Style V. Substance
Topic: Personal


"People want leadership. They're so thirsty for it they'll crawl through the desert toward a mirage and when they discover there's no water, they'll drink the sand.

People don't drink the sand because they're thirsty; they drink the sand because they don't know the difference."

The Independent Voice obviously has a bias but I've tried to look at the debate last night through the lens of objectivity. Even through this lens John Kerry still won hands down. The reason that he so easily won is because George W. Bush never answers a question he doesn't like, and W. doesn't like questions.

John Kerry won because his arguments are substantive and are backed up by either facts or a plan. Kerry's arguments appeal to reason while Bush's appeal to emotion, the darker side of human emotion. John Kerry won in my mind because I look to a President to appeal to the logical part of my brain not the emotional.

Listen John Kerry, it's not that you didn't win in the debate last night but you didn't win as decisively as you should have because you allowed Bush's style to upstage you. You need to pre-empt W.'s simple minded and emotional arguments. Try some of these tips:

- First, you need to say something like:

"My fellow Americans, I have an apology to make. I haven't made clear that I am not trying to debate or compare George Bush on matters of personality. This is not the same type of election that we had in 2000. The world is a much different place. No longer should your decision be based on who you would rather have a beer with. You need a commander-in-chief that understands the issues. You need a commander-in-chief that faces reality. You need a commander-in-chief who has good judgement.

So please forgive me for not trying to pander to your emotional side. That is not in my makeup and I don't believe that the most powerful leader in the world should resort to appealing to your most powerful negative emotions but should rather appeal to your strengths: your mind, your will and your spirit."

Secondly, you need to rephrase some of your arguments so that you're not using the same sound bites that you've been using. Additionally, you need to add new statements that Bush isn't going to expect. George Bush did well last night because every single question that was asked was completely predictable and he was prepared by his handlers, for every single one. George W. Bush, contrary to public opinion, is NOT a decisive leader. He doens't know how to think spontaneously to solve problems. He needs to be thrown off balance so that we can see the Bush we saw in the first debate and the Bush we saw on 9/11 when he sat in his chair in the nations ultimate time of crisis. Regurgitating the same sound bites that you've used over and over again in your public statements isn't going to work.

Try something like this:

"Mr. President, you like throwing around labels. You've called me a liberal, and while that's not true, I think that your trying to insinuate that liberals raise taxes. I'm wondering how can you possibly refrain from raising taxes with the tax cut that you provided to the rich, never vetoeing any spending bill's that's come across your desk, the costly war of choice, and the spending that needs to take place in our homeland to make us safer?

All of these things are going to lead to even greater record budget deficits. Mr. President, you are spending money that we don't have. I cannot see a way that you can keep from raising our taxes and if you say that you can, you're pandering. So I ask you Mr. President, not as a Senator or your opponent, but as a citizen, can you either tell me your plan for not raising taxes on the middle class or can you promise us that you won't?"

Third, you need to continue to plug away at this administrations inability to face reality. Try this:

"Mr. President, you've attempted to tell us that Iraq is getting better and that creating 96,000 jobs is good enough. Mr. President, you're wrong. And you've been wrong. We can do better. We need a leader who will lead us to times of prosperity by leveling with us in the tough times. We do not need a leader who sugar coats hard realities because he refuses to admit mistakes or will not face them because he's afraid of the political backlash. Leaders face their problems Mr. President, and you have not."

You also need to attack every single time this President makes an incorrect statement. You need not dwell on the details but you need to rebut the incorrect or misleading statements and then you need to go on the offensive- I cannot stress this enough- EVERY SINGLE TIME. Your answer needs to balance respect with defiance.

Mr. Kerry you need to LEAD this national argument back to one of substance versus substance, only then will you win.

"Might" Doesn't Make Might, Right
Topic: Iraq
In the never-ending quagmire that is Iraq, you may have heard that the latest news is that not only was Iraq's WMD program not "gathering" it was withering. In fact, Hussein's only ambitions about creating weapons was for defense against Iran. This coupled with the fact that there was absolutely no connection between Iraq and Al-Queda leaves the President looking for a new excuse for invading and occupying an arab oil-rich country.

One last time, let's just get the facts right:

EVEN if Iraq had a fully capable arsenal of biological, chemical and nuclear weaponry the United States would not have been threatened by Iraq.

Israel would have been in trouble, Saudi Arabia would have been in trouble, Kuwait would have been in trouble, Iran would have been in trouble if Iraq had WMD, but the U.S. would not have been directly threatened by Iraq because they've never had the rocket technology capable of reaching the United States (yes, including Alaska, Hawaii, and the satellites). Without any established connections to terrorists who were directly threatening the U.S., Iraq didn't have any method of delivering a weapon to the U.S. which kind of blows away the latest assertions that "if" the sanctions were removed, Hussein "might" create WMD, that he "might" hand to terrorists, who "might" use them in the U.S. "Might" doesn't make might, right.

