with tears, watching Al Gore

[cwsox]

seeing Al Gore speak at the Democratic convention...

 

that good and decent man who received more votes than any other person in American history...

 

that wise, compassionate, intellectually alive, brilliant and personable man of such courage...

 

had he taken office, America would not be as divided as it it is now;

 

had Gore taken office, he would not have been welded to ideology as Bush was: Bush who dismissed terrorism as a threat because his ideology called for Star Wars, Bush who set aside warnings on terrorism to pursue his only political bents.

 

President Gore would have taken seriously the warnings on terrorism and not ignored them,

 

If September 11th had happened, President Gore would not have sat still for seven minutes waiting to be told what to do and then fly around the country scared and frightened when the US needed its president -

 

President Gore would have flown to DC and stood outside the Pentagon and said, "we are America, we shall not be intimidated, our vision and our commitment to justice and freedom will not be challenged by the violence of terrorists.."

 

President Gore would have worked with the nations of the world in that moment when all the world was with us, to combat al qaeda, to strike at terrorists, and not disfuse our efforts and alienate our allies by confusing the real needs of this nation with the ideological goals of the near sect of ideologues that control the white house now.

 

Under President Gore we would not have recession, or a jobless economy, or these historically largest ever and economically destructive deficits that will overwhelm our future.

 

President Gore would not choose political stances that his pollsters told him he needed to play to his base as Bush has done with his dividing Americans by bogus constitutional proposals or refusing to meet with people who differ from him, as Bush has done.

 

Gore would not have lost 1.8 million jobs, the vast majority of them manufacturing jobs, and make speeches to wealthy political donors, as Bush did, calling them "my base" which he defined as the "haves" and the "have mores" - for that lone Bush should be tossed - Gore would have understood that he was called to unite the people of the United States, not divide them.

 

Gore would have understood what was happening in the world and responded with policies that make sense, bringing America to work with its allies rather than alienate them.

 

Gore would not cause America to lose its status as the number one beacon of liberty and freedom and democracy in the world - as Bush has caused our image to be so tarnished and shamed by cowboy go it alone strategies.

 

Gore would have appealed to our highest instincts and American values, not pandering to fear. Gore would have called us in the most difficult times to be true to ourselves, to be Americans, to not aside our Constitution and lock people away in camps in isolation in violation of the Geneva Conventions, in violation of the Constitution, endangering our own POWS, leaving people without information as to the charges against them, without contact with family or attorneys, and the horrors of the treatment of prisoners would not have happened and thus creating greater hostility and hatred and raise up new terrorists who hate us - Gore would have called us to live true to ourselves and show the world that we need not sacrifice one bit of what it means to be America - that it is indeed by being truest to our own American values that we are strongest and can deal with whatever confronts our nation.

 

Gore would not lie about reasons to go to an elective war.

 

Gore would take responsibility. Bush when asked to name any mistake he made, could not think of any and called that a "trick question." Gore would have been a president with humility, who would - unlike the current president - take responsibility for what happened under his watch.

 

If the man the people elected, Al Gore, had taken office, America would be in a better place today, stronger, more secure, more respected, safer.

 

Let the tired old jokes come. No, Al Gore never claimed he invented the internet but he did say that he wrote the first legislation which enabled it - which he did. Al Gore never claimed to have discovered Love Canal but he did claim to have had the first congressional hearing on it - which he did.

 

Al Gore was elected by the people.

Al Gore was the president we needed these past four years.

 

In John Kerry we have the right candidate to undo all the things which Bush has done, to let America be America again, to act against terrorists, not against enemies of (poor) choice which lead us into quagmires rather than making America safer. John Kerry will bring America back to living as America and not as a rogue Rome which thinks it can dismiss the world with impunity with the greatest hubris seen in human history and how I fear the fall with another term of Bush. Bush must go, to save America from the path that we are going down now, unilateral isolationism and imperial arrogance disregarding the wisdom, counsel, insights, and support of our allies, let alone the Bush disregard for voices of our own people because they belong to the "wrong" party and are not among the "haves and the have more" (Bush's own words)

 

I cried watching the President who was elected, Al Gore. I cry with hope knowing that the leader my nation needs, John Kerry, is gong to win this election because we will not waver in reaching out with the vision of a stronger America, a respected America, an America true itself as it has surely not been these past four years.

