George W. Bush and the GOP: Character Assassins

September 13 2004
Counterbias.com
Dennis Jones
D E M O C R A T I C   V I E W

Let's reflect a little on the past shall we? Which party was it that gave us the great gift of McCarthyism?  Disagree with them and you were a "Comsymp" – a communist sympathizer – a traitor. Which party accused President Truman of as much when he refused to go to war with China and the Soviet Union over Korea? Which party questioned the loyalty of anyone who dared to question our efforts in Vietnam, or Panama or Nicaragua, or anywhere for that matter? Which party is it that actually counts among its supporters an acid tongued author who has written a book claiming that all liberals are "Traitors"? If you said the GOP, you win!

Flash forward to 2004. It is time for George W. Bush to seek re-election. The president and his political advisors scout the terrain to decide on a strategy knowing that their opponent will be John Kerry, the liberal junior senator from Massachusetts. It's painfully obvious that the economy is soft and that the recovery is weak. Even more obvious is the failing occupation in Iraq and a stalled war on terror. What to do? Dipping down into the deep well of faith that Mr. Bush constantly touts, he decides to do what Jesus would do: character assassination. Ignore your own record, bring in the Swift Vets to slime the war hero, distort his long record in the Senate, lie about his proposals for the future and send out Darth Cheney to suggest that a vote for Kerry will be a vote for the enemy. Voila! Kerry is a hopeless pussy and George W. Bush by comparison is Goliath!

OK, Mr. President, I'll take the bait. To begin with, you have argued that character is a sure sign of leadership. I agree, but may I suggest that you are lacking, sir. Both you and Senator Kerry were born to privilege, but only you saw fit to use your family's influence to obtain favorable treatment. John Kerry volunteered for service in the navy and two terms in Vietnam, during which he was fired at (and saved a life under fire). Kerry was wounded and killed for his country while you got drunk and had a good time. With the power of your father's position you vaulted over several hundred less influential fellow Texans to a position of safety in the Texas Air National Guard, not in combat.

When he left active duty, John Kerry opposed the Vietnam War in an act of great courage, given the antipathy of many Americans and Richard Nixon in
particular. He spoke out when many would have receded into the background. Mr. President, your minions have distorted what Kerry said during his youth to argue that he slandered all veterans in his protests, but any fair reading of the record shows that he was faulting superiors – especially civilian superiors. He was 27 years old and could have chosen his words more carefully, but his opposition to that wasted and costly war was noble. But since when did a little thing like facts
stand in your way? In the meantime, you, Mr. Bush, stumbled from one drink to another in a never-ending search for a good time.

John Kerry served as a prosecutor and later stood before the public to win election as a U.S. senator. You used money from your family to found an oil exploration firm which, against all odds, couldn't find oil in Texas! When that started to fold, your father's rich friends bailed you out and set you up to run another oil company which you also managed to tank. Then, daddy's rich friends to the rescue again - you became a stockholder in Harkin Energy where you received a bunch of stock options and a nice salary for doing... nothing! That proved too much for you and Harkin started to fail, so you sold a bunch of your stock just before the price fell and then conveniently forgot to notify the SEC. Once again daddy sent the cavalry, this time in the form of the commissioners of the SEC whom he had appointed. They found you guiltless. Stupid, but guiltless. Finally you used your ill-gotten gains to purchase less than 2% of the Texas Rangers. You were the managing general partner, but daddy's rich friends didn't allow you to have anything to do with the running of the team; no dummies they! During this entire time you managed to finely hone your drinking abilities.

OK, Mr. President, is this what you mean by character? On one hand we have a man who served heroically in battle in Vietnam, while you obtained a spot in the National Guard to avoid the draft. We have one man who served his fellow
citizens as a prosecutor and as a senator, while you stumbled from one business failure to another, all the while depending on your father's influence to pick you up and send you on your way. It appears that the only real thing that you
did on your own was drink - a lot! I would say that early character favors Mr. Kerry, maybe just a teensy weensy little bit, eh?

