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In the section "Political ideology", it mentions in an image caption "...and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon...". If i remember correctly, didn't he step down for health reasons? If somebody can confirm this then please change it to "former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon" MichaelBillington 11:19, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
ANY Accurate Bio Should include the following information :
George W. Bush -- By his own admission ( thus not disputable ) was a D student and a poor academic. His Father bought his way into Yale, Where he was known for his fanatically Pro - Vietnam War political stance while on student deferment. Anyone who questioned him on this contradiction was subject to the whispering campaigns by which he would get back at his enemies ... ie any who would chalenge him. His inability to endure any criticism and engage in reasoned debate or discussion was clearly noted by his teachers and classmates.
Given a coveted position for Fighter training for which he was not suited, in the National Guard , again only through political influence of his family, since normaly only the best candidates, in academic ability and charachter are allowed to train for fighters -- one of the most highly skilled and competitive areas of military training -- widely known to anyone who folows military aviation and training.
It is also widely known that ever since the faliures of early vietnam in producing pilots of high caliber -- later on changes in training and selection were vastly improved. It was an essential charachter trait for "fighter jock" that they had aggressive and sure confidence ( justified or not) that they are better than most - a kind of attitude which made them eager to test their skills and increased as well the odds that they WOULD be one of those whowere not as likely to waste multi million dollar craft, or far worse -- the incredible expense of fighter military training -- in the hundreds of millions s --- by getting themselves killed and not justify the huge expewnse of their sp-ecialized training.
It is worth noting that although the fighter war inb Vietnam was ongoing at the time of George Bush's Time with the Gaurd -- He made no effort or attempt to join the rest of those of his avowed occupation - either joining the acction, or trying by any means available to put their skills to the test in real combat, not always available to these highly trained, skilled and motivated aviators -- at least those whose positions were attained through merit and ability.
- Unknown who posted above (I was too lazy to look through all the history)
- Moved out of introduction by me, -- Perlman10s 10:07, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
- The item above citing "George W. Bush, by his own admission, was a D student and a poor academic" is relevant, verifiable and needs to be added back. I won't comment on the other items above, but relevant, verifiable facts should be included, especially if the subject himself has admitted as much. -- Digiterata 13:26, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
Should the censure resolution include a quote from Senator Feingold, or at least an extra line about the purpose? More text is devoted to the problems with the resolution than is devoted to explaining what the censure is - a poor explanationg at best. -- Ryan 21:06, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
Agreed, this has a definite bias against Feingold. - Gavin
George W Bush, there is much pro and con for him, with sides ready to storm the white house and overthrough him, and some ready to make him a god, just like the issuie of abortion, it is on a VERY thin line.
Respectfully Rhobite (and others), can you provide more justification for this edit, the removal of the wiretap and "prisoners' rights/torture/rendition" content from the lead, the summary for which reads:
The lead contains a number of seemingly mundane topics - for example, a mention of Bush's having signed a medicare law - but the wiretap scandal (which has thus far brought a motion of censure to the Senate) and the 'torture/rendition/rights of detainees/abu gitmo' issues, while certainly negative to Bush are a direct result of actions he personally asserts to be within his rights, as a 'unitary executive'. - it's true they're unflattering... but they are more than major, they're positively notorious. Can you elaborate on your rationale? The edit doesn't sit well with me, but I'm not going to revert it outright, I'd like to understand Rhobite's and folks' view/rationale of this edit better before I decide. That having been said, the text of the content in question is pretty poor and could itself do with a fair amount of editing, in my humble opinion. Anyway, thanks! -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:23, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
The other mundane information should go as well. In my opinion a good lead section should be a "dictionary definition" of the subject, containing stuff that high-schoolers who know nothing about politics would understand. Bush is the 43rd and current president. He is a republican and was elected twice to the presidency after twice being elected to gov of texas. His presidency created the bush doctrine, the war on terror, and the iraq and afghanistan wars. That is all it needs. Details of the war on terror or the election or whatever that people love or hate are subtopics of those topics and people can find the information in the appropriate places. The current lead section needs to be divided into subsections. 67.124.201.166 12:38, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree with this. There is no need to delve into individual details or minutae. It should be broad and informative. There is a section on the war on terror and this is where wiretap stuff should go. It needs to be a lot more general. For a guide, go to the Clinton bio. In the intro, there is no Monica Lewinksy. No motion of censure since it wasn't voted on (yes, it was presented), etc, etc. There are places for the details. -- Tbeatty 18:12, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
However, I wasn't saying the censure motion should be in the intro, but the raging wiretap and habeas corpus controversies themselves. The wiretap and habeas issues are not merely an aspect of the 'war on terror' (or whatever else the brand name for American pre-emptive war policies) - they are fundamental constitutional issues that are defining this presidency and changing America itself. The censure motion is a mere blip. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 18:18, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
I disagree. Every president has "fundamental consitutional issues." From claims of executive privilege to the expanse of federal power. This is merely a news item that has it's place but not in the intro. It is a small part in the overall "War on Terror". I think WOT is fundamental, but the minutae of praise and crticism of individual aspects of it belong in different sections. Patriot Act, Homeland Securty, TSA, Rendering, Enemy Combatants, Wiretaps, Faith-Based Intitiatives, Abortion restriction, etc, are all constitutional issues. And there are even other issues such as Plame Affair that are not Constitutional but are still major events. -- Tbeatty 00:06, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
What's Abu Gitmo? Do you mean Abu Gahrab(?) and Gitmo Prison?
Yes. And the violation of FISA and human rights of prisoners is not a mere 'news item'. So far, it appears to be the most far-reaching Constitutional 're-interpretation' by any modern president - and potentially the most illegal act to which a President himself has admitted. Wiretapping Americans in direct violation of FISA is not a 'small part in the war on terror'... it's a violation of our basic Constitutional laws, and since President Bush has admitted making the decision himself to circumvent FISA despite warnings from WH counsel, it may even be an impeachable offense - it's not just part of some PR effort to justify invasion. since the information about who was wiretapped, what was recorded and what actions may have been taken is 'classified', and outside the jurisdiction of FISA, there is no proof that this 'unitary executive' privilege that the President has asserted has only been used against suspected terrorists. Quite the opposite in fact - we've begun to see reports of FBI surveillance and search of domestic peace rallies, political events, private meetings and even private homes and residences within the U.S. Where is the proof that only suspected terrorists, and not political enemies, may have been wiretapped? The claim it's just part of the 'war on terror' is a claim, not a fact that is verifiable. Compartmentalization of issues in the interests of damage control is for politicians, not for an encyclopedia. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 13:44, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Sounds like a bunch of spin doctoring to me. I especially like the demands for proof that a crime has not been committed. But it clearly falls under the category of war on terror in many verifiable ways. For example the justification given, and the source of funding. You have already conceded as much. keith 14:59, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
We simply disagree. And of course, you mischaracterized my position. I am not asking for negative proof. I am saying that actions without any public oversight, which can not be verified, can not be verified to be within, or beyond, the war on terror. All we have to go on are conflicting statements from Bush and other involved parties. Therefore, it's not 'clearly under' any category - it stands alone as a crisis. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 16:11, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
When it becomes and impeachable offense or it becomes a crime, we can add it to the intro. But until then, it's just par for the course of a President. You outlined your beliefs, but that's exactly what they are. They are not fact. I, personally, disagree with almost every one of your assertions. I don't think the wiretaps violated the law. I don't think 'unitary executive' is a new concept or a wrong interpretation. I don't think gitmo or 'enemy combatants' is unconstitutional. I do believe that wiretap information that the NSA has can be used in a court of law. The fact that this is unsettled means that it doesn't belong in the intro, it belongs in the body where all points of view can be fully developed. -- Tbeatty 17:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
The fact that we (as in a sense, representative Americans) disagree so strongly about the issue (which, again, is the President's intentional bypassing of FISA) speaks to it's notoreity. It certainly doesn't support 'folding' it conceptually into the topic of the 'war on terror' meme. In my opinion the fact that it is as notorious as it is, generating massive public outcry and at this point a censure motion, speaks to the value of addressing it at the outset of the article. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 18:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
You are confusing contemporary with contentious. Last year it was social security. Before that, Afghan war, before that tax cuts. It's as contentious as 'Hillary Care' or travelgate was in the clinton adminstration. All of those items are just as contentious. But they have their place. Ken Starr wasn't even mentioned. His impeachment received one sentence. If we choose the Clinton wording it would be something lie "Bush's priorities were to fight the Global War on Terrorism, reduce the tax burden and grow the economy, reform social security, etc, etc. -- Tbeatty 19:37, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Let's put it this way, the Bush Administration intro is twice as long as the Clinton info in about half the time. Has the Bush administration really accomplished twice as much as the Clinton Administration in half the time?-- Tbeatty 19:43, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
I'm not confusing the two. The wiretap scandal is a fundamentally different 'beast' than the failed attempts to privatize social security, or the Afghan war. Your view that this is somehow of the 'same stripe' as the other issues you mention is just that - a POV - it's not fact. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 19:47, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree. Your view that they are of a different stripe is just that - a POV - not fact. Why does POV belong in the intro instead of a controversy section or a policy section where competing views can be explored? I don't believe these issues will define his presidency any more than Elian Gonzalez defined Clinton's presidency or Terri Schiavo defines Bush's. It looks bad when it happens but in the long run it's just a blip. This is the same with the wiretaps. There is lots of press and "controversy" today but it is a temporal issue. -- Tbeatty 06:50, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Once again, you are misrepresenting my argument. I'm not asserting POV belongs in the intro. I'm asserting that the wiretap and human rights abuses of prisoners 'issues' are profound and fundamental - FAR more so that Terri Schiavo or Elian. The willing disregard of FISA in order to circumvent the Constitution and perform unauthorized search is entirely different than the other issues you mention from a Constitutional perspective. And the President's primary role is not to 'protect the infirm' or 'rescue Cuban kids' - it's to 'protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. You've also parroted my words back to me (blip) twice now, a sign the discussion may be becoming unproductive. If so, I'm willing to agree to disagree and leave it at that :) . -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:08, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Reread what you jsut said: "profound and fundamental" = POV - "willing disregard of FISA in order to circumvent the Constitution" = POV - "human rights abuses" = POV. I disagree with you htat you can properly include these as introductory items. You state as fact issues that are very much disputed. I don't think the NSA wiretaps have anything to do with FISA and are covered by a completely different law. I am willing to ascertain that others will disagree with me and therefore this should go in the controversy section. The 'War on Terror' is general enough to put in the intro. Wiretaps and human rights abuses are POV that belong in the controversy section. -- Tbeatty 18:44, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
In my assessment those phrases are not POV. 'human rights abuses' is objective at this point. The argument isn't being made that the behavior going on (torture, murder, rendition, starvation) isn't abusive - the argument is that those people do not possess protection against such behavior. I've explained this elsewhere, but the wiretap scandal involves a President who himself commanded a violation of FISA. Section 1809 of FISA clearly states that:
And Section 2511(2)(f) provides that FISA:
Thus, a person has broken the law if -- as the President admits he did -- he orders eavesdropping on Americans without complying with the warrant requirements of the statute. That's not POV. The POV is that bypassing was not illegal, not that it occurred. The example you mentioned (assault weapon ban) is about interpreting the extent of a Constitutional provision. This is about a direct, admitted violation of FISA and the Constitution. The POV is whether or not one believes the claim that the President has inherent authority to violate the FISA law. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 20:18, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
And Alberto Gonzales admitted this. He stated that the wiretapping NSA engaged in requires judicial approval under FISA on December 15, 2005:
There's POV, and there's fact. The precise nature of this Constitutional crisis is factual - and the attempts to avoid accountability under the auspices of unitary privilege are POV. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 20:26, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Did you not read this part "except as authorized by statute"? The Bush Administration claims the statute that authorizes them to hunt down and kill the 9/11 terrorist also gives them the authority to listen to their phone calls.-- Tbeatty 05:25, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Your hostility is unproductive. Perhaps you'd like to enlighten me as to which statute that was, exactly, that authorized wiretaps? In the words of Senator Patrick Leahy, "Now that the illegal spying of Americans has become public and the President has acknowledged the four-year-old program, the Bush Administration?s lawyers are contending that Congress authorized it. The September 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force did no such thing" [3] -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:11, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
You misinterpret my statement. It wasn't hostile, it was to enlighten. Leahy's submittal on the "Sense of the Senate" is not law. Nor is it an lawful interpretation or have any legal standing. I don't even think it was passed. The wording is currently "That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons." To me, and the Administration, "all" includes monitoring phone calls of those persons, nations, and organizations regardless of whether those calls are placed to the U.S. It is lunacy to think that the call from Osama bin Laden to Mohammad Atta would not be able to be listened to and that the specific statute that addresses force against these terrorists didn't authorize it. -- Tbeatty 06:31, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Leahy, like many of the Senators participating, voted on the statute itself, and asserts it did not in any way authorize wiretapping. It is not his statement that I am alleging to be law, it is his view of the legislation he himself voted on that is relevant - just as wiretap is relevant to Bush because he himself admitted authorizing it in defiance of FISA. Your claim that 'use all appropriate force' automatically includes 'wiretap Americans in the U.S. in direct violation of FISA' is one of the Bush administration's POV talking points, but it is not shared by many of the Senators in the censure hearings, Leahy among them - and is, on it's face, legally indefensible. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:45, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
I have no other definition of 'All'. These are foreign phone calls that may originate or terminate at 9/11 terrorist locations. I still can't see how you think that the Act didn't authorize the NSA to listen in on a OBL to "Terrorist In the US Phone Call." That makes no sense. It's great political posturing for Dems, but doesn't pass scrutiny. Let's put it this way: God forbid that another terrorist strike happens, but if it was because we couldn;t listen to OBL giving instructions to terrorists in the U.S., I'd bet dollars to donuts that Leahy's "Interpretation" would be completely different. -- Tbeatty 06:54, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
'All appropriate force' did not and does not include wiretapping Americans when FISA already provided the President that capability. However, inconvenient for the 'new era', observing FISA requires the administration to offer an explanation for why the wiretapping should be conducted. The Bush administration did not want to have to justify it's wiretapping, so it circumvented FISA. If you can't understand how I hold the opinion I do, consider that a Senator, who deliberated and voted, holds the same opinion. It's not political posturing, it's protecting and defending the Constitution of the United States. We are not a country of men, or of parties. We are a country of laws. By removing judicial oversight, you are trusting a man over the law. That's not my America.
Nor is it Senator Robert Byrd's (D-WV):
I perfectly understand how you hold your opinion. But I and others disagree with it. FISA says it only applies when it isn't superceded by another law. Intercepting communications of the enemy, whether the enemy is "foreign or domestic," is a fundamental part of warfare. I hope you can also see why others disagree with you. This whole discussion belong in the controversies section, not in the intro. -- Tbeatty 16:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
FISA states it 'shall be the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance {...} may be conducted.' The exception for wiretapping 'authorized by statute' does not legally mean 'any possible interpretation of any statute'. It means specific authorization by statute, which the September 2001 act did not provide, as numerous signatories of the act have stated.
You again claim a negative where none exists. Wiretapping, which you state is a fundamental part of warfare, was not prohibited by FISA, which permitted it under certain specific judicial oversight. It is judicial oversight that theexectuive seeks to avoid in violating FISA, to allow them to tap massively and indiscriminately:
The scope and impact of this scandal is unprecedented, and it's not just 'part of the war on terror'. It deserves specific treatment, representing the Congressional and Constitutional crisis Bush's actions have generated - not to be folded into that PR topic.-- User:RyanFreisling @ 16:57, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
This is election year jockeying, not a scandal. It is ludicrous to say that the authorization for war (which the resolution was) doesn't include listening in on the enemies private phone calls. The Commander in Chief in a time of war does not need permission of the court to conduct wartime operations. It's silly on it's face. Statutes also prohibit the use of the military as law enforcement: Does that mean that if a hijacker took control of an aircraft, the military couldn't shoot it down without a court order or due process? Please. The September 11th act authorized all of these measures and more. This is NOT law enforcement, it is war. The enemy is contacting people in the U.S. whether they are citizens or not, and monitoring those conversations are a part of this war. In fact, using the FISA courts to conduct war would set a dangerous precedent for future Presidents and violate the separation of powers doctrine. Every member of congress that is privy to these wiretaps say it is an important program and has saved lives. In the end, after the election, the program will be ratified by Congress. The NY Times did a grave disservice to the nation by publishing it's details. -- Tbeatty 17:24, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Once again, we are a nation of laws, not of men. If you can illustrate how the AUMF (Authorization to Use Military Force) authorized this behavior, you will have done the President a great service in avoiding accountability. A leaked Justice Department memo that appears to confirm the President's right to conduct warrantless domestic wiretapping, provided that the wiretapping was of individuals meeting the AUMF's requirement, reads:
The AUMF reads:
However, The AUMF does not authorize the kind of massive wiretapping, interception and data-mining of millions of Americans' communications, as we've learned is occuring:
Since the President has authorized the wiretapping of millions of Americans' phone and email conversations, and has not authorized domestic wiretapping only of individuals meeting the AUMF's requirement, he has clearly exceeded the AUMF. Next, your characterization that "Every member of congress that is privy to these wiretaps say it is an important program and has saved lives" is plainly unproven. Rockefeller, for example, expressed great concern:
Besides - discussing the program with a few Congressmen does not satisfy the requirements of the Constitution. FISA, however, explicitly addresses warrantless wiretapping during wartime, in Section 1811:
Knowing this was the law, Bush didn't ask for more time, or more authority. He simply dismissed FISA and personally authorized the NSA to wiretap without regard for the law, based on his own view of the powers of the executive.