 

Let America be America. The choice in this election is clear. For America to be the America of the Constitution, the America of the patriots' dreams that see beyond the years, the America of the Pledge of Allegiance of one nation with liberty and justice for all, if America is to be the America as good as its people, as honest as its people, with as much integrity as its people, the choice is clear: Kerry. We cannot allow the travesty of 2000 to repeat itself. It must be Kerry and Edwards. Now. More than ever.

[aboz56]

you forgot to add that Gore is a duechebag that couldn't win his own home state....

 

just kidding cw, good post, even though I am a Bush supporter I am glad you are passionate with your views.

[OfficerKarkovice]

It must be Kerry and Edwards.  Now.  More than ever.

Yeah thanks...but no thanks.

[Queen Prawn]

Yeah thanks...but no thanks.

I'd much rather Kerry than Bush.

[Chisoxfn]

No thanks. Gore and Clinton sat their with information at hands. They had Bin Laden sitting their and in custody at one point and another country offered to hand him over to the US, yet they passed. What makes you think he would of handled foreign affairs any better then Clinton, which was poor, imo.

 

Clinton just lobbed some bombs and would call it a day. Don't give me this crap that 9/11 is Gore's fault. Their was a huge flaw in national security as well as the US intelligence, their still is a flaw, but its definately been improved.

[kapkomet]

*sigh*

 

I could go through and write a diatribe like cw just did about "President" Gore, but it would do no good.

 

I must agree with one thing another poster said. Do you realize had Gore won his HOME STATE, none of this would have mattered? If you can't win your home state, I find it difficult to support a "President" who was NOT elected.

 

But why rehash this?

 

Edit (for those who saw what I said already):

 

I used the word diatribe. I didn't mean to imply bitterness, I leave this here to set the record straight. I simply meant, LOOOOONG post. My apologies, Vince...

Edited July 27, 2004 by kapkomet

[Chisoxfn]

Wow...Clinton proves once again why he is one of the greatest political speakers ever. I may not like his political views, but I'm always in awe when he goes out and makes a speach.

 

He did an awesome job framing the republicans and why they are bad and showing why the democrats are good. I was kind of hoping he would talk more about himself and not do all that much, but he really helped out Kerry tonight in what was truly a great speach.

 

I'm not talking about content, but he just did a great job. He does what so few politicians can do, go out and talk about the seperatoin and really make your stances look like the right ones.

[kapkomet]

Love him or hate him, Clinton is one of the best speakers of our generation. Period.

[soxman352000]

you forgot to add that Gore is a duechebag that couldn't win his own home state....

[EvilMonkey]

If September 11th had happened, President Gore would not have sat still for seven minutes waiting to be told what to do and then fly around the country scared and frightened when the US needed its president -

You are right. He would have commissioned a poll to see what the potential voting public thought was the best course of action.

[soxman352000]

You are right.  He would have commissioned a poll to see what the potential voting public thought was the best course of action.

[YASNY]

:puke

[mreye]

:puke

:puke :puke

[Texsox]

No thanks.  Gore and Clinton sat their with information at hands.  They had Bin Laden sitting their and in custody at one point and another country offered to hand him over to the US, yet they passed.  What makes you think he would of handled foreign affairs any better then Clinton, which was poor, imo. 

 

Clinton just lobbed some bombs and would call it a day.  Don't give me this crap that 9/11 is Gore's fault. Their was a huge flaw in national security as well as the US intelligence, their still is a flaw, but its definately been improved.

No 9/11 wasn't Gore's fault, at least not anymore than the rest of the country.

 

It was a shame that Clinton followed the US Constitution and International Law instead of tossing those aside and grabbing Bin Laden. BTW, which terrorist has Bush caught that would have carried out an attack of 9/11 magnitude in 2008?

 

I find the Clinton poll bashing amusing. It's as if Clinton invented polling. It must be that the Republican party does not care what the American people want or think, so no need for polls.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

John Kerry is another member of the Republicrat War Party.

