My feelings....

[monsoon]

[Dale]

I don't see the distinction. He's saying that the war was the right thing.

Now I have no doubt that if Kerry is elected that France and Germany will like us more. Not that this would constitute an altogether natural state-of-affairs, IMO.

Oh, and Kerry did qualify his statement by adding that he would have used war authority "effectively", a qualification no doubt added to provide wiggle room - just another way of assuring Americans and the world that he would govern much like Bush, while simultaneously affirming that he is not Bush while doing it.

[Dale]

monsoon -

Oh, and were you very much torn about who to vote for, and the way Iraq has turned out has pushed you into the Kerry camp ?

[monsoon]

[Dale]

Actually yes. I originally supported the war when I though Bush was telling the truth. Now that I see that he wasn't, and worse, had no plans for what to do once he toppled the legitimate government there. So I decided to drop my support for Nader and put it behind Kerry. The United States can't afford 4 more years of this miserable excuse of a President.

If you don't want to see the difference between voting to give the President the authority to use war, if necessary and Bush's bad decision to actually declare war, then so be it. But I am very amused that Bush supporters are down to legitimizing Bush by what "Kerry said".

Nice try. Kerry acknowledged that he would still have voted to give Bush authority to go to war even if: (1) He knew intelligence was flawed (2) No WMD was found (3) No connection between Iraq and 9/11 was established.

So indeed, you were opposed to Bush, at any rate, and it is ammusing to me that Kerry supporters have been reduced to legitimizing Kerry's wiggle-words to legitimize his candidacy.

[monsoon]

[Dale]

Sorry Dale, you can't blame the War in Iraq on Kerry no matter how hard you try.

Kerry is a legitimate candidate. Unlike Bush, he was actually voted into his present position.

Now you have two problems: (1) I didn't say I was blaming the war on Kerry. Why indeed would I do that when I don't believe the war was blameworthy ? (2) You may not be aware that we have this thing called the Electoral College, which, for some strange reason, the Democrats never protested until they found that it did not work to their advantage.

[monsoon]

[Dale]

I agree with you 100% on the Electoral College. But we never found out the true outcome of the Electoral College vote. Bush & Co. sued in the Supreme Court to stop the count. A funny thing to do when you are the party that that claims to be for state's rights, yet you sue in federal court to stop a state's election process. You claim the demos are hypocritical on this but you can't get more hypocritical than that.

You impled that John Kerry was no different than Bush on the issue of the war. Though you failed to prove it, it was an attempt by you to pin responsibilty of this war on Kerry. Sorry but no one is buying it.

I myself am still a little steamed about the way Gore and the dems tried to steal the election by insisting on highly selective recounts and such. Just shameful.

And I think your problem is that you can scarecly bring yourself to acknowledge that Kerry is not the Kerry you thought you knew. He's not really John Kerry. He's George W. Bush But Not Precisely That (unwieldy name, I know).

[monsoon]

[Dale]

Sorry again. You don't go to the Supreme Court to stop an election recount if you are not afraid of the outcome.

You ponderings concerning my thoughts make no sense. I have not seen you present any "facts" here that would change my opinion of Kerry.

Fear is a red herring. Each party feared an unfavorable outcome. What you are really saying is that the dems only desired to see some some magical process come to fruition, apart from any human interferance. Hogwash. They had their hands dirty up to the elbows with this and that machination.

It was probably the closest election in the history of the world. Bush won Florida. He won the recount. He won the various scenarios as envisaged by major news dailies, save one. The Florida Supreme Court ruled for further recount. The State legislature ruled for Bush. Bush took it to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Bush. Move on.

moveon.org

And I'm not actually trying to change your mind. Where would the sport be in that ?

[monsoon]

[Dale]

Except of course Dale as usual, you only offer up opinion as fact. It was a Fact that Bush and Co. went to the Supreme Court to stop the recount. i.e. they did not want the income. What facts do you offer to prove your assertions about the Democrats?

Why do you consider Republican actions more damning than Democrat actions ? Again, was there some prescribed process that the Democrats only wanted to honor and that the Republicans only wanted to circumvent ? Was it not the case that the Democrats wanted certain, select counties recounted ?

In any case, the advice holds: moveon.org

[monsoon]

[Dale]

I see you have no facts to back up your assertions and are skirting the issue again. Bush went to court to stop the recount. Democrats did not do this. Can't be simpler than that. If you have something more concrete to discuss then lets do so.

And what kind of recount did the bush team seek to prevent ?

moveon.org

[monsoon]

[Dale]

A hand recounting of the ballots. As I said earlier they used the Supreme Court to stop a state election process.

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/storie...ident.election/

The Supreme Court ruled that all Florida recounts were simply illegal under federal equal protection laws ...

In short, from where I stand, Gore tried to manipulate the election and got busted by the Supreme Court.

And as this is my final post, I would like to bid farewell - and all the best - to my fellow formers. Goodbye all !

[cityboi]

on September 11, 1990, 11 years before the events of 9/11/01, President George Bush Sr. announced the coming of a new world order. Well it looks we are in a new world order where we force our beliefs on other nations in the name of oil and fight needless wars to make that happen. Then we say its a fight between good and evil.

[BrandonTO416]

The Supreme Court ruled that all Florida recounts were simply illegal under federal equal protection laws ...

In short, from where I stand, Gore tried to manipulate the election and got busted by the Supreme Court.

And as this is my final post, I would like to bid farewell - and all the best - to my fellow formers. Goodbye all !

It is kind of funny considering Republicans did all they could to keep certain ballots from getting counted, and the Bush Republicans started the lawsuits to keep a simple hand recount from occuring during an exceptionally close election where there were many irregularities.

Then you try and turn around and say its the Democrats who actively took a role in trying to change the course of events - when in reality the Republicans started all the lawsuits - and ended up winning regardless because they got their way.

[monsoon]

[BrandonTO416]

Am I the only one who feels that the human eye is more accurate then a counting machine looking at holes in a paper?

In my history, all my scantron tests in school have had some pretty bad errors. I don't trust machines over people.

Were the people looking at hanging chads "trying to determine voter's intent" like the Republicans made claim to during that fight? DAMN STRAIGHT THEY WERE! As they should be.

I thought it was sickening to hear the Republican argument: "the machines tallied the vote already. Now these people are trying to determine the voter's intent" - as if that was a logical argument against a hand recount in such of an historic election with these kinds of circumstances?!?

[cityboi]

I have no doubt it was a conspiracy

[BrandonTO416]

It wasn't a conspiracy. It was Republicans playing dirty politics - and they had it planned and worked out better.