The resulting outrage that the leak of the NSA wiretapping activity has generated is similarly American, not merely Democratic. This is not election year posturing... that's the most recent GOP talking point, as evidenced in their attack ad on Feingold, claiming:
Our argument has now run the gamut of the administration's current defenses, from 'unitary privilege' to 'it was authorized by the 11th Act' to 'all we're doing is wiretapping terrorists' to 'Congress was briefed' to 'Why do you hate America?'... but I see very little critical analysis from Bush's supporters - as if they simply trust he'll make the right decision about who, when and what to wiretap. That's un-American. I think it's quite clear where the politicization is occuring - and where the accountability is lacking. In any case, at this point, with millions of phone and email conversations between innocent Americans being tapped, it's quite clear the scope of the crisis is well beyond being an 'aspect of the war on terror'. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 17:33, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
And once again I have to point out that that is your POV. You are entitled to it. But it is not fact and is disputed and doesn't belong in the intro where side will be able to explore it fully. As for your "millions", you need to add this to the page on the NSA Surveillance article becuase it is lacking. The article mentions "thousands". And as far as I can tell, it was only phone calls that originated and terminated with those persons the president had determined were responsible for 9/11. You keep quoting only Democrats in an election year. This should tell you this is a POV determination. The Attorney General and the President has determined this is legal. The courts have not issued a stay (so either the "millions" don't have standing or they are legitmate) and the Congress has not revised or passed any resolution saying they disagree with the interpretation. What we have is Democratic senators grandstanding in order to get face time on TV and whip up the base in a lather. But there is little more to it. And I've given you the critical analysis for the justification. We are monitoring the communications of those nations, persons and organizations that were responsible for 9/11. One of those communications methods is "telephone." I'm sure there are more. We are also attacking them in all sorts of ways, including direct military action, covert military action, disinformation, financial disruption, psychological warfare and others. And speaking of critical analysis: Does the 9/11 military authorization supercede Posse Comitatus? Does the President have the authority to shoot down an airliner over the U.S. (on routes that started and ended in a U.S. City, just like 9/11) even if the Hijacker is an American Citizen? And if hte President does have this authority how did he achieve it? There is no explicit repeal in the Authorization. And when you make it this far, please tell me how you think that thought process that superceded Posse Comitatus doesn't supercede FISA (or rather supplement it)? Doesn't it seem odd that the president is authorized to attack and kill al Qaeda all over the world (including the U.S.) but we can't listen to their phone calls? -- Tbeatty 02:36, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
While the exact number of innocent Americans affected isn't clear, as Attorney General Gonzales refused to answer that question, saying "that information remains classified", what has leaked is that there are at least tens if not hundreds of thousands of American conversations/emails/individuals possibly affected. 'Millions' is indicated by numerous sources that I provided inline, including Chertoff's comments, which also serve as an example that I've not quoted only Democrats. A primary indication of the scope of this classified program is this article, which states:
In another strong indication, Russ Tice, the whistleblower, has indicated the possible scope of affected Americans:
In addition, the 'EFF' case that describes the NSA program as one that 'intercepts and analyzes the communications of millions of ordinary Americans' was already mentioned on the NSA article (I added Tice's comments there). I have demonstrated facts to substantiate every point I raised above, what exactly are you claiming is POV? The President violated FISA. The sources made it quite clear, and factual - we are monitoring, intercepting and analyzing a vast store of communications, not just those of known terrorists, and scanning them for 'keywords' or other indications of possible terrorism... and then retroactively investigating the participants. That's the opposite of the law. If the individuals are suspected of terrorism and it's an emergency, FISA allows for 72-hour retroactive warrants, and the FISC has approved all but five of the 19,000 requests it received. However, the NSA is now intercepting American conversations which have nothing to do with terrorism, in hopes of netting a terrorist. That's an entirely different, and illegal, proposition. And I'm not sure what your example of posse comitatus has to do with wiretapping, when they are addressed quite separately in our laws. A state of war does not mean that domestic laws are superceded without Congressional approval. The NSA wiretapping is, in essence, attacking the entire public in hopes of hitting a few terrorists. It's more akin to shooting down every airplane in hopes of downing one suspicious one. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 02:53, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
If it's so clear cut and factual, why did every senator, save 3, back away from censure (let alone impeachment or criminal charges)? Why hasn't the court stopped it? The reality is that laws are superceded all the time with new laws. Ttat's why we make new laws. We made a new one shortly after 9/11 and that was giving the president hte authority to use all available means to prevent future attacks. It didn't say with a court order. So far the only official legal viewpoint came from the Attorney General in favor of the program. In fact, the majority view of conresspeople who have commented one it is that it is a good program and should be continued but with more oversight. They simply say change the paperwork but nothing about any existing wiretaps that should not have been granted or outright stopped. It is simply disputable that what has transpired is against the law or unconstitutional. -- Tbeatty 04:42, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
That's a logical fallacy. The censure motion by Senator Feingold is not the entirety of the controversy, and one's support for censure is not equivalent to one's view that the programs are illegal. The 9/11 AUMF didn't include wiretapping of innocent Americans. The program is classified, and therefore a court cannot simply 'step in'. In order for the Judicial branch to play its part, the information needs to be uncovered despite the government's efforts to hide it. And so, despite relentless attacks by the administration on the patriotism and motives of those seeking to uncover this information the wheels are definitely turning, Congress is involved, whistleblowers are speaking out, and hearings are being held. It's a whole lot bigger than the 'war on terror'. And the stated view of Gonzales, appointed by the very same individual who authorized the program, does not qualify as an objective legal view - especially since he was intentionally "confining {his} remarks to the Terrorist Surveillance Program as described by the President, the legality of which was the subject" of the Feb. 6 Senate hearing. [15]
Laws are indeed changed, all the time. In this case, however, the behavior took place in violation of existing law... making it illegal. Bush could have sought to change the law, but thought it unnecessary. [16] -- User:RyanFreisling @ 05:04, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
The wiretapping authorization was for Al Qaeda and those responsible for 9/11. Those are the poeple being wiretapped. If the listener at the other end happens to be an American Citizen, that is too bad. It's not illegal. The government is not 'hiding' it, it's secret and Congress is briefed and has been for the life of the program. Are you really telling me that after 9/11 and the Authorization to Use Force, the government would need a search warrant to listen to bin Laden give orders to Mohammad Atta because Atta was in the U.S.? Give me a break. The whole reason for the authorization and the Patriot Act and the Department of Homeland security and the North American Military command was so that this could not happen again. It's silly to think that 'all' did not mean 'all'. That somehow we could kill domestic terrorists but not listen to their calls. -- Tbeatty 06:00, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it was authorized for al Qaeda and those responsible. And instead, millions of Americans' conversations have been tapped with no relation to al Qaeda. Congress was not 'briefed'. What information some Senators did receive, they are not permitted to share or act upon. Your example about Bin Laden and Atta is hyperbole, as I've repeatedly said that according to DoJ and the Congress in that instance, the AUMF would certainly apply. I have not contested that here, so the repeated argument you make, and it's Clintonian parsing of 'all' is likewise hyperbole. I should hope you don't misstate my argument simply to avoid any hint of acquiescence. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
While a wikipedia talk page is not the place to squabble over petty political disagreements, I can hardly see anyone stopping you two from going at each other. So do everyone using this talk page one favor, at least... Keep the ridiculous overuse of indentations to a minimum so the page isn't hundreds of times longer than it should be in comparison to most talk pages, thank you! I had a hard time reading the majority of your discussion as it got so bad that one word would be on every line to the right side of the page! Dudewheresmypizz4 12:28, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
The problem is, we have only Bush and Gonzalez's word on that, and they are hardly objective sources. That's the whole reason that judicial oversight exists: so that someone other than the person wanting to do the wiretap can determine whether it's justified. You might believe that Bush can be trusted with such unrestricted power, that he would never abuse it by having the NSA listen in on conversations having nothing to do with terrorism. But Bush is not a dictator, he's just the president. His power has limits. In addition, even if the authorization to use force somehow also authorized no-warrant wiretapping of American citizens, the Fourth Amendment still expressly warrantless searches. The courts have been very clear and very consistent, for as long as wiretaps have existed, that they are searches. Thus, there is no act of Congress that can give Bush the authority he claims to have, as no law can override the Constitution. 71.236.33.191 15:42, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
There is a secret judicial department within the white house designed specifically for spying during war time. They had given Bush permission to use their top secret judical service. Instead, Bush bypassed this system and created his own means to spy for for whatever reasons and for whatever end result... Yet he still prevents proper research from being done on WHO and WHAT they were spying on, claiming to spy only on internation relivant terrorists - are they telling you the truth? well, just ask yourself how many 'truths' have you known Bush to use.
One person involved with Homeland Security has recently been arrested for seducing a child online and sending harmful material to this child.
ok... I do not care if the person is internation or not, this type of spying could still violate people 'internationally' - what is to prevent them without the proper checks and balances?
Sorry, but you be the judge... Should our government have the ability to spy for security purposes for anything they deem worthy? Umm... who is doing the watching and who is watching those watching? What sort of governmental control do you want, and what makes you think that the government would act proper given their history?
You decide. What do you honestly think?
Think before you feel like you ought to agree with everything Bush does. 149.169.45.2 18:26, 5 April 2006
Also, even if Bush is being perfectly honest about only using this program to spy on terrorists now, that doesn't mean he can be trusted with the power. As the saying goes, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Neither Bush nor anyone can be trusted with the power he's claiming, the power to tap phones solely on his own say-so, without being required to provide evidence to anyone that the action is legally justified. 71.236.33.191 01:38, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
You guys are hilarious. Especially "so far, it appears to be the most far-reaching Constitutional 're-interpretation' by any modern president - and potentially the most illegal act to which a President himself has admitted"
Please, dude. I dont think you've actually studied American History. For one, the Constitution has been massively reinterpretated all over this century, most notably by FDR, the scale of whose contributions to the modern presidency dwarf anybody elses 100-fold. As for "most illegal", Nixon's actions trump anything this completely manufactured "scandal" with the wiretaps is. The funny thing is that RyanFreisling doesn't appear to know that the Bush govt did not create the practice of monitoring domestic transmissions, the NSA has been doing it for literally years and years, including under Clinton. And the most hilarious thing is the NY Times kept the story under wraps and then did a puff piece on it: http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/99/05/cyber/articles/27network.html
No headlines, nothing. The NY Times, being the unashamedly liberal rag it is, has merely made it seem like Bush is doing something new and strange in an election year.
I agree with the above posters, the Intro shouldn't have issues like the Wire Tap scandal and such. The intro should just give a quick summary of his presidency, for Example FDR would contain the Great Depression, WWII, and other similar unique and crucial information of his presidency. Now if they start a successful motion to impeach based on it, then it may have a place, but once again broad, and leave the controversy to the section that goes in detail about it. PPGMD 18:35, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
]::::::On further reading and consideration, I think that a more appropriate model for comparision would be Richard Nixon. I say this without knowing the content of its intro. Kevin Baas talk 03:40, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
The recently added paragraph into the intro just makes it bigger, which is the last thing this article needs, and is highly slanted. Just another star in the night T | @ | C 06:33, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
I haven't read this huge rambling discussion, but I should probably respond here. I removed this text because it doesn't fit in the intro. The lead section of an article is intentionally general. It should be a short mini-biography of Bush, not a laundry list of actions which he's been criticized for. The NSA wiretap controversy was a moderately large story, but it doesn't rise to the level of the lead section. And mentioning it before mentioning the entire Iraq war is just nuts. The suspension of habeas corpus is many orders of magnitude away from a lead-worthy topic.
It's not helpful to debate the importance of these stories here. We should rely on media coverage as a guideline for what gets included in the lead section. Rhobite 06:34, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
I'm bringing the disputed section here for the benefit discussion:
He has interpreted the resolution that authorizes force against the 9/11 terrorists to mean that the executive branch can suspend habeas corpus rights of U.S. citizens captured overseas who are " illegal enemy combatants." His interpretation allows him to conduct wiretaps of international calls that may involve U.S. citizens and other people located in the United States.
I think that it can be shorter and focus on the more fundamental issue: the president's constitutional interpretation of presidential power. I think that's intro-worthy, seeing as though it sets the entire scope and agenda of the presidency. Kevin Baas talk 19:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps one or two short sentences with a link to Unitary_executive_theory? Kevin Baas talk 22:28, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Let me give this a few tries:
Bush's presidency has been marked by controversy surrounding his interpretaion of the Constitution and the powers of the president. Namely, his assertion and practice of Unitary executive theory has resulted in accusations that he is exceeding his authority and being destructive of the system of checks and balances built into the Constitution.
Kevin Baas talk 01:53, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
Domestic spying is NOT new. Its not even remotely new. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2000/02/24/60minutes/main164651.shtml "As an example of those innocent people, Frost cites a woman whose name and telephone number went into the Echelon database as a possible terrorist because she told a friend on the phone that her son had "bombed" in a school play. "The computer spit that conversation out. The analystwas not too sure what the conversation was referring to, so, erring on the side of caution, he listed that lady," Frost recalls. "
Thats under Clinton. Nothing about this is particularly unprecedented, huge, or constitutionally novel. Just because the Democrats go wide-eyed and "Oh my God! Wiretapping! Totally new and unprecedented and illegal!" doesn't mean the government has been doing it for years.
Power abuse is clearly seen all around. What has this guy done right? What has this administration done right? it is a big mess, in my opinion.
Actually, if we want to be accurate for the sake of NPOV here, the original estimates were that the troops would pretty much stay indefinitely, that the most likely outcome would be civil war, that the war would cost hundreds of billions of dollars, etc. The original estimates were dead-on accurate. Those estimators were promptly sacked, and new estimators were found that said what bush wanted to hear. It's disingenous to call what bush wanted to hear "estimates", and it's disingenuous to call them "original". Kevin Baas talk 19:04, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
I seem to recall a lot of predictions referring to Vietnam which, if you've forgotten, was over 50,000 US dead and hundreds dying daily often times. Not to mention over a million dead Vietnamese. Is that the current situation as you see it? Sounds to me like it wasn't as good as the best-case scenario but was better than the worst-case. Both predictions were apparently naive.
And of course Bush now expects us to be there until much later then 2009 - saying they will be there when he leaves office. With the situation as it is, it is more likely then not then MORE soldiers will be going rather then any getting sent home. The whole time, of course, KBR continues to profit and Cheney's stock looks better and better, as well as the pocket-book of many wealthy elite..... circumstancial? I will let you be the judge of that, and let you decide who would foster civil war (logically, the person at the most advantage of there being a civil war would seem to have the greatest motives to encourage one... thus, U.S. wealthy elite profit a lot or terrorists meeting their radical idealism... both choices seem plausable, thus worthy of research and debate with no decisive conclusion until evident)
I notice that while the Clinton Wiki article delves into every single allegation that the right-wing talk radio ever dreamed up against Clinton, the Bush article has been heavily sanitized and doesn't even mention a number of serious allegations against Bush (even if only to dispute them). I have no opinion on whether or not Bush ever used cocaine, but I do believe that this allegation ought to at least be mentioned in the article. If Bush himself had ever denied using cocaine, I would agree that it was a non-issue. However, Bush has been asked a number of times about past cocaine use and has always avoided answering the question and has only offered up glib comments like "When I was young and foolish, I was young and foolish." If Bush himself has not denied cocaine use (a felony, by the way), then surely this ought to at least get a mention in this article, if Wiki is going to claim even a tiny shred of credibility as a reference source.
So we'll be adding Category:Suspected heralds of Galactus to this article? - A Man In Bl?ck ( conspire | past ops) 00:55, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
The reason why Clinton's alleged drug use is mentioned is because it is TRUE!!!! ~Lilfreakydude
Bush is a very honest liar, with lies ranging from the war in Iraq to lies such as Social Security issues. And before you jump to calling me a terrorist, which I am defintiely not, because I too hate terrorists. But don't we live in a free country? Don't we have the right to free speech? What if I personally don't agree with Bush?
Then you are a wise man, my friend. Well, sorta wise. The lies and deceptions of Bush are easy to detect. Only an ignorant person would not recognize them. I mean, how illogical is it to say that terrorists are fighting against freedom? They die for their cause! They are not concerned with getting some sort of temporal personal advantages out of it. Let us be honest, they are fighting against the imperalism of America, which they feel is violating their system of ethics and morals (economic control and dominance over other states is classified as imperalism, thus America would qualify - and especially now, since by definition imperalism is the control of another state; Iraq is currently under the control of America. Thus, by the definition of imperalism America is an imperial power. They fight the American empire, in other words)
Going back to the central topic of debate, i believe that mentioning the allegations of Bush's cocaine use does belong in this article. I'm not quite sure, because i don't live in the states, but i think i remember someone close to the bush family stating this in a book of some sort before the elections, and also seeing it in several other articles. It is a widely known fact that people have accused him of this. The fact that he has been accused of this is not irrelevant, is encyclopedic and therefore is better in the article, rather than ommited, IMO. Gerardo199 02:58, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
According to this article from Svenska Dagbladet [18], the Bush family is related to Måns Andersson, a Swedish immigrant who came to American in the 1600s. Bronks april 3, 2006.
