Check out this link: http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20070618105243.pdf

While I've made no bones about my level of disaffection for this administration, I haven't piled on. I mean, what's the point of beating up an administration that only 1 in 3 has a favorable opinion of the job he's doing? Kind of like impacting an expired equine.

While at this point, there is no evidence that the email was intentionally deleted and/or not retained, there is significant evidence that personnel knew about the presidential record retention policy and what it required back in 2001. There is also evidence that this is why they had and routinely used RNC accounts.

It does add another facet to the pattern of avoidance of oversight and refusal to follow the law or the constitution that this administration has continued to perpetrate.

So lets do a little comparison:

Richard M. Nixon				George W. Bush
- Republican				- Republican
- Gas price = $1.45/gal				- Gas @ $3.25/gal
(corrected for inflation)
- Inherited unpopular quagmire				- STARTED unpopular quagmire
-Tried to get out via Nixon Doctrine				- Is trying to get out by emphasizing training
that places primary responsibility for				of Iraqi police & army
defense with the country in question
- Escalated war by bombing Laos				- Escalated war by instituting "Surge"
and Cambodia
- VP Agnew resigned amid bribery				- Jack Abramoff jailed for bribery
and money laundering charges
- Dick Cheney & Don Rumsfeld				- Dick Cheney & Don Rumsfeld
- Watergate				- RNC email in defiance of Hisch act/Presidential
				Record Retention act, Revealing identity of V. Plame
				in defiance of Intelligence Identities Protection act,
				held personnel as "enemy combatents" without
				warrants in defiance of habeus corpus, Warrantless
				wiretapping in defiance of Foreign Intelligence
				Surveillance act, etc...

well I support Bush

Quote: Originally Posted by ex421 well I support Bush

Because....?

I did in the beginning... then I was iffy... now, he needs to go before we get into a world war.

I'm not saying I FULLY support him, but it could always be worse. I feel the same about the war as a lot of other people I guess, it was right to go in at first because you can't just let terrorist kill over 2000 people and do nothing about it, but it's getting long now. If we dont leave soon it probably will turn into another world war...and gas is just worse now. But people in Europe have been paying those prices for awhile so we were kind of overdue for the price increase. Theres tons more to go into but I just think with another president this could be much worse than it is now.

Quote: Originally Posted by ex421 I'm not saying I FULLY support him, but it could always be worse. I feel the same about the war as a lot of other people I guess, it was right to go in at first because you can't just let terrorist kill over 2000 people and do nothing about it, but it's getting long now. If we dont leave soon it probably will turn into another world war...and gas is just worse now. But people in Europe have been paying those prices for awhile so we were kind of overdue for the price increase. Theres tons more to go into but I just think with another president this could be much worse than it is now.

Unfortunately like a lot of misinformed citizens, you got misled into believing that Iraq were the terrorists, when in fact it was the Taliban in Afganistan. It's really disconcerting how easily Bush pulled that off... Our Canadian Prime Minister at the time (Jean Chretien) made so many political gaffes, (he stuck his foot in his mouth so often his breath smelled like toe-jam) but I was a proud Canadian when he said we'll take a pass when it came to invading Iraq looking for WMDs...that were sold to Iraq by the USA in the first place. The whole thing is unfortunate and North American safety, as a whole, has been negatively impacted as a result.

That's not to say Saddam Hussein wasn't a despicable man who had thousands of people killed, of course...but there was a definite agenda of personal interests (oil maybe?) for that invasion of Iraq to happen. By way of comparison, consider the genocide of 800,000 people in Rwanda during the Hutu/Tutsi problems in 1994...did anyone lift a finger to help them (my country included)? Nope.

From Wikipedia

Thats why I said I supported it in the beginning, because we went directly for terrorists most of the time, in Afghanistan. Now we're off course. I'm not going to lie and say I knew the majority of the terrorists were in Afghanistan because I thought more than half were in Iraq, but I did know a good amount were in Afghanistan.

About the genocide, the UN and other countries definitely have their priorities in the wrong places, but theres no oil or money to be made in Rwanda is what they see.

All very good points, however, my biggest beef is not about the war... faulty justification or no, the Office of the President CLEARLY has that responsibility as commander in chief.

My gripe is the seemingly continual efforts to circumvent the law, the constitution, Geneva convention, WHATEVER is standing in the way of doing what they want.

Rather than try to fix what is hindering their goals via established, legal methods they prefer to break the law. Why do you suppose that is? Probably because they know that they couldn't get the law changed. And the main reason for that is BECAUSE IT NEEDS TO BE THE WAY IT IS FOR CONTINUATION OF A NORMAL, DECENT, AND MORAL SOCIETY!!!!

Ya, Gore and Kerry would of been real winners

The only real good politicians are those that had no political aspirations (or predispositions) by birth. The good ones rarely last past 1-2 terms.
The rest I wouldn't trust to guard a dog doo snowcone........ I would just as soon shove it in his beady little eye and "rub vigorously in a circular motion hithertofore unknown in your area but destined to take the place of the mighty mud shark in your mythology.
Here it is now, that circular motion....... rub it!"

