Bush is the Next Reagan

"No"

Then I retract my statement.

Nope. But people who sign on YESTERDAY and act like experts are highly suspicious.

I'll see you later, if you're still here in a few months.

"Nope. But people who sign on YESTERDAY and act like experts are highly suspicious."

Experts on what? Conservatism? One can only get that here?

I'll have to bring that up with my Senator the next time I play golf with him... (yes, he's a Republican).

Pardon my skepticism, but one can say anything one wants on the Internet. You have no track record to go on.

You could be an eighty year old Chinese communist for all I know.

Good evening.

"Pardon my skepticism, but one can say anything one wants on the Internet. You have no track record to go on."

Neither do you.

Thanks I have been looking for the NRO link. Do you remember the name of the person at the State Department who kept on signing away and Saudi Visas way after 9/11? She was finally found another job. It was an embarrassment. At least that is how I remember it.

"Do you remember the name of the person at the State Department who kept on signing away and Saudi Visas way after 9/11?"

Yes, it was, but I'm afraid I don't recall the person's name.

You're referring to the VISA Express program here? The problem with State is that they too often view foreign nationals and foreign governments as their clients and customers. That's not a healthy attitude for a foreign service.

Exactly, it was a she! Darn, I wish I had saved that shortcut. But thanks for confirming that my memory is not completely faulty.

"Exactly, it was a she!"

Mary Ryan

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&contentId=A14788-2001Oct30&notFound=true

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=2028

http://www.nationalreview.com/mowbray/mowbray102202.asp

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14363

http://www.9-11commission.gov/hearings/hearing7/for_the_record_gadiel.pdf

http://www.cis.org/articles/Katz/katz2003.html

http://www.911fsa.org/resources/congressional_testimony_2004jan26.html

"Clearly, Ms Ryan was reflecting an attitude that pervaded State Department officials at the highest levels: On June 10, 2002 Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage wrote that believing that “an applicant may pose a threat to national security…is insufficient [grounds] for a consular officer to deny a visa.” But the trail of guilt does not stop at Mr. Armitage, for it was Sen. Ted Kennedy who was responsible for adding language to the 1996 immigration reform act which stipulated that “mere membership” in a terrorist organization is insufficient basis for denying a visa to an applicant.

Whatever the roles of Messrs. Armitage and Kennedy in allowing terrorists entry to the US, Ms. Ryan was clearly committed to Visa Express and allowing virtually anyone to enter the US. After 9/11, Diane Andruch (Ryan’s deputy) reported that the program had been discontinued, but investigation proved the expedited processing still continued. And incomprehensibly, despite public anger over her activities, the State Department awarded Mary Ryan a $15,000 bonus for her “outstanding performance” for the period April 16, 2001 to April 15, 2002. It was as if the State Department was affirming its approval for incompetence."

http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/002916.php

Interesting if true.

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/joelmowbray/2003/09/30/168588.html

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/joelmowbray/2003/10/01/168404.html

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/joelmowbray/2002/11/25/165011.html

Why I strongly dislike the State Department.....

"Secretary of State Colin Powell expresses concern that tighter visa protocols make Middle Easterners feel "unwelcome," but he neglected to mention that earlier this year when State was trying to push through visas quickly, some 200 people on terrorist watch lists were given visas because the full checks had not been completed. Although State is publicly spouting platitudes about its actions to strengthen visa procedures, it is quietly waging a battle to reinstate as much of the "courtesy culture" as possible. Most of the quasi-reforms implemented this summer—no changes were made any sooner—were only enacted under duress. A few months ago, State faced an increasing number of members of Congress fed up with frequent and inexcusable lapses in visa security--and Congress was poised to move the entire visa function to the new Department of Homeland Security. In largely symbolic fashion, Powell did two things: 1) he fired the woman in charge of the Consular Affairs agency who pioneered the "courtesy culture," and 2) he promised to beef up screening procedures for people seeking visas, particularly in Saudi Arabia. The most tangible effort Powell made to strengthen border security was to end the program known as Visa Express, which allowed all Saudi residents to submit their visa applications to private Saudi travel agents. Even though Visa Express was responsible for three of the terrorists getting visas in the three months the program was in operation before 9/11, State kept this open door policy intact in the country that sent us 15 of the 19 terrorists for a full ten months after 9/11. State only ended Visa Express because the public was—justifiably--outraged. But now, a mere four months after Powell's promise that his department would do a better job safeguarding our shores, State's PR machine is trying to make the case that tighter visa rules actually hurt the United States."

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/contributors/joelmowbray/archive/2002/

Archives: Joel Mowbray

Feeding at the Saudi Trough
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/joelmowbray/2003/10/01/168404.html

Department of Saudi
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/joelmowbray/2003/12/02/160376.html

Foggy Bottom's Friends
http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110004154

THE STATE DEPARTMENT - Express Deception.(Brief Article)
http://www.highbeam.com/library/docfree.asp?DOCID=1G1:89636743&ctrlInfo=Round20%3AMode20e%3ADocG%3AResult&ao=

Around here I have five years worth of activism and lots of 'real' friends, so yes, I do.

For instance.....people have MET my son in my tagline, and many here prayed for him with me during his deployment in Iraq (Baghdad, specifically). One freeper actually met with him there.

Others worked with me on the Bush 2004 campaign.

That's a track record. I am who I say I am. No one knows that about you.

This guy is insane.

Bush is mediocre at best, and has the potential to go down as one of the worst Presidents in American history.

He signed into law McCain-Feingold, a blatantly unconstitutional law abriging political speech, in the mistaken hope that it would be overturned by the Supreme Court. The liberals who ran the Court at that time - predictably - did not. Now we have a law which benefits Democrats as apparently the newspapers can say what other people cannot.

But MOST of all, he has consistently and steadily refused to enforce laws to protect our borders, particularly the southern border and conspired with a foreign leader - Vicente Fox and American corporate interests who rely on cheap foreign labor - to violate his oath to protect and defend the COnstitution of the United States, which includes Federal Laws and our immigration laws. In doiing so, he has defied the overwhelminig majority of Americans and endangered the control of his party in COngress.

Bush is now presiding over the transformation of what was once a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic nation united under an common social system and language into another South American bananna republic.

As for the war on terror, Bush did a good job in Afghanistan and initially in Iraq. But what started out as a conflict to protect us against Islamic atttacks and should have immediately been expanded to exterminate the governments of all terror states in the Middle East has become bogged down into a Crusade to create a new social experiment - a Democracy in an area where history, culture and social norms for over four thousand years has never had one - and it isn't working.

He should have had our military destroy Saddam and his political machine, move on to wipe out the ayatollahs and Syrian Baathists, and then simply pulled out. By remaining there to work on his scheme of nation-building, he is waging a long defensive war - one the American public psyche is poorly designed to accept, and a type of war in which the advantage lies with the aggressor, not the passive or active defender.

Don't even use "Bush" and "Reagan" on the same page, let alone in the same sentence.

"That's a track record. I am who I say I am. No one knows that about you."

I think you vastly overestimate the impact and import of "activism" via participation in an internet forum. I'll just leave it at that.

I have only one thing to say.

That's a hell of a thing to say. I'm with you.