Bottom Line: Bush Failed

Voters have a clear choice between Kerry's clear thinking, honesty and leadership ability versus Bush's odd mix of vacillation when we need clarity and stubborn refusal to change course when his simplistic stabs at policy blow up in our faces. Bush's lies, denials and excuses won't bring the dead back to life or prevent future attacks. Bush ignored good information and followed only the "intelligence" that supported his snap judgments and prejudices. We must hold Bush accountable for his fatal mistakes. Bush showed he won't stop endangering our lives with his bad decisions. He refuses to adjust or reverse the bad choices he keeps making based on ignorance, false information and poor planning. Kerry can keep us safe. Bush can't. We have to vote Bush out before he gets more Americans killed. What more is there to think about?

Over the next few days, at the office, at your children's football or soccer games, and in your homes, people will be talking about the first presidential debate. Here are some important facts to keep in mind as you're talking with friends, relatives and neighbors about this important event. Bush was unclear and either uninformed or dishonest about the past, present and future. During the debate Bush bragged about "progress" in Iraq which is deteriorating daily into an increasingly chaotic bloodbath. Bush doesn't understand that his failed policies caused and increased the difficulties our troops face in Iraq and Afghanistan. As Sen. Kerry said, Bush "out-sourced" national security to unreliable warlords - our enemies - with disastrous results: bin Laden and his top al Qaeda terrorists escaped because Bush can't tell enemies from friends in Afghanistan. Bush is not just wrong about Afghanistan, he's wrong about Iraq too. Bush seemingly blames Kerry for supporting Bush's failed Iraqi policies. He said Kerry hopes people won't remember that, but Bush wants us to forget he promised the Iraqis would welcome our troops with flowers. Instead they've killed our people with bullets and bombs. When Bush's dreamy scenario didn't materialize, he had no plan B. Bush's lack of commonsense and planning put our troops into a living nightmare. 1000s of dead and wounded Americans later, Bush has no plan to stabilize Iraq. Even worse, he refuses to accept how badly his flawed approach is failing. He demands we blindly "stay the course." Bush swears his Iraq policy is working. Maybe he even believes that, but almost no one else does. Every day things get worse there. We now know Bush relied on "proof" and intelligence from liars like Ahmed Chalabi and now he depends on testimony from Iraq's interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. How can Bush present Allawi's words as proof of success when the Bush Administration admitted he mouthed words the Administration told him to say? After using Allawi as a ventriloquist dummy, how can Bush criticize Kerry for implying Allawi is a puppet? Bush - desperate for any support for his failed policies - made up propaganda and made Allawi use it to mislead the Congress and the American people. Then Bush repeated these lies during the debate. These shady but transparent tricks reveal the Administration as incompetent liars in the eyes of the world - and the Iraqi people. Bush's outburst against Kerry after these clumsy manipulations expose Bush as a pathological liar who believes his own lies, forces others to repeat his lies so he can claim his lies are true, and then can't tell the truth because he can't tell the difference. Allawi isn't even Bush's first choice to run Iraq. Ahmed Chalabi was Bush's man, even after our allies warned us that Chalabi was a liar - even a wanted criminal in Jordan. Bush and Cheney kept trying to impose Chalabi on the Iraqis until we found he was spying on us and working for the Iranians. That was the last straw. Lying to us and defrauding our allies was fine, but not even Cheney could accept a Pro-Iranian spy as the leader of Iraq. Now Bush is backing another unpopular Iraqi and undermining him by making him say absurd things about how great Bush's policy is. Bush never learns. No wonder the mess in Iraq keeps getting worse. Bush keeps telling us Iraq is showing "progress" but others disagree. "Iraq is in serious danger of coming apart because of lack of planning, underestimating the task and buying into a flawed strategy. The longer we stubbornly resist admitting the mistakes and not altering our approach, the harder it will be to pull this chestnut out of the fire." Who said that? Some wide-eyed peacenik? No, that was retired Four Star Marine Corps General Anthony Zinni. What does he know? A lot. Zinni served America as chief of the U.S. military Central Command for the Middle East. He enforced the "no-fly" zones over Iraq and commanded air strikes against Iraq in 1998. Bush chose him as a special envoy to the Middle East. Too bad Bush doesn't have the sense to listen to people like Gen. Zinni. For someone so proud of his "clarity" and "certainty," Bush certainly flip-flops a lot. For example, in the first debate Bush said he had to attack Iraq because the enemy attacked us on 9/11 in America's cities. When Kerry corrected him by explaining Saddam Hussein did not attack us, Bush spat back he knows al Qaeda attacked us. Flip. Flop. Bush acts