Please Tell Me I'm Wrong

[ThomWV]

I just included the following passage in a note to a friend in California. How far off do you think I was, if at all? Here is what I said:

I look for war with Syria as a campaign diversion sometime right around the spring. Actually I think the Democratic Convention comes after the Republican this year, might be mistaken on that though. I expect we will see the largest protest demonstratons in the nations history during the Republican Convention. I understand that Bloomberg (I believe that is the Mayor of NYC's name) has made arrangements so that Bush can leave the Convention and lay the cornerstone on the memorial they are building where the trade towers stood. The group of families of 9/11 victims has already promised to demonstrate against the politicizing of their loss. Anyway I would not be at all suprised to see a major military launch against someone (Syria most likely) during the Democratic Convention. I would not put scheduling a war for political effect out of the question for the Republicans. What a god damned shame the country has come to this. Pray that I am wrong.

Thom

[LibertyorDeath]

1. Wish I could but your friend is right.

"I would not put scheduling a war for political effect out of the question for the Republicans. What a god damned shame the country has come to this."

[Salviati]

2. I'm pretty sure that the republican convention is later...

Remember that they're pushing it way back in order to capatalize on the 911 aniversery, so late that it's past the deadline for the nominee (Bush) to get on the ballot in several states...

[Holly]

3. Sorry to say

but I don't think that your wrong. A president exploiting a 9/11 ceremony . A nation divided. From this side of the border it's a damn shame what your country has become. :cry: You deserve better.

[liberalhistorian]

12. Yes, we do, indeed, deserve better, but

until we can get our fellow apathetic Americans to wake the hell up, we may not get it. I have already said many times on here, btw, that if the election doesn't go our way next year or the Bushistas pull another coup and once again blatantly steal the presidency, I'm taking the kid and moving to Canada, I don't give a damn if I have a job or not.

I have a B.A. and a paralegal certificate, it shouldn't really be too hard to find something. I will NOT stay in a country where people actually vote for the Bushistas, refusing to see how they're totally trashing this once-great country, and I will NOT be able to bear watching said blatant total destruction of my own country and the apathy of its citizens who will allow it to happen.

[Thinman12]

4. I think this is a little to far fetched

but Bill Clinton was the model to have a military actions happening when he found himself in trouble.

(And before someone claims I a freeper, I consider myself a conservative Dem who could not stand how I feel Clinton embarrassed this country...)

[HawkerHurricane]

7. Clinton embarrassed us?

I was overseas repeatedly during the Clinton years. And the question most commonly asked me about Clinton is 'how come Americans hate thier own President so much?'.

As a American, Clinton did not and does not embarrass me or my country. The reaction of certain people to Clinton is the embarrassment, not Clinton's actions.

[salin]

9. am I misunderstanding you

you seem to be saying:

A) Yes it is a little far fetched for the bush administration...

B) But that last administration, for them it wasn't far fetched - they set the model.

So are you saying that the scenario is MORE likely from Clinton than from Bush?

[Old and In the Way]

11. Uh yeah, "wag the dog"

Right....Bill should have had the decency to put foreign policy on hold for 8 years while the Republicans ran their public Inquisition.

Please explain what Bill Clinton did to start the Kosovo War, the retaliation against the alledged Bush assassination, or the attempted OBL takeout in the Sudan? One scrap of evidence that he conspired to distract the American people from his personal problems.

I remember when Reagan lost 243 Marines in Lebanon back in 83, he invaded Grenada the next day, but I can't recall Bill doing anything cynical like that.

Instead of being embarassed about the best President we've had in my lifetime, you should be embarrassed for the hyprocites in the Republican Party who spent $70MM of taxpayer money conducting a bullshit investigation on a $30,000 land deal that the Clinton's lost money on. And then they used testimoney from an unrelated investigation to entrap the President to lie about a personal issue that had no bearing on anything.

Embarased about Clinton? Nah, just sick of the bullshit that the only thing you Republicans can drag up is his lying about extra-marital sex. An act that I suspect every President has engaged in since George left Mt. Vernon for Philadelphia.

You deserve the Moron-in-Chief that you have residing in Al Gore's office.

[Arianrhod]

13. I spent the Clinton years in Europe

as a noncommissioned officer in the US Army. The Europeans thought what we did to Clinton was utterly unbelievable. Most Americans think the Europeans look down on us, but the fact is they want very much to look up to us, but are finding fewer and fewer reasons to do so.

Europe loved Clinton. Tony Blair modeled his campaign on Bill's. (I was in London the last week before their election, and it was marvelous to see the conservative Times and Telegraph pointing out all the similarities between the two men.) Clinton was welcome everywhere (whereas * is welcome nowhere). Would that we could have more such "embarrassment".

Meanwhile, the whole "Clinton started a war to distract the nation" line is a piece of right-wing propaganda begun by Newt Gingrich and Trent Lott. Today these same men are saying he didn't do enough to fight terrorism. You conservatives want to have everything both ways, all the time. Denigrating our own party is no way to win elections, and even if we manage to do so while in-fighting, who needs a bunch of Zell Millers and Joe Liebermans in office? Might as well vote Republican.

[ThomWV]

5. Maybe Even Worse Than I Thought Then

Well, a wide time period between the two conventions would be even worse. It would allow Bush/Rove to schedule an incursion against Syria to overshadow the Democratic convention and marginalize it in the eyes of the electorate. Then months later let the pimp grandstand for the mindless at ground zero. Best of both worlds in the Rovian mindset.

[Aleesha]

6. Sorry, but you are right!

I heard Gen. W. Clark on Tweetys show say that the pentagon is planning to withdraw trrops from Bosnia because they will be needed in Syria, and that the invasion of Syria is alread being planned. He also stated that the Iraq invasion was planned as early as Nov. 2001. You would think he would speak more on this.

[Dagaz]

8. Partly wrong

The party out of power always schedules their convention first. It's not any rule but a long standing gentlemen's agreement. So in this case the Democrats go first and the Pubbies after. They moved it back to Sept because of campaign finance rules. Until they officially nominate Bush any campaign ads are under the primary phase. The Dem candidate, however, will be nominated muih earlier and the spending rules will start at the nominating date.

A war with Syria is possible but I wouldn't see waiting until August as a plan. The troops get roted out in April so I'd say shortly after that IF that's the plan. The WH is already putting out the story that the WMDs are in Lebanon and Syria.

[ikojo]

10. The Republican CONvention is scheduled for September 2004

just around the third anniversary of the 9/11/01 attacks on the World Trade Center. Of course shrubby and co will exploit that for all it's worth. From what I have heard it is unusual for a party to have their convention so close to election day.

FYI: The party in the White House always has their convention last.