How do we stop Bush?

[Scotty]

Great post! You make some very good points.

[Jablea]

Hey I'm glad we are in agreement on hating Bush. I can't wait for that date, if it really comes.

But we do disagree on your first sentence. You're right that our system of government will restrict some of the abuses that Hitler was able to get by with. But if you adjust the scale their are similarities. You mention sending armies into numerous other countries. He entered Iraq on a pretext and other than Brittain forced all the rest of our so called allies to join him under economic threat. Join us or lose trade. I well remember when French fries were either banned or renamed Freedom Fries at the nation's capital because the French had the audacity to tell us to go take a leak. I'm not alone in my thinking he will continue taking the war to Iran, check out MSNBC.com or search for former Republican presidential candiate Pat Buchanan at antiwar.com and his views of this week's speech.

Since the military commanders didn't agree with him he's replaced them. He's sent an Air Force General and an Admiral as the new US commanders and positioned Air Force bombers on a repositioned carrier group in the gulf. He's sent in stealth bombers last week to South Korea. Raising the stakes by 20,000 troops in Iraq is a ruse, a feint, something to get us looking that way while he destroys America's reputation even more by not bothering to ask Congress if he can attack Iran and North Korea. He really believes he is King George and in his interview today he said the congress can only "try" to stop him. We will find out after the bombers fly, not before. Every morning I wake up expecting the news.

And you mention concentration camps. Bush knows we wouldn't tolerate it on our soil so he's co-opted Guantanamo Bay to hold taxi drivers for 4 years and flown other prisoners to other countries where water boarding and making people think they are drowning is, according to dear Cheney, not an act of torture. He's tapped our phones, made our homes violatable at his whim, and scared the [!@#$%^&*] out of us all. I attended a gun show this week and you should have seen the crowds.

Can we agree that all politicians are wusses? They are all beholden to the money exchangers and too worried about the next election to do the right thing now and stop him.

[Dan]

I'll agree that the comparison is rather extreme.

Also, I couldn't help but enjoy the mention of the draft. Especially considering that the last attempt to reinstate the draft was sponsored by... a Democrat.

Take that for what it's worth.

[Danni]

Rangel doesn't really support the idea of enacting the draft. It's basically his way of calling politicians out on their bullshit.

[King]

War is necessary at times. Yes.

This is not one of those times.

[SpiritualJunkie]

Yeah, that's exactly what I was trying to say earlier and that's why I don't think your comparison of Bush to Hitler is completely extreme. Had Bush been placed in a different context with different laws and a different political structure like let's say, Hitler's, what would he be like?

Oohhh..very good point. Bush is like a dictator with a narrowminded, very black-and-white way at looking at things when it comes to what Americans think as well as what other countries think and decide to do. If you're not for America or the war in Iraq, then you must be for those Islamic fundamentalist terrorists who are trying to take down the Western world.

The racism in the Bush government is also appalling. I've heard stories of people of Middle Eastern decent being bulldozed with questions at the border because of the possibility that they are terrorists.

I also think it's interesting that the U.S. doesn't air military funerals on TV. Are there too many funerals? Are they trying to downplay the sad reality behind the number of war casualties? Definitely something to ponder about.

[JamesF]

SJ, you've really hit the nail on the head and there's not much else I can add.

I really worry about the naivete of people who still support the war, spouting words such as "protecting freedom" and "removing dictators" for the sake of a better world. They purport to have some kind of global view yet have NO idea of what is really going on outside American borders. I'm sorry to break it, but "protecting" is not what the US is about and it never has been (and don't think I'm bashing, other countries including mine are just as guilty). There have been dozens of other examples of murderous dictators and terrorist acts that the US have done nothing about because they never had the vested interest that they do in the Middle East yet as soon as Bush decides to tear it up in the Gulf, it's a matter of national conscience? Please.

The motivations of the Bush family are best left known only to them because they're indecipherable to anyone with half a brain or a conscience. The Kuwaiti "baby killing" saga of 1991 should be proof positive that all is not as it seems in that regard.

As far as non-conservatives being "tree huggers"? I'd say more people who have their eyes open, realise that the world doesn't stop at the west and don't live in an eternal present where one can consume what they like and to hell with the consequences.

[MarlandRulez]

ITA James. Great post. The person who made the "tree huggers" comment is an ignorant ass. I'm sure if he gained power he would have all of us 'huggers' shipped off to the gas chambers.

[daysfan]

ITA! War is necessary but not this time.

[Scotty]

I agree with Danni's response to this. When Senator Rangel proposed this, it wasn't because it was something he felt deeply in or agreed with. He knew it didn't have a snowball's chance in hell of passing. His reasoning for doing it was to draw attention to how ignorant and stupid the war in Iraq has always been.

[Jablea]

I'm not worried about the draft now, I'm worried about the draft when my 7 year old comes of age. The future for our children looks very bleak because of this one man.