 

No Child Left Behind - Voted For It

PATRIOT Act - Voted For It

TWAT (The War On Terror) Appropriations - Voted For It

Iraq War - Voted For It

 

Kerry is going to keep troops in Iraq. As a CIA analyst put it on a PBS show (I think it was the Tucker Carlson show) "The choice between Kerry and Bush is the choice between war and endless war respectively."

 

The DNC put free speech zones in Boston for the convention so the protesters are conveniently out of sight (and therefore out of mind) from the Fleet Center.

 

A good portion of Democrats are nothing but corporate welfare loving shills who don't fix offshore Carribbean tax havens for huge corporations and contributed with the Republicans to sell off our free speech and personal freedoms by supporting bulls*** like the PATRIOT Act, the Drug War, etc. etc.

 

Both major parties in our country are pure, unadulterated garbage. So, ladies and gentlemen...let's get ready to choose our immensely rich aristocrat f*** who claims to represent our interests when they do not. Kerry skiing in Aspen saying that Bush doesn't know what real Americans go through every day is just like Bush showing up on the USS Abe Lincoln saying "Mission Accomplished."

[southsider2k5]

President Gore would have taken seriously the warnings on terrorism and not ignored them,

 

One of the reports that Sandy Berger stuffed in his socks and walked out with was a report detailing the operation to get Osama Bin Laden in 1998. Guess who nixed that operation. It wasn't George Bush.

 

And I guess I forget, what were Al's policies to prevent 19 men from flying planes into our buildings? Were they the same ideas that prevented someone from parking a truck bomb in front of an Oaklahoma federal building for the largest act of domestic terrorism in US history? Were they the same ideas that prevented the first attack on the WTC? Were they the same ideas the prevented Ruby Ridge and Waco? Were they the same ideas the saved our boys on the USS Cole, or were they the same ideas that saved our embassies and thousands of natives in Africa? What exact magic wand was going to wave that was going to change all of that???

 

Under President Gore we would not have recession, or a jobless economy, or these historically largest ever and economically destructive deficits that will overwhelm our future.

 

Gore would not have lost 1.8 million jobs, the vast majority of them manufacturing jobs...

 

This is a bold faced lie. I have demonstrated at least a few times that the recession was caused by the Clinton/Gore administration, but I guess I can tell it again. The Bureau of Labor Statistics put the start of the recession at March of 2001. Bush took office about 6 weeks before then. With a basic understanding of the velocity of money, it is economically impossible that any action the Bush admin could have taken would have enough effect on the US economy to cause a recession. This is a fact. The conservate estimate for economic activity to have a measurible effect in the US economy, due to its enormous size is 6 months. Estimates range as high as a year plus for economic activity to have measurible economic effect on the US economy.

 

Also after 9-11 how exactly would Al Gore have cured our economy. Since he wouldn't have cut taxes, because he is opposed to tax cuts for the rich. And he wouldn't have increased spending appreciablly because he opposed to deficits, what is left? The key to the recovery after 9-11 is two fold. One maintaining confidence, and two keeping money flowing through the economy. By neither increasing spending or cutting taxes he would have failed at both of these vital fucntions.

 

And to the second part of that, with no confidence and no one spending money, how exactly are companies to continue operating? The economic effects of Gore's inactions, or even assuming small actions, would have been catastrophic. The multipier effect of consumers wallets closing up would have been dire. Come to think of it you probably are right, we wouldn't have had a recession. According to your posts about Gore would have had a full blown depression.

 

Say what you want about Bush and his social policy. Hell I'll probably agree with most of it. But don't make contradictary assumptions about economy and terrorism. There is plenty of evidence out there on a lot of stuff.

 

I appreciate your passion, but come on. Some of those statements are so chockful of idealism, they need a nutritional label to tell you how much sugarcoating is in them!

[mreye]

Here we go. It's going to be a GREAT day! Yee haw!

 

[LowerCaseRepublican]

No thanks.  Gore and Clinton sat their with information at hands.  They had Bin Laden sitting their and in custody at one point and another country offered to hand him over to the US, yet they passed.  What makes you think he would of handled foreign affairs any better then Clinton, which was poor, imo. 

 

Clinton just lobbed some bombs and would call it a day.  Don't give me this crap that 9/11 is Gore's fault. Their was a huge flaw in national security as well as the US intelligence, their still is a flaw, but its definately been improved.

