# Moral Values did not win it for Bush. Terrorism did. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 10, 2004, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022 "2004-11-10T16:00:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2004, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/61 "2004-11-10T21:40:55Z")
> [@Orbifold](#): > > Nice over-generalization, there. This particular supporter of the Democrats wasn’t all that surprised by the result of the election. The polls from Ohio and Florida were consistently close enough that a Bush win was always a possibility. I was rebutting **Dio** ’s “5. Kerry gave the public credit for being smarter than they actually were.” ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2004, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/62 "2004-11-10T22:03:33Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Gore was stunned when the public wasn’t as smart as he gave them credit for, and that’s why he did not win the election, despite coming off an eight-year run as VP to the most successful President in modern history. What was Reagan, chopped liver? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2004, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/63 "2004-11-10T22:20:08Z")
You’re not seriously going to compare Reagan to Clinton, are you? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2004, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/64 "2004-11-10T22:37:20Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > You’re not seriously going to compare Reagan to Clinton, are you? No, Reagan was a much better president overall. The rankings I’ve seen by historians and scholars, like the [CNN ranking in 2000](http://www.csulb.edu/~astevens/posc100/files/ratings.htm), generally agree. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 12:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/65 "2004-11-11T00:23:34Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > No, the people who think that Iraq had something to do with 9/11, or that Iraq had WMD or that the US had international support for the invasion or that Kerry voted for the war…you know…Fox News viewers…those are the dumb ones. Do you have a single political argument that doesn’t depend upon everyone who doesn’t agree with you – huge segments of the American population – being far “dumber” or “more evil” than wonderful omniscient you? This is the antidote to the “politics of personal destruction?” If the “dumb” Americans were being fed **obvious lies, only believable by morons** – why didn’t Kerry (the genius) correct them? I happen to think that most Americans aren’t dumb, and that GWB isn’t necessarily dumb, but that they were gulled by a fairly sophisticated, albeit ultimately-debunkable, campaign that had long been planned by the neocons to lead the U.S. into war. Kerry made nothing but the most ineffectual and indirect efforts to debunk these (therefore very effective) neocon arguments. Therefore Kerry lost. Therefore, Kerry’s kinda . . . dumb? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/66 "2004-11-11T00:28:24Z")
Kerry did correct them. The morons weren’t paying attention and the media was on Bush’s side. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/67 "2004-11-11T00:31:02Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > No, Reagan was a much better president overall. The rankings I’ve seen by historians and scholars, like the [CNN ranking in 2000](http://www.csulb.edu/~astevens/posc100/files/ratings.htm), generally agree. Yeah, that eight years of unprecedented peace, prosperity and technical advancement was a real bummer compared to Reagan’s exploding deficits, administrative corruption, secret wars, arms for hostages, stonewalling of AIDS research and out of control defense spending. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![pervert](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bbe5ce/32.png) [@pervert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pervert)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/68 "2004-11-11T00:34:21Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > No, Reagan was a much better president overall. The rankings I’ve seen by historians and scholars, like the [CNN ranking in 2000](http://www.csulb.edu/~astevens/posc100/files/ratings.htm), generally agree. > [@Diogenes The Cynic](#): > > Yeah, that eight years of unprecedented peace, prosperity and technical advancement was a real bummer compared to Reagan’s exploding deficits, administrative corruption, secret wars, arms for hostages, stonewalling of AIDS research and out of control defense spending. Perhaps it is not just the electorate who are stupid. Perhaps most historical scholars are too? Or maybe it is not just the media which is controled by conservatives. Perhaps our institutes of higher learning are too? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/69 "2004-11-11T00:40:16Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > Yeah, that eight years of unprecedented peace, prosperity and technical advancement was a real bummer compared to Reagan’s exploding deficits, administrative corruption, secret wars, arms for hostages, stonewalling of AIDS research and out of control defense spending. 😛 You are an admitted partisan. Why would anyone take your opinion of a comparison between any Republican and any Democrat? Show me a presidential ranking by a group of non-partisan historians that has Clinton ranked higher than Reagan, and then we’ll have something to discuss. But I won’t continue to hijack this thread any further on the Reagan/Clinton subject. ---