1316 Måns Andersson 658 & 659 Chrisopher Mounce & Martha 328 & 329 Robert Mercer & Ann Mounce 164 & 165 Robert Mercer & (possibly) Sarah Beeston 82 & 83 John Mercer & Rebecca Davis 40 & 41 George E. Walker & Harriet Mercer 20 & 21 David Davis Walker & Martha Adela Beaky 10 & 11 George Herbert Walker & Lucretia Wear 4 & 5 Prescott Sheldon Bush & Dorothy Walker 2 & 3 George Herbert Walker Bush & Barbara Pierce 1 George Walker Bush
From unsigned editor: ---SECTION ON 9/11 IN ORIGINAL PAGE---
PLEASE STOP PROPAGATING OFFICIAL VERSION OF EVENTS AND WHO IS RESPONSIBLE. THERE IS TOO MUCH INFORMATION BY NOW TO IGNORE AT LEAST THE QUESTIONABILITY OF THE OFFICIAL VERSION, AND THERE IS ABUNDANT COMPELLING EVIDENCE TO POINT THE FINGER THE OTHER WAY. FOR THE SAKE OF OBJECTIVITY AND TRUTH, PLEASE INCLUDE CONSIDERATIONS OF DOUBTS ABOUT THE OFFICIAL STORY AND LINKS TO SITES FEATURING THE AMAZING AMOUNT OF INFORMATION COUNTERING IT. WE CANNOT KEEP PROPAGATING THE SAME FALSE INFORMATION, IF WE WANT TO BE HONEST WITH OURSELVES AND THE WORLD.
THANK YOU.
I completely agree, wikipedia users should be objective-- point out all sides of the argument, all criticisms! Otherwise, we are merely recreating whatever we have heard; which very well could be propaganda! Questioning and reasoning is at the heart of wikipedia, and at the throat of truth! Thanks
--end of unsigned comment. -- Tbeatty 17:15, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
I agree 110%
fyi, Bush was talking about fighting for freedom, Iraq, and terrorism in many speeches before 9/11. In fact, he talked about all three right next too each other in two speeches during his first two months in office, Jan & Feb. This was not a war conducted because of 9/11 alone and it was pre-developed, as any analyse would conclude. 9/11 did help foster resentment towards Iraq in the way Bush inaccurately phrased his speeches
Being "at the throat of truth" -- I'm not sure I like the sound of that! -- Cubdriver 21:07, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Can anyone shed some light on why the sources listed in the "References" section don't appear to actually be referenced in the article? To me, the "Notes" section and some of the items under the "Links" section appear to be the actual references. Am I mistaken in this perception? I'd like to:
Thoughts? Comments? I'll leave this out there for a few days before making any changes as this is obviously a high-traffic, controversial article. I'm bold but not stupid. :) -- ElKevbo 22:16, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
I have unprotected semiprotection. I will monitor and will reprotect after six hours or if vandalism gets out of control.-- MONGO 05:06, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
I've restored semiprotection. As noted by the semiprotection policy, it isn't supposed to be a permanent feature, but with over 50 vandalisms in about 14 hours, and almost nothing constructive done to the article otherwise, we expend more energy fighting the vandals than we do making the article better. I'm inclined to keep semiprotection in place for the forseeable future, but we should occasonally remove the semiprotection every now and then to be complient with the policy.-- MONGO 19:50, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
I made some edits tonight. Please comment here if you take exception to them. Merecat 05:34, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your feedback. As you know, "fact" tags add a "citation needed" link when placed into an article. Suffice it to say, there is nothing wrong with fact tags and frankly, if you don't like them, perhaps you could help dig up some citations for the tagged assertions. I've tagged only those points that appear to warrant it. Merecat 19:29, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
If you look at the Afghanistan section you'll note that the nation was entered with "some" international support. I looked it up but could not find any specifics. Does anyone have any specifics (number of nations, the UN's position, and/or NATO's position) on this support so we can be more specific than just "some." Thank you.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.167.200.77 ( talk • contribs)
This is two days old and I haven't seen it mentioned in the article. Bush has no denied it. It should be mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.210.83.146 ( talk • contribs)
Title updated as per [23]. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 04:42, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps, but POV edits are not the Wiki way. The known court documents so far do not accuse Bush of authorizing the release of Plame's name. In light of that, it's POV for us to side with those who do accuse Bush of that. Remember, our citations must be to reliable sources WP:CITE. Partisan opinion and media speculation are not as reliable as actual court documents. "Fitzgerald did not say in the filing that Cheney authorized Libby to leak Plame's identity, and Bush is not accused of doing anything illegal." Merecat 05:19, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Without the word "allegedly" in the section title, the section title presumes that the accusation is accurate. This presumption sides with those who accuse Bush of this. Your edit deleted "allegedly", therefore your edit sided with those who accuse Bush. Whether you side with them or not, your edit did. Merecat 05:29, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Whether or not Libby disclosed Plame's name, is irrelevant to the above discussion about section title. That discusion focuses on whether or not Bush authorized that particular aspect of Libby's (alleged) disclosure. Libby was authorized to reveal parts of an NIE, but even Fitzgerald has not said that Bush authorized the release of the NIE portion which contained Plame's name. Please read the Yahoo link again. [25] Merecat 06:27, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
According to the Washington Post Sunday, April 9, 2006; Page B06 , my assertions as per above, are correct. Merecat 04:05, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, I'm getting great enjoyment from reading your postings. Tell me though, regarding this one, why did you manually edit the time stamp? Also, you may be willing to suggest that a "news" article from WAPO should be presumed to have more veracity that the WAPO editorial I linked to, but I am not going to join you in your presumption. There is nothing to suggest that WAPO's editors, in their fully informed knowledge of all the news they are currently publishing, wrote anything other than the truth - so far as asserted facts go, in that editorial. Of course, any conclusions they come to, are opinion, but that's also true about any conclusions that a reporter comes to. Suffice it to say, there are facts, presentation of facts and conclusions in both pieces. And frankly, there is more more equivocation ("discredit, punish or seek revenge against") in the "news" story you point to. Please stop this one-ups-manship, it's beneath you and it's tiring. The WAPO editorial I pointed to lays out specific facts which no one rebuts. You are free to disregard the conclusions of that piece as opinion, but if you disregard the stated facts in it, you are basically calling the WAPO editors page liars. In which case, that calls into question the WAPO editors' oversight of the newsroom and the veracity of everything it releases. Is that what you are telling me, that we should think of a MSM entity as a bunch of liars? Merecat 04:29, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
I noticed this article while browsing Category:Petroleum; it seems out of place there. On the other hand, this article has lots of categories. Too many, if you ask me.
Here's a sample distribution:
Thoughts? Melchoir 07:26, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
Anyone? Melchoir 00:06, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Okay, here we go! Melchoir 20:33, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
After 'agent' was changed to 'employee', I changed it to 'operative'. That is the actual word used by Novak in the actual public piece that started the leak scandal:
I have added a tag to address this point. Merecat 02:40, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
hey look, after 2 archives of the talk page, the
{{OMGtehLiberalBIAS}} tag grew back, and look, now it goes away again, if you want to edit the article, then just edit the article, don't just slap it with as many tags as humany possible then trol- walk away--
205.188.116.138. 14:59, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Newb observations: "6 weeks/6 months" screams for a reference. How do you burn a 'graph on the war on terror and not mention Afghanistan?
The Washington Post had an interesting editorial [27] today that argued that President Bush "was right to approve the declassification of parts of a National Intelligence Estimate about Iraq three years ago in order to make clear why he had believed that Saddam Hussein was seeking nuclear weapons." The editorial also argued that Joseph Wilson had twisted the truth and in his Ny Times op-ed piece and that the Bush White House was right to set the record straight. It is nice to see that the liberals at the Washington Post are capable of grasping these issues. RonCram 04:18, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Facts asserted by the editorial:
Ryan, don't you get it yet? These items listed above, are facts, not opinion. Wilson has lied at least three times about critical parts of this dispute. And if Libby actually did leak Plame's name, why is he not charged with that? The simple truth is that this entire controversy was ginned up by anti-Bush partisans, with Wilson as their front man. Wilson lied, three times (at least). Libby is not charged with leaking Plame's name, because he did not leak it. Merecat 04:44, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
??? No one has accused you of ginning anything up. Do you work in the media? You do understand that I am talking about Wilson's deliberate prevarications, yes? Unless you are telling me that you were personally involved with Wilson and the Dems in their activities with this, then I can't see how you take that comment personally. Merecat 04:54, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
"Don't you get it yet?" is a rhetorical device, imploring the reader to pay careful attention. If it offended you, I apologize. No offense was intended. As for the 11 point list, they are indeed facts. Do you agree, yes or no? Also, please do not interpolate your reply into the body of my 11 point list. Please answer with your own 11 point list below. Thanks. Merecat 05:03, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Here's my response to the 11 assertions Merecat extracted from the WaPo editorial. As you can see, I believe a significant number of them to be grossly incorrect, or at least misleadingly incomplete. It's a big swath of text, so my apologies if anything is unclear, poorly edited or otherwise difficult to follow. All questions welcome. Last - if this belongs elsewhere, I'm glad to move it. Meanwhile, I've gotta get back to work! :) -- User:RyanFreisling @ 17:42, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. Therefore, your claim that the 11 points you listed above are 'facts' is equally erroneous. In my case, I've provided facts to back up my assertions, and have included allegations based on facts - and I've provided the relative facts. I'm glad to hear you respect my views as I do yours and most of all, I am saddened that our President and his administration have brought us to this point. I hope that there can be more respect for the rule of law, and less hero worship, in the ongoing and heated defense of the President. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 19:44, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
But regarding the distinct datum of: "To date, Bush and Cheney have not been charged with any crime.", that itself is a true fact, right? Merecat 01:28, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Ok, lets' review the uncontested facts:
So Ryan, what are you saying? Are you no saying we should interpret McClellan's specific denial - more broadly than it was spoken, so we can play "gotcha!"? Merecat 01:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, we are going in circles. Please answer this question, yes or no. Has Libby been charged with leaking classified information, yes or no? Merecat 02:32, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Uncivil? Since when do we say that yes or no questions are uncivil? I think they are not. If you think they are, we disgree. Personally, I feel that compound answers to single fact questions is a boorish method. However, I would not go so far as to call you boorish and I ask that you refrain from calling me uncivil, as in "Your behavior is becoming uncivil". So then, since you refused to answer my yes/no question, I will distill your answer for you. "Libby has not been charged with leaking classified information" = no. That said, since Fitzgerald has also not said that Bush authorized the release of Plame's name, here's what we have so far:
Further, I contend that Fitzy has not charged Libby with release of classified info because:
Also, I contend that Libby was not charged with violating rules regarding CIA operative identities, because:
And lastly, even if her background did qualify her to protection under the "indentities" laws:
Stop being so quick to conclude that only the DEM speculations are accurate. Even our wiki states that Richard Armitage leaked. Why he is not being charged, I have no idea. Hmmmm, perhaps because he cut a deal for immunity and he was an anti-Bush mole a foggy bottom? Merecat 03:02, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Indeed, "undermine Wilson" was the goal - more specifically, undermining Wilson's spurious and false "yellowcake" op-ed piece (hmmm opinion piece, now who was it that said opinion pieces have less veracity?...). However, because Wilson and his Dem cronies knew that Bush would be forced to defend on the yellowcake and because Wilson wrote that hit piece to provoke that response, it's very logical to see how this started: Wilson attacked the President with lies about Niger so as to hurt Bush in 2004 election. I note that you do not contend that Bush was trying to harm Plame in revenge against Wilson - even though this was Wilson's central thesis. And to date, that has not been borne out by the facts. Nor has Fitzgerald contended that either. And please, stop quoting the media on this point and start looking at verbatim quotes from Fitzy. Fitzy has not alleged that Bush et al, released Plame so as to personally punish Wilson. That contention was ginned up by the Looney Left (you used "looney" 1st, so I get to use it here). Merecat 03:33, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Hey, that's not nice. I'm not being any more obtuse than Ryan. Merecat 03:41, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
What? I said obtuse in reference to the format of our lengthy comments. There is no insult in that. You however, said this about me "frenzied and illogical defense". At least that's how I read it. Merecat 03:45, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
You are being unfair. I did not complain to you. That other editor suggested I was smoking something and I tried to defend my edits in brief to him/her. You do see that, yes? Merecat 03:52, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, since you say I've done this and that to you, but you do not address the points I raise where I directly quote harsh comments from you that were directed at me (see above), I have lost interest in talking with you for now. Some time later, if you say you are sorry, I might talk with you more. But for now, you have hurt my feelings. Good night. Merecat 04:06, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
To those who read the above and think that Wilson told the truth about "yellowcake", please read "Wowie Zahawie - Sorry everyone, but Iraq did go uranium shopping in Niger" - Christopher Hitchens, Slate.com Monday, April 10, 2006 Merecat 13:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
The above slate.com article which I linked to [37] has this in it: "In February 1999, Zahawie left his Vatican office for a few days and paid an official visit to Niger, a country known for absolutely nothing except its vast deposits of uranium ore." Merecat 06:18, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Ok, so who thinks we've been freeped....again?-- 205.188.116.138 20:26, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
In late 2005 and 2006, Bush led the world community in opposition to Iran's announced intention to develop nuclear technology.
I was going to tag this with {{fact}}, but the thought occured: Can leadership of the world community on this issue be cited or fact-checked? There will always be someone to dispute it, and the fact pattern can as easily be used to support a POV statement the complete opposite of this one. I was thinking:
In late 2005 and 2006, Bush publically declared American opposition to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's announced intention to develop nuclear technology.
Let the merciless editing begin... Ssbohio 21:56, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Terrorist \Ter"ror*ist\, n. [F. terroriste.]
1. One who governs by terrorism or intimidation ... --Burke. [1913 Webster]
A number of people fly planes into buildings: this is murder. To encourage the repeated broadcast of these searing images across a world and the promotion of fears of national security to exploit this terrible act to allow actions and policy change previously desired, is terrorism.
At best, Bush's administration has seen the distraction of the American people from the issues that effect them most and the redirection of national assets toward the interests of Bush friendly business. If America could be seen as a powerful vehicle, Bush and his buddies have taken it for a spin, far away from where it needs to go. I am an Australian who loves America and I hope he doesn't get America bogged and wrecked.
Is Bush a war criminal? Is the Republican Party a terrorist organisation? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Danieljames626 ( talk • contribs) .
The article Bush Crimes Commission is up on AFD. Unfortunately, there is concern over Wikipedia:Vote Stacking because of a large and possibly selective notification spamming. Undoubtedly, the individual votes are good faith, but the apparent selectivity of notification raises questions about the validity of the process. In an effort to salvage that discussion, I am posting this notification here. My intent is to bring the discussion to the attention of those with prior expressed interested in Bush, without pre-selecting for either likely supporters or opponents. Brillig20 16:31, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
This section is factually incorrect. It reports the promise as if it was all delivered on: it hasn't been. It then explicitly states that Congress has allocated the full amount: it absolutely did not. These are untrue statements in wikipedia, they should be corrected with the correct amount of dolars actually asked for by Bush in the budget and the actual amount disbursed by Congress (the two are different). It contains nothing of the considerable controversy over abstinence funding, the effectivness of ABC prevention programs, the allocation of PEPFAR money to explicitly religious groups, the possible conflict of interest of Randall Tobias as a former chief executive of a pharmaceutical company now in charge of purchasing billions in AIDS drugs, the duplication created by using PEPFAR instead of the Global Fund, the refusal to by less expensive generic drugs that are combinable, etc. All of these are very relevant and debates over them rage in the HIV policy world. I made these edits and someone called them POV. They are not. I encourage someone to do an NPOV edit of this section, I'll recuse myself for the time being. I don't have a problem with Bush, but the article as it stands does not reflect the truth of US AIDS policy, for better or worse. Thes entinel 19:18, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, totally he probaly wants the terroriists to win. Wouldnt rthat be kind of cool maybe not totally but just thinking, you though they were gonna lose but then they won = psych! Probably this is what hes trying to do.
"But we're at war man! where are your priorities!!!?!?!" -This could actually be why America went to war, couldn't it? As an excuse to do fuck-all about anything else. "Medical Research?" "But we're at war!" "Climate change?" "But we're at war!" "The terrifying spectre of AIDS, stalking the world and killing more people than a hundred Saddams?" "By golly, we're at war!!" 81.157.73.179 10:27, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
thanks for that wonderful debate, guys, but the section remains woefully underdeveloped and factually inorrect (the $15 billion has not been funded by Congress, for one). This sections reflects a weakness of a few of the sections here: they are merely regurgitation of White House press releases. They could go a long way to give context and some critical assessment (eg, has the government done what it says it does?) Thes entinel 05:58, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
The main article's third paragraph (in the intro) incorrectly (both factually and grammatically) states that, in relation to Iraq, "The commitment of United States, Europe, and Canada troops has been controversial both domestically and internationally." The fact is that Canada has never sent troops to Iraq since Gulf Storm in 1991.
Jtlaw 03:06, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
Canadian troops are also involved in training Iraqis, though this is taking place outside Iraq (in Jordan, I think). Thes entinel 16:15, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Michael Isikoff wrote in Newsweek:
"May 17 - The White House's top lawyer warned more than two years ago that U.S. officials could be prosecuted for "war crimes" as a result of new and unorthodox measures used by the Bush administration in the war on terrorism, according to an internal White House memo and interviews with participants in the debate over the issue.
The concern about possible future prosecution for war crimes—and that it might even apply to Bush adminstration officials themselves— is contained in a crucial portion of an internal January 25, 2002, memo by White House counsel Alberto Gonzales obtained by NEWSWEEK. It urges President George Bush declare the war in Afghanistan, including the detention of Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters, exempt from the provisions of the Geneva Convention.
