Bush's Rhetoric Not Matching Reality

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Fri Sep 02, 2005 10:49 pm

Newsview: Rhetoric Not Matching Reality By RON FOURNIER, AP Political Writer
1 hour, 12 minutes ago

The Iraqi insurgency is in its last throes. The economy is booming. Anybody who leaks a CIA agent's identity will be fired. Add another piece of White House rhetoric that doesn't match the public's view of reality: Help is on the way, Gulf Coast.

As New Orleans descended into anarchy, top Bush administration officials congratulated each other for jobs well done and spoke of water, food and troops pouring into the ravaged city. Television pictures told a different story.

"What it reminded me of the other day is 'Baghdad Bob' saying there are no Americans at the airport," said Rich Galen, a Republican consultant in Washington. He was referring to Saddam Hussein's reality-challenged minister of information who denied the existence of U.S. troops in the Iraqi capital.

To some critics, President Bush seemed to deny the existence of problems with hurricane relief this week. He waited until Friday to acknowledged that "the results are not acceptable," and even then the president parsed his words

Republicans worry that he looks out of touch defending the chaotic emergency response.

"It's impossible to defend something like this happening in America," said former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

"No one can be happy with the kind of response which we've seen in New Orleans," said Republican Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts.

Bush got himself in trouble by trying to put the best face on a horrible situation. The strategy is so common in Washington that operatives have a name for it, "spin," and the Bush White House has perfected the shady art.

This is what the president had to say about the relief effort earlier in the week:

_"There's a lot of food on its way, a lot of water on the way, and there's a lot of boats and choppers headed that way."

_"Thousands have been rescued. There's thousands more to be rescued. And there's a lot of people focusing their efforts on that."

_"As we speak, people are moving into New Orleans area to maintain law and order."

Technically, the president may have been right. Help was on the way, if not fast enough to handle one of the largest emergency response efforts in U.S. history. But the words were jarring to Americans who saw images of looters, abandoned corpses and angry, desperate storm victims.

It was worse when he was wrong. In one interview, Bush said, "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees." In fact, many experts predicted a major storm would bust New Orleans' flood-control barriers.

One reason the public relations effort backfired on Bush is that Americans have seen it before.

On Iraq alone, the rhetoric has repeatedly fallen far short of reality. Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction. The mission wasn't accomplished in May 2003. Most allies avoided the hard work of his "coalition of the willing." And dozens of U.S. soldiers have died since Vice President Dick Cheney declared that insurgents were in their "last throes."

Bush often touts the health of the U.S. economy, which is fair game because many indicators point in that direction. But the public doesn't share his rosy view. The global economy had most Americans worried about job and pension security even before rising gas added to their anxieties.

Bush's spokesman said anybody involved in leaking the identity of a CIA agent would be fired, but no action has been taken against officials accused of doing so.

The president himself promised to fully pay for his school reform plan and strip pork-barrel spending from a major highway bill. The school money fell short. The pork thrived.

The list goes on. But this didn't start with Bush. Former President Clinton certainly had his rhetoric vs. reality problems. Indeed, most politicians do. At some point, however, the spin can take a toll.

Bush crafted a reputation as a blunt-speaking, can-do leader from his response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Five months later, about three-fourths of Americans viewed him as honest.

But his trust rating dropped gradually to a slim majority by the 2004 election year and remained at the mid-50s through the early part of 2005. In August, an AP-Ipsos poll showed 48 percent of respondents considered Bush honest, the lowest level of his presidency.

Americans like straight-shooters, especially in an era that has seen vast failures by government and social institutions. People are witnessing another institutional failure in the Gulf Coast, and Bush reluctantly acknowledged it Friday.

"This is a storm that's going to require immediate action now," he said. Few would disagree.

88GTneverfinsihed · Post by **88GTneverfinsihed** » Fri Sep 02, 2005 11:02 pm

The presidential disconnect from reality has been apparent to some of us for 5 years.

It's a damn shame that it took a disaster to expose it to the masses. W has failed the country since the day he took office. He failed in business and he was rewarded with the job of Commander in Chief. What do you all think now? The American people put this hack in charge. Now we see the fruits of our idiocy.

