Bush benefits from decay of democracy

Boston Globe ^ | April 2, 2003 | Robert Kuttner

[Cincinatus' Wife]

His trademark is the use of liberal-sounding rhetoric -- on health care, education, jobs, tax fairness, the environment -- while his policies do the opposite. To watch his recent address on Medicare and Medicaid (which he wants to gut), you would think you were listening to Ted Kennedy.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

This column reminds me of the hate and contempt the Left and elite media held for President Ronald Reagan. No matter how hard they tried to destroy him, the people just kept on loving him. The more good men fight for freedom, the more evil men cry out.

[Trailerpark Badass]

Naturally, this "failure of democracy" only became a problem when George Bush became President. What an insipid article.

[MEG33]

The words of a desperate liberal.

[ARepublicanForAllReasons]

Yes, it's deja vu all over again. Give Mr. Kuttner a pound of cheese to go with his gallon of whine.

[EternalVigilance]

An amen from this particular rightwing amen corner...

[joyful1]

The columnist is infuriated that FOX news is a run-away number 1 in the polls

[netmilsmom]

The Iraq war and 9/11. People do rally around the commander in chief in wartime. But not always. Lyndon Johnson was hounded out of office in 1968, at the height of the Vietnam War. Roosevelt barely won the election of 1944. Bush would not be so invulnerable were it not for the other factors.

---

Just keep wishing and hoping.
The biggest thing that has pushed the Republicans into the lead is the desperation that the Clinton White House caused. Most of us sat back letting Washington run itself, then the frat boys came in and it was the last straw. The conservatives woke up and mobilized. We had to because we were just as credulous about how Clinton could stay in office when he and his pals were such lowlife.

[EternalVigilance]

More like the decay of Democrats...

[Dstorm]

Earth to Robert Kuttner, Get a Grip!!

[edwin hubble]

"...the so-called liberal papers, like the Globe and The New York Times play it absolutely straight in their news reporting."

No need to read beyond this statement.

[backhoe]

Gee, I was under the impression that our President was too stupid to walk & chew gum at the same time, and here this fella's telling me that he's an evil genius surrounded by equally-brillant henchmen... it's sooo confusing-

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Oh, BTW- aren't we in a Republic?

[marktwain]

The major item this story misses, because of its false assumptions, is that the OldDominantLiberalMedia can't control the content of the information the average american gets anymore. It is the reemergence of a free press and the distrust of the OldDomiantLiberalMedia and its lies that are the heart of the conservative resurgence.

[martin_fierro]

Not a particularly original piece.

Just substitute "Clinton" for "Bush" and "conservative" for "liberal" and this could've been written during the 90s.

[dawn53]

Quick! We need somebody to poast that crying baby seal of the Democratic party. It's so appropo to this article.

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Algore Backs Chicks, Bashes Clear Channel

[NoControllingLegalAuthority]

I just remember Janet Reno and Bill/Hillary Clinton. They ran the government like a dictatorship. They fired every U.S. attorney in charge on the day they took office and appointed their own cronies and began a systematic manipulation of the government for their own personal gain. They made a travesty of our governmental system with the happy assistance of the left-wing media. We had eight years of trash turned ruthless dictator and the media dare call GWB undemocratic?

[hotpotato]

Bush's march to war has also been marked by one misrepresentation after another. Seymour Hersh, writing in The New Yorker, recently exposed as a forgery the administration's claim that Saddam Hussein was seeking to buy enriched uranium for nuclear weapons.

It wasn't the Bush administration's forgery. The forgery came from another country. And the administration isn't basing its suspicions about enriched uranium based solely on that document. If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck....

The war is not the cakewalk Bush forecast.

Bush never claimed it would be a cakewalk and I challenge Kuttner to prove it.

Ordinary Iraqis are not greeting American troops with flowers, while US casualties mount.

Iraqis, where the fear of Saddam does not abound, are greeting coallition forces with thumbs up and handshakes and expressions of glee. As for US casualties, the coallition has traveled farther faster than in any other military campaign in history and now has over 8,000 POWs and estimated thousands of dead enemy. What exactly does Kuttner mean by "mount?"

The recriminations -- generals versus Rumsfeld, Pentagon versus State Department -- are already leaking into the press.

The "recriminations" are primarily the product of fabrication by the media. General Myers was pretty clear about that on Tuesday.

So... exactly *who* is engaged in misrepresentation here? I don't think I need to read further.

[GailA]

Paging an Admin Moderater you need to add a EXTREME BARF ALERT to the title.

[CanisRex]

Their ''liberal'' counterparts are polite and moderate by comparison

Paul Begala Lil Jimmy Carville Ellis Hedicam Bill Press Phil Donahue (who cancels out Bill O'Reilly IMHO)

[Texas_Jarhead]

sset this piiece out on the curb 'cause it's garbage