In the memo, the White House lawyer focused on a little known 1996 law passed by Congress, known as the War Crimes Act, that banned any Americans from committing war crimes—defined in part as "grave breaches" of the Geneva Conventions. Noting that the law applies to "U.S. officials" and that punishments for violators "include the death penalty," Gonzales told Bush that "it was difficult to predict with confidence" how Justice Department prosecutors might apply the law in the future. This was especially the case given that some of the language in the Geneva Conventions—such as that outlawing "outrages upon personal dignity" and "inhuman treatment" of prisoners—was "undefined."
One key advantage of declaring that Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters did not have Geneva Convention protections is that it "substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act," Gonzales wrote.
"It is difficult to predict the motives of prosecutors and independent counsels who may in the future decide to pursue unwarranted charges based on Section 2441 [the War Crimes Act]," Gonzales wrote.
The best way to guard against such "unwarranted charges," the White House lawyer concluded, would be for President Bush to stick to his decision—then being strongly challenged by Secretary of State Powell— to exempt the treatment of captured Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters from Geneva convention provisions.
"Your determination would create a reasonable basis in law that (the War Crimes Act) does not apply which would provide a solid defense to any future prosecution," Gonzales wrote.
The memo—and strong dissents by Secretary of State Colin Powell and his chief legal advisor, William Howard Taft IV—are among hundreds of pages of internal administration documents on the Geneva Convention and related issues that have been obtained by NEWSWEEK and are reported for the first time in this week's magazine. Newsweek made some of them available online today."
This from the following URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4999734/site/newsweek/#storyContinued
Additonally, there are texts of Gonzales's memo and Powell's response at the URL above. They are in .PDF format, and are of the original documents, so cannot cut and paste here (putting four whole pages of .PDF would eat up bandwidth).
I just looked this up today, and was lucky to find it in and amongst the lunatic ravings of the left wing fringe (which, btw, are equally as bad as the lunatic ravings of the right wing fringe). Be careful of all the stupidity you see, which just might be disinformation posted by the very people it purports to castigate.
As a final note, Bush's tactic of excluding people from the Geneva Conventions is nothing new. Ike did it after WWII by reclassifying German POW's as DEF's, or Disarmed Enemy Forces, meaning that they were not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions. (this is also verifiable and not "original research" - now, I'm not talking about the lunacy that claims Ike murdered 1.7 million German POW's (which is untrue), merely the fact that Ike purposely ordered the reclassification of POW's as DEF's)
TheKurgan 04:28, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
btw fuck that twat
We know that Bush Senior was wary of getting involved in a war with Saddam back in 1990 because of the potential for large numbers of Iraqi civilian casualties and how this would square with his deity. So Bush called in Billy Graham and asked him what God would think about it. Billy Graham assured Bush that God wouldn't mind too much as it was a just war and so Bush proceeded. Now Dubya of course dosen't need to consult Billy Graham before attacking Iraq because Dubya already knows the Supreme Being's views on these matters because he talks with him all the time. Two questions arise I think: (1) Why did Bush Senior bother to ask Billy Graham over to the White House to give him advice when his own son already had a direct hotline to the Almighty, (2) Shouldn't the article on here make some mention of these things, since it might give readers some indication of what a truly amazing world we live in when even in the late 20th and 21st centuries, people as spectacularly wacky as this can actually be allowed to preside over the world's only superpower and, what's more, hardly anyone seems to think it's unusual or kind of disturbing?
Here is a translation of part of German Wikipedia's article on Bush:
First, the German itself...
Da die Nationalgarde vorwiegend im Inland eingesetzt wird, sah sich Bush später mit dem Vorwurf konfrontiert, einer Einberufung in die Army zuvorgekommen zu sein und sich damit einem Einsatz im Vietnam entzogen zu haben - er wurde draft dodger (als ein sich der Einberufung Entziehender; vergleiche die deutschen Begriffe: Kriegsdienstverweigerer, Wehrdienstverweigerer) gescholten, bei patriotischen US-Amerikanern alles andere als ein Ehrentitel.
The translation:
Since the National Guard operated mostly within the US (literal translation is within the homeland), Bush was later confronted with the accusation of having avoided service in the regular army (here, the literal translation is "scoop himself out of the draft, which is stilted English, at best) which would have resulted in service in Vietnam - he was scolded as a draft dodger (compared with the German concepts of Conscientious Objector (the term Kriegsdienstverweigerer) or "draft dodger" (the more colloquial term Wehrdienstverweigerer)...the two have different connotations in German -- Krieg is War, so the term including "Kriegsdienst" means "war service" (Dienst means service). Wehr, on the other hand, is merely a term for the Army (along with Armee or Heer), so Wehrdienst means "army service" (a distinct difference). Verweigen is the verb "to deny."), a term which is anything but honorable among patriotic Americans.
It would be interesting to see if I were to be labeled a troll for posting something like this on the English language site...oh, wait, I can't because the page itself is locked from editing. I am therefore asking that since this paragraph is included on German Wikipedia that it also be included on the English site.
TheKurgan 04:57, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Carl Bernstein's new Vanity Fair article. Wow. -- 71.141.126.76 06:54, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Here's one of the sentences in the science section: "On 2002-12-19, Bush signed into law H. R. 4664, far-reaching legislation to put the National Science Foundation on a track to double its budget over five years and to create new mathematics and science education initiatives at both the pre-college and undergraduate level." That's ignoring the much larger issues of all of the science budgets that Bush has cut, including NIH, stem cell research, global warming research, etc. And the section doesn't even mention stem cell research/global warming. At least it mentions science education. Anyone know where I could find charts/tables outlying the overall state of science funding these past six years? NSF's budget is peanuts compared to the overall science budget. -- Cyde Weys 18:55, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
The sentence "On February 18, 2004, the radical left[71] liberal activist group, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS),..." is a blatant attempt to slander legitimate critics of the President's policies. The UCS is NOT a collection of radical left liberals, it is an organization of concerned scientists. Let's remove this deliberate insult. -- Gerald Lovel 23:40, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm seconding Mr. Lovel's remarks. The "Radical Left" designation of the UCS was given by the Captial Research Center (CRC), a group which is led by two long-time members of the conservative Heritage Foundation [40] and is extensively funded by the right-leaning Scaife foundation [41]. Moreover, the CRC has a history of slapping "leftist" labels on other organizations, over less-than-ideologically-motivated actions. [42] IMO, the comments about UCS violate the NPOV policy and should be retracted. ))ECB(( 03:24, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
This guy may have defended Clinton to the end, but he's also a highly respected historian. All points in this article should be analyzied and made note of in the main article.
I can provide lots of cites to James Taranto on OpinionJournal, demonstrating that Geo W is one of the near-great presidents of the past hundred years. Certainly as valid a viewpoint as one in Rolling Stone. -- Cubdriver 19:36, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, surely you are not suggesting that Rolling Stone is a better source than something published by Dow Jones & Co, are you? You do know that Dow Jones owns WSJ and Opinion Journal, yes? Merecat 20:26, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Well then, on that point we can disagree. Dow Jones does not produce dreck. However, in my view, the air-brushed 'bulging crotch' [43] cover photos of Dem candidates produced by Rolling Stone, tells me that Rolling Stone does. Merecat 20:46, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, I have no idea what you just said. Merecat 21:45, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Advice? What are you talking about? No advice from you was solicited. Merecat 21:52, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, I'm sorry you lack the wherewithal to continue our dialog today. I hope you are feeling better soon. I enjoyed our chat. Have a nice day. Merecat 21:58, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
The question should not be whether Rolling Stone is POV, in my judgment. The question should be whether Rolling Stone's opinion, or the opinion of this author is notable. There are ways to get around the POV issue if this author is notable, but in the grand scheme of Bush's presidency, I do not believe he is. BlueGoose 00:12, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
This post is addressed to Merecat. I find it interesting that a notable periodical with left leaning tendencies is "dreck," while a notable periodical with right leaning tendencies is "more reliable." By that reasoning, Playboy is to be completely discarded even though Playboy is the only magazine to land an interview with Fidel Castro (the veracity of what Castro says is for a different forum). By the same reasoning, you must also discard all of the following as "reliable sources:"
The Nation New Republic Rolling Stone Macleans (Canadian) Der Spiegel
while venerating the following as ultra reliable:
Time US News and World Report Wall Street Journal Detroit News Anything owned by Rupert Murdoch
This is fallacious on its face. Editorial bent is inherent in every periodical, and has been ever since Ben Franklin first published Poor Richard's Almanac (or Thomas Paine penned "Common Sense"). To condemn a publication as unreliable because of said editorial bent is hypocritical since you espouse the same bent with the periodicals you venerate.
It is possible to present evidence objectively and also show your own opinion, as well. Problems arise when opinion is not seperated from evidence (which can be caused by many things, chief among them extreme editorial bias (insert Fox News and Mother Jones as the two extremes of this)). Shameless trolling condeming the other point of view without solid evidence is the worst kind of yellow journalism. For example, when Bush choked and passed out a few years ago, imagine the furor that would have been created with the following headline:
Former drunken driver collapses at White House
This carries the implication that Bush was wasted at the time of his fall. The headline encompasses two facts:
1) Bush is a former drunk driver 2) Bush collapsed at the White House
By juxtaposing the two in an underhanded manner, the editor conveys a double meaning (the root of yellow journalism).
By the same token, a right wing editor could put a differnt spin on the following two facts:
1) Vince Foster committed suicide 2) Bill Clinton was being investigated at the time (for different things)
Vince Foster found dead - Bill Clinton investigated
Two things that are undeniably true; however, Clinton was never seriously investigated nor even considered a suspect in Foster's death (ruled a suicide).
These two preceding examples show how extreme editorial bias can demean a periodical's reliability. I am sure that publications as reliable as Rolling Stone and the Wall Street Journal would never resort to such yellow journalism.
This brings me to my next point. Concepts such as "worst president," "best president," "best football team ever," "worst natural disaster ever," and others are inherently OPINION pieces. One cannot show these to be facts. One must gather facts and other respected opinions to bolster his or her case in presenting an hypothesis.
For example, in order to make a case for the Black Death being the worst natural disaster ever (an easy case, BTW), I would present the following facts:
1) It was a disease that ran rampant throughout Europe for four years (1347 - 1351) 2) It could not be stopped by conventional means at the time 3) It killed 1/3 of the population of Europe (roughly 75,000,000 people)
All of these make a compelling case that it was the worst natural disaster in history, but it is still an opinion. Someone else could argue that the 1918 Flu pandemic was worse because it was a more modern era and we should have known better. Someone else could argue that the single earthquake that killed 830,000 people in one day is the worst since not even the Black Death killed that many in one day.
And on and on. In making the case for Bush as worst president, I'm sure that there are several facts that could be presented to bolster this case (such as basing the public reason for going to war in Iraq on Weapons of Mass Destruction which have yet to be found, unbelievable grammatical and speaking lapses, supporting the Patriot Act). As damning as those are, they still do not prove Bush is the worst president. It is still only my opinion. I'm sure that citizens who espouse a right wing ideology could present other evidence that Bush is the best president in history. They cannot prove that, however.
Now, if we're going to present Wikipedia as an objective resource, we must avoid the trap of presenting only one side of the equation. Believe me, I'd love to post what I really think of Bush as "fact" (that he's a smug, arrogant, Fascist sonofabitch who wants to institute a Christian theocracy in the US and subvert five Amendments of the Bill of Rights at once with the Patriot Act (1,4,5,6 and 8)); however, in good conscience I would not post that as fact. In Bush's article, however, I think we should present both sides of the argument about his accomplishments/deficiencies. The article, as it stands, is right leaning in its bias (not the ultra right wing that Murdoch would print about Bush's crap not stinking, but still right leaning). We must counter that right wing bias by including discussion of Bush's shortcomings, as well (see the German translation above about Bush avoiding service in Vietnam).
In summation, I believe that dismissing Rolling Stone as a source is a mistake. Merecat, would you discount it if it were as right leaning as the Wall Street Journal? To quote the urban legend "I think not."
TheKurgan 00:17, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
OK, mea culpa. Allow me to rephrase.
Merecat, what you can make of my post is a recommendation not to discount certain publications simply because of a left leaning editorial bias. Those of us on the left cannot discount publications with a right leaning bias. As I stated above, we can discount sources that are extremely biased (as I also already stated, the two extremes being Mother Jones and Fox News).
Would you agree with an article in the Wall Street Journal or the Detroit News that examined the possibility of Bush being the worst president? If not, then the bias of the editorial staff in question is not the issue. If so, then blindly following a publication because of its editorial tendencies is folly.
I hope this condensation is clearer.
TheKurgan 23:43, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
1. I do agree in principle with your assertion that the Rolling Stone is equivalent to the Wall Street Journal, Time and similar publications.
2. However, I do not believe that every article or opinion piece of a well-known publication is in itself notable to put into an encyclopaedia article, especially on the topic of a President. Maybe this means that we need more sub-articles of George W. Bush, but in general, I believe a 6 to 10 page summary of a President or a similarly important historical figue cannot practically include all information from every article written about or in reference to him or her. BlueGoose 10:49, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
TheKurgan 19:01, 23 April 2006 (UTC) (Edited typo)
The story in Rolling Stone is quite interesting...some Historians offering up their insightful opinions of the George W. Bush presidency while STILL in the middle of his presidency.
I recall a similar article written by the great-great-great grandfather of the author of this current piece:
My, my, my...how foolish it sounds for a Historian to comment without the real benefit of history. I would guess that should the Middle East become a place for the growth of freedom and Democracy in 20-50 years from now...with it's roots traced back to the liberation of Iraq...these "Historians" will not even be a footnote in the book of history. We will see. Jeravicious 11:30, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
the most recent 250
the most recent 500
From august 5 to 12 of 2005
the last 5000 Page stats (from the 5000 edits shown on this page):
Don't know what to make of these, but look at that 100%....yikes. The 8.18% goes up to 21.6% likely due to sleeper accounts. I bet its necessary though. Voice-of-All T| @| ESP 01:09, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
Imho there is a serious misstatement in this part. Pls look at this sentence: "However, most of the methods that would have given victory to Gore relied on counting overvotes -- which is against election law, as it takes a ballot with two votes on it and assigns it arbitrarily to one candidate. 21 22 23" OK, Firstly, link 21 has to be paid for, I can't afford to buy it and I don't think it's proper to use paid content here. However, links 22 and 23 don't support the statement in the article. 22 says: "In addition to undervotes, thousands of ballots in the Florida presidential election were invalidated because they had too many marks. This happened, for example, when a voter correctly marked a candidate and also wrote in that candidate's name." No reference to election laws here. Instead, this shows that the recount teams determined the voter intent (you remember this phrase from the news, right?) and counted a valid vote when both the chad was gone and the same candidate's name was written on the ballot. This isn't the same as two votes, this isn't arbitrary, and it's very questionable if this is against the law - 22 says nothing about that. Now, link 23 isn't about law either, its topic is possible voter confusion. So, imho the whole sentence at the start is unsurported opinion and I think it would be the best solution to simply delete it. Gray62 22:48, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
I'd really like if someone were to review my additions to the article concerning the Illinois resolution to impeach Bush at the bottom of the Impeachment section. Polish it up, and add some more clarifying content, or improvement would be nice.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Peterfa ( talk • contribs) 06:48, April 28, 2006
As a former Rockford, IL and Chicago resident, I would like to state that Illinois is not a democratic state. The population of Chicago, which as a big city, tends to skew opinions to the left, dominates the political landscape of the state. I don't have any facts to cite, but based upon personal experience, I would suggest that Illinois is overall a conservative state, but the population of Chicago tips the scale, come election time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.101.233.172 ( talk • contribs) 16:51, April 29, 2006
So Illinois is really a republican state but just happens to be blue for the presidential vote? Are people who live outside of Chicago but inside of Illinois suppose to have their votes counted more than once or something?
dirt don't vote. -- me
Please update. Washington Post Article on Lumber
1-The alleged manipulation of NASA information seems to warrant inclusion in the Science section. http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/03/31/nasa.media.policy.reut/index.html
2-Saudi Flights is problematic, because Michael Moore's scurrilous politicking as resource must defer to the 9/11 commission report, which addressed these allegations and unambiguously dismissed them. I don't believe this section belongs under GWB.