The terrorists that Bush/Cheney constantly refer to as Iraq having "harbored", are the same terrorists that the Saudi's (and other muslim nations) aid and harbor. They're responsible for actions in Israel, not the U.S.

There are up to 50 reasons why this war was completely unnecessary but the major reasons are because it has only been successful at recruiting more terrorists, dividing our country and driving a wedge between us and our allies.

P.S. That new Bush/Cheney excuse attempting to justify Iraq, will go something like this:

"Not only was Hussein capable of producing WMD but the out-of-work scientists within Iraq could have sold the secrets of WMD to terrorists harboring nations". I'll add that those nations are the very nations that we should have worried about instead of Iraq.

It's still not too late for all you neo-cons to get on the "right" side of history.

Beware Of Conservative Ignorance
We need to guard the U.S. against conservative terrorists who's weapons of mass destruction are ignorance. They continually promote actions that lead directly to mass stupidity. After being wrong so many times you would think that they would just shutup already.

Case in point: Stop Conservative Terrorists How's this for dumb?

... the smoking gun ...

Halloween
Guess what Mikhail Gorbachev is going to be for Halloween?

An out of touch MADMAN:

Average People
I'm writing this very quickly (no really!). I don't know what debate some TV commentators were watching but John Edwards definitely won tonight's debate and he did so for one reason: he connected with people.

Honestly, I think that Dick Cheney probably is a well-meaning and good-hearted person but in the debate he looked like an out-of-touch, cold war remnant. He tried to inspire fear and Edwards stomped him. He tried to make false and misleading statements and Edwards rebutted him. He said that he just met Edwards for the first time and that's completely not true:

He said that he didn't make statements that Iraq was connected with 9/11 and he either lied or he didn't remember repeatedly making such statements (he said so on Meet The Press with Tim Russert).

Edwards repeatedly turned the debate around to the issues that average people are interested in, (jobs, healthcare, and the economy). Cheney talked about these issues like they were abstract concepts.

The debate was hard fought (as it should have been) and Edwards continually struck the ball back into Cheney's court. We finally heard some talk about how Bush/Cheney lives in a glass house and is throwing stones at Kerry for taking different positions on issues.

Edwards closing remarks were his most powerful. I presume that throughout the debate people watched the annoying timing lights indicator. When Edwards last spoke those lights melted away in his message. When Cheney spoke the 2 minutes dragged on with a incoherent and abstract speech about nothing any average joe would give a crap about.

John Edwards won hands down.

Son Of Republican President Voting Kerry
Topic: Misc.
"Why I will vote for John Kerry for President" - by John Eisenhower, son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, The Union Leader

THE Presidential election to be held this coming Nov. 2 will be one of extraordinary importance to the future of our nation. The outcome will determine whether this country will continue on the same path it has followed for the last 3? years or whether it will return to a set of core domestic and foreign policy values that have been at the heart of what has made this country great.

Now more than ever, we voters will have to make cool judgments, unencumbered by habits of the past. Experts tell us that we tend to vote as our parents did or as we "always have." We remained loyal to party labels. We cannot afford that luxury in the election of 2004. There are times when we must break with the past, and I believe this is one of them.

As son of a Republican President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, it is automatically expected by many that I am a Republican. For 50 years, through the election of 2000, I was. With the current administration's decision to invade Iraq unilaterally, however, I changed my voter registration to independent, and barring some utterly unforeseen development, I intend to vote for the Democratic Presidential candidate, Sen. John Kerry.

The fact is that today's "Republican" Party is one with which I am totally unfamiliar. To me, the word "Republican" has always been synonymous with the word "responsibility," which has meant limiting our governmental obligations to those we can afford in human and financial terms. Today's whopping budget deficit of some $440 billion does not meet that criterion.

Responsibility used to be observed in foreign affairs. That has meant respect for others. America, though recognized as the leader of the community of nations, has always acted as a part of it, not as a maverick separate from that community and at times insulting towards it. Leadership involves setting a direction and building consensus, not viewing other countries as practically devoid of significance. Recent developments indicate that the current Republican Party leadership has confused confident leadership with hubris and arrogance.

In the Middle East crisis of 1991, President George H.W. Bush marshaled world opinion through the United Nations before employing military force to free Kuwait from Saddam Hussein. Through negotiation he arranged for the action to be financed by all the industrialized nations, not just the United States. When Kuwait had been freed, President George H. W. Bush stayed within the United Nations mandate, aware of the dangers of occupying an entire nation.