Jas, about nabbing bin Laden...they had a CIA analyst on PBS a couple of nights ago and he said that the intelligence they had, they had one clear shot in 1999 at killing bin Laden at a hunting ground but the CIA was not apt to green light it to Clinton because the prince of the United Arab Emirates was there. At the time, the Pentagon and US companies like Lockheed Martin were selling billions of dollars worth of fighter jet equipment to the UAE and they thought that a dead prince might squelch the business deal.

 

Also, the Sudan claim of offering to turn him over...In the Washington Post and also in the book, "The Age of Sacred Terror" by Daniel Benjamin states that the Sudanese government only offered to "arrest Osama bin Laden and place him in Saudi custody." Columnist Joe Conason goes on to elaborate using Washington Post articles that show that "detailed the efforts by the Clinton White House and the State Department to induce the Saudis to accept custody of bin Laden, a request that the authorities in Riyadh adamently refused. There was no offer to hand bin Laden over to the US before the Sudanese deported him back to Kabul."

 

Also, anything intel wise from Sudan is suspect. Most of their agreement to cooperate is based on the fact that they do not want the US to impose sanctions on their country for their genocidal campaigns that have not been on the radar of most news outlets here in the US. Frequently during those years, the Sudanese govt provided lots of intelligence information about AQ and Islamic terror networks. However, after many meetings the CIA and the FBI believed that they were not providing anything valuable on AQ or bin Laden.

 

Clinton did try to kill bin Laden. In 1998, he signed at National Security Decision Directive that authorized an ongoing campaign to kill bin Laden and destroy AQ. Several attempts were made on bin Laden but most were dismissed as "wag the dog" tactics during the Lewinsky/Troopergate/Whitewater BS. In 1999, the CIA organized a Pakistani commando unit to enter Afghanistan to capture/kill bin Laden. It was aborted when PM Pervez Musharraf took power from Nawaz Sharif, the more cooperative PM. A year later, bin Laden was almost killed in a missile attack on a convoy. The missiles hit the wrong truck. There's some more info that I could cite but I gotta head off to work. (Damn 9 hour work days)

[mreye]

Apu, Clinton said in a speech, himself, not too long ago that they were offered Bin Laden and he didn't think they had enough to hold him on. That out of the horse's mouth, so to speak.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

Apu, Clinton said in a speech, himself, not too long ago that they were offered Bin Laden and he didn't think they had enough to hold him on. That out of the horse's mouth, so to speak.

Well, the 1993 WTC bombing was almost all that AQ had done up until then. Most intelligence organizations have said that they barely knew AQ existed up until that point and even in the years after, did not have much information on AQ. In fact, evidence tying AQ to the 1993 bombing attack is quite scanty. If Clinton was offered bin Laden before the USS Cole etc. there is some credence to his claim that they might not have had enough evidence to hold him. I don't want to turn into a die hard Clinton defender because he supported W199I among other things but there is some proof for his claim that they might not have been able to hold him.

[aboz56]

Anyone who wants a French looking President should be given one of these....

[mreye]

Well, the 1993 WTC bombing was almost all that AQ had done up until then.  Most intelligence organizations have said that they barely knew AQ existed up until that point and even in the years after, did not have much information on AQ.  In fact, evidence tying AQ to the 1993 bombing attack is quite scanty.  If Clinton was offered bin Laden before the USS Cole etc. there is some credence to his claim that they might not have had enough evidence to hold him.  I don't want to turn into a die hard Clinton defender because he supported W199I among other things but there is some proof for his claim that they might not have been able to hold him.

I hear ya. I'm not really faulting him for not taking him neccessarily. Just making the point that Bin Laden was indeed offered.

[mreye]

Anyone who wants a French looking President should be given one of these....        

If you want a French looking President that makes a habit of marrying filthy rich widows...SEND ME!

 

(You had to watch the Clinton speech last night.)

[Texsox]

At least with Bush we got that nice color coded system of terror levels that even Bush could understand.

 

Hey, hey this is cool, maybe we could let the public see it too. Imma certain everyone is as confused as myself . . .

[Steff]

Just in case... I think this thread deserves to be screen captured.. rolleyeyes.gif