Yahoo news

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WASHINGTON - President Bush, facing opposition from both parties over his plan to send more troops to Iraq, said he has the authority to act no matter what Congress wants.

"I fully understand they could try to stop me from doing it. But I've made my decision. And we're going forward," Bush told CBS' "60 Minutes" in an interview to air Sunday night.

Vice President Dick Cheney asserted that lawmakers' criticism will not influence Bush's plans and he dismissed any effort to "run a war by committee."

"The president is the commander in chief. He's the one who has to make these tough decisions," Cheney said.

The defiant White House stance comes as both the House and Senate, now controlled by Democrats, prepare to vote on resolutions that oppose additional U.S. troops in Iraq. Cheney said those nonbinding votes would not affect Bush's ability to carry out his policies.

"He's the guy who's got to decide how to use the force and where to deploy the force," Cheney said. "And Congress obviously has to support the effort through the power of the purse. So they've got a role to play, and we certainly recognize that. But you also cannot run a war by committee."

Any attempts to block Bush's efforts would undermine the troops, Cheney said. He took particular aim at Democratic lawmakers who have blasted the president for increasing troops despite opposition from Congress, military advisers and a disgruntled electorate that in November ousted the GOP as the majority party on Capitol Hill.

"They have absolutely nothing to offer in its place," Cheney said of Democratic leaders. "I have yet to hear a coherent policy from the Democratic side."

Yet many Republican lawmakers, too, have begun to criticize Bush's war management. Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel (news, bio, voting record) of Nebraska, for example, said last week he feared Bush's plan would be the worst foreign policy blunder since the Vietnam War.

Responding to that, Cheney said the most dangerous blunder would be to give up on the global fight against terrorism because the United States has decided the war in Iraq is too difficult. That is just what America's terrorist enemies are counting on, he said.

"They're convinced that the United States will pack it in and go home if they just kill enough of us," Cheney said. "They can't beat us in a standup fight, but they think they can break our will."

Bush announced last week he will send 21,500 more troops to Iraq to halt violence, mainly around Baghdad, as an essential step toward stabilizing the country's government. That plan — along with economic and political steps — are meant to allow Iraqis to move ahead with securing the country themselves and allow U.S. troops to gradually return home.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived in London for talks Sunday with Prime Minister Tony Blair on Bush's new approach in Iraq and Britain's plan to withdraw troops from southern Iraq.

Like Bush, though, Cheney braced Americans to frame the war in Iraq as part of a much longer effort.

"This is an existential conflict," Cheney said. "It is the kind of conflict that's going to drive our policy and our government for the next 20 or 30 or 40 years. We have to prevail and we have to have the stomach for the fight long term."

The White House also said Sunday that Iranians are aiding the insurgency in Iraq and the U.S. has the authority to pursue them because they "put our people at risk."

"We are going to need to deal with what Iran is doing inside Iraq," national security adviser Stephen Hadley said.

Added Cheney: "Iran is fishing in troubled waters inside Iraq."

The U.S. military in Baghdad said five Iranians arrested in northern Iraq last week were connected to an Iranian Revolutionary Guard faction that funds and arms insurgents in Iraq.

"We do not want them doing what they can to destabilize the situation inside Iraq," Cheney said.

Bush's revised war strategy seeks to isolate Iran and Syria, which the U.S. has accused of fueling attacks in Iraq. The president also says Iran and Syria have not done enough to block terrorists from entering Iraq over their borders.

"We know there are jihadists moving from Syria into Iraq. ... We know also that Iran is supplying elements in Iraq that are attacking Iraqis and attacking our forces," Hadley said.

"What the president made very clear is these are activities that are going on in Iraq that are unacceptable. They put our people at risk. He said very clearly that we will take action against those. We will interdict their operations, we will disrupt their supply lines, we will disrupt these attacks," Hadley said.

"We are going to need to deal with what Iran is doing inside Iraq."

Iran's government denied the five detainees were involved in financing and arming insurgents and said they should be released.

Hadley asserted that if Iranians in Iraq "are doing things that are putting are people at risk, of course we have the authority to go after them and protect our people."

Hadley sidestepped a question about whether U.S. forces would move across the border to pursue Iranians who are helping Iraqi insurgents.

He said the priority "is what's going on inside Iraq. ... That's where we're going to deal with his problem."

Hadley was interviewed on "This Week" on ABC and "Meet the Press" on NBC. Cheney was on "Fox News Sunday."

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[Shawn]

I've said it before, and I will say it again. Bush is the Antichrist.

[daysfan]

2008 can't come fast enough.

[Scotty]

Tell me about it...and surely to goodness a Democrat will win that election.

[daysfan]

Lets just hope they have a good one in the running....the last two, hey mabye even three, people who ran for President weren't good choices.