3-Why is Katrina all but completely omitted from this bio? The Public Perception section indicates that the administration was faulted for a "slow" response; this is a very generous euphemism, and does not impartially reflect the truth of the matter--allegations of negligence, the perceived betrayal of promises regarding Homeland Security, and the impression that the administration was more preoccupied with political fallout than disaster management. It would seem that this defining moment of his second term, his response to the most visible natural disaster in the nation's history, would warrant a section of its own. DBaba 02:04, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
Richard Clarke, a WELL KNOWN BUSH CRITIC had already admitted to letting the Bin Ladens leave the country. This was AFTER the flight ban had been lifted, not before..... [44] -- 71.198.141.63 17:41, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
Wouldn't it make sense to start a Wikipedia page on the "George Bush Controversy"? It would include things in the news that have caused commotion based on events, appointees and laws that Bush has made. It would also include the thoughts of pundits on both sides of the arguments. As well as excerpts from this talk page. In a way, it would be kind of like the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry page in that both sides would get their opinnions stated. Discuss: User:Secret
I made a few edits here tonight. If you disagree, please do not blanket revert. Please dialog here. Merecat 02:53, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
I've reinserted this section because I felt it was removed for insufficient cause. Yes, it's true that Moore's insinuation - that the Saudis were flown out during the no-fly period - was false. However, his chief point - that these Saudis, some of them members of the Bin Laden family, were not detained and questioned regarding the crimes of their infamous relative - is definitely important enough to be notable. While I agree that it's likely that Moore's omission was deliberate (and therefore kind of slimy), it's not sufficient grounds for removing the section. Wikipedia isn't the right place to judge what Moore knew or didn't know. Kasreyn 20:34, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
The only possible reason for inserting this meretricious gossip is to have people walk away saying, "Hm, might be something in it!" There's nothing in it. Bloviate is indeed a fair verb to describe what Mr. Moore does in his doccos. If you want to discuss the allegation, then do it on a Michael Moore article, not on an article about one of his victims. Or create a new article called "The Saudi flights fantasy." I have an external link for it already! -- Cubdriver 22:09, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
Kasreyn is correct here. The Saudi flight is no fantasy, and its source need not be Mr. Moore. The Saudi flight was written about in a Tampa newspaper shortly after 911 and confirmed after the movie mentioned it. There was at least one flight on 9/13 and more on 9/14. I believe this is already covered elsewhere in wikipedia. Richard Clarke did take responsibility for approving the flight after the 911 Commission report was published, but when he was asked about it during the hearings, he said that the flights were likely approved either by the white house or the state department.-- csloat 08:15, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
If Clarke himself says (at best) "I don't know" and the 9/11 Commission (page 329) says: "We found no evidence that anyone at the White House above the level of Richard Clarke participated in a decision on the departure of Saudi nationals", then this information does not belong on Bush's article, but in does belong in Clarke's article. After all, Clarke did authorize the flight, but does not know (and therefore cannot say) if White House told him to. There has been a finding of "no evidence" against Bush/WH on this and Clarke does not offer any ("I don't know"). To put this in Bush's article is sheer conjecture. Merecat 13:20, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 35 | ← | Archive 40 | Archive 41 | Archive 42 | Archive 43 | Archive 44 | Archive 45 |
In the section "Political ideology", it mentions in an image caption "...and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon...". If i remember correctly, didn't he step down for health reasons? If somebody can confirm this then please change it to "former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon" MichaelBillington 11:19, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
ANY Accurate Bio Should include the following information :
George W. Bush -- By his own admission ( thus not disputable ) was a D student and a poor academic. His Father bought his way into Yale, Where he was known for his fanatically Pro - Vietnam War political stance while on student deferment. Anyone who questioned him on this contradiction was subject to the whispering campaigns by which he would get back at his enemies ... ie any who would chalenge him. His inability to endure any criticism and engage in reasoned debate or discussion was clearly noted by his teachers and classmates.
Given a coveted position for Fighter training for which he was not suited, in the National Guard , again only through political influence of his family, since normaly only the best candidates, in academic ability and charachter are allowed to train for fighters -- one of the most highly skilled and competitive areas of military training -- widely known to anyone who folows military aviation and training.
It is also widely known that ever since the faliures of early vietnam in producing pilots of high caliber -- later on changes in training and selection were vastly improved. It was an essential charachter trait for "fighter jock" that they had aggressive and sure confidence ( justified or not) that they are better than most - a kind of attitude which made them eager to test their skills and increased as well the odds that they WOULD be one of those whowere not as likely to waste multi million dollar craft, or far worse -- the incredible expense of fighter military training -- in the hundreds of millions s --- by getting themselves killed and not justify the huge expewnse of their sp-ecialized training.
It is worth noting that although the fighter war inb Vietnam was ongoing at the time of George Bush's Time with the Gaurd -- He made no effort or attempt to join the rest of those of his avowed occupation - either joining the acction, or trying by any means available to put their skills to the test in real combat, not always available to these highly trained, skilled and motivated aviators -- at least those whose positions were attained through merit and ability.
- Unknown who posted above (I was too lazy to look through all the history)
- Moved out of introduction by me, -- Perlman10s 10:07, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
- The item above citing "George W. Bush, by his own admission, was a D student and a poor academic" is relevant, verifiable and needs to be added back. I won't comment on the other items above, but relevant, verifiable facts should be included, especially if the subject himself has admitted as much. -- Digiterata 13:26, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
Should the censure resolution include a quote from Senator Feingold, or at least an extra line about the purpose? More text is devoted to the problems with the resolution than is devoted to explaining what the censure is - a poor explanationg at best. -- Ryan 21:06, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
Agreed, this has a definite bias against Feingold. - Gavin
George W Bush, there is much pro and con for him, with sides ready to storm the white house and overthrough him, and some ready to make him a god, just like the issuie of abortion, it is on a VERY thin line.
Respectfully Rhobite (and others), can you provide more justification for this edit, the removal of the wiretap and "prisoners' rights/torture/rendition" content from the lead, the summary for which reads:
The lead contains a number of seemingly mundane topics - for example, a mention of Bush's having signed a medicare law - but the wiretap scandal (which has thus far brought a motion of censure to the Senate) and the 'torture/rendition/rights of detainees/abu gitmo' issues, while certainly negative to Bush are a direct result of actions he personally asserts to be within his rights, as a 'unitary executive'. - it's true they're unflattering... but they are more than major, they're positively notorious. Can you elaborate on your rationale? The edit doesn't sit well with me, but I'm not going to revert it outright, I'd like to understand Rhobite's and folks' view/rationale of this edit better before I decide. That having been said, the text of the content in question is pretty poor and could itself do with a fair amount of editing, in my humble opinion. Anyway, thanks! -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:23, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
The other mundane information should go as well. In my opinion a good lead section should be a "dictionary definition" of the subject, containing stuff that high-schoolers who know nothing about politics would understand. Bush is the 43rd and current president. He is a republican and was elected twice to the presidency after twice being elected to gov of texas. His presidency created the bush doctrine, the war on terror, and the iraq and afghanistan wars. That is all it needs. Details of the war on terror or the election or whatever that people love or hate are subtopics of those topics and people can find the information in the appropriate places. The current lead section needs to be divided into subsections. 67.124.201.166 12:38, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree with this. There is no need to delve into individual details or minutae. It should be broad and informative. There is a section on the war on terror and this is where wiretap stuff should go. It needs to be a lot more general. For a guide, go to the Clinton bio. In the intro, there is no Monica Lewinksy. No motion of censure since it wasn't voted on (yes, it was presented), etc, etc. There are places for the details. -- Tbeatty 18:12, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
However, I wasn't saying the censure motion should be in the intro, but the raging wiretap and habeas corpus controversies themselves. The wiretap and habeas issues are not merely an aspect of the 'war on terror' (or whatever else the brand name for American pre-emptive war policies) - they are fundamental constitutional issues that are defining this presidency and changing America itself. The censure motion is a mere blip. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 18:18, 29 March 2006 (UTC)
I disagree. Every president has "fundamental consitutional issues." From claims of executive privilege to the expanse of federal power. This is merely a news item that has it's place but not in the intro. It is a small part in the overall "War on Terror". I think WOT is fundamental, but the minutae of praise and crticism of individual aspects of it belong in different sections. Patriot Act, Homeland Securty, TSA, Rendering, Enemy Combatants, Wiretaps, Faith-Based Intitiatives, Abortion restriction, etc, are all constitutional issues. And there are even other issues such as Plame Affair that are not Constitutional but are still major events. -- Tbeatty 00:06, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
What's Abu Gitmo? Do you mean Abu Gahrab(?) and Gitmo Prison?
Yes. And the violation of FISA and human rights of prisoners is not a mere 'news item'. So far, it appears to be the most far-reaching Constitutional 're-interpretation' by any modern president - and potentially the most illegal act to which a President himself has admitted. Wiretapping Americans in direct violation of FISA is not a 'small part in the war on terror'... it's a violation of our basic Constitutional laws, and since President Bush has admitted making the decision himself to circumvent FISA despite warnings from WH counsel, it may even be an impeachable offense - it's not just part of some PR effort to justify invasion. since the information about who was wiretapped, what was recorded and what actions may have been taken is 'classified', and outside the jurisdiction of FISA, there is no proof that this 'unitary executive' privilege that the President has asserted has only been used against suspected terrorists. Quite the opposite in fact - we've begun to see reports of FBI surveillance and search of domestic peace rallies, political events, private meetings and even private homes and residences within the U.S. Where is the proof that only suspected terrorists, and not political enemies, may have been wiretapped? The claim it's just part of the 'war on terror' is a claim, not a fact that is verifiable. Compartmentalization of issues in the interests of damage control is for politicians, not for an encyclopedia. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 13:44, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Sounds like a bunch of spin doctoring to me. I especially like the demands for proof that a crime has not been committed. But it clearly falls under the category of war on terror in many verifiable ways. For example the justification given, and the source of funding. You have already conceded as much. keith 14:59, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
We simply disagree. And of course, you mischaracterized my position. I am not asking for negative proof. I am saying that actions without any public oversight, which can not be verified, can not be verified to be within, or beyond, the war on terror. All we have to go on are conflicting statements from Bush and other involved parties. Therefore, it's not 'clearly under' any category - it stands alone as a crisis. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 16:11, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
When it becomes and impeachable offense or it becomes a crime, we can add it to the intro. But until then, it's just par for the course of a President. You outlined your beliefs, but that's exactly what they are. They are not fact. I, personally, disagree with almost every one of your assertions. I don't think the wiretaps violated the law. I don't think 'unitary executive' is a new concept or a wrong interpretation. I don't think gitmo or 'enemy combatants' is unconstitutional. I do believe that wiretap information that the NSA has can be used in a court of law. The fact that this is unsettled means that it doesn't belong in the intro, it belongs in the body where all points of view can be fully developed. -- Tbeatty 17:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
The fact that we (as in a sense, representative Americans) disagree so strongly about the issue (which, again, is the President's intentional bypassing of FISA) speaks to it's notoreity. It certainly doesn't support 'folding' it conceptually into the topic of the 'war on terror' meme. In my opinion the fact that it is as notorious as it is, generating massive public outcry and at this point a censure motion, speaks to the value of addressing it at the outset of the article. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 18:38, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
You are confusing contemporary with contentious. Last year it was social security. Before that, Afghan war, before that tax cuts. It's as contentious as 'Hillary Care' or travelgate was in the clinton adminstration. All of those items are just as contentious. But they have their place. Ken Starr wasn't even mentioned. His impeachment received one sentence. If we choose the Clinton wording it would be something lie "Bush's priorities were to fight the Global War on Terrorism, reduce the tax burden and grow the economy, reform social security, etc, etc. -- Tbeatty 19:37, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
Let's put it this way, the Bush Administration intro is twice as long as the Clinton info in about half the time. Has the Bush administration really accomplished twice as much as the Clinton Administration in half the time?-- Tbeatty 19:43, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
I'm not confusing the two. The wiretap scandal is a fundamentally different 'beast' than the failed attempts to privatize social security, or the Afghan war. Your view that this is somehow of the 'same stripe' as the other issues you mention is just that - a POV - it's not fact. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 19:47, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
I agree. Your view that they are of a different stripe is just that - a POV - not fact. Why does POV belong in the intro instead of a controversy section or a policy section where competing views can be explored? I don't believe these issues will define his presidency any more than Elian Gonzalez defined Clinton's presidency or Terri Schiavo defines Bush's. It looks bad when it happens but in the long run it's just a blip. This is the same with the wiretaps. There is lots of press and "controversy" today but it is a temporal issue. -- Tbeatty 06:50, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Once again, you are misrepresenting my argument. I'm not asserting POV belongs in the intro. I'm asserting that the wiretap and human rights abuses of prisoners 'issues' are profound and fundamental - FAR more so that Terri Schiavo or Elian. The willing disregard of FISA in order to circumvent the Constitution and perform unauthorized search is entirely different than the other issues you mention from a Constitutional perspective. And the President's primary role is not to 'protect the infirm' or 'rescue Cuban kids' - it's to 'protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. You've also parroted my words back to me (blip) twice now, a sign the discussion may be becoming unproductive. If so, I'm willing to agree to disagree and leave it at that :) . -- User:RyanFreisling @ 14:08, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Reread what you jsut said: "profound and fundamental" = POV - "willing disregard of FISA in order to circumvent the Constitution" = POV - "human rights abuses" = POV. I disagree with you htat you can properly include these as introductory items. You state as fact issues that are very much disputed. I don't think the NSA wiretaps have anything to do with FISA and are covered by a completely different law. I am willing to ascertain that others will disagree with me and therefore this should go in the controversy section. The 'War on Terror' is general enough to put in the intro. Wiretaps and human rights abuses are POV that belong in the controversy section. -- Tbeatty 18:44, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
In my assessment those phrases are not POV. 'human rights abuses' is objective at this point. The argument isn't being made that the behavior going on (torture, murder, rendition, starvation) isn't abusive - the argument is that those people do not possess protection against such behavior. I've explained this elsewhere, but the wiretap scandal involves a President who himself commanded a violation of FISA. Section 1809 of FISA clearly states that:
And Section 2511(2)(f) provides that FISA:
Thus, a person has broken the law if -- as the President admits he did -- he orders eavesdropping on Americans without complying with the warrant requirements of the statute. That's not POV. The POV is that bypassing was not illegal, not that it occurred. The example you mentioned (assault weapon ban) is about interpreting the extent of a Constitutional provision. This is about a direct, admitted violation of FISA and the Constitution. The POV is whether or not one believes the claim that the President has inherent authority to violate the FISA law. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 20:18, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
And Alberto Gonzales admitted this. He stated that the wiretapping NSA engaged in requires judicial approval under FISA on December 15, 2005:
There's POV, and there's fact. The precise nature of this Constitutional crisis is factual - and the attempts to avoid accountability under the auspices of unitary privilege are POV. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 20:26, 31 March 2006 (UTC)
Did you not read this part "except as authorized by statute"? The Bush Administration claims the statute that authorizes them to hunt down and kill the 9/11 terrorist also gives them the authority to listen to their phone calls.-- Tbeatty 05:25, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Your hostility is unproductive. Perhaps you'd like to enlighten me as to which statute that was, exactly, that authorized wiretaps? In the words of Senator Patrick Leahy, "Now that the illegal spying of Americans has become public and the President has acknowledged the four-year-old program, the Bush Administration?s lawyers are contending that Congress authorized it. The September 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force did no such thing" [3] -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:11, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
You misinterpret my statement. It wasn't hostile, it was to enlighten. Leahy's submittal on the "Sense of the Senate" is not law. Nor is it an lawful interpretation or have any legal standing. I don't even think it was passed. The wording is currently "That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons." To me, and the Administration, "all" includes monitoring phone calls of those persons, nations, and organizations regardless of whether those calls are placed to the U.S. It is lunacy to think that the call from Osama bin Laden to Mohammad Atta would not be able to be listened to and that the specific statute that addresses force against these terrorists didn't authorize it. -- Tbeatty 06:31, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Leahy, like many of the Senators participating, voted on the statute itself, and asserts it did not in any way authorize wiretapping. It is not his statement that I am alleging to be law, it is his view of the legislation he himself voted on that is relevant - just as wiretap is relevant to Bush because he himself admitted authorizing it in defiance of FISA. Your claim that 'use all appropriate force' automatically includes 'wiretap Americans in the U.S. in direct violation of FISA' is one of the Bush administration's POV talking points, but it is not shared by many of the Senators in the censure hearings, Leahy among them - and is, on it's face, legally indefensible. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:45, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
I have no other definition of 'All'. These are foreign phone calls that may originate or terminate at 9/11 terrorist locations. I still can't see how you think that the Act didn't authorize the NSA to listen in on a OBL to "Terrorist In the US Phone Call." That makes no sense. It's great political posturing for Dems, but doesn't pass scrutiny. Let's put it this way: God forbid that another terrorist strike happens, but if it was because we couldn;t listen to OBL giving instructions to terrorists in the U.S., I'd bet dollars to donuts that Leahy's "Interpretation" would be completely different. -- Tbeatty 06:54, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
'All appropriate force' did not and does not include wiretapping Americans when FISA already provided the President that capability. However, inconvenient for the 'new era', observing FISA requires the administration to offer an explanation for why the wiretapping should be conducted. The Bush administration did not want to have to justify it's wiretapping, so it circumvented FISA. If you can't understand how I hold the opinion I do, consider that a Senator, who deliberated and voted, holds the same opinion. It's not political posturing, it's protecting and defending the Constitution of the United States. We are not a country of men, or of parties. We are a country of laws. By removing judicial oversight, you are trusting a man over the law. That's not my America.
Nor is it Senator Robert Byrd's (D-WV):
I perfectly understand how you hold your opinion. But I and others disagree with it. FISA says it only applies when it isn't superceded by another law. Intercepting communications of the enemy, whether the enemy is "foreign or domestic," is a fundamental part of warfare. I hope you can also see why others disagree with you. This whole discussion belong in the controversies section, not in the intro. -- Tbeatty 16:04, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
FISA states it 'shall be the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance {...} may be conducted.' The exception for wiretapping 'authorized by statute' does not legally mean 'any possible interpretation of any statute'. It means specific authorization by statute, which the September 2001 act did not provide, as numerous signatories of the act have stated.