like he has no idea who the real enemy is in the "War on Terror" - or in Afghanistan or in Iraq for that matter. Bush may know who really attacked us, but most of his supporters don't seem to know and he likes it that way. Debating Kerry, Bush claimed unilateral discussions to protect Americans from North Korean nukes is a "big mistake" because that might offend the Chinese, but then attacked Kerry for supposedly letting other countries set our foreign policy. Flip. Flop. Then Bush - over-solicitous of Chinese feelings on North Korean Nukes - bragged about his nearly-unilateral attack on Iraq that alienated most of our key allies. Flip. Flop. And again, that's just from the first debate. The list of Bush flip-flops goes on and on as his failures keep empowering al Qaeda and the US bears 90% of the burden of blood and $billions in Iraq. Bush promised to bring back Osama bin Laden "dead or alive," but pulled out of Afghanistan before he got the job done in his mad rush to attack Iraq. The enemy who attacked us was not in Iraq, but Bush is obsessed with Iraq. That led Bush to mislead American and allied leaders. To convince Sen. Kerry and others to support his Iraq Resolution in Congress, he promised he'd attack only as a last resort after gaining explicit allied and UN support. Instead he attacked as a first resort after submitting then withdrawing a war resolution in the Security Council. Flip. Flop. Bush first opposed and delayed the Homeland Security Dept. then demanded haste and attacked any who didn't support his version as unpatriotic. Flip. Flop. Bush first opposed and delayed the 9/11 Commission, then supported it. He refused to let Condoleezza Rice testify before it, and then ordered her to testify. He refused to testify himself, then agreed to with a strict hour-limit, then lifted the limit. Bush says one thing about our most critical national security policies but does the opposite over and over. Bush flip-flops and waffles because he has no idea what to do. He just won't listen to the people who know better - Anthony Zinni, Richard Clarke, Joe Wilson, and others warned Bush he was making big mistakes ignoring terror and relying on false information. Bush ignored the experts and so remained ignorant. All these flip-flops and failures prove Bush has no real plan to keep Americans safe from terrorism. Bush's flip-flops get Americans killed in Iraq. First, he orders our troops to invade various cities to hunt down local Iraqi leaders. Then Bush orders the troops to pull back and announces he'll turn over control to the same Iraqis he just tried to kill! Bush can't distinguish friend from foe in Iraq. These Bush disasters result from a simple truism: "If you fail to plan you plan to fail." Bush planned for failure when he refused to undertake the hard work and careful consideration he should have done before committing our troops and our nation to war. Bush kept complaining that his job was "hard work," but the sad fact is he won't work hard to do his job. He can't lead because he refuses to read critically important briefings or learn the facts needed to lead. Borrowing from Orwell, Bush tries to make ignorance into strength. It isn't. Bush won't even admit anything he's done wrong, so he can't fix what's gone wrong. During the debate, Bush and Kerry both exposed Bush's troubling lack of understanding and his frightening inability to do the hard thinking required of the Commander in Chief. Bush is a serial liar and exaggerator who can't handle the truth. During the debate, he first claimed credit for sanctions on Iran, but when Sen. Kerry said they didn't go far enough he flip-flopped and blamed the Clinton Administration for imposing those sanctions. In reality, Bush renewed the sanctions which date back to the Carter years. Bush also lied when he claimed his policies brought Libya to the bargaining table. Just plain wrong. Those negotiations began during the Clinton years, but Bush demanded the credit. This is not new. Back in 2000 Bush grossly exaggerated his record in Texas. He claimed credit for the Patients' Bill of Rights he vetoed and which later passed despite his threatened second veto. He told us to judge him based on his record on education after he lied about a Rand study that showed a miserable performance under Bush's policies after gains due to Ann Richards' polices. When the New York Times' Adam Clymer reported the real record behind Bush's exaggerated boasts, Bush lashed out with angry profanity. That's what Bush does when confronted with uncomfortable facts that expose his lies. Bush has to exaggerate and make up accomplishments because he has nothing to show for his term in office. Nothing but big giveaways to corporations like Enron and Halliburton, millions of lost jobs, more poverty, more pollution, higher oil and medical prices, $500 billion deficits, and - by far worst of all - 1000s of dead and wounded Americans and counting. Bush has no plan for security or prosperity. On every critical concern, Bush simply has no idea what he's doing. The press and his advisors coddle Bush, so when Kerry confronted him Bush didn't know what to do. His childish reactions - fuming at Kerry and denying the facts that show he's wrong - demonstrate how he got us into this mess. Bush keeps his mind empty and when his assumptions don't fit reality, Bush