Shaun41178(2) · Post by **Shaun41178(2)** » Fri Sep 02, 2005 11:35 pm

Post by **eHoward** » Fri Sep 02, 2005 11:40 pm

I actually enjoy reading a lot the Ed posts.

the ones with Stricter were real good.

Shaun41178(2) wrote:

DiggityBiggity · Post by **DiggityBiggity** » Sat Sep 03, 2005 2:28 am

A-Fuckin-Men.. that reporter couldn't have said it any better

:thumbleft:

Your paranoid leader

DiggityBiggity

richfiero · Post by **richfiero** » Sun Sep 04, 2005 8:29 pm

I think the local goverment has to have most of the blame not bush. the mayor of new orleans is a fucking moron. did any of you hear him speak. i cant believe they made a thug a mayor. also the state had 5000 national gaurd people at thier disposal they didnt respond rite away. new orleans didnt even get hit as hard as missippi. so how is it that missippi can handle their own and not louisana. because the goverment at missippi arent morons like the may or of neworleans. :bootyshake:

88GTneverfinsihed · Post by **88GTneverfinsihed** » Sun Sep 04, 2005 10:23 pm

richfiero wrote:I think the local goverment has to have most of the blame not bush. the mayor of new orleans is a fucking moron. did any of you hear him speak. i cant believe they made a thug a mayor. also the state had 5000 national gaurd people at thier disposal they didnt respond rite away. new orleans didnt even get hit as hard as missippi. so how is it that missippi can handle their own and not louisana. because the goverment at missippi arent morons like the may or of neworleans. :bootyshake:

you're the fuckin moron. The mayor was on tv 2 days before beggin for everyone to leave. You have a poor city, you got barely enough resources to run things in the best of times and you get targeted by a once in a lifetime natural disaster. let's see how well you would do completely evacuating a city on your own.

Local governments are designed and funded to maintain status quo. They are not designed to deal with disasters. That is the role of the fed. The Fed fights wars and protects the homeland. A disaster of that scale is absolutly the domain of the office of the president. That office failed the American people yet again.

richfiero · Post by **richfiero** » Mon Sep 05, 2005 2:27 am

so the mayor shouldnt have an evacuation plan for his own city. thats not the feds job to come up with a good evac plan. the mayor had a couple of days to evacuate the people. it was after the hurricane when things got really hairy. so yes the mayor is at fault. he waited to long to call the evacuation.

Weponhead · Post by **Weponhead** » Mon Sep 05, 2005 10:33 am

N.O. had a MANDATORY evacuation plan in effect if a hurrican was cited to make landfall 72 hours BEFORE, if someone said the words "neworleans" and "hurricane" together , everyone shouldve said "buh bye!" and the mayor was on the tv begging everyone to leave 24 HOURS before landfall not two days. and not the 3 days like he was supposed to, even though the national hurricane center was telling him to get everyone out! Beside the fact , the mayor of N.O. every time i see him on tv seems like an idiot to me.

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Mon Sep 05, 2005 11:36 am

richfiero wrote: I think the local goverment has to have most of the blame not bush. the mayor of new orleans is a fucking moron. did any of you hear him speak. i cant believe they made a thug a mayor. also the state had 5000 national gaurd people at thier disposal they didnt respond rite away. new orleans didnt even get hit as hard as missippi. so how is it that missippi can handle their own and not louisana. because the goverment at missippi arent morons like the may or of neworleans. :bootyshake:

Weponhead wrote:N.O. had a MANDATORY evacuation plan in effect if a hurrican was cited to make landfall 72 hours BEFORE, if someone said the words "neworleans" and "hurricane" together , everyone shouldve said "buh bye!" and the mayor was on the tv begging everyone to leave 24 HOURS before landfall not two days. and not the 3 days like he was supposed to, even though the national hurricane center was telling him to get everyone out! Beside the fact , the mayor of N.O. every time i see him on tv seems like an idiot to me.