You again claim a negative where none exists. Wiretapping, which you state is a fundamental part of warfare, was not prohibited by FISA, which permitted it under certain specific judicial oversight. It is judicial oversight that theexectuive seeks to avoid in violating FISA, to allow them to tap massively and indiscriminately:
The scope and impact of this scandal is unprecedented, and it's not just 'part of the war on terror'. It deserves specific treatment, representing the Congressional and Constitutional crisis Bush's actions have generated - not to be folded into that PR topic.-- User:RyanFreisling @ 16:57, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
This is election year jockeying, not a scandal. It is ludicrous to say that the authorization for war (which the resolution was) doesn't include listening in on the enemies private phone calls. The Commander in Chief in a time of war does not need permission of the court to conduct wartime operations. It's silly on it's face. Statutes also prohibit the use of the military as law enforcement: Does that mean that if a hijacker took control of an aircraft, the military couldn't shoot it down without a court order or due process? Please. The September 11th act authorized all of these measures and more. This is NOT law enforcement, it is war. The enemy is contacting people in the U.S. whether they are citizens or not, and monitoring those conversations are a part of this war. In fact, using the FISA courts to conduct war would set a dangerous precedent for future Presidents and violate the separation of powers doctrine. Every member of congress that is privy to these wiretaps say it is an important program and has saved lives. In the end, after the election, the program will be ratified by Congress. The NY Times did a grave disservice to the nation by publishing it's details. -- Tbeatty 17:24, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
Once again, we are a nation of laws, not of men. If you can illustrate how the AUMF (Authorization to Use Military Force) authorized this behavior, you will have done the President a great service in avoiding accountability. A leaked Justice Department memo that appears to confirm the President's right to conduct warrantless domestic wiretapping, provided that the wiretapping was of individuals meeting the AUMF's requirement, reads:
The AUMF reads:
However, The AUMF does not authorize the kind of massive wiretapping, interception and data-mining of millions of Americans' communications, as we've learned is occuring:
Since the President has authorized the wiretapping of millions of Americans' phone and email conversations, and has not authorized domestic wiretapping only of individuals meeting the AUMF's requirement, he has clearly exceeded the AUMF. Next, your characterization that "Every member of congress that is privy to these wiretaps say it is an important program and has saved lives" is plainly unproven. Rockefeller, for example, expressed great concern:
Besides - discussing the program with a few Congressmen does not satisfy the requirements of the Constitution. FISA, however, explicitly addresses warrantless wiretapping during wartime, in Section 1811:
Knowing this was the law, Bush didn't ask for more time, or more authority. He simply dismissed FISA and personally authorized the NSA to wiretap without regard for the law, based on his own view of the powers of the executive.
The resulting outrage that the leak of the NSA wiretapping activity has generated is similarly American, not merely Democratic. This is not election year posturing... that's the most recent GOP talking point, as evidenced in their attack ad on Feingold, claiming:
Our argument has now run the gamut of the administration's current defenses, from 'unitary privilege' to 'it was authorized by the 11th Act' to 'all we're doing is wiretapping terrorists' to 'Congress was briefed' to 'Why do you hate America?'... but I see very little critical analysis from Bush's supporters - as if they simply trust he'll make the right decision about who, when and what to wiretap. That's un-American. I think it's quite clear where the politicization is occuring - and where the accountability is lacking. In any case, at this point, with millions of phone and email conversations between innocent Americans being tapped, it's quite clear the scope of the crisis is well beyond being an 'aspect of the war on terror'. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 17:33, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
And once again I have to point out that that is your POV. You are entitled to it. But it is not fact and is disputed and doesn't belong in the intro where side will be able to explore it fully. As for your "millions", you need to add this to the page on the NSA Surveillance article becuase it is lacking. The article mentions "thousands". And as far as I can tell, it was only phone calls that originated and terminated with those persons the president had determined were responsible for 9/11. You keep quoting only Democrats in an election year. This should tell you this is a POV determination. The Attorney General and the President has determined this is legal. The courts have not issued a stay (so either the "millions" don't have standing or they are legitmate) and the Congress has not revised or passed any resolution saying they disagree with the interpretation. What we have is Democratic senators grandstanding in order to get face time on TV and whip up the base in a lather. But there is little more to it. And I've given you the critical analysis for the justification. We are monitoring the communications of those nations, persons and organizations that were responsible for 9/11. One of those communications methods is "telephone." I'm sure there are more. We are also attacking them in all sorts of ways, including direct military action, covert military action, disinformation, financial disruption, psychological warfare and others. And speaking of critical analysis: Does the 9/11 military authorization supercede Posse Comitatus? Does the President have the authority to shoot down an airliner over the U.S. (on routes that started and ended in a U.S. City, just like 9/11) even if the Hijacker is an American Citizen? And if hte President does have this authority how did he achieve it? There is no explicit repeal in the Authorization. And when you make it this far, please tell me how you think that thought process that superceded Posse Comitatus doesn't supercede FISA (or rather supplement it)? Doesn't it seem odd that the president is authorized to attack and kill al Qaeda all over the world (including the U.S.) but we can't listen to their phone calls? -- Tbeatty 02:36, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
While the exact number of innocent Americans affected isn't clear, as Attorney General Gonzales refused to answer that question, saying "that information remains classified", what has leaked is that there are at least tens if not hundreds of thousands of American conversations/emails/individuals possibly affected. 'Millions' is indicated by numerous sources that I provided inline, including Chertoff's comments, which also serve as an example that I've not quoted only Democrats. A primary indication of the scope of this classified program is this article, which states:
In another strong indication, Russ Tice, the whistleblower, has indicated the possible scope of affected Americans:
In addition, the 'EFF' case that describes the NSA program as one that 'intercepts and analyzes the communications of millions of ordinary Americans' was already mentioned on the NSA article (I added Tice's comments there). I have demonstrated facts to substantiate every point I raised above, what exactly are you claiming is POV? The President violated FISA. The sources made it quite clear, and factual - we are monitoring, intercepting and analyzing a vast store of communications, not just those of known terrorists, and scanning them for 'keywords' or other indications of possible terrorism... and then retroactively investigating the participants. That's the opposite of the law. If the individuals are suspected of terrorism and it's an emergency, FISA allows for 72-hour retroactive warrants, and the FISC has approved all but five of the 19,000 requests it received. However, the NSA is now intercepting American conversations which have nothing to do with terrorism, in hopes of netting a terrorist. That's an entirely different, and illegal, proposition. And I'm not sure what your example of posse comitatus has to do with wiretapping, when they are addressed quite separately in our laws. A state of war does not mean that domestic laws are superceded without Congressional approval. The NSA wiretapping is, in essence, attacking the entire public in hopes of hitting a few terrorists. It's more akin to shooting down every airplane in hopes of downing one suspicious one. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 02:53, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
If it's so clear cut and factual, why did every senator, save 3, back away from censure (let alone impeachment or criminal charges)? Why hasn't the court stopped it? The reality is that laws are superceded all the time with new laws. Ttat's why we make new laws. We made a new one shortly after 9/11 and that was giving the president hte authority to use all available means to prevent future attacks. It didn't say with a court order. So far the only official legal viewpoint came from the Attorney General in favor of the program. In fact, the majority view of conresspeople who have commented one it is that it is a good program and should be continued but with more oversight. They simply say change the paperwork but nothing about any existing wiretaps that should not have been granted or outright stopped. It is simply disputable that what has transpired is against the law or unconstitutional. -- Tbeatty 04:42, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
That's a logical fallacy. The censure motion by Senator Feingold is not the entirety of the controversy, and one's support for censure is not equivalent to one's view that the programs are illegal. The 9/11 AUMF didn't include wiretapping of innocent Americans. The program is classified, and therefore a court cannot simply 'step in'. In order for the Judicial branch to play its part, the information needs to be uncovered despite the government's efforts to hide it. And so, despite relentless attacks by the administration on the patriotism and motives of those seeking to uncover this information the wheels are definitely turning, Congress is involved, whistleblowers are speaking out, and hearings are being held. It's a whole lot bigger than the 'war on terror'. And the stated view of Gonzales, appointed by the very same individual who authorized the program, does not qualify as an objective legal view - especially since he was intentionally "confining {his} remarks to the Terrorist Surveillance Program as described by the President, the legality of which was the subject" of the Feb. 6 Senate hearing. [15]
Laws are indeed changed, all the time. In this case, however, the behavior took place in violation of existing law... making it illegal. Bush could have sought to change the law, but thought it unnecessary. [16] -- User:RyanFreisling @ 05:04, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
The wiretapping authorization was for Al Qaeda and those responsible for 9/11. Those are the poeple being wiretapped. If the listener at the other end happens to be an American Citizen, that is too bad. It's not illegal. The government is not 'hiding' it, it's secret and Congress is briefed and has been for the life of the program. Are you really telling me that after 9/11 and the Authorization to Use Force, the government would need a search warrant to listen to bin Laden give orders to Mohammad Atta because Atta was in the U.S.? Give me a break. The whole reason for the authorization and the Patriot Act and the Department of Homeland security and the North American Military command was so that this could not happen again. It's silly to think that 'all' did not mean 'all'. That somehow we could kill domestic terrorists but not listen to their calls. -- Tbeatty 06:00, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it was authorized for al Qaeda and those responsible. And instead, millions of Americans' conversations have been tapped with no relation to al Qaeda. Congress was not 'briefed'. What information some Senators did receive, they are not permitted to share or act upon. Your example about Bin Laden and Atta is hyperbole, as I've repeatedly said that according to DoJ and the Congress in that instance, the AUMF would certainly apply. I have not contested that here, so the repeated argument you make, and it's Clintonian parsing of 'all' is likewise hyperbole. I should hope you don't misstate my argument simply to avoid any hint of acquiescence. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 06:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
While a wikipedia talk page is not the place to squabble over petty political disagreements, I can hardly see anyone stopping you two from going at each other. So do everyone using this talk page one favor, at least... Keep the ridiculous overuse of indentations to a minimum so the page isn't hundreds of times longer than it should be in comparison to most talk pages, thank you! I had a hard time reading the majority of your discussion as it got so bad that one word would be on every line to the right side of the page! Dudewheresmypizz4 12:28, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
The problem is, we have only Bush and Gonzalez's word on that, and they are hardly objective sources. That's the whole reason that judicial oversight exists: so that someone other than the person wanting to do the wiretap can determine whether it's justified. You might believe that Bush can be trusted with such unrestricted power, that he would never abuse it by having the NSA listen in on conversations having nothing to do with terrorism. But Bush is not a dictator, he's just the president. His power has limits. In addition, even if the authorization to use force somehow also authorized no-warrant wiretapping of American citizens, the Fourth Amendment still expressly warrantless searches. The courts have been very clear and very consistent, for as long as wiretaps have existed, that they are searches. Thus, there is no act of Congress that can give Bush the authority he claims to have, as no law can override the Constitution. 71.236.33.191 15:42, 4 April 2006 (UTC)
There is a secret judicial department within the white house designed specifically for spying during war time. They had given Bush permission to use their top secret judical service. Instead, Bush bypassed this system and created his own means to spy for for whatever reasons and for whatever end result... Yet he still prevents proper research from being done on WHO and WHAT they were spying on, claiming to spy only on internation relivant terrorists - are they telling you the truth? well, just ask yourself how many 'truths' have you known Bush to use.
One person involved with Homeland Security has recently been arrested for seducing a child online and sending harmful material to this child.
ok... I do not care if the person is internation or not, this type of spying could still violate people 'internationally' - what is to prevent them without the proper checks and balances?
Sorry, but you be the judge... Should our government have the ability to spy for security purposes for anything they deem worthy? Umm... who is doing the watching and who is watching those watching? What sort of governmental control do you want, and what makes you think that the government would act proper given their history?
You decide. What do you honestly think?
Think before you feel like you ought to agree with everything Bush does. 149.169.45.2 18:26, 5 April 2006
Also, even if Bush is being perfectly honest about only using this program to spy on terrorists now, that doesn't mean he can be trusted with the power. As the saying goes, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Neither Bush nor anyone can be trusted with the power he's claiming, the power to tap phones solely on his own say-so, without being required to provide evidence to anyone that the action is legally justified. 71.236.33.191 01:38, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
You guys are hilarious. Especially "so far, it appears to be the most far-reaching Constitutional 're-interpretation' by any modern president - and potentially the most illegal act to which a President himself has admitted"
Please, dude. I dont think you've actually studied American History. For one, the Constitution has been massively reinterpretated all over this century, most notably by FDR, the scale of whose contributions to the modern presidency dwarf anybody elses 100-fold. As for "most illegal", Nixon's actions trump anything this completely manufactured "scandal" with the wiretaps is. The funny thing is that RyanFreisling doesn't appear to know that the Bush govt did not create the practice of monitoring domestic transmissions, the NSA has been doing it for literally years and years, including under Clinton. And the most hilarious thing is the NY Times kept the story under wraps and then did a puff piece on it: http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/99/05/cyber/articles/27network.html
No headlines, nothing. The NY Times, being the unashamedly liberal rag it is, has merely made it seem like Bush is doing something new and strange in an election year.
I agree with the above posters, the Intro shouldn't have issues like the Wire Tap scandal and such. The intro should just give a quick summary of his presidency, for Example FDR would contain the Great Depression, WWII, and other similar unique and crucial information of his presidency. Now if they start a successful motion to impeach based on it, then it may have a place, but once again broad, and leave the controversy to the section that goes in detail about it. PPGMD 18:35, 30 March 2006 (UTC)
]::::::On further reading and consideration, I think that a more appropriate model for comparision would be Richard Nixon. I say this without knowing the content of its intro. Kevin Baas talk 03:40, 1 April 2006 (UTC)
The recently added paragraph into the intro just makes it bigger, which is the last thing this article needs, and is highly slanted. Just another star in the night T | @ | C 06:33, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
I haven't read this huge rambling discussion, but I should probably respond here. I removed this text because it doesn't fit in the intro. The lead section of an article is intentionally general. It should be a short mini-biography of Bush, not a laundry list of actions which he's been criticized for. The NSA wiretap controversy was a moderately large story, but it doesn't rise to the level of the lead section. And mentioning it before mentioning the entire Iraq war is just nuts. The suspension of habeas corpus is many orders of magnitude away from a lead-worthy topic.
It's not helpful to debate the importance of these stories here. We should rely on media coverage as a guideline for what gets included in the lead section. Rhobite 06:34, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
I'm bringing the disputed section here for the benefit discussion:
He has interpreted the resolution that authorizes force against the 9/11 terrorists to mean that the executive branch can suspend habeas corpus rights of U.S. citizens captured overseas who are " illegal enemy combatants." His interpretation allows him to conduct wiretaps of international calls that may involve U.S. citizens and other people located in the United States.
I think that it can be shorter and focus on the more fundamental issue: the president's constitutional interpretation of presidential power. I think that's intro-worthy, seeing as though it sets the entire scope and agenda of the presidency. Kevin Baas talk 19:09, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps one or two short sentences with a link to Unitary_executive_theory? Kevin Baas talk 22:28, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
Let me give this a few tries:
Bush's presidency has been marked by controversy surrounding his interpretaion of the Constitution and the powers of the president. Namely, his assertion and practice of Unitary executive theory has resulted in accusations that he is exceeding his authority and being destructive of the system of checks and balances built into the Constitution.
Kevin Baas talk 01:53, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
Domestic spying is NOT new. Its not even remotely new. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2000/02/24/60minutes/main164651.shtml "As an example of those innocent people, Frost cites a woman whose name and telephone number went into the Echelon database as a possible terrorist because she told a friend on the phone that her son had "bombed" in a school play. "The computer spit that conversation out. The analystwas not too sure what the conversation was referring to, so, erring on the side of caution, he listed that lady," Frost recalls. "
Thats under Clinton. Nothing about this is particularly unprecedented, huge, or constitutionally novel. Just because the Democrats go wide-eyed and "Oh my God! Wiretapping! Totally new and unprecedented and illegal!" doesn't mean the government has been doing it for years.
Power abuse is clearly seen all around. What has this guy done right? What has this administration done right? it is a big mess, in my opinion.
Actually, if we want to be accurate for the sake of NPOV here, the original estimates were that the troops would pretty much stay indefinitely, that the most likely outcome would be civil war, that the war would cost hundreds of billions of dollars, etc. The original estimates were dead-on accurate. Those estimators were promptly sacked, and new estimators were found that said what bush wanted to hear. It's disingenous to call what bush wanted to hear "estimates", and it's disingenuous to call them "original". Kevin Baas talk 19:04, 2 April 2006 (UTC)
I seem to recall a lot of predictions referring to Vietnam which, if you've forgotten, was over 50,000 US dead and hundreds dying daily often times. Not to mention over a million dead Vietnamese. Is that the current situation as you see it? Sounds to me like it wasn't as good as the best-case scenario but was better than the worst-case. Both predictions were apparently naive.
And of course Bush now expects us to be there until much later then 2009 - saying they will be there when he leaves office. With the situation as it is, it is more likely then not then MORE soldiers will be going rather then any getting sent home. The whole time, of course, KBR continues to profit and Cheney's stock looks better and better, as well as the pocket-book of many wealthy elite..... circumstancial? I will let you be the judge of that, and let you decide who would foster civil war (logically, the person at the most advantage of there being a civil war would seem to have the greatest motives to encourage one... thus, U.S. wealthy elite profit a lot or terrorists meeting their radical idealism... both choices seem plausable, thus worthy of research and debate with no decisive conclusion until evident)
I notice that while the Clinton Wiki article delves into every single allegation that the right-wing talk radio ever dreamed up against Clinton, the Bush article has been heavily sanitized and doesn't even mention a number of serious allegations against Bush (even if only to dispute them). I have no opinion on whether or not Bush ever used cocaine, but I do believe that this allegation ought to at least be mentioned in the article. If Bush himself had ever denied using cocaine, I would agree that it was a non-issue. However, Bush has been asked a number of times about past cocaine use and has always avoided answering the question and has only offered up glib comments like "When I was young and foolish, I was young and foolish." If Bush himself has not denied cocaine use (a felony, by the way), then surely this ought to at least get a mention in this article, if Wiki is going to claim even a tiny shred of credibility as a reference source.
