Please help!

[YpsiH2Otwr]

I recently received the following e-mail. I would love to respond creatively, and who is more creative that your average DUer? Put on your thinking caps... DON'T LET ME DOWN!
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What to believe?
I'm trying to get all this political stuff straightened
out in my head so I'll know how to vote come November.
Right now, we have one guy saying one thing.
Then the other guy says something else.
Who to believe?
Lemme see; have I got this straight?


Clinton awards Halliburton no-bid contract in Yugoslavia - good...
Bush awards Halliburton no-bid contract in Iraq - bad...

Clinton spends 77 billion on war in Serbia - good...
Bush spends 87 billion in Iraq - bad...

Clinton imposes regime change in Serbia - good...
Bush imposes regime change in Iraq - bad...

Clinton bombs Christian Serbs on behalf of Muslim
Albanian terrorists-good...
Bush liberates 25 million from a genocidal dictator - bad...

Clinton bombs Chinese embassy - good...
Bush bombs terrorist camps - bad...

Clinton commits felonies while in office - good...
Bush lands on aircraft carrier in jumpsuit - bad...

No mass graves found in Serbia - good...
No WMD found Iraq - bad...

Stock market crashes in 2000 under Clinton - good...
Economy on upswing under Bush - bad...

Clinton refuses to take custody of Bin Laden - good...
World Trade Centers fall under Bush - bad...

Clinton says Saddam has nukes - good...
Bush says Saddam has nukes - bad...

Clinton calls for regime change in Iraq - good...
Bush imposes regime change in Iraq - bad...

Terrorist training in Afghanistan under Clinton - good...
Bush destroys training camps in Afghanistan - bad...

Milosevic not yet convicted - good...
Saddam turned over for trial - bad...

Ahh, it's so confusing!

Every year an independent tax watchdog group
analyzes the average tax burden on Americans,
and then calculates the "Tax Freedom Day".
This is the day after which the money you earn
goes to you, not the government.
This year, tax freedom day was April 11th.
That's the earliest it has been since 1991.
It's latest day ever was May 2nd, which occurred in 2000.
Notice anything special about those dates?

Recently, John Kerry gave a speech in which he
claimed Americans are actually paying more
taxes under Bush, despite the tax cuts.
He gave no explanation and provided no data for this claim.

Another interesting fact: Both George Bush and
John Kerry are wealthy men.
Bush owns only one home, his ranch in Texas.
Kerry owns 4 mansions, all worth several million dollars.
(His ski resort home in Idaho is an old
barn brought over from Europe in pieces.
Not your average A-frame).

Bush paid $250,000 in taxes this year;
Kerry paid $90,000.
Does that sound right?
The man who wants to raise your taxes obviously
has figured out a way to avoid paying his own.

Pass this on.
Not many days left until the election.

[DAGDA56]

1. Bush is running for President...Clinton is not...BOTH are BAD!

[joefree1]

2. Always check with Snopes.com

Daily Kos knock this down:
http://pa08.dailykos.com/story/2004/10/15/12220/328

Clinton/Kerry urban legend email
by bobkopp
Fri Oct 15th, 2004 at 05:22:20 GMT

My adviser forwarded to me an email from his right-wing sister which promotes a whole lot of falsehoods about Bill Clinton and John Kerry. These things require a lot more work to refute than to fabricate. The basic answer is simple: Bill Clinton is not running for president. But I decided to take a closer look at the claims.

Clinton awards Halliburton no-bid contract in Yugoslavia - good...
Bush awards Halliburton no-bid contract in Iraq - bad... (1) Bill Clinton is not running for president. (I'm not aware of the details of this contact, but I'll accept for the purpose of argument that the fact is correct.)

Diaries :: bobkopp's diary ::
(2) Former Halliburton CEO Dick Cheney's staff was, according to the LA Times, directly involved in the decision to award the contract. No Halliburton executive was a member of the Clinton administration.

More on Halliburton (from factcheck.org): (1) Halliburton is paying $7.5 million in fines for failing to disclose a change in accounting rules dating back to 1998, when Cheney was CEO. (2) The US did business with Iran, a sworn enemy of the US, when Cheney was CEO, and Cheney lobbied for the lifting of sanctions against Iran. (3) Halliburton is under investigation for alleged bribery to win a $12 billion construction contract in Nigeria dating to the time when Cheney was CEO.