Quote: Originally Posted by godfoot The only real good politicians are those that had no political aspirations (or predispositions) by birth. The good ones rarely last past 1-2 terms. The rest I wouldn't trust to guard a dog doo snowcone........ I would just as soon shove it in his beady little eye and "rub vigorously in a circular motion hithertofore unknown in your area but destined to take the place of the mighty mud shark in your mythology. Here it is now, that circular motion....... rub it!"

It's amazing that you quoted that so well. You are my hero for making me get out the apostrophe LP and listen to it.

Otherwise I volunteered for bush twice. He had my vote in 04' but I do feel that many things are changing. But like coel said, who sold them them WMD's in the first place. Wasn't it the grateful has-been that bush replaced?

I don't want to start a political debate, too many people read these forums and itll get uglier than hilary herself. So take what i'm saying for what its worth, nothing.

Quote: Originally Posted by s1ugh34d It's amazing that you quoted that so well. You are my hero for making me get out the apostrophe LP and listen to it.

Apostrophe/Overnight Sensation is my favorite (double) album by Zappa.
I was listening to Dyna Moe Hum earlier tonight in fact. Love the groove.

Quote: Originally Posted by NoSlak Ya, Gore and Kerry would of been real winners

Didn't say that at all Vic.

I'm just tired of their holier than thou attitude... especially when it comes to my civil rights.

There's always the part of me that says: "Hell, I'm not doing anything wrong, tap away", but think about it for a second...

If they do that, what's to stop them from the next invasion... such as checking your PC for unlicensed crap, porn, left or right wing propaganda. Protection from unreasonable search and seizures was one of the reasons we kicked the Brits out back in the late 1700s and why it's in the constitution.

And if they had their way, what's to stop them from saying you are an enemy combatant and therefore can be locked up without charges, access to a lawyer, or even being able to refute the charges? For years.

I'm all for stopping the terrorists, both here and abroad. But when you're dealing with those here at home, you HAVE to treat them with the same rules as you treat me, you, or Paris Hilton.

Misinformation is what all these wars have been about. The word terrorist is smeared across wherever we want to attack. I heard some newscaster or political pundit talking about the Al Qaeda in Iran... since when? I thought that whole deal was about nukes?

I think the government wanted us to think Afghanistan and Iraq were the same thing and that's moving on to Iran now

Our war in Afghanistan is what I would consider "justified". Why? Simple, Bin Laden was there, the Taliban refused to turn him over, so we told them we were coming to get him and don't get in our way. They got in our way and we pulverized them. Of course now they are reqrouping in the mountains but that is another story.

Iraq is another story. There were no WMDs, that was a lie. The real deal is that Saddam was a US/CIA pawn back in the 80s who got out of control and needed to be eliminated. We tried the nice way (UN Sanctions) after he invaded Kuwait, but that didn't work as he was in violation of at least 17 of them when we went in. Was he a bad guy, hell yeah. Did he need to be removed? Sure thing. Did we need to mount a full scale invasion of Iraq? Only to protect the oil.

Additionally I don't care what anyone says, Cheny is making boatloads of $$$ off the no-bid contracts Haliburton is getting in Iraq. They are literally pissing away our money over there and getting nothing for it.

Finally, as has been said, the trampling of civil rights and the willingness of the White House to "look the other way" when someone needs to step around the rules is downright scary. So is the push for electronic voting machines. Did you know that many states that are instituting them will NOT have an audit trail. That means no paper trail, so the machines can be rigged and there would be no way to tell......

Quote: Originally Posted by DickNervous So is the push for electronic voting machines. Did you know that many states that are instituting them will NOT have an audit trail. That means no paper trail, so the machines can be rigged and there would be no way to tell......

Dubya could win another term that way.

Quote: Originally Posted by NoSlak Ya, Gore and Kerry would of been real winners

The 'could have been, would have been' excuse isn't enough to justify the actions of of the current administration. You may have some idea, but there is no way to predict what another individual with different political opinions would have done in that same situation. It's easy to assume anti-moderate opposing views supported by the entertainment media.

Since 2003, party affiliation doesn't mean jack sh*t to me; however, many of my views are of the socially liberal point of view. I've made no bones about not being a fan of the current administration. There are some days in which I believe President Bush really does have good intentions, but is easily led astray by his staff and political allies.

I'm also pretty p*ssed at the Democratic party right now, too. The campaign promises they ran on to gain control Congress have been broken, such as the 'transparency in government spending' issue (LINK). There has been hypocrisy on both sides and frankly, I'm sick of it.

There is one candidate out there that I am more interested in every time I hear him talk and that is Representative Ron Paul. So far, he's the only candidate on both sides of the fence that really understands the ongoing conflict with Islamic extremist.

The Republicans have turned their slogan into a bumper sticker ("War on Terror") and use it as an excuse for just about every bullsh*t issue they try to push through.

The Democrats are using the war in Iraq as political fodder by now saying that they are against the war in Iraq.

Rep. Ron Paul has it right.

Quote: Originally Posted by Rep Ron Paul at May 15 Debate