Subj : Re: Yet another poll To : alt.tv.farscape From : Ken McElhaney Date : Fri Sep 09 2005 15:08:24 From Newsgroup: alt.tv.farscape TNW7Z7Z7Z12345 wrote: > Ken McElhaney wrote: > > > Isn't it amazing! Unprecidented negative coverage of Bush, lowest > > approval ratings yet and he STILL BEATS KERRY! > > > > Doesn't say much for most people's view of Kerry. :) > > Between the Swift-boat lies and Flip-flop hypocrisy, I would say that > Kerry received unprecedented negative coverage from August until the > election. Not compared to Bush, no way, no day. > He's been my senator for a very long time, and I know he's > nothing like the charicature the country was left with after his > character was decimated. He's an intelligent, competent guy who > unfortunately speaks in a wordy, round-about way that seriously hurts > his cause. And that was his downfall. It's not the accusations, it was Kerry's inability to respond simply and effectively to them. He should've taken a page from the Clinton playbook of 1992, but I really think that Kerry is unable to do that. He just didn't understand that sometimes a Presidential candidate has to speak clearly and not worry about ticking some people off. > Of course Dubya can barely speak, but with Karl Rove doing the > scripting, that doesn't matter. Notice how bad his response to the > hurricane was until Rove got back from vacation. Too bad for the country > that Kerry didn't shut up and let someone else script his remarks. Kerry was given every chance and then some to overcome the swift-boat accusations and to clearly explain his positions without cluttering them up. ABC, CBS, CNN, & NBC all gave him entire hour-long news programs (like ABC's Sunday Morning program) and Kerry still could not come across clearly and directly. Do I personally think the accusations made of his time with the swift-boats are accurate? No, I never did. Nor should a lot of things that happened to a candidate 30+ years ago be held against him. But I felt his reactions to the charges and his overall inability to clearly, concisely state his positions without cluttering them up gave the impression that he wasn't very decisive (whether true or not). Besides, some of the best Presidents this nation has had (be they Republican or Democrat) were not the smartest, but they were not afraid to act, even if it was unpopular. And that trait is very important to show during a presidential campaign. Candidates who win usually have a very high "vote for" percentage compared to the "voted against" reason. Many Kerry voters were simply voting against Bush and were driven not by Kerry's character or positions, they simply hated Bush and picked someone whom they thought could be him, even if they knew little about the candidate. Bush, for all the problems you see in him, had a very high "vote for" percentage. > > Ken - who actually thinks Bush should take some blame, just not as much > > as the Mayor of New Orleans & the gov, who were the ones that really > > screwed up. > > > The governor declared a state of emergency a day before Bush did (before > the hurricane hit) and asked Bush for help directly. Funny that you leave out that Bush made his declaration BEFORE the hurricane hit, which was a rather unusual move in historic terms for presidents to make. > Under Clinton, > this would've triggered immediate meetings between the federal disaster > *specialists* and local and state officials to anticipate many of the > problems and have a coordinated response ready (who was in charge of > what, communication systems, etc.). What can be said is that local & state officials are the first responders and THEY make the decisions, FEMA acts in "support" of local & state entities. FEMA can advise and coordinate, but they cannot order the National Guard to commandeer buses for evacuation, only the gov can do that and she waited until WEDNESDAY afternoon before making that call. Both the gov & Bush begged the Mayor of New Orleans to call for a manditory evacuation of the city on Saturday, yet he waited until Sunday morning because "he didn't know if he had the authority.". A pretty sorry excuse for someone who should know what authority he has, but let's say he didn't know, why would it take 12 to 18 hours for him to figure it out? Admittedly, the Superdome & Convention Center were terrible places to be after the retaining walls broke, but it was better than being trapped in their homes where many (perhaps thousands) have died. How many more people who wanted to be evacuated from their homes could've been saved in that 12 - 18 hour period? That's something that will be on the Mayor's concience for the rest of his life. > If there is a fair investigation, the issue will be why FEMA was > decimated and failed to act in the way it had under Clinton (or even in > the pre-election Florida hurricanes). You sure have a high opinion of Clinton's abilities. But FEMA, at least in terms of hurricane response, was hardly tested during his tenure compared to Bush. If you check the US chart for most damaging hurricanes to hit the US since 1851 (not including Katrina); http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastcost.shtml 6 out of top 10 hit between 2001 - 2004. Whearas during Clinton's tenure only 2 of the top 10 made landfall. This is not to say Clinton has done a bad job, just that his FEMA organization was not tested like Bush's has been, so I find the Clinton comparison faulty on lack of evidence. > This time, regardless of the > initial screw ups by local and state officials, once FEMA acted, it was > so shockingly incompetent, there is no way the Republicans won't get > blamed for that. Again, FEMA is not a first responder organization able to override local and state officials, no matter how stupid their decisions are. The federal government should get some of the blame, but the majority falls on the Mayor and the Governor. > http://makeashorterlink.com/?Y156124CB > > or if that doesn't work -- > > > > Please don't dismiss the article just because it's in Salon. It has a > lot of background info. Read it carefully, and if you disagree, go after > his specific argument. First off, why do you chose Salon? Certainly if the problem is that bad, there are less hard-core, Republican-bashing news sources (like CNN, ABC, AP, etc) that would confirm this story. > And the other issue will be why the federal gov. didn't shore up the > levees to start with, which inspite of the considerable expense, > would've been a whole lot cheaper than what we're going to pay now. ABC News had a great story last Thursday which interviewed many "experts" that bitterly complained on how the money was not allocated to pay for reinforcing the levees for over 20 years (mostly because they were tied to pork projects). But at the end of the report, the reporter sheepishly admitted that even if the money had been spent and ALL the improvements made, the retaining walls STILL would've been breached because they were completed projects and not subject to ANY of the bills put before Congress. Meaning that Bush-bashers would've bitterly complained about how he "wasted" all that money on the levees/retaining walls that didn't break. > For > that, some blame will fall on Clinton, although I believe most of the > alarms were published since 2000, and if Bush is the "grown-up" opposite > of Clinton, why didn't he act? Bush did act, more money was allocated during the first five years of the Bush administration than the last five years of Clinton's. But it still didn't make any difference, nor would it have had all the bills been passed. I think the tide will turn away from FEMA and focus on the Mayor and the Gov, where it should be. Ken .