Today many people are rightly concerned about our precious individual freedoms, our privacy, the basis of our democracy. Of course we must fight terrorism, but have we irresponsibly gone overboard in doing so? I wonder. In 1960, President Eisenhower told the Republican convention, "If ever we put any other value above (our) liberty, and above principle, we shall lose both." I would appreciate hearing such warnings from the Republican Party of today.

The Republican Party I used to know placed heavy emphasis on fiscal responsibility, which included balancing the budget whenever the state of the economy allowed it to do so. The Eisenhower administration accomplished that difficult task three times during its eight years in office. It did not attain that remarkable achievement by cutting taxes for the rich. Republicans disliked taxes, of course, but the party accepted them as a necessary means of keep the nation's financial structure sound.

The Republicans used to be deeply concerned for the middle class and small business. Today's Republican leadership, while not solely accountable for the loss of American jobs, encourages it with its tax code and heads us in the direction of a society of very rich and very poor.

Sen. Kerry, in whom I am willing to place my trust, has demonstrated that he is courageous, sober, competent, and concerned with fighting the dangers associated with the widening socio-economic gap in this country. I will vote for him enthusiastically.

I celebrate, along with other Americans, the diversity of opinion in this country. But let it be based on careful thought. I urge everyone, Republicans and Democrats alike, to avoid voting for a ticket merely because it carries the label of the party of one's parents or of our own ingrained habits.

John Eisenhower, son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, served on the White House staff between October 1958 and the end of the Eisenhower administration. From 1961 to 1964 he assisted his father in writing "The White House Years," his Presidential memoirs. He served as American ambassador to Belgium between 1969 and 1971. He is the author of nine books, largely on military subjects.

Perception Is Reality
Topic: State Of The Union

Couple of statistics to brighten up your day: (Article found here: Perception Is Reality)

- 12 percent of Muslims believe that the United States respects Islamic values

- 7 percent believe the West understands Muslim culture

- 11 percent approve of President Bush

- 13 percent of Egyptians hold a favorable opinion of the United States

- 6 percent of Jordanians hold a favorable opinion of the United States

- 3 percent of Saudi Arabians hold a favorable opinion of the United States

Majorities in 7 out of 8 Muslim countries worry about a military threat from the United States:

- 74 percent in Indonesia
- 72 percent in Nigeria
- 72 percent in Pakistan
- 71 percent in Turkey.

- 56 percent of people in Muslim nations believe Iraq will be better off since the toppling of Saddam Hussein

Percentage of European that believe the US is acting solely in its own interest:

- 85 percent of Germans held this view
- 80 percent of the French
- 73 percent of the British
- 68 percent of Italians

Countries that believe the United States is a threat to world peace:

- 80 percent of Greeks
- 63 percent of the Dutch
- 55 percent of the British
- 52 percent of the French

"In some countries, distrust and dislike of the United States have doubled and tripled in the space of a single year."

The only way that this reality is going to change is with a change of leadership.

Cool Is In This Season


The Independent Voice was worried that the agreement that lead up to last night's debate would only allow the candidates to show us exactly what they wanted us to see. That didn't happen at all. George Bush didn't want us to see his anger- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see his haste and impatience- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see his arrogance- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see his inarticulate nature- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see his flubbering and floundering- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see that he doesn't understand the issues- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see John Kerry's decisiveness- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see John Kerry's thoroughness and complete comprehension of the issues- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see John Kerry's Presidential nature- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see John Kerry's strength- we did. George Bush didn't want us to see John Kerry's calmness and coolness under fire- WE DID!

The Independent Voice was worried that the debate agreement wasn't going to allow us to see the true nature of the President, not as some cool, methodical and decisive leader but as an arrogant, pushy, wishy-washy, vindictive, out-of-touch puppet, who is absolutely incompetent without his handlers. John Kerry came across as having mastery of the issues that effect us. He came across as strong. He came across as having a vision and real direction for this country. He showed that he had a well-thought out plan. He was able to describe the inadequacies of this administration, not to say don't vote for him because he's incompetent, but rather, vote for me because I have a vision and a mission.

The pundits and the partisans will spin it any way they want but I just want to ask every American, if it was your ass on the line, who would you want standing in your corner? I was embarrassed that the rest of the world was watching us last night and what they saw in our President was weakness, incompetence, arrogance, impatience and a complete disconnect from reality. Frankly the President was hitting John Kerry hard and Kerry remained steadfast and cool throughout the entire debate, while George Bush consistently appeared completely flustered and hasty in his responses. That is not the way a decisive and thoughtful leader acts.

Cool is definitely in this season.