Making this issue one of the Mayor of N.O. or even the Governor is weak. Itâ€™s pure distraction and transference of blame for inaction. OK, hypothetically, the Mayor and Governor of N.O. and Louisiana are scum; where does that put Bush? That makes him scum as well. There should have been action at all levels of jurisdiction, but the difference is that the US gov has most all the resource and ability to summarily and immediately send in the forces. Even the state-based guard and reserve forces are completely under the jurisdiction of the US gov, right? The state has almost no resource for these actions, but the taxpayers of the state pay federal taxes for these kinds of things. Of course chimp wants all those resources and future resources to be shipped off to Halliburton and the likes for his hobby in the M.E.

The Mayor of N.O. went on the radio after the hurricane and got nasty with the US gov., especially the chimp and then the chimp met with the Mayor a couple days later. The interviewer of the Mayor asked the Mayor about the comments and the Mayor stated he was heated and mad. He said he kind of meant the remarks, but downplayed them a bit. I donâ€™t blame the Mayor a bit; sometimes you have to ruffle feathers to get attention.

So what I see in the arguments above is pure transference:

1) I think the local goverment has to have most of the blame not bush. the mayor of new orleans is a fucking moron.

- a) Weighing who has to be blamed, chimp being fully exonerated by the authorâ€™s
Preponderance, not proportionality.

- b) Ad Hominem of the Mayor in an attempt to defer attention from the chimp.
As for Moron, itâ€™s not good to call others around the chimp a moron, as he
(chimp) laughs at his own illiteracy.

2) did any of you hear him speak.

-a) Have you heard chimp speak? I could pick your post apart with grammatical
flaws, but I want to argue the merits of your post, not semantics. Funny
comparison is though, the Mayor sounded similar in literacy to the chimp and
the Mayor is under the stress of his life and didnâ€™t attend an Ivy League school.

3) i cant believe they made a thug a mayor.

- a) Chimp set US records for state executions in Texas and his brother in Florida
w/o any pardons or reversals that I'm aware of. There may have been 1 or 2 stays, but Iâ€™m not
aware of them. So Chimp set records for questionable executions and the
Mayor is a thug? The US has executed 19 of the last 39 minors in the world
under, in part, the direction of the chimp and the Mayor is a thug?

4) new orleans didnt even get hit as hard as missippi. so how is it that missippi can handle their own and not louisana.

- a) Really? Have you reard of that little wall that holds back the water from the
city? Have you heard that N.O. is built below sea level? I believe that
Louisiana was hit harder than Mississippi, but that is opinion. The real issue
here is the standing waterâ€¦. In case you havenâ€™t heard.

5) Beside the fact , the mayor of N.O. every time i see him on tv seems like an idiot to me.

- a) Again, hypothetically the Mayor of N.O. is a moron, ok, so letâ€™s let the
citizens of Louisiana die. Brilliant. If itâ€™s beside the fact then why include it?
Isnâ€™t it for more distraction from your chimp that can do no wrong? The
Mayorâ€™s duties are to handle civic and fiscal maters of the city, not to regulate
disasters of federal proportion. If the Mayor wanted to call off the rescue he
could not.

Furthermore, the interview of the Mayor I watched showed the Mayor saying the chimp kind of admitted he was hesitant in regard to his action / inaction. Remember when chimp was in that school talking to kids when he was notified of the WTCâ€™s? He sat there stunned for about 7 minutes not saying or doing anything. He is a pathetic leader. Just because his dad was a leader, his family are multimillionaires and they have all kinds of high, secretive gov connections doesnâ€™t automatically make him a leader. The guy is lost when it comes to giving direction or even knowing how to pronounce the names of other world leaders, which indicated his apathy to foreign matters. I think that apathy transcends across the board. I donâ€™t think there is racism in chimpâ€™s apathy, I do think there is classism, but primarily a case of, â€œdonâ€™t give a shit,â€

richfiero · Post by **richfiero** » Mon Sep 05, 2005 11:42 pm

Missippi did get harder is fact. Not opinion it got a direct hit from the hurricane. N.O. did not. Also the state has to ask for help. If the state was hesitant and the mayor was hesitant then every one will be. There were some states ready to give help but had to wait for Louisiana to say yes you can help. Also it takes time to get all the equipment there the roads are kind of flooded to put it in light terms. Also who the hell would live in a city thatâ€™s below see level right next to the ocean I sure the hell wouldnâ€™t floods happen. Those people were taking a chance by living in a giant bull.