refuses to change his mind. When challenged, his efforts to excuse his failures spiral into contradiction, dishonesty and incoherence. Bush showed he lacks the wisdom to lead America and the world. Bush fails and fails because he is just not up to the job. Clearly Bush is not up to the job, so his only chance is to bash Kerry as potentially even worse. Exposed as shallow, dishonest, and lazy Bush hopes his spurious attacks on John Kerry will distract voters from Bush Administration lies and failure. While this worked well during the Summer of the Swift Boat Liars, John Kerry passed the one test he had to pass last night: he proved he is qualified to serve as Commander in Chief. Bush showed he cannot meet that standard by trying to excuse his own failure with cheap shots and unfounded criticism of Kerry. Kerry overcame the phony "credibility gap" Bush's political operatives tried to create with $million in attack ads and unrelenting lies. If anyone has a gaping credibility gap, it's Bush. As Kerry pointed out, Bush tried to lead by lying to our allies and misleading the American people. Bush fails and then refuses to face up to failure. As his policies fail, Bush piles the lies higher and deeper. A liar cannot lead. He can only mislead. When we need resolution, Bush flip-flops and then hypocritically attacks those who credited Bush's lies. When we need to try something that might work better, Bush misleads us by claiming disaster is desirable. That's misleadership, not leadership. Bush revealed an alarming lack of understanding and accountability combined with indecision, vacillation and cynicism. Bush has a record of running away in the face of real challenges, refusing to face facts, and then making excuses for failing. We can and must do better. Bush whines that the job of Commander in Chief is "hard work" and pleads that "there will be good days and bad days" in the war on terror. If the job is too hard for Bush, as it appears it is, we must take that job away from him. We're doomed to suffer through more bad days than good until we stop following Bush's poorly planned and unrealistic tactics - such as expecting our enemies to throw flowers at us after we attack the wrong people at the wrong time in the wrong places. Winning the war against terrorists is essential to our safety at home and victory is the only option. Unfortunately, Bush cannot remember who our real enemies are, and insists on following failed policies which make us less safe. Leadership requires setting priorities properly, and Bush can't do that. As Sen. Kerry shows, intelligence and strength are not competing ideals. As Bush shows, stubborn refusal to change course is no virtue when you're going over the cliff. Bush complains the War on Terror is too difficult for him. Perhaps he should step aside and let a real leader lead. John Kerry is a combat veteran who knows war like Bush never could. Enough excuses and failure. Bush showed he cannot keep us safe. Kerry shows every indication that he can. People saw for themselves that John Kerry has the strength, stature, and courage to lead our military, our allies and the world to victory in the War on Terror. Bush showed he can't get the job done; he can only blame others when he fails. When Bush fails, we lose 100s of $billions and 1000s of lives. Over the past three presidential elections, Republicans have tried to tar their opponents as unworthy of holding office. They bashed Bill Clinton as an inveterate liar. They branded Al Gore as a serial exaggerator out-of-touch with reality. Now they try to tell us John Kerry is a flip-flopper. If these attributes disqualify a presidential candidate, then George W. Bush is triply unacceptable. Bush is an inveterate liar who is out-of-touch with reality and a serial exaggerator who tries to take credit for things he opposed. He is also a flip-flopper. By these Republican measures, Bush is unworthy to hold office. Voters have a clear choice between Kerry's clear thinking, honesty and leadership ability versus Bush's odd mix of vacillation when we need clarity and stubborn refusal to change course when his simplistic stabs at policy blow up in our faces. Bush's lies, denials and excuses won't bring the dead back to life or prevent future attacks. Bush tries to excuse his horrendous record by blaming "bad intelligence." That's not good enough. Bush ignored good information and followed only the "intelligence" that supported his snap judgments and prejudices. We must hold Bush accountable for his fatal mistakes. Bush showed he won't stop endangering our lives with his bad decisions. He refuses to adjust or reverse the bad choices he keeps making based on ignorance, false information and poor planning. Kerry can keep us safe. Bush can't. We have to vote Bush out before he gets more Americans killed. What more is there to think about? [Note: Portions taken from and in response to Republican National Committee propaganda email] � Copyright 2002, 2003, 2004 by MikeHersh.com MikeHersh.com invites you to reproduce, reprint or broadcast any material at this site, provided you identify the source as MikeHersh.com. All Internet and email summaries, excerpts or other written reproductions must include this blurb and a link to http://www.MikeHersh.com.

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