Third party candidates have been growing in popularity lately, though, not just on the national level (Perot, Nader, Buchannan) but at a state level (Jesse Ventura). If a third party candidate can emerge who has some gravitas and is not a complete nutball (Perot), fascist (Buchannan) or weenie (Nader) he might have a shot at an upset. John McCain might be viable if he were to leave the GOP. Powell, too, if he wanted it (which he doesn’t). Jesse Ventura has dropped an occasional hint about it but I think he would embarrass himself.
Is there a chance that people might take a serious look at the Libertarians this time?
Bush will certainly get renominated. The only way some one else would run on the REp. ticket next time is if Bush decides not to run. And I’m not betting the farm on that one.
what bugs the shit out of me about all this (well, one thing) was that there were a whole lotta people who kept saying “if Colin Powell is saying this, he must have info not apparent to the rest of us, that tells him it’s true, that there’s a real threat there” and that’s why they bought into the war.
Keep in mind that that was the way it appeared back in 1992 before Clinton emerged from the pack. Weren’t those Democratic candidates the ones that were refered to as the Seven Dwarves?
That’s true, and I think Dean may have the potential to emerge this time, but the rest are all too familiar. I think that’s why the Senate produces so few presidents. people know who they are, there’s no mystery, no excitement.
what’s most disgusting is - where’s the outrage? the protests?
the fucking appolgies for calling those of us skeptical, “UnAmerican”, traitors etc.? We kept on insisting that to put our troops at risk required the greatest amount of hard evidence, and were told we were being unsupportive of our troops because of it. Now that the funerals have been held (tho’ they’ll continue to be held since our troops are still in harms way), where’s the fury that they were killed for a lie?
Considering how Powell’s advocacy won over many here who were on the fence up until then, I think it had the potential to make a real difference if he’d resigned instead, citing “philosophical differences” or whatever, even without blasting anyone on the way out.
I don’t think it should get him off the hook at all. When you go on national TV, look the American public in the eye, and say, “this is why we need to invade another country, remove their leaders, and institute a military occupation,” and it turns out to have all been a pack of lies, that renders trivial by comparison (IMHO, at least) any question of whether or not it was under oath.
No-one’s going to apologise, wring, because no matter how many died and no matter how many billions were pissed away, Monica sucked Clinton’s dick. See? It all balances out.
absolutely. And they relied on his positive image for being a ‘stand up guy’, one who had honor and scruples.
yea, I know lying under oath is a greater crime than lying to gain popular support for an invasion of another country, killing thousands, putting our troops at risk, using the ghosts of those who died on 9/11 to stoke the fire. etc. etc etc. all to do the ‘nation building’ that he’d claimed was not the rightful US’s role.
The Bush supporters on this Board are curiously absent in this thread. I thought they’d be marching in and presenting us with all the “evidence” of WMDs that the Administration has uncovered. Or at the very least accusing us of not supporting the troops.
I think what it will take is a dynamic, well-respected speaker to denounce Bush in a very public manner. Problem is, I cannot imagine who might do this. The cowardly fuck Democrats won’t. Every day I grow more and more pissed at these dickless wonders.
And re: Colin Powell – There’s no excuse for him not resigning if he felt it was all bullshit. None. At. All.
I have trouble coming up with anything more immoral than helping along an unjustified war. If he really felt there wasn’t justification, and still argued for the war… there’s simply no excuse.
I agree with the implication of doubt. Recall that Tony Blair was saying essentially the same things about WMDs as Colin Powell. Blair said his statements were based on reports from British intelligence. Blair had no obvious political motive to promote war with Iraq. On the contrary, supporting the war hurt him politically. It’s hard to doubt Blair’s sincerity.
No source is identified for Powell’s alleged criticism of the intelligence info. It’s a good guess that the story came to the newsmagazines by means of an intentional leak from Powell himself or a Powell supporter. The story seems to be designed to put Powell in a better llight than some others in the Administration. The story certainly may be fully correct, but OTOH it may be self-serving spin.
december said: “Blair had no obvious political motive to promote war with Iraq.”
Alas no cite, (and a minor hijack) but a friend of mine in the U.K. told me that Blair’s support for Bush was because he had reason to fear that Bush would limit the U.K.'s access to vital U.S. owned communication sattellites. Anyone know anything else about this.
Could it be that Blair was also “taking one for his team” despite personal misgivings about the war?
Suprised no one has seen this Senate Inquiry into WoMD claims. Seems they intend to research the quality of the evidence the Administration had as well as the manner this evidence was presented to the people.
Not a lot of faith in this investigation quite frankly, but who knows.
Hmmm…it doesn’t really say who’s going to be on the investigative committee other than ® John Warner.
I have a feeling this is just going to be an event staged by Republicans with a pre-ordained conclusion. Senate Reublicans will absolve the White House of all charges, thus any time the topic of lying about WMDs comes up during the election cycle, the pubbies will say “He was fully investigated by the Senate and he was exonerated. Why can’t you dems just let this go?”
Yea, the article was kind of sparse on details. They said it was based off a USA Today source but I couldn’t find an article about it on the USA Today website. Some more googling might turn up another source with more info. Maybe using Warner’s name as well as a search parameter. I’m tied up at the moment at work though.