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:46 am

[quote="richfiero"]Missippi did get harder is fact. Not opinion it got a direct hit from the hurricane. N.O. did not. Also the state has to ask for help. If the state was hesitant and the mayor was hesitant then every one will be. There were some states ready to give help but had to wait for Louisiana to say yes you can help. Also it takes time to get all the equipment there the roads are kind of flooded to put it in light terms. Also who the hell would live in a city thatâ€™s below see level right next to the ocean I sure the hell wouldnâ€™t floods happen. Those people were taking a chance by living in a giant bull.[quote]

1) Missippi did get harder is fact. Not opinion it got a direct hit from the hurricane. N.O. did not.

- Under what criteria? Also, are you going to ignore what I wrote about La being below sea level and all that? Guess so. If a school bus full of kids gets in a wreck on one end of town and an empty school bus gets a worse wreck, which accident is more crucial to attend to?

2) Also the state has to ask for help. If the state was hesitant and the mayor was hesitant then every one will be.

- Please. Do you mean to ask for federal help? I will investgate FEMA's rules if you have the cookies to answer the post above. Regardless of whether you're right or not, which I believe FEMA and the Pres are supposed to declare an area a disaster area regardless of what the governor of a state does, isn't it reasonable to go ahead and act when the obviousness of an urgent, life and death disaster is ocurring? Chimp said, "we're not going to ask the lawyers what to do" when he decided to go into Iraq, but when his own country is under attack from nature he needs to be prodded or needs oficial forms filled out?

3) There were some states ready to give help but had to wait for Louisiana to say yes you can help.

- Under the purview of what document, rule or law? Most importantly we are talking about the chimp here, not neighboring states.

4) Also it takes time to get all the equipment there the roads are kind of flooded to put it in light terms.

- Have you heard the word, "preemptive?" The hurricane was thought to be a cat 5, which downgraded to a cat 4 by the time it hit land, so was there a form La had to fill out there too? Kinda funny how the righties seem to call the locals a bunch of dumb "N's" for not leaving, yet when it comes to aid they're supposed to be intelligent. Quit being a chimp lover for a second and see what you're doing here.

5) Also who the hell would live in a city thatâ€™s below see level right next to the ocean I sure the hell wouldnâ€™t floods happen.

- And who the hell would live in a desert that gets so hot that people die of heat stroke every year, paint bakes off your car in a couple years, kids get left in cars a bake every year? Oh, that's me. Most places have disaters that are inherent to the climate or topography, etc... Cali and their slides, midwest and their tornadoes, the North and their freezings; where is the perfect place please? This chimp-loving argument is your weakest, now go back and answer my questions from my previous post or consider to be acquiescing.

6)Those people were taking a chance by living in a giant bull

- What does that mean?

> Oh! After reading this a day later, I think you mean, "bowl!!!" I'm not spelling-Naziing you, but that is hillarious!!!! I thought maybe it was the, "trojan Bull!!!"

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:48 am

eHoward wrote:I actually enjoy reading a lot the Ed posts.

the ones with Stricter were real good.

Shaun41178(2) wrote:

Cool and it's great to have a place to debate these issues w/o fear of the Euro-Nazi..... :afrocool:

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Tue Sep 06, 2005 12:51 am

88GTneverfinsihed wrote:
richfiero wrote:I think the local goverment has to have most of the blame not bush. the mayor of new orleans is a fucking moron. did any of you hear him speak. i cant believe they made a thug a mayor. also the state had 5000 national gaurd people at thier disposal they didnt respond rite away. new orleans didnt even get hit as hard as missippi. so how is it that missippi can handle their own and not louisana. because the goverment at missippi arent morons like the may or of neworleans. :bootyshake:
you're the fuckin moron. The mayor was on tv 2 days before beggin for everyone to leave. You have a poor city, you got barely enough resources to run things in the best of times and you get targeted by a once in a lifetime natural disaster. let's see how well you would do completely evacuating a city on your own.

Local governments are designed and funded to maintain status quo. They are not designed to deal with disasters. That is the role of the fed. The Fed fights wars and protects the homeland. A disaster of that scale is absolutly the domain of the office of the president. That office failed the American people yet again.

> Local governments are designed and funded to maintain status quo.