**Author:** ![Maeglin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8baadc/32.png) [@Maeglin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maeglin)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/70 "2004-11-11T00:58:44Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Calling you out. Prove it. Open a GD thread and prove what you said, in a situation where counter-arguments can be offered. > > Caveat: you may be right, kinda hope you are. I don’t find the PIPA results exhilarating, on the contrary, they provoke hopelessness and despair. > > But lets see what you got. Bring it on. **Bill** may not bother, but I [did](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=285948). For what it’s worth, I am on your side. But alas, the study sucks rocks. I hope you find my remarks helpful. ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/71 "2004-11-11T02:29:51Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > White House press conference with UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, 31 January 2003:Could it have been any clearer? At first I thought you were joking, so I sort of bypassed this. But now I’m not so sure. So, how about this? > [@Washington Post 6/17/2004](#): > > President Bush insisted today that “numerous contacts” between the ousted government of Saddam Hussein and the al Qaeda terrorist network showed that the former Iraqi leader was a threat to the United States, despite a report by the Sept. 11 commission that found no “collaborative relationship” between Iraq and al Qaeda. > > “The reason I keep insisting that there was a relationship between Iraq and Saddam and al Qaeda [is] because there was a relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda,” Bush told reporters after a Cabinet meeting at the White House. > [@Rudy Guiliani at Republican Convention](#): > > In his address to the convention this week, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani tried to link Iraq to the Sept. 11 attacks. Giuliani recalled seeing Bush standing amid the rubble of the World Trade Center and hearing the president say of those who attacked America, “They will hear from us.” > > “Well, well, they heard from us,” Giuliani said. “They heard from us in Afghanistan, and we removed the Taliban. They heard from us–they heard from us in Iraq and we ended Saddam Hussein’s reign of terror.” > [@Dick Cheney 1/23/2004](#): > > Vice President Dick Cheney revived two controversial assertions about the war in Iraq Thursday, declaring there is “overwhelming evidence” that Saddam Hussein had a relationship with al Qaeda and that two trailers discovered after the war are proof of Iraq’s biological weapons programs. > > “There’s overwhelming evidence there was a connection between al Qaeda and the Iraqi government,” Cheney said in an interview on National Public Radio. > > He cited “documents indicating that a guy named Abdul Rachman Yasin, who was part of the team who attacked the World Trade Center in 1993, when he arrived back in Iraq was put on the payroll and provided a house, safe harbor and sanctuary,” Cheney said. “I’m very confident there was an established relationship there.” > [@Don Rumsfeld](#): > > In a statement issued several hours after he had told the Council on Foreign Relations in New York that “to my knowledge, I have not seen any strong, hard evidence that links the two”, [Rumsfeld] claimed he had been “misunderstood”. > > In the statement posted on the Department of Defense website, Rumsfeld said: “I have acknowledged since September 2002 that there were ties between Al Qaeda and Iraq. This assessment was based upon points provided to me by then CIA Director George Tenet to describe the CIA’s understanding of the Al Qaeda-Iraq relationship.” Well, geez, how much clearer can you get? ---
**Author:** ![Smartass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@Smartass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smartass)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/72 "2004-11-11T03:14:38Z")
I am surprised that no one has even mentioned the one thing that seemed to me to be the stake through the heart of the Kerry campaign: The freaking “global test”. He never should have said it, and he never lived it down. Regardless of what he was trying to say, what a large portion of America heard was that Kerry wouldn’t take action in the war on Terror without France and Germany’s permission. And pretty much all conservatives and a good number of liberals would rather have Bush taking the wrong action boldly than risk Kerry failing to take action because Europeans didn’t approve. For those inclined to think of Democrats as weak on defense, this pretty much validated that belief. I know that the nutjob Republican on my radio on the way to work said it over and over, day after day. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/73 "2004-11-11T03:41:03Z")
> [@Smartass](#): > > I am surprised that no one has even mentioned the one thing that seemed to me to be the stake through the heart of the Kerry campaign: The freaking “global test”. He never should have said it, and he never lived it down. Stupidest possible way to torpedo a legitimate issue that he could potentially have hit out of the park. Middle America: Hey, ma, Kerry’s on the radio! Kerry: "While the war in Iraq was no doubt vital to our national security and a noble endeavor, and I stand by my decision to give the President the authority to wage it . . . " Middle America: [60% tunes out] “Well, sounds like they’re in agreement on getting that madman out of there, and the President’s already been at work on Iraq for two years, so I’ll have to vote based on some other issue.” Kerry: . . . but I would have based this decision on a ‘global test’ Middle America: [remaining 40% hates Kerry, **justly** , for suggesting that an endeavor vital to our national security is, nonetheless, contingent on [FILL IN THE BLANK FOR STUPID COUNTRY THAT MADE ASSES OF THEMSELVES WRITING TO VOTERS IN OHIO CRITICIZING BUSH BEFORE THE ELECTION AS IF BELGIUM MATTERED]. Kerry’s explanation of his out-of-touch gaffe was even more surreal: "But I can do a better job of protecting America’s security because the test that I was talking about was a test of legitimacy, **not just in the globe, but elsewhere.** [http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/04/kerry.global/](http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/04/kerry.global/) So now we have to clear it with the Romulans, too? The exact opposite of the populist, manly, war vet opposition to the war that was the **only way** a Dem. could get away with being “anti-military.” ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/74 "2004-11-11T03:52:37Z")