Clinton spends 77 billion on war in Serbia - good...
Bush spends 87 billion in Iraq - bad... (1) I don't know where the $77 billion figure comes from. I think it includes costs from allied countries. According to the Woodrow Wilson Institute, the cost of the eight years of military involvement in Bosnia totaled $50 billion in military expenditures and several tens of billions in reconstruction. The US share was $10.8 billion and $2.1 billion, respectively. The total costs for Kosovo was also in the tens of billions, with the US share being $7.1 billion military and about $500 million reconstruction.

Over the eight years of involvement in Yugoslavia, total costs to all nations involved may have been similar to that spent in the last year and a half in Iraq, but because we worked with our allies in Yugoslavia, the cost to the US was only $20.5 billion, just over $2.5 billion per year.

(2) In contrast, Bush has spent $120 billion in Iraq, with a total of $200 billion to be spent by the end of the year. For comparison, the first Gulf War cost a total of $61 billion, with the allies paying for $54 billion of the $61 billion.

Clinton imposes regime change in Serbia - good...
Bush imposes regime change in Iraq - bad... Both candidates believe Saddam Hussein posed a threat in Iraq, and both supported regime change as a goal. The difference between the two candidates is that John Kerry insisted that the US work with the rest of the world, as we did in Yugoslavia, and as we did in the first Gulf War. Had we done so, we would not now be bearing the lion's share of casualties and expenses, and America would not be distrusted throughout the world.

(BTW, at the time Bush pushed the so-called "war" authorization through Congress, he did not describe as a declaration of war. Rather, he said, "None of us here today desire to see military conflict, because we know the awful nature of war. Our country values life, and never seeks war unless it is essential to security and to justice. America's leadership and willingness to use force, confirmed by the Congress, is the best way to ensure compliance and avoid conflict." Only after the fact has Bush described Kerry's vote for this resolution as a vote for war.)

Clinton bombs Christian Serbs on behalf of Muslim Albanian terrorists- good...
Bush liberates 25 million from a genocidal dictator - bad... Umm... Nobody serious denies that Saddam Hussein was a murderous dictator, but the first statement demonstrates a lack of understand about the war in Yugoslavia.

(1) Approximately 200,000 Bosnians, mostly Muslim, were murdered between 1995 and 1999, mostly by Serbian Orthodox Christians. (Source: religoustolerance.org)

(2) Approximately 400,000 Kosovars, mainly Muslims, were driven out of their homes in 1998-1999 by Serbian Orthodox Christians. (Source: religoustolerance.org)

(3) Muslims of the former Yugoslavia are on were largely secular, but the tardiness of the international community in intervening to stop genocide in the former Yugoslavia left an opening of which jihadists took advantage to establish a foothold in Europe. (Source: FAS)

Clinton bombs Chinese embassy - good...
Bush bombs terrorist camps - bad... (1) Clinton bombs Chinese embassy -- probably bad and a mistake, although some European news sources reported after the bombing that the Chinese embassy may have been broadcasting Yugoslav radio signals, which would make the act strategically good but diplomatically bad.

(2) Who's objecting to the US attacks on al-Qaeda terrorist bases? Nobody I've heard of save some of Ralph Nader's supporters (the leftist ones, not the Republican ones). The contention is that the war in Iraq distracted the United States from the important task of fighting al Qaeda, which had little or no connection to Iraq. As Vice President Cheney said in the VP debate, "I have not suggested there's a connection between Iraq and 9/11".

Clinton commits felonies while in office - good...
Bush lands on aircraft carrier in jumpsuit - bad...

(1) Clinton has not been charged with any felonies, so the allegation has not basis in fact.

(2) When Bush landed on the aircraft carrier, signs placed with the encouragement of the White House declared "Mission Accomplished." Bush has since, in an interview with Bill O'Reiley, said that he feels no regrets about this, even though 1,088 Americans have died in Iraw, all but 239 killed after the mission was "accomplished."

No mass graves found in Serbia - good...
No WMD found Iraq - bad...

As above, the author demonstrates a lack of understanding of the Yugoslav wars. More than 18,000 victims have so far been exhumed from 300 mass graves in the former Yugoslavia (Source: CBC). (Technically, the statement may be correct, but only because the war and the genocide occurred in Bosnia, not Serbia.)

Stock market crashes in 2000 under Clinton - good...
Economy on upswing under Bush - bad... George Bush is the first president since Herbert Hoover to lose American jobs over the course of his administration. He has turned a record surplus into a record deficit. Under his watch, the minimum wage has sunk to its lowest real-dollar value in many years. Under his watch, America has become more economically divided.