>The Fed fights wars and protects the homeland. A disaster of that scale is absolutly the domain of the office of the president.

Well put - that's what I was trying to say!

richfiero · Post by **richfiero** » Tue Sep 06, 2005 2:03 pm

it should be the president and the feds to handle big dasters but are country is not set up that way. states have power to and we cant do shit unless a state ask for help. and if they wait 2 days to ask for help we have to wait those 2 days no if ands and buts

88GTneverfinsihed · Post by **88GTneverfinsihed** » Tue Sep 06, 2005 10:52 pm

richfiero wrote:it should be the president and the feds to handle big dasters but are country is not set up that way. states have power to and we cant do shit unless a state ask for help. and if they wait 2 days to ask for help we have to wait those 2 days no if ands and buts

Yea that must be it. Louisiana didn't ask for help in a timely manner.

I thought FEMA was responsible for natural disaster response. What does that acronym stand for again? I forget.

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 1:08 am

richfiero wrote:it should be the president and the feds to handle big dasters but are country is not set up that way. states have power to and we cant do shit unless a state ask for help. and if they wait 2 days to ask for help we have to wait those 2 days no if ands and buts

Uh, in addition to the fact that there are a lot of chickens on here who refuse to answer posts that answer questions asked by the former, there is a another, "Oops upside the head" here.

FEMA Mission
DISASTER. It strikes anytime, anywhere. It takes many forms -- a hurricane, an earthquake, a tornado, a flood, a fire or a hazardous spill, an act of nature or an act of terrorism. It builds over days or weeks, or hits suddenly, without warning. Every year, millions of Americans face disaster, and its terrifying consequences.

On March 1, 2003, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) became part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). FEMA's continuing mission within the new department is to lead the effort to prepare the nation for all hazards and effectively manage federal response and recovery efforts following any national incident. FEMA also initiates proactive mitigation activities, trains first responders, and manages the National Flood Insurance Program and the U.S. Fire Administration

Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, PL 100-707, signed into law November 23, 1988; amended the Disaster Relief Act of 1974, PL 93-288. This Act constitutes the statutory authority for most Federal disaster response activities especially as they pertain to FEMA and FEMA programs.

OK, statutory authority, which means they don't need state permission, k? The feds have supreme powers over states in so many ways, so let's quit this chimp-loving absolution. Fcae it, FEMA screwed up, chimp sat there and did nothjing until he received pressure. Here's an article off the net:

FEMA Chief Sent Help Only When Storm Ended
By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press Writer 45 minutes ago
The government's disaster chief waited until hours after Hurricane Katrina had already struck the Gulf Coast before asking his boss to dispatch 1,000 Homeland Security workers to support rescuers in the region â€” and gave them two days to arrive, according to internal documents.
Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, sought the approval from Homeland Security Secretary Mike Chertoff roughly five hours after Katrina made landfall on Aug. 29. Brown said that among duties of these employees was to "convey a positive image" about the government's response for victims.
Before then, FEMA had positioned smaller rescue and communications teams across the Gulf Coast. But officials acknowledged Tuesday the first department-wide appeal for help came only as the storm raged.
Brown's memo to Chertoff described Katrina as "this near catastrophic event" but otherwise lacked any urgent language. The memo politely ended, "Thank you for your consideration in helping us to meet our responsibilities."
The initial responses of the government and Brown came under escalating criticism as the breadth of destruction and death grew. President Bush and Congress on Tuesday pledged separate investigations into the federal response to Katrina. "Governments at all levels failed," said Sen. Susan Collins (news, bio, voting record), R-Maine.
Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said Brown had positioned front-line rescue teams and Coast Guard helicopters before the storm. Brown's memo on Aug. 29 aimed to assemble the necessary federal work force to support the rescues, establish communications and coordinate with victims and community groups, Knocke said.
Instead of rescuing people or recovering bodies, these employees would focus on helping victims find the help they needed, he said.
"There will be plenty of time to assess what worked and what didn't work," Knocke said. "Clearly there will be time for blame to be assigned and to learn from some of the successful efforts."
Brown's memo told employees that among their duties, they would be expected to "convey a positive image of disaster operations to government officials, community organizations and the general public."
"FEMA response and recovery operations are a top priority of the department and as we know, one of yours," Brown wrote Chertoff. He proposed sending 1,000 Homeland Security Department employees within 48 hours and 2,000 within seven days.
Knocke said the 48-hour period suggested for the Homeland employees was to ensure they had adequate training. "They were training to help the life-savers," Knocke said.
Employees required a supervisor's approval and at least 24 hours of disaster training in Maryland, Florida or Georgia. "You must be physically able to work in a disaster area without refrigeration for medications and have the ability to work in the outdoors all day," Brown wrote.
The same day Brown wrote Chertoff, Brown also urged local fire and rescue departments outside Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi not to send trucks or emergency workers into disaster areas without an explicit request for help from state or local governments. Brown said it was vital to coordinate fire and rescue efforts.
Sen. Barbara Mikulski (news, bio, voting record), D-Md., said Tuesday that Brown should step down.
After a senators-only briefing by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and other Cabinet members, Sen. Charles E. Schumer (news, bio, voting record) said lawmakers weren't getting their questions answered.
"What people up there want to know, Democrats and Republicans, is what is the challenge ahead, how are you handling that and what did you do wrong in the past," said Schumer, D-N.Y.
Sen. Ted Stevens (news, bio, voting record), R-Alaska, said the administration is "getting a bad rap" for the emergency response. "People have to understand this is a big, big problem."
Meanwhile, the airline industry said the government's request for help evacuating storm victims didn't come until late Thursday afternoon. The president of the Air Transport Association, James May, said the Homeland Security Department called then to ask if the group could participate in an airlift for refugees.