The negative public reaction to the phrase “global test” just goes to show how fucking ignorant and easily manipulated they are. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/75 "2004-11-11T03:59:12Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > The negative public reaction to the phrase “global test” just goes to show how fucking ignorant and easily manipulated they are. Then you really need to (1) leave the country, if everyone but you and your friends is “fucking ignorant and easily manipulated.” Scary place to live, if so. OR (2) Defer that elusive 12,000th post for a week or two, turn off the computer, and set things right in the country by taking power (benignly, of course). How hard can it be to persuade, and if persuasion is impossible, manipulate “fucking ignorant and easily manipulated” people into following the **correct** policies (as handed down on high by, well, you)? As I have, I’ll ask before: Do you have one, even one, political or moral belief, theory, or proposition that contemplates that a person disagreeing with you as to that proposition is not “fucking ignorant” or [fill in ad nauseum expressions of Diogenes’s superiority and the impossibility of things not going his way for any reason other than the evil conniving stupid bigoted idiotic fucking idiocy] of everyone who is not you or does not believe exactly as you do? Just curious. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/76 "2004-11-11T04:02:54Z")
The “leave the country” thing is very clever. Did you get that from a bumper sticker? I think I’ll stay. Someione needs to explain to these people how stupid they are and tell them who to vote for. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/77 "2004-11-11T04:13:39Z")
> [@Huerta88](#): > > As I have, I’ll ask before: Do you have one, even one, political or moral belief, theory, or proposition that contemplates that a person disagreeing with you as to that proposition is not “fucking ignorant” or [fill in ad nauseum expressions of Diogenes’s superiority and the impossibility of things not going his way for any reason other than the evil conniving stupid bigoted idiotic fucking idiocy] of everyone who is not you or does not believe exactly as you do? > > Just curious. I’ll answer this, what the hell. If you actually read a substantial part of my 11,000 posts you’ll see that I am more than tolerant, amenable and respectful to any number of views I disagree with (read my posts in religious threads, especially. It’s a subject I’m far more educated about than law and which I think you’ll find I am not disrespectful to people who hold beliefs very contrary to my own). There are only a few positions which I truly find idiotic. Homophobia is one of them. Voting for Bush is another (and just to be clear, I am not generally hostile to Republicans or conservatives, “some of my best friends” and all that…I’m just hostile to this particular administration). If your question was asked in good faith, my answer is that I tend to be a little over the top in political threads but that I’m much more sensible elsewhere. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/78 "2004-11-11T04:16:36Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > The “leave the country” thing is very clever. Did you get that from a bumper sticker? > > I think I’ll stay. Someione needs to explain to these people how stupid they are and tell them who to vote for. “These people.” That’s right up there with “you people.” It’s good you’re so liberal and practically perfect in every way. Otherwise someone might mistake you for a troglodyte conservative, if the only criteria they went by were systemic condescension, arrogance, intolerance, and just plain inability to go one sentence without vulgarity, insult, and rudeness. Again, I’ll ask, as you haven’t answered my serious question: Do **ANY** of your political analyses contemplate the possibility that **ANY** substantial number of people not holding substantially your exact views could be anything but stupid and evil? What, by the way, is the source of your incredibly firm conviction as to your overweening intelligence vis a vis the fucking stupid fucking moron fucking idiotic fucking evil moron imbeciles? Your vocabulary and syntax wouldn’t seem to be a candidate for establishing this intelligence on a prima facie basis. Look around: You have die-hard Dems. here who are willing to contemplate that non-Kerry voters were potentially motivated by something other than FUCKING EVIL IDIOCY. You have someone who’s not a die-hard Dem. (me) writing speeches that Kerry should have given in order to steal a march from the STUPID FUCKING EVIL RETARD Bush, because I likewise don’t believe either candidate was beyond the pale of what anyone but a FUCKING MORON would vote for. Then, off in a corner, slobber dribbling from his mouth, is FUCKING MORON IDIOT FUCKING TOURETTES REPUBLICANS ARE STUPID FUCK THEM BUT SO ARE NON REPUBLICAN SWING VOTERS KERRY COULDN’T HAVE MADE A TACTICAL ERROR AND AMERICANS ARE FUCKING MORONS – well, you get the picture. Obviously, you’re used to being in a behavioral and intellectual minority of one, but didja ever wonder, as Andy Rooney might put it, which of these kids’ arguments don’t really have much point? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/79 "2004-11-11T04:22:50Z")
You might want to tone down the ad homs and the caps a little bit. You’re still in GD. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 11, 2004, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022/80 "2004-11-11T04:35:45Z")
Well, I’m convinced. Used to kinda like ol’ **Dio** , but now I see that he’s a completely rotten human being, just like **Stoid** , who also seethes evil from every pore. Bad **Dio**! Bad! Go lay down by your water dish! And change your political views, this instant! I absolutely refuse to have a blackguard, scoundrel and despoiler of maidens profess the same political views as myself! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/moral-values-did-not-win-it-for-bush-terrorism-did/274022.md?page=5)