That brings us to the Republican National Convention and the kickoff to your bid for re-election. It's time for the strategy to kick in so to whom do you entrust this hugely important task? Like your dad you are too much of a chickenshit to do the dirty work yourself, so you send out Zig Zag Zell Miller and Vice President Darth Cheney. And a masterful job they did, because they were totally unencumbered by the facts. Using gross exaggerations, huge distortions and outright lies they crapped on Kerry to the point where you, Mr. Bush, look like Abraham Lincoln and George Washington all rolled up into one by comparison. Golly, aren't you just wonderful?

Ol' Zell was particularly effective. In a speech clearly designed to bridge our differences and bring us together, he accused Democrats of a "manic obsession to bring down our Commander in Chief." I guess that means that we are in favor of holding an election and that we want to see you retired. Guilty! He said that "today's Democratic leaders see America as an occupier, not a liberator." Guilty again! We got that idea from - let's see - oh yeah, you! Zig Zag Zell must've screwed up big time when he suggested that "No one should dare to even think about being Commander in Chief of his country if he doesn't believe with all his heart that our soldiers are liberators abroad and defenders of freedom at home." I'm sure that he was a little deranged there because I know that he does really like you. Zell went on to say that Democrats "don't believe there is any real danger in the world except that which America brings upon itself through our clumsy and misguided foreign policy." That probably explains why we unreservedly backed you up when you attacked the Taliban in Afghanistan and the bastards who hit us on 9-11 - and still do.

Zell bellowed that "Senator Kerry has made it clear that he would use military force only if approved by the United Nations. Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending." Actually, sir, what Kerry really said was, "I will never hesitate to use force when it is required. Any attack will be met with a swift and certain response. I will never give any nation or international institution a veto over our national security." The two statements are fairly close, I suppose - both mentioned international institutions.

Zell really struck the killing blow when he listed almost every major weapon in the entire U.S. arsenal as systems that John Kerry had "opposed." Zell thundered, "This is the man who wants to be the Commander in Chief of our U.S. Armed Forces? U.S. forces armed with what? Spitballs?" Old Zell calculates that a vote against the Defense Appropriations Bill in 1990 at the end of the Cold War constitutes opposition to specific systems, but in fact there were no votes against specific systems. Kerry also voted against the appropriations bills in 1995 and 1996, but he has supported defense appropriations bills in 16 of the 19 years that he has served in the Senate and every year since 1996. Those votes included appropriations for the weapons systems that Kerry is said to "oppose". Zell said that, "Twenty years of votes can tell you much more about a man than twenty weeks of campaign rhetoric." How right he is!

Mr. President, Kerry lay bloodied and battered on the rhetorical field of battle and you sent in Darth Cheney to deliver the coup de grace. (Pardon the French). Citing Kerry's protest vote against the $87 billion appropriation for Iraq, Cheney opined that Kerry, "voted against funding for our men and women in the field. He voted against body armor, ammunition, fuel, spare parts, armored vehicles, extra pay for hardship duty, and support for military families. Senator Kerry is campaigning for the position of commander in chief. Yet he does not seem to understand the first obligation of a commander in chief and that is to support American troops in combat." Would it be acceptable if I pointed out here that there was no danger of the vote failing and that the reason for that vote in the first place was that you sir, our great leader, sent our troops into battle without those things in the first place? Probably better not to mention that.

Cheney went on to say, "But Senator Kerry's liveliest disagreement is with himself. His back-and-forth reflects a habit of indecision, and sends a message of confusion. And it is all part of a pattern. He has, in the last several years, been for the No Child Left Behind Act and against it. [Not true, he just wants you to fund it, sir]. He has spoken in favor of the North American Free Trade Agreement and against it. [Not true, he just wants it to be fair for American workers]. He is for the Patriot Act and against it. [Not true; he, like many Republicans, wants to refine it to protect civil liberties]. Senator Kerry says he sees two Americas. It makes the whole thing mutual - America sees two John Kerrys." At last, the truth! They see the real John Kerry and the straw man that you have created to run against!