Let's hear your next chimp-loving spin......

BTW, Clinton sign NAFTA after Bush1 initiated it, he also pardoned Symington; it's ok to admit the chimp fucked this all up. Chimp lovers and Repubs in general need to learn that it's ok to make certain admissions.

88GTneverfinsihed · Post by **88GTneverfinsihed** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 1:44 am

Take a look. The deer in the headlights look is not an act or a fluke. This is the guy we put in charge.

That face has D'oh! written all over it.

Hack.

EBSB52 · Post by **EBSB52** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 11:16 am

88GTneverfinsihed wrote:

Take a look. The deer in the headlights look is not an act or a fluke. This is the guy we put in charge.

That face has D'oh! written all over it.

Hack.

Look at the sign behind him; "Reading makes a country great." Maybe he should have followed that when he was in school.

The guy is not a leader, he's not even a leader of a corporation, but now a country. The world laughs at us.......

....and all the geniuses say is, "Maybe so, but I'm not voting for a Massachusettes Democrat." So they vote for a Texas illiterate?

The way I feel is that who cares if some Dems are womanizers, who cares if Bush is the first criminal elected into office, who cares about all the Ad Hominem-based rhetoric; what is a person doing? The Repugs can only defer to the weak Mass. Dem argument. The Repugs are at least wise enough to either abstain from arguments llike the one in this thread, and I'm not cornering any Repugs here, but nationally. They are wise enough to continually defer to unrelated, irrelevant nothingness as opposed to addressing substantive issues like homelessness, health insurance, jobs, execution of the innocent, and other classist core issues that the Repugs fear.

I compell any Repugs here to address these, but first start by addressing the enumerated post above..... crickets.... won't happen. I feel sorry for the Repugs not being able to argue the merits of their ideologies; no wonder they're often angry......

Kohburn · Post by **Kohburn** » Wed Sep 07, 2005 1:55 pm

EBSB52 wrote: The Repugs are at least wise enough to either abstain from arguments llike the one in this thread, and I'm not cornering any Repugs here, but nationally. They are wise enough to continually defer to unrelated, irrelevant nothingness as opposed to addressing substantive issues like homelessness, health insurance, jobs, execution of the innocent, and other classist core issues that the Repugs fear.

I compell any Repugs here to address these, but first start by addressing the enumerated post above..... crickets.... won't happen. I feel sorry for the Repugs not being able to argue the merits of their ideologies; no wonder they're often angry......

thats because saying anything in here would be about as effective as a black man walking into a Klan meeting and debating with them about how their hate is unjust. Now like the smart man - i'ma run along now before the lynch mob forms up