Somewhere Over The Rainbow
Topic: Satire
Over the past 2 weeks, in the State of New York, 250 civilians and 29 police officers have been killed. There have been, on average, 70 brutal and deadly attacks daily. There have been sophisticated ambushes and simple attacks, like children throwing Molotov cocktails at police cars. No one area has been free from these attacks. In fact there are complete cities within New York that are completely off limits to police or National Guard members. Exacerbating the problems is that the National Guard is stretched to the max because the Governor has also involved them with the reconstruction of the South from the hurricane damage.

You may, at this point, be asking yourself why you haven't heard anything about what has been going on in New York. The reason is obvious and devious. Governor George Pataki is in an election year fight for his life. The polls narrowly show him ahead of his opponent. Though Pataki's opposition is running around trying to tell anyone he can about the major problems in New York, Pataki's political self-interest involves minimizing any problems that are occurring on his watch. Pataki has wisely, however materially inaccurate, succeeded in convincing the citizens of New York that his Democratic opponent is a liar and not to be believed. Pataki has even enlisted the help of Mayor Bloomberg to convince the people that New York is safe and getting safer.

It appears to many objective sources that the election process itself is not going to be possible for many New York citizens. Many are complaining that since the majority of the off-limit areas are in low-income African American neighborhoods, where people are for the Democratic candidate 9 to 1, the elections are going to be skewed in favor of Pataki. Additionally, many of the experts have concluded that this conflict will easily last a minimum of 10 years. They also believe that the costs for this conflict coupled with the controversial policies of the Pataki administration offering substantial and massive tax breaks to businesses that are already profitable, may bankrupt the entire State.

Unfortunately at this crucial and tenuous period in the history of New York State, many of the biggest press outlets, including the most watched Television network, have turned a blind eye to the realities of what is taking place on the ground. The press, instead of reporting the actual facts, have resorted to reporting the statements of the 2 candidates without vetting them. They've largely ignored some of the most important issues where human life is at stake because they're too busy concentrating on sound bites, the newest hurricane or celebrity trial. Ultimately it is not the fault of the press but rather the responsibility of the citizens of New York to choose, by way of the almighty dollar, that they want the truth not entertainment. Until the citizens demand the truth, no matter how ugly it may be, situations the likes of which are presently being felt in New York will continue and extend to other states where the population has ignored reality.
_____________________________________________________

New York, a State that is roughly the same size and population of Iraq, is not presently experiencing the problems described above. The facts and situations described above represent exactly what has occurred in Iraq over the past 2 weeks.

Could you ever imagine an analogous situation to what is going on in Iraq right at this very moment playing out on the streets of a state like New York and have the Governor largely ignore the realities of what is going on? Picture your town for a moment. Think about what it would be like to have rocket propelled grenade or suicide car bomber attacks. If your President or Prime Minister were attempting to minimize your pain, and your fear of your reality, wouldn't you be angry? Wouldn't you call for his head? Wouldn't you at least vote him out of office?

Imagine the Russians coming to your town to remove your Government. Imagine them installing a council and a "Prime Minister" to govern you. Imagine if our revolution didn't take place with our own initiatives and ambitions but was forced upon us by another government. What would our democracy look like today?

Imagine the women and children of your town being maimed and killed. Picture yourself turning on your television and seeing your President tell you that everything is O.K. Think about what it would be like if the number of attacks in your town were constantly escalating and your Mayor told you that he was in control of the situation. Can you imagine 70 brutal and deadly attacks taking place in your state on a daily basis and upon turning on your favorite news channel, you hear the commentator and the President talking about how the good things aren't being reported, when what really angers you is the fact that the majority of the attacks aren't widely reported?

Think about it.

Soldiers For Kerry
Topic: Iraq
The neo-cons are fond of quoting soldiers who believe that the "media" isn't covering the good news in Iraq. Well here are some quotes from the unsilent many, presently fighting in Iraq:

Army Spc. Nathan Swink, of Quincy, Ill.
"There's no clear definition of why we came here. First they said they have WMD and nuclear weapons, then it was to get Saddam Hussein out of office, and then to rebuild Iraq. I want to fight for my nation and for my family, to protect the United States against enemies foreign and domestic, not to protect Iraqi civilians or deal with Sadr's militia".

"Kerry protested the war in Vietnam. He is the one to end this stuff, to lead to our exit of Iraq".

Marine Infantryman Fighting In Ramadi

"We shouldn't be here. There was no reason for invading this country in the first place. We just came here and [angered people] and killed a lot of innocent people. I don't enjoy killing women and children, it's not my thing".

"Bush didn't want to attack [Osama] Bin Laden because he was doing business with Bin Laden's family".

Enlisted Soldier In Najaf

"Nobody I know wants Bush. This whole war was based on lies."

(You can read more here:Anti-Bush Troops In Iraq)