So we'll be adding Category:Suspected heralds of Galactus to this article? - A Man In Bl?ck ( conspire | past ops) 00:55, 3 April 2006 (UTC)
The reason why Clinton's alleged drug use is mentioned is because it is TRUE!!!! ~Lilfreakydude
Bush is a very honest liar, with lies ranging from the war in Iraq to lies such as Social Security issues. And before you jump to calling me a terrorist, which I am defintiely not, because I too hate terrorists. But don't we live in a free country? Don't we have the right to free speech? What if I personally don't agree with Bush?
Then you are a wise man, my friend. Well, sorta wise. The lies and deceptions of Bush are easy to detect. Only an ignorant person would not recognize them. I mean, how illogical is it to say that terrorists are fighting against freedom? They die for their cause! They are not concerned with getting some sort of temporal personal advantages out of it. Let us be honest, they are fighting against the imperalism of America, which they feel is violating their system of ethics and morals (economic control and dominance over other states is classified as imperalism, thus America would qualify - and especially now, since by definition imperalism is the control of another state; Iraq is currently under the control of America. Thus, by the definition of imperalism America is an imperial power. They fight the American empire, in other words)
Going back to the central topic of debate, i believe that mentioning the allegations of Bush's cocaine use does belong in this article. I'm not quite sure, because i don't live in the states, but i think i remember someone close to the bush family stating this in a book of some sort before the elections, and also seeing it in several other articles. It is a widely known fact that people have accused him of this. The fact that he has been accused of this is not irrelevant, is encyclopedic and therefore is better in the article, rather than ommited, IMO. Gerardo199 02:58, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
According to this article from Svenska Dagbladet [18], the Bush family is related to Måns Andersson, a Swedish immigrant who came to American in the 1600s. Bronks april 3, 2006.
1316 Måns Andersson 658 & 659 Chrisopher Mounce & Martha 328 & 329 Robert Mercer & Ann Mounce 164 & 165 Robert Mercer & (possibly) Sarah Beeston 82 & 83 John Mercer & Rebecca Davis 40 & 41 George E. Walker & Harriet Mercer 20 & 21 David Davis Walker & Martha Adela Beaky 10 & 11 George Herbert Walker & Lucretia Wear 4 & 5 Prescott Sheldon Bush & Dorothy Walker 2 & 3 George Herbert Walker Bush & Barbara Pierce 1 George Walker Bush
From unsigned editor: ---SECTION ON 9/11 IN ORIGINAL PAGE---
PLEASE STOP PROPAGATING OFFICIAL VERSION OF EVENTS AND WHO IS RESPONSIBLE. THERE IS TOO MUCH INFORMATION BY NOW TO IGNORE AT LEAST THE QUESTIONABILITY OF THE OFFICIAL VERSION, AND THERE IS ABUNDANT COMPELLING EVIDENCE TO POINT THE FINGER THE OTHER WAY. FOR THE SAKE OF OBJECTIVITY AND TRUTH, PLEASE INCLUDE CONSIDERATIONS OF DOUBTS ABOUT THE OFFICIAL STORY AND LINKS TO SITES FEATURING THE AMAZING AMOUNT OF INFORMATION COUNTERING IT. WE CANNOT KEEP PROPAGATING THE SAME FALSE INFORMATION, IF WE WANT TO BE HONEST WITH OURSELVES AND THE WORLD.
THANK YOU.
I completely agree, wikipedia users should be objective-- point out all sides of the argument, all criticisms! Otherwise, we are merely recreating whatever we have heard; which very well could be propaganda! Questioning and reasoning is at the heart of wikipedia, and at the throat of truth! Thanks
--end of unsigned comment. -- Tbeatty 17:15, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
I agree 110%
fyi, Bush was talking about fighting for freedom, Iraq, and terrorism in many speeches before 9/11. In fact, he talked about all three right next too each other in two speeches during his first two months in office, Jan & Feb. This was not a war conducted because of 9/11 alone and it was pre-developed, as any analyse would conclude. 9/11 did help foster resentment towards Iraq in the way Bush inaccurately phrased his speeches
Being "at the throat of truth" -- I'm not sure I like the sound of that! -- Cubdriver 21:07, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Can anyone shed some light on why the sources listed in the "References" section don't appear to actually be referenced in the article? To me, the "Notes" section and some of the items under the "Links" section appear to be the actual references. Am I mistaken in this perception? I'd like to:
Thoughts? Comments? I'll leave this out there for a few days before making any changes as this is obviously a high-traffic, controversial article. I'm bold but not stupid. :) -- ElKevbo 22:16, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
I have unprotected semiprotection. I will monitor and will reprotect after six hours or if vandalism gets out of control.-- MONGO 05:06, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
I've restored semiprotection. As noted by the semiprotection policy, it isn't supposed to be a permanent feature, but with over 50 vandalisms in about 14 hours, and almost nothing constructive done to the article otherwise, we expend more energy fighting the vandals than we do making the article better. I'm inclined to keep semiprotection in place for the forseeable future, but we should occasonally remove the semiprotection every now and then to be complient with the policy.-- MONGO 19:50, 6 April 2006 (UTC)
I made some edits tonight. Please comment here if you take exception to them. Merecat 05:34, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your feedback. As you know, "fact" tags add a "citation needed" link when placed into an article. Suffice it to say, there is nothing wrong with fact tags and frankly, if you don't like them, perhaps you could help dig up some citations for the tagged assertions. I've tagged only those points that appear to warrant it. Merecat 19:29, 7 April 2006 (UTC)
If you look at the Afghanistan section you'll note that the nation was entered with "some" international support. I looked it up but could not find any specifics. Does anyone have any specifics (number of nations, the UN's position, and/or NATO's position) on this support so we can be more specific than just "some." Thank you.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.167.200.77 ( talk • contribs)
This is two days old and I haven't seen it mentioned in the article. Bush has no denied it. It should be mentioned. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.210.83.146 ( talk • contribs)
Title updated as per [23]. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 04:42, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps, but POV edits are not the Wiki way. The known court documents so far do not accuse Bush of authorizing the release of Plame's name. In light of that, it's POV for us to side with those who do accuse Bush of that. Remember, our citations must be to reliable sources WP:CITE. Partisan opinion and media speculation are not as reliable as actual court documents. "Fitzgerald did not say in the filing that Cheney authorized Libby to leak Plame's identity, and Bush is not accused of doing anything illegal." Merecat 05:19, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Without the word "allegedly" in the section title, the section title presumes that the accusation is accurate. This presumption sides with those who accuse Bush of this. Your edit deleted "allegedly", therefore your edit sided with those who accuse Bush. Whether you side with them or not, your edit did. Merecat 05:29, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
Whether or not Libby disclosed Plame's name, is irrelevant to the above discussion about section title. That discusion focuses on whether or not Bush authorized that particular aspect of Libby's (alleged) disclosure. Libby was authorized to reveal parts of an NIE, but even Fitzgerald has not said that Bush authorized the release of the NIE portion which contained Plame's name. Please read the Yahoo link again. [25] Merecat 06:27, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
According to the Washington Post Sunday, April 9, 2006; Page B06 , my assertions as per above, are correct. Merecat 04:05, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, I'm getting great enjoyment from reading your postings. Tell me though, regarding this one, why did you manually edit the time stamp? Also, you may be willing to suggest that a "news" article from WAPO should be presumed to have more veracity that the WAPO editorial I linked to, but I am not going to join you in your presumption. There is nothing to suggest that WAPO's editors, in their fully informed knowledge of all the news they are currently publishing, wrote anything other than the truth - so far as asserted facts go, in that editorial. Of course, any conclusions they come to, are opinion, but that's also true about any conclusions that a reporter comes to. Suffice it to say, there are facts, presentation of facts and conclusions in both pieces. And frankly, there is more more equivocation ("discredit, punish or seek revenge against") in the "news" story you point to. Please stop this one-ups-manship, it's beneath you and it's tiring. The WAPO editorial I pointed to lays out specific facts which no one rebuts. You are free to disregard the conclusions of that piece as opinion, but if you disregard the stated facts in it, you are basically calling the WAPO editors page liars. In which case, that calls into question the WAPO editors' oversight of the newsroom and the veracity of everything it releases. Is that what you are telling me, that we should think of a MSM entity as a bunch of liars? Merecat 04:29, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
I noticed this article while browsing Category:Petroleum; it seems out of place there. On the other hand, this article has lots of categories. Too many, if you ask me.
Here's a sample distribution:
Thoughts? Melchoir 07:26, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
Anyone? Melchoir 00:06, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
Okay, here we go! Melchoir 20:33, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
After 'agent' was changed to 'employee', I changed it to 'operative'. That is the actual word used by Novak in the actual public piece that started the leak scandal:
I have added a tag to address this point. Merecat 02:40, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
hey look, after 2 archives of the talk page, the
{{OMGtehLiberalBIAS}} tag grew back, and look, now it goes away again, if you want to edit the article, then just edit the article, don't just slap it with as many tags as humany possible then trol- walk away--
205.188.116.138. 14:59, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Newb observations: "6 weeks/6 months" screams for a reference. How do you burn a 'graph on the war on terror and not mention Afghanistan?
The Washington Post had an interesting editorial [27] today that argued that President Bush "was right to approve the declassification of parts of a National Intelligence Estimate about Iraq three years ago in order to make clear why he had believed that Saddam Hussein was seeking nuclear weapons." The editorial also argued that Joseph Wilson had twisted the truth and in his Ny Times op-ed piece and that the Bush White House was right to set the record straight. It is nice to see that the liberals at the Washington Post are capable of grasping these issues. RonCram 04:18, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Facts asserted by the editorial:
Ryan, don't you get it yet? These items listed above, are facts, not opinion. Wilson has lied at least three times about critical parts of this dispute. And if Libby actually did leak Plame's name, why is he not charged with that? The simple truth is that this entire controversy was ginned up by anti-Bush partisans, with Wilson as their front man. Wilson lied, three times (at least). Libby is not charged with leaking Plame's name, because he did not leak it. Merecat 04:44, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
??? No one has accused you of ginning anything up. Do you work in the media? You do understand that I am talking about Wilson's deliberate prevarications, yes? Unless you are telling me that you were personally involved with Wilson and the Dems in their activities with this, then I can't see how you take that comment personally. Merecat 04:54, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
"Don't you get it yet?" is a rhetorical device, imploring the reader to pay careful attention. If it offended you, I apologize. No offense was intended. As for the 11 point list, they are indeed facts. Do you agree, yes or no? Also, please do not interpolate your reply into the body of my 11 point list. Please answer with your own 11 point list below. Thanks. Merecat 05:03, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Here's my response to the 11 assertions Merecat extracted from the WaPo editorial. As you can see, I believe a significant number of them to be grossly incorrect, or at least misleadingly incomplete. It's a big swath of text, so my apologies if anything is unclear, poorly edited or otherwise difficult to follow. All questions welcome. Last - if this belongs elsewhere, I'm glad to move it. Meanwhile, I've gotta get back to work! :) -- User:RyanFreisling @ 17:42, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. Therefore, your claim that the 11 points you listed above are 'facts' is equally erroneous. In my case, I've provided facts to back up my assertions, and have included allegations based on facts - and I've provided the relative facts. I'm glad to hear you respect my views as I do yours and most of all, I am saddened that our President and his administration have brought us to this point. I hope that there can be more respect for the rule of law, and less hero worship, in the ongoing and heated defense of the President. -- User:RyanFreisling @ 19:44, 10 April 2006 (UTC)
But regarding the distinct datum of: "To date, Bush and Cheney have not been charged with any crime.", that itself is a true fact, right? Merecat 01:28, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Ok, lets' review the uncontested facts:
So Ryan, what are you saying? Are you no saying we should interpret McClellan's specific denial - more broadly than it was spoken, so we can play "gotcha!"? Merecat 01:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, we are going in circles. Please answer this question, yes or no. Has Libby been charged with leaking classified information, yes or no? Merecat 02:32, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Uncivil? Since when do we say that yes or no questions are uncivil? I think they are not. If you think they are, we disgree. Personally, I feel that compound answers to single fact questions is a boorish method. However, I would not go so far as to call you boorish and I ask that you refrain from calling me uncivil, as in "Your behavior is becoming uncivil". So then, since you refused to answer my yes/no question, I will distill your answer for you. "Libby has not been charged with leaking classified information" = no. That said, since Fitzgerald has also not said that Bush authorized the release of Plame's name, here's what we have so far:
Further, I contend that Fitzy has not charged Libby with release of classified info because:
Also, I contend that Libby was not charged with violating rules regarding CIA operative identities, because:
And lastly, even if her background did qualify her to protection under the "indentities" laws:
Stop being so quick to conclude that only the DEM speculations are accurate. Even our wiki states that Richard Armitage leaked. Why he is not being charged, I have no idea. Hmmmm, perhaps because he cut a deal for immunity and he was an anti-Bush mole a foggy bottom? Merecat 03:02, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Indeed, "undermine Wilson" was the goal - more specifically, undermining Wilson's spurious and false "yellowcake" op-ed piece (hmmm opinion piece, now who was it that said opinion pieces have less veracity?...). However, because Wilson and his Dem cronies knew that Bush would be forced to defend on the yellowcake and because Wilson wrote that hit piece to provoke that response, it's very logical to see how this started: Wilson attacked the President with lies about Niger so as to hurt Bush in 2004 election. I note that you do not contend that Bush was trying to harm Plame in revenge against Wilson - even though this was Wilson's central thesis. And to date, that has not been borne out by the facts. Nor has Fitzgerald contended that either. And please, stop quoting the media on this point and start looking at verbatim quotes from Fitzy. Fitzy has not alleged that Bush et al, released Plame so as to personally punish Wilson. That contention was ginned up by the Looney Left (you used "looney" 1st, so I get to use it here). Merecat 03:33, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Hey, that's not nice. I'm not being any more obtuse than Ryan. Merecat 03:41, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
What? I said obtuse in reference to the format of our lengthy comments. There is no insult in that. You however, said this about me "frenzied and illogical defense". At least that's how I read it. Merecat 03:45, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
You are being unfair. I did not complain to you. That other editor suggested I was smoking something and I tried to defend my edits in brief to him/her. You do see that, yes? Merecat 03:52, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, since you say I've done this and that to you, but you do not address the points I raise where I directly quote harsh comments from you that were directed at me (see above), I have lost interest in talking with you for now. Some time later, if you say you are sorry, I might talk with you more. But for now, you have hurt my feelings. Good night. Merecat 04:06, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
To those who read the above and think that Wilson told the truth about "yellowcake", please read "Wowie Zahawie - Sorry everyone, but Iraq did go uranium shopping in Niger" - Christopher Hitchens, Slate.com Monday, April 10, 2006 Merecat 13:49, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
The above slate.com article which I linked to [37] has this in it: "In February 1999, Zahawie left his Vatican office for a few days and paid an official visit to Niger, a country known for absolutely nothing except its vast deposits of uranium ore." Merecat 06:18, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Ok, so who thinks we've been freeped....again?-- 205.188.116.138 20:26, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
In late 2005 and 2006, Bush led the world community in opposition to Iran's announced intention to develop nuclear technology.
I was going to tag this with {{fact}}, but the thought occured: Can leadership of the world community on this issue be cited or fact-checked? There will always be someone to dispute it, and the fact pattern can as easily be used to support a POV statement the complete opposite of this one. I was thinking:
In late 2005 and 2006, Bush publically declared American opposition to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's announced intention to develop nuclear technology.
Let the merciless editing begin... Ssbohio 21:56, 11 April 2006 (UTC)
Terrorist \Ter"ror*ist\, n. [F. terroriste.]
1. One who governs by terrorism or intimidation ... --Burke. [1913 Webster]
A number of people fly planes into buildings: this is murder. To encourage the repeated broadcast of these searing images across a world and the promotion of fears of national security to exploit this terrible act to allow actions and policy change previously desired, is terrorism.
At best, Bush's administration has seen the distraction of the American people from the issues that effect them most and the redirection of national assets toward the interests of Bush friendly business. If America could be seen as a powerful vehicle, Bush and his buddies have taken it for a spin, far away from where it needs to go. I am an Australian who loves America and I hope he doesn't get America bogged and wrecked.
Is Bush a war criminal? Is the Republican Party a terrorist organisation? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Danieljames626 ( talk • contribs) .
The article Bush Crimes Commission is up on AFD. Unfortunately, there is concern over Wikipedia:Vote Stacking because of a large and possibly selective notification spamming. Undoubtedly, the individual votes are good faith, but the apparent selectivity of notification raises questions about the validity of the process. In an effort to salvage that discussion, I am posting this notification here. My intent is to bring the discussion to the attention of those with prior expressed interested in Bush, without pre-selecting for either likely supporters or opponents. Brillig20 16:31, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
This section is factually incorrect. It reports the promise as if it was all delivered on: it hasn't been. It then explicitly states that Congress has allocated the full amount: it absolutely did not. These are untrue statements in wikipedia, they should be corrected with the correct amount of dolars actually asked for by Bush in the budget and the actual amount disbursed by Congress (the two are different). It contains nothing of the considerable controversy over abstinence funding, the effectivness of ABC prevention programs, the allocation of PEPFAR money to explicitly religious groups, the possible conflict of interest of Randall Tobias as a former chief executive of a pharmaceutical company now in charge of purchasing billions in AIDS drugs, the duplication created by using PEPFAR instead of the Global Fund, the refusal to by less expensive generic drugs that are combinable, etc. All of these are very relevant and debates over them rage in the HIV policy world. I made these edits and someone called them POV. They are not. I encourage someone to do an NPOV edit of this section, I'll recuse myself for the time being. I don't have a problem with Bush, but the article as it stands does not reflect the truth of US AIDS policy, for better or worse. Thes entinel 19:18, 13 April 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, totally he probaly wants the terroriists to win. Wouldnt rthat be kind of cool maybe not totally but just thinking, you though they were gonna lose but then they won = psych! Probably this is what hes trying to do.