Another paragon of truth, RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie, charges that Kerry wants to eviscerate our intelligence system because he voted to cut $1.5 billion from that budget in 1995. In actuality Kerry was looking out for the poor, overburdened taxpayer that the Republicans constantly invoke. The Air Force had secured that money to operate a spy satellite that was never launched. Kerry and a majority of his colleagues sought a refund on the program that the National Reconnaissance Office had cancelled. Don't you people ever check the facts?

Joseph Welsh, the attorney for the U.S. Army in the McCarthy hearings in the 50's uttered an immortal question. He could easily have said it to you, Mr. President. Welsh said, "You've done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?  Have you left no sense of decency?" Knowing your character as I do, sir, I assume that you will be unmoved. I assume your attacks on John Kerry will continue unabated, but sooner or later you will have to answer to the American people for your record.

You have passed massive tax cuts which have resulted in precious little stimulation of our economy and the largest deficits in our history. You propose to make those cuts permanent, ensuring that those deficits will endure far into
the future and will seriously impair programs like Social Security, Medicare, aid to education and many more. You have consistently weakened environmental laws in favor of your friends in big business. You have imperiled the welfare of
the public by appointing lobbyists and toadies of big business to the very regulatory agencies which were designed to oversee their activities. You have crippled medical research by seriously limiting federal funding for embryonic stem cell research - a sop to the fanatics of the religious right.

Under your watch the number of jobs created has actually declined. Darth Cheney believes that we can improve that number by classifying the people who sell things on eBay as "employed." (This is the man who is qualified to lead us should something happen to you?). The number of people living in poverty has dramatically increased. The number of people without any health coverage has likewise ballooned. The wealthy have prospered at the expense of the poor and the middle class.

In September 2002, you sent the National Security Strategy to the Congress. In it you called on "America to use our position of unparalleled strength and influence to create a balance of power that favors freedom." You said that "We
will preserve the peace by fostering an era of good relations among the world's great powers." You have got to be kidding! Your policies have severely weakened respect for our country around the world. You stubbornly led us into a completely unnecessary war in Iraq based on an argument that proved to be totally false. Should you argue for action in the future, who will believe you?

The heroic actions of our military forced the Taliban from power and sent al Qaeda packing in Afghanistan. Instead of following up on that success you dumped most of our resources into Iraq in what turned out to be the greatest recruiting tool the Islamists ever received. We have spent $200 billion and sacrificed over 1000 dead and 7000 injured to create the greatest hotbed of terrorist activity the Middle East has ever seen. We could have used those resources to create an Afghanistan of which the world would be proud. Instead we left it to a resurgent Taliban and the warlords whose only loyalty is to money and power. We could have wiped out Afghanistan's poppy trade that contributes mightily to the world heroin trade. Instead, they are going to have a record crop. We could have tracked down and eliminated Al Qaeda leaders Bin Laden and Al Zawahiri. Instead they live to spawn further attacks on us and our friends.

You argue that we should be satisfied because Saddam Hussein sits in jail and his two evil sons are dead. You ask if it would be better that this not be the case. As difficult as that is and knowing what evil people they were, sir, I say profoundly yes! The quagmire in Iraq is not worth the thousand casualties we have suffered and the enormous costs that we have run up. I ask you, sir, would you be satisfied if your daughters were raped and killed and in return the government caught and punished other criminals for other crimes wholly unconnected to that tragedy? I think not.

You and your minions want to argue that the chief reason for reelecting you is the strength that you have shown in making these decisions. I guess that we are not supposed to examine whether or not they were wise decisions. That cannot happen, sir. Like it or not, you are going to have to stand upon your record. And what a pitiful record it is.