This is kind of like “if you’re not with Bush, you’re with the terrorists.” The fallacy of the excluded middle. “Either you believe Bush is well on the way to installing a functional democracy in Iraq, or you’re against democracy in Iraq.”
I’d feel a lot more comfortable with Bush if the Senate was controlled by Dems and the House evenly divided. It was close to that when he first came in, no? Maybe a slight edge to the Republicans in the Senate?
How exactly does the CA governor plan on getting around the "you must be a US-born citizen to be President?
In the first two years of his next term, Bush will doff his moderate “election face” and lurch to the right again. We will see:
-
A concentrated effort to replace the income tax with a national sales tax.
-
At the same time (in case the sales tax proposal fails) we will see an effort to “make the Bush tax cuts permanent.” Sounds good, but this is code for permanently eliminating the Estate Tax (which was the real purpose of the “Bush tax cuts” - the rest was just throwing other taxpayers a bone).
-
A renewed effort to eliminate or greatly reduce capital gains tax.
-
A renewed effort to eliminate taxes on dividends.
-
A renewed effort to make the bankruptcy code more friendly to credit card companies (i.e. to make it more difficult for consumers to escape credit card debt).
-
“Tort reform.” I.e., a constriction of the rights of injured parties to sue those who caused their injuries. (How this is a federal issue, I don’t know. What ever happened to Republicans valuing “states’ rights?”) The beneficiaries of this action will not be consumers but insurance carriers.
-
Redoubled efforts to privatize Social Security.
-
Further erosion (and lax enforcement) of environmental protection laws.
In the second two years, expect Bush and the Republican majority to tack back to the center, so the Republicaan Party can present a more moderate face to the electorate come 2008.
I’m fine with a democratic Iraq. But I’ll be interested to see how Bushco handles it if:
A) A majority go for a Shia theocracy and then immediately eliminate or severely curtail democracy. This is entirely feasible. Will we accept the Mullahs in charge?
B) A “balkanization” that threatens to fracture the country into civil war. Will we need to stay in place to protect the Kurds from the Arabs and Turks? If Iraq breaks into three pieces (Kurdish, Shia and Sunni controlled areas, with ethnic minorities in each), will we allow that? What will Iranian, Syrian and Turkish response to this be.
It’s a bit simple to believe that we just hold an election and then leave them with the keys.
It would take a constitutional amendment of course, which is highly unlikely to get through and ratified in the near future. But I won’t be surprised if a Republican Washington begins work on this.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…
That’s fine. You continue to tell each other how stupid, ignorant, and corrupt the majority of voters are, and we will continue to elect Republicans. I am perfectly happy with that plan. You get the smug sense of moral superiority, we get the actual seats in Congress, the White House, federal benches, and state capitols. This is a division of responsibility I heartily endorse.
In 2001, the House was barely under GOP control and the Senate was briefly 51-50 for the Republicans until Jim Jeffords became an Ind., making it 50-50-1.
I doubt it. While there might be some talk, Bush has never indicated this was anywhere on the agenda.
Given. And he’ll get it, too.
Agreed. I think he’ll get reductions in (3) and (4), and everything they want on (5).
And HMOs. And just wait and see what happens to medical care for children, the elderly, and non-working spouses, who do not earn income and therefore have no economic damages in a malpractice case.
Not likely to be successful on the grand scale, but I can certainly see partial privatization for young workers.
Given.
Not a chance. They’ll run the place like they think they own it.
Let he who is without a smug sense of moral superiority cast the first stone.
OK, that’d be me. I have no sense of moral superiority – merely a strong sense of superiority when it comes to accurately perceiving the political climate around me. I guess that’s “smug” and “superior” but it’s no claim on any moral pedestal.
Briker:
With the Taliban out of power, state sponsorship is not the key to the terrorist threat. Call that the Bush Delusion rather than the Bush Doctrine. Terrorists operate clandestinely and/or in areas outside government control in places like Pakistan and the new Iraq.
Shibboleth:
Iran may give some support to terrorism, but short of a WWII-style mobilization with the draft and/or attacking them with nuclear weapons, how can we go to war against them? Syria is a bit more doable militarily, but instead of doing much good vs terrorism it would only make a bad situation worse. I don’t see Bush making much of a case for going there.
RikWriter:
Exhibit A of conservative selfishness. If you’re getting more money, then the economy is doing great. I got next to nothing and I’m not exactly low-income.
:eek: Iraq was not a base for terrorism, but it is now. Saddam was practially our ally in the war on terrorism in that he was a secularist who–unlike the Saudis who made a devil’s bargain with the radical Islamists–kept a tight lid on them. In one sense it’s good that we got rid of him (did we have the right to do so? We weren’t defending ourselves.), but we worsened and complicated the terrorist threat and bogged down our military. And Iraq is not free and may never be.
Bush is to blame for Iran’s and North Korea’s nuclear programs and if Musharraf is overthrown and Islamists get ahold of Pakistan’s nukes, Bush will be to blame for that as well.
I’m taking a more circumspect view and wondering what the next four years hold for the country in a social sense. The past four years have been some of the most divisive in a long time (1968 probably being the high (or low) water mark). I pointed out in a few threads a while back that the venom people seem to carry with them has just reached astronomical levels - you could actually hear the hatred in people’s voices when they spoke about one or the other candidates (I was guilty of that myself). I have to wonder if that level of vitriol on both sides can be sustained.
I’m not a pollyanna, and I don’t to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony, but I don’t believe the situation in general is going to get any better. Interesting times. Scary, but interesting.
So then you are smug, superior, and completely amoral. A perfect description of the GOP! 
Well, on the pragmatic side, there will probably be something that happens that makes this easier to support. Perhaps intelligence pointing to one or either helping to support or direclty act as insurgents in Iraq, perhaps. On the more cynical side, I’m fairly sure that Wolfowitz and Co. see the election victory as validation and will work towards democracy over theocracy/tyranny, and will push for expanding a “security zone” into neighboring states. Screw the rest of the world/UN if they don’t support us.
BTW, I won’t be surprised to see us move further away from the UN in the next few years as well.
sqweels - do you understand that a majority of voters don’t seem to agree with your assessment? Now, perhaps you’re right and they’re wrong. But merely repeating the same talking points that failed to convince the electorate seems… a bit hardheaded.
No, sorry, that’s an outright lie.
No, actually that would be a perfect description of the average American liberal.
Prove it, and prove it in context. 
The problem is that the theocratic-right faction of the GOP would (correctly) interpret that as preparation for kicking them to the curb. A bare-knuckled faction fight within the GOP is inevitable at this point, but I think the fiscal-conservative and neocon factions are going to take their time and gather strength (by which time it will probably be too late to amend the Constitution before the 2008 election) before crossing that Rubicon.