Clinton refuses to take custody of Bin Laden - good...
World Trade Centers fall under Bush - bad... (1) The story about Clinton refusing to take custody of Bin Laden appears to come from a Washington Post article dated October 3, 2001. ("U.S. Was Foiled Multiple Times in Efforts To Capture Bin Laden or Have Him Killed; Sudan's Offer to Arrest Militant Fell Through After Saudis Said No") This is a complex issue and the article deserves to be read in full. Needless to say, had the Clinton adminstration perfect foresight, they would have paid less attention to legalities, but at the time the true threat bin Laden posed was not yet apparent.

(2) Are you claiming that the attack on the World Trade Centers was not an evil act?

Clinton says Saddam has nukes - good...
Bush says Saddam has nukes - bad... Clinton let the sanctions regime work, and it did work -- that's why Saddam had no WMDs, according to the Duelfer report. The inspectors told Bush that they could find no evidence of WMDs and, surprise, surprise, now that we've spent $120 billion going into Iraq, we can't either.

Clinton calls for regime change in Iraq - good...
Bush imposes regime change in Iraq - bad... See discussion above.

Terrorist training in Afghanistan under Clinton - good...
Bush destroys training camps in Afghanistan - bad... (1) The US public would not have supported an invasion of Afghanistan pre-9/11, but Bill Clinton did launch air strikes against al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan in 1998. Remember? People accused him of trying to distract attention from Monica Lewinsky.

(2) See discussion above.

Milosevic not yet convicted - good...
Saddam turned over for trial - bad... (1) Milosevic is in allied custody and on trial. His generals have been charged and found guilty. (2) Who is objecting to Saddam being tried?

Ahh, it's so confusing!

Every year an independent tax watchdog group analyzes the average tax burden on Americans, and then calculates the "Tax Freedom Day". This is the day after which the money you earn goes to you, not the government. This year, tax freedom day was April 11th. That's the earliest it has been since 1991. It's latest day ever was May 2nd, which occurred in 2000. Notice anything special about those dates?
The maximum tax rate in during the Eisenhower administration was 87%, so I found this claim rather suspicious.

Recently, John Kerry gave a speech in which he claimed Americans are actually paying more taxes under Bush, despite the tax cuts. He gave no explanation and provided no data for this claim. See Bush Tax.

Another interesting fact: Both George Bush and John Kerry are wealthy men.
Bush owns only one home, his ranch in Texas. Kerry owns 4 mansions, all worth several million dollars. (His ski resort home in Idaho is an old barn brought over from Europe in pieces. Not your average A-frame). John Kerry owns one house, in Boston. The Heinz family owns four mansions. People who criticize Teresa for being wealthy need to remember that the Heinz Endowments are among the largest independent philanthropic organizations in the country and gave more than $54 million in grants to nonprofits in 2003 alone.

Bush paid $250,000 in taxes this year; Kerry paid $90,000. Does that sound right? The man who wants to raise your taxes obviously has figured out a way to avoid paying his own. No, it doesn't sound right. The reason it doesn't is because you're pretending John Kerry is individually wealthier than George Bush and owns four mansions. John Kerry earns less than George Bush while pretending that Teresa Kerry doesn't pay taxes. John Kerry paid $90,000 in taxes on $395,000 in income and George Bush paid $250,000 in taxes on $822,000 in income. Teresa Kerry paid $750,000 in taxes on $2.3 million in taxable income.

Pass this on. Only 40 days until the election!


Seating now available in the Smoking Section:
Politics, humor, death and the Devil - http://www.eDiablo.com

[HootieMcBoob]

3. line up the straw men so i can knock them down

this is so much bs. just do a little research and you can refute each of these things. if i wasn't hanging out and watching the world series i'd help you out. i'm sure there are plenty of folks who can talk to this shit. another option is to ignore it.

[lancdem]

4. Clinton's on the ballot?

I must've missed that. :eyes:

BTW, this email has been making the rounds for months. zzzzz ....

[Sparkly]

5. False comparisons followed by blatant lies

Anybody who believes this hasn't picked up a newspaper in the past decade.

[dogman]

6. The usual ignorance.

How about simple things like Clinton prevented genocide-good
After George I allowed genocide his idiot son inflicted further pain on the masses in that country and ours-bad
One could go on all night if it were worth the time and effort.

[rasputin1952]

7. I am locking this thread...

This is a situation that should be dealt with on an individual basis.

Thank you for understanding.