he has accomplished that, or even that what he fought for was the right way to go about accomplishing that; but how in the world can you discount his efforts and call the man �insane� or in cahoots with terrorists? What are these little puissants doing, in comparison? They�re running their mouths and spewing vile bullshit on television.

Which do you think deserves more respect?

This also goes hand-in-hand with the recent and well-publicized literature that the Republican Party sent to some Southern states saying that Democrats want to ban the Bible. And no, I�m not exaggerating in the slightest. In the same literature, they said that Kerry wants to legalize Gay Marriage and again intimated that a vote for Kerry would put us all in danger of another terrorist attack. Never mind that Kerry has said he opposes gay marriage. He just also opposes Amending our Constitution.*

And by the way � how does any of his speech logically lead to Kennedy being touted as �bin Laden�s P.R. man�? Does Michael Savage ever speak in anything but vomit-inducing sound-bites?

Oh! I forgot! If you disagree with the Bush Administration these days, you support terrorists.

Disagree with Ted Kennedy. Vote for George Bush if you want to � just tell us why you�re doing it using hard cold facts, instead of this�well, this vile bullshit. Does anyone in the Republican Party even know how to do that anymore?

You know, I disagreed with George the First. I disagreed with Ronald Regan. Hell, I disagree with a lot of people. I have never felt the disgust that I have been feeling in the past eight years, because those men supported their positions with facts (generally speaking. All politicians use a bit of hyperbole). They didn�t resort to calling people who disagreed with them horrible names and intimating they were un-American. They didn�t make shit up about their opponents, as Dubya and his flunky Karl Rove do, on a regular basis, in order to get votes.

Or did I just sleep through that debate, while nursing a hangover or something?

How people can listen to this drivel, take it seriously and NOT vote for John Kerry is beyond me.

�What luck for rulers that men do not think.�
--Adolf Hitler

*I know this well, because it sticks in my craw. As you all know, I think marriage should be legal for all people, no matter who you choose to marry.

~~~
President George W. Bush's buzz phrase about Iraq is "freedom is winning." Columnist Christopher Dickey writes: "The president's one-liner is a well-honed campaign message to an American nation in denial, a placebo of hope for an electorate that doesn't dare admit to itself how bad things are or how dire the future is likely to be if we continue to stay this course." (click link for complete Newsweek story)

last / next



~~~~~~~~~~~peace, love and smooches~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Don't know why you'd wanna, but on the off-chance you may feel tempted to steal any of my words and claim them as your own, please be advised: All material
Copyright 2002-2005, Howl-at-the-Moon Words



***DISCLAIMER: These are my thoughts and my thoughts alone. If you know me in my "real life" off the net and have come across this page purely by accident, please keep in mind that you were not invited here and I would suggest you leave this page now. However, should you choose not to do so, please be warned that reading my thoughts here is not an invitation to discuss them off-line. You may discover things you do not know about me and may not like very much. Such is life. Again, this is MY space and I will use it as I see fit. If you are offended by anything here, well that's pretty much your own fault at this point. I say all of this with love, of course, but there it is.