Looking Forward; Looking Back
1 month till election; 5 years in Afghanistan

October 8, 2006 by mugsy.

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In a week where a Republican sex scandal has bumped appalling revelations about the Bush Administrations “State of Denial” in Bob Woodward’s latest book to Page 2 (hehe: a story about “Pages” bumps a page-1 story), this has not been a good week for the GOP (boo hoo!), four weeks before a potentially control-shifting election in both the House and Senate. And while most analysts (even Conservative ones) tend to agree that Democrats will probably pick up the 15 seats needed to regain control of the U.S. House of Representatives, regaining control of the Senate has, up to now, been described as an uphill climb, with Democrats needing to win 6 of the 8 seats up for grabs this November (or hold on to NJ and win five others)… a feat compared to being dealt “an inside straight” in poker. But then someone loaded the deck with a bunch of jokers… Hastert, Boehner and Reynolds… and an almost “Keystonian” (if I may make up a word here) PR blitz by Conservative pundits running around looking for ways to blame Democrats and/or the victims (Limbaugh: “Scandal breaks just before the election? I smell a Democratic October surprise!”; Drudge: “These kids are not innocent. They set him up”, etc) is curdeling like sour milk in the stomaches of most “values voters”.

(When questions arose last week about conflicting stories of “who knew what and when” regarding the Foley/Page sex scandal, Conservative newspaper “The Hill” called for Boehner and Hastert to “get on the same page“. I kid you not.)

These same Republicans, blaming the kids and defending the coverup, are the ones that painted Monica Lewinski as a “victim” preyed upon by “Sexual Preditor” Bill Clinton. “Hot Tub Tom” Delay even poked his head out of his spider-hole to defend Speaker Hastert and the GOP (which is earning their new moniker “Grand Old Perverts”).

Then we have Bob Woodward’s aptly titled new book revealing that CIA Director Tenet was so concerned about an impending terrorist attack in July of 2001 that he begged for a meeting with National Security Advisor Condi Rice, fearing what he called “the Big One”. Her response was to do *nothing*.

The war in Iraq, incredibly bad before, is now headed into such a death-spiral that even neocon hawk and Chairman of the Armed Services Commitee Sen John Warner has reversed course and now says that “if things don’t substantially improve in Iraq in the next couple of months, we need to completely rexamine our strategy”, adding “I wouldn’t take [any idea] off the table.”

Saturday (10/7) was the fifth anniversary of that other war… the forgotten war… Afghanistan. People talk about how, after three years, can this Administration get us out of Iraq. Hell, we’ve been in Afghanistan for FIVE years now, with no end in sight. Violence there has only gotten worse (video: “Attacks in Afghanistan have DOUBLED every year”). We have FAR greater International support in Afghanistan (the second largest force in Afghanistan isn’t the British, it’s the French), but they aren’t there combing the hills looking for Osama bin Laden, they’re in firefights with the resurging Taliban, which seeks to regain control of the country.

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld went on tour this past week to show off his newly chromed ‘Nads by listing examples of progress in Afghanistan on this fifth anniversary… among those acheivements: “The Afghanistan economy has TRIPLED [since the overthrow of the Taliban]”. Of course, Rummy won’t tell you that the largest cash crop in that country today is Heroin. Afghanistan is once again the leading supplier of the deadly narcotic on the planet, accounting for some “92% of the world’s Opium market“. Way to go, Rummy! USA! USA!

And despite all this, Democratic Senatorial Candidates are either tied or lead only by slim margins in five of the six closest races they need to win back for control, with that one trail coming in one of the highest profile races in the country, that of George “Macaca” Allen (R-Va), still clinging to a more than 5% lead over his Democratic rival, former Secretary of the Navy Jim Webb, a man once decorated and honored by Republican messiah Ronald Reagan, himself. Apparently, being a racist jerk in Virgina isn’t necessarilly a bad thing. Maybe Webb needs to ranting about “Mex’cuns crossing our borders illegally” in order to boost his poll numbers.

Last week, I heard the best description of a modern Conservative that I’ve ever heard in my life:

“They justify their hypocrisy with the belief; if it’s a Conservative doing it, it must not be so bad.“

How true. What does it take for a Democrat to win in this country? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Democrats are in SERIOUS need of a major PR campaign to undo the brainwashing of the past 30 years (since Carter) that Republicans have pounded mercilessly into voters brains until the lie has become the reality, and reality is spun like Straw into election-year gold.

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