"But we're at war man! where are your priorities!!!?!?!" -This could actually be why America went to war, couldn't it? As an excuse to do fuck-all about anything else. "Medical Research?" "But we're at war!" "Climate change?" "But we're at war!" "The terrifying spectre of AIDS, stalking the world and killing more people than a hundred Saddams?" "By golly, we're at war!!" 81.157.73.179 10:27, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
thanks for that wonderful debate, guys, but the section remains woefully underdeveloped and factually inorrect (the $15 billion has not been funded by Congress, for one). This sections reflects a weakness of a few of the sections here: they are merely regurgitation of White House press releases. They could go a long way to give context and some critical assessment (eg, has the government done what it says it does?) Thes entinel 05:58, 24 April 2006 (UTC)
The main article's third paragraph (in the intro) incorrectly (both factually and grammatically) states that, in relation to Iraq, "The commitment of United States, Europe, and Canada troops has been controversial both domestically and internationally." The fact is that Canada has never sent troops to Iraq since Gulf Storm in 1991.
Jtlaw 03:06, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
Canadian troops are also involved in training Iraqis, though this is taking place outside Iraq (in Jordan, I think). Thes entinel 16:15, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Michael Isikoff wrote in Newsweek:
"May 17 - The White House's top lawyer warned more than two years ago that U.S. officials could be prosecuted for "war crimes" as a result of new and unorthodox measures used by the Bush administration in the war on terrorism, according to an internal White House memo and interviews with participants in the debate over the issue.
The concern about possible future prosecution for war crimes—and that it might even apply to Bush adminstration officials themselves— is contained in a crucial portion of an internal January 25, 2002, memo by White House counsel Alberto Gonzales obtained by NEWSWEEK. It urges President George Bush declare the war in Afghanistan, including the detention of Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters, exempt from the provisions of the Geneva Convention.
In the memo, the White House lawyer focused on a little known 1996 law passed by Congress, known as the War Crimes Act, that banned any Americans from committing war crimes—defined in part as "grave breaches" of the Geneva Conventions. Noting that the law applies to "U.S. officials" and that punishments for violators "include the death penalty," Gonzales told Bush that "it was difficult to predict with confidence" how Justice Department prosecutors might apply the law in the future. This was especially the case given that some of the language in the Geneva Conventions—such as that outlawing "outrages upon personal dignity" and "inhuman treatment" of prisoners—was "undefined."
One key advantage of declaring that Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters did not have Geneva Convention protections is that it "substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the War Crimes Act," Gonzales wrote.
"It is difficult to predict the motives of prosecutors and independent counsels who may in the future decide to pursue unwarranted charges based on Section 2441 [the War Crimes Act]," Gonzales wrote.
The best way to guard against such "unwarranted charges," the White House lawyer concluded, would be for President Bush to stick to his decision—then being strongly challenged by Secretary of State Powell— to exempt the treatment of captured Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters from Geneva convention provisions.
"Your determination would create a reasonable basis in law that (the War Crimes Act) does not apply which would provide a solid defense to any future prosecution," Gonzales wrote.
The memo—and strong dissents by Secretary of State Colin Powell and his chief legal advisor, William Howard Taft IV—are among hundreds of pages of internal administration documents on the Geneva Convention and related issues that have been obtained by NEWSWEEK and are reported for the first time in this week's magazine. Newsweek made some of them available online today."
This from the following URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4999734/site/newsweek/#storyContinued
Additonally, there are texts of Gonzales's memo and Powell's response at the URL above. They are in .PDF format, and are of the original documents, so cannot cut and paste here (putting four whole pages of .PDF would eat up bandwidth).
I just looked this up today, and was lucky to find it in and amongst the lunatic ravings of the left wing fringe (which, btw, are equally as bad as the lunatic ravings of the right wing fringe). Be careful of all the stupidity you see, which just might be disinformation posted by the very people it purports to castigate.
As a final note, Bush's tactic of excluding people from the Geneva Conventions is nothing new. Ike did it after WWII by reclassifying German POW's as DEF's, or Disarmed Enemy Forces, meaning that they were not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions. (this is also verifiable and not "original research" - now, I'm not talking about the lunacy that claims Ike murdered 1.7 million German POW's (which is untrue), merely the fact that Ike purposely ordered the reclassification of POW's as DEF's)
TheKurgan 04:28, 17 April 2006 (UTC)
btw fuck that twat
We know that Bush Senior was wary of getting involved in a war with Saddam back in 1990 because of the potential for large numbers of Iraqi civilian casualties and how this would square with his deity. So Bush called in Billy Graham and asked him what God would think about it. Billy Graham assured Bush that God wouldn't mind too much as it was a just war and so Bush proceeded. Now Dubya of course dosen't need to consult Billy Graham before attacking Iraq because Dubya already knows the Supreme Being's views on these matters because he talks with him all the time. Two questions arise I think: (1) Why did Bush Senior bother to ask Billy Graham over to the White House to give him advice when his own son already had a direct hotline to the Almighty, (2) Shouldn't the article on here make some mention of these things, since it might give readers some indication of what a truly amazing world we live in when even in the late 20th and 21st centuries, people as spectacularly wacky as this can actually be allowed to preside over the world's only superpower and, what's more, hardly anyone seems to think it's unusual or kind of disturbing?
Here is a translation of part of German Wikipedia's article on Bush:
First, the German itself...
Da die Nationalgarde vorwiegend im Inland eingesetzt wird, sah sich Bush später mit dem Vorwurf konfrontiert, einer Einberufung in die Army zuvorgekommen zu sein und sich damit einem Einsatz im Vietnam entzogen zu haben - er wurde draft dodger (als ein sich der Einberufung Entziehender; vergleiche die deutschen Begriffe: Kriegsdienstverweigerer, Wehrdienstverweigerer) gescholten, bei patriotischen US-Amerikanern alles andere als ein Ehrentitel.
The translation:
Since the National Guard operated mostly within the US (literal translation is within the homeland), Bush was later confronted with the accusation of having avoided service in the regular army (here, the literal translation is "scoop himself out of the draft, which is stilted English, at best) which would have resulted in service in Vietnam - he was scolded as a draft dodger (compared with the German concepts of Conscientious Objector (the term Kriegsdienstverweigerer) or "draft dodger" (the more colloquial term Wehrdienstverweigerer)...the two have different connotations in German -- Krieg is War, so the term including "Kriegsdienst" means "war service" (Dienst means service). Wehr, on the other hand, is merely a term for the Army (along with Armee or Heer), so Wehrdienst means "army service" (a distinct difference). Verweigen is the verb "to deny."), a term which is anything but honorable among patriotic Americans.
It would be interesting to see if I were to be labeled a troll for posting something like this on the English language site...oh, wait, I can't because the page itself is locked from editing. I am therefore asking that since this paragraph is included on German Wikipedia that it also be included on the English site.
TheKurgan 04:57, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Carl Bernstein's new Vanity Fair article. Wow. -- 71.141.126.76 06:54, 18 April 2006 (UTC)
Here's one of the sentences in the science section: "On 2002-12-19, Bush signed into law H. R. 4664, far-reaching legislation to put the National Science Foundation on a track to double its budget over five years and to create new mathematics and science education initiatives at both the pre-college and undergraduate level." That's ignoring the much larger issues of all of the science budgets that Bush has cut, including NIH, stem cell research, global warming research, etc. And the section doesn't even mention stem cell research/global warming. At least it mentions science education. Anyone know where I could find charts/tables outlying the overall state of science funding these past six years? NSF's budget is peanuts compared to the overall science budget. -- Cyde Weys 18:55, 19 April 2006 (UTC)
The sentence "On February 18, 2004, the radical left[71] liberal activist group, the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS),..." is a blatant attempt to slander legitimate critics of the President's policies. The UCS is NOT a collection of radical left liberals, it is an organization of concerned scientists. Let's remove this deliberate insult. -- Gerald Lovel 23:40, 5 May 2006 (UTC)
I'm seconding Mr. Lovel's remarks. The "Radical Left" designation of the UCS was given by the Captial Research Center (CRC), a group which is led by two long-time members of the conservative Heritage Foundation [40] and is extensively funded by the right-leaning Scaife foundation [41]. Moreover, the CRC has a history of slapping "leftist" labels on other organizations, over less-than-ideologically-motivated actions. [42] IMO, the comments about UCS violate the NPOV policy and should be retracted. ))ECB(( 03:24, 6 May 2006 (UTC)
This guy may have defended Clinton to the end, but he's also a highly respected historian. All points in this article should be analyzied and made note of in the main article.
I can provide lots of cites to James Taranto on OpinionJournal, demonstrating that Geo W is one of the near-great presidents of the past hundred years. Certainly as valid a viewpoint as one in Rolling Stone. -- Cubdriver 19:36, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, surely you are not suggesting that Rolling Stone is a better source than something published by Dow Jones & Co, are you? You do know that Dow Jones owns WSJ and Opinion Journal, yes? Merecat 20:26, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Well then, on that point we can disagree. Dow Jones does not produce dreck. However, in my view, the air-brushed 'bulging crotch' [43] cover photos of Dem candidates produced by Rolling Stone, tells me that Rolling Stone does. Merecat 20:46, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, I have no idea what you just said. Merecat 21:45, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Advice? What are you talking about? No advice from you was solicited. Merecat 21:52, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
Ryan, I'm sorry you lack the wherewithal to continue our dialog today. I hope you are feeling better soon. I enjoyed our chat. Have a nice day. Merecat 21:58, 20 April 2006 (UTC)
The question should not be whether Rolling Stone is POV, in my judgment. The question should be whether Rolling Stone's opinion, or the opinion of this author is notable. There are ways to get around the POV issue if this author is notable, but in the grand scheme of Bush's presidency, I do not believe he is. BlueGoose 00:12, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
This post is addressed to Merecat. I find it interesting that a notable periodical with left leaning tendencies is "dreck," while a notable periodical with right leaning tendencies is "more reliable." By that reasoning, Playboy is to be completely discarded even though Playboy is the only magazine to land an interview with Fidel Castro (the veracity of what Castro says is for a different forum). By the same reasoning, you must also discard all of the following as "reliable sources:"
The Nation New Republic Rolling Stone Macleans (Canadian) Der Spiegel
while venerating the following as ultra reliable:
Time US News and World Report Wall Street Journal Detroit News Anything owned by Rupert Murdoch
This is fallacious on its face. Editorial bent is inherent in every periodical, and has been ever since Ben Franklin first published Poor Richard's Almanac (or Thomas Paine penned "Common Sense"). To condemn a publication as unreliable because of said editorial bent is hypocritical since you espouse the same bent with the periodicals you venerate.
It is possible to present evidence objectively and also show your own opinion, as well. Problems arise when opinion is not seperated from evidence (which can be caused by many things, chief among them extreme editorial bias (insert Fox News and Mother Jones as the two extremes of this)). Shameless trolling condeming the other point of view without solid evidence is the worst kind of yellow journalism. For example, when Bush choked and passed out a few years ago, imagine the furor that would have been created with the following headline:
Former drunken driver collapses at White House
This carries the implication that Bush was wasted at the time of his fall. The headline encompasses two facts:
1) Bush is a former drunk driver 2) Bush collapsed at the White House
By juxtaposing the two in an underhanded manner, the editor conveys a double meaning (the root of yellow journalism).
By the same token, a right wing editor could put a differnt spin on the following two facts:
1) Vince Foster committed suicide 2) Bill Clinton was being investigated at the time (for different things)
Vince Foster found dead - Bill Clinton investigated
Two things that are undeniably true; however, Clinton was never seriously investigated nor even considered a suspect in Foster's death (ruled a suicide).
These two preceding examples show how extreme editorial bias can demean a periodical's reliability. I am sure that publications as reliable as Rolling Stone and the Wall Street Journal would never resort to such yellow journalism.
This brings me to my next point. Concepts such as "worst president," "best president," "best football team ever," "worst natural disaster ever," and others are inherently OPINION pieces. One cannot show these to be facts. One must gather facts and other respected opinions to bolster his or her case in presenting an hypothesis.
For example, in order to make a case for the Black Death being the worst natural disaster ever (an easy case, BTW), I would present the following facts:
1) It was a disease that ran rampant throughout Europe for four years (1347 - 1351) 2) It could not be stopped by conventional means at the time 3) It killed 1/3 of the population of Europe (roughly 75,000,000 people)
All of these make a compelling case that it was the worst natural disaster in history, but it is still an opinion. Someone else could argue that the 1918 Flu pandemic was worse because it was a more modern era and we should have known better. Someone else could argue that the single earthquake that killed 830,000 people in one day is the worst since not even the Black Death killed that many in one day.
And on and on. In making the case for Bush as worst president, I'm sure that there are several facts that could be presented to bolster this case (such as basing the public reason for going to war in Iraq on Weapons of Mass Destruction which have yet to be found, unbelievable grammatical and speaking lapses, supporting the Patriot Act). As damning as those are, they still do not prove Bush is the worst president. It is still only my opinion. I'm sure that citizens who espouse a right wing ideology could present other evidence that Bush is the best president in history. They cannot prove that, however.
Now, if we're going to present Wikipedia as an objective resource, we must avoid the trap of presenting only one side of the equation. Believe me, I'd love to post what I really think of Bush as "fact" (that he's a smug, arrogant, Fascist sonofabitch who wants to institute a Christian theocracy in the US and subvert five Amendments of the Bill of Rights at once with the Patriot Act (1,4,5,6 and 8)); however, in good conscience I would not post that as fact. In Bush's article, however, I think we should present both sides of the argument about his accomplishments/deficiencies. The article, as it stands, is right leaning in its bias (not the ultra right wing that Murdoch would print about Bush's crap not stinking, but still right leaning). We must counter that right wing bias by including discussion of Bush's shortcomings, as well (see the German translation above about Bush avoiding service in Vietnam).
In summation, I believe that dismissing Rolling Stone as a source is a mistake. Merecat, would you discount it if it were as right leaning as the Wall Street Journal? To quote the urban legend "I think not."
TheKurgan 00:17, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
OK, mea culpa. Allow me to rephrase.
Merecat, what you can make of my post is a recommendation not to discount certain publications simply because of a left leaning editorial bias. Those of us on the left cannot discount publications with a right leaning bias. As I stated above, we can discount sources that are extremely biased (as I also already stated, the two extremes being Mother Jones and Fox News).
Would you agree with an article in the Wall Street Journal or the Detroit News that examined the possibility of Bush being the worst president? If not, then the bias of the editorial staff in question is not the issue. If so, then blindly following a publication because of its editorial tendencies is folly.
I hope this condensation is clearer.
TheKurgan 23:43, 22 April 2006 (UTC)
1. I do agree in principle with your assertion that the Rolling Stone is equivalent to the Wall Street Journal, Time and similar publications.
2. However, I do not believe that every article or opinion piece of a well-known publication is in itself notable to put into an encyclopaedia article, especially on the topic of a President. Maybe this means that we need more sub-articles of George W. Bush, but in general, I believe a 6 to 10 page summary of a President or a similarly important historical figue cannot practically include all information from every article written about or in reference to him or her. BlueGoose 10:49, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
TheKurgan 19:01, 23 April 2006 (UTC) (Edited typo)
The story in Rolling Stone is quite interesting...some Historians offering up their insightful opinions of the George W. Bush presidency while STILL in the middle of his presidency.
I recall a similar article written by the great-great-great grandfather of the author of this current piece:
My, my, my...how foolish it sounds for a Historian to comment without the real benefit of history. I would guess that should the Middle East become a place for the growth of freedom and Democracy in 20-50 years from now...with it's roots traced back to the liberation of Iraq...these "Historians" will not even be a footnote in the book of history. We will see. Jeravicious 11:30, 23 April 2006 (UTC)
the most recent 250
the most recent 500
From august 5 to 12 of 2005
the last 5000 Page stats (from the 5000 edits shown on this page):
Don't know what to make of these, but look at that 100%....yikes. The 8.18% goes up to 21.6% likely due to sleeper accounts. I bet its necessary though. Voice-of-All T| @| ESP 01:09, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
Imho there is a serious misstatement in this part. Pls look at this sentence: "However, most of the methods that would have given victory to Gore relied on counting overvotes -- which is against election law, as it takes a ballot with two votes on it and assigns it arbitrarily to one candidate. 21 22 23" OK, Firstly, link 21 has to be paid for, I can't afford to buy it and I don't think it's proper to use paid content here. However, links 22 and 23 don't support the statement in the article. 22 says: "In addition to undervotes, thousands of ballots in the Florida presidential election were invalidated because they had too many marks. This happened, for example, when a voter correctly marked a candidate and also wrote in that candidate's name." No reference to election laws here. Instead, this shows that the recount teams determined the voter intent (you remember this phrase from the news, right?) and counted a valid vote when both the chad was gone and the same candidate's name was written on the ballot. This isn't the same as two votes, this isn't arbitrary, and it's very questionable if this is against the law - 22 says nothing about that. Now, link 23 isn't about law either, its topic is possible voter confusion. So, imho the whole sentence at the start is unsurported opinion and I think it would be the best solution to simply delete it. Gray62 22:48, 27 April 2006 (UTC)
I'd really like if someone were to review my additions to the article concerning the Illinois resolution to impeach Bush at the bottom of the Impeachment section. Polish it up, and add some more clarifying content, or improvement would be nice.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Peterfa ( talk • contribs) 06:48, April 28, 2006
As a former Rockford, IL and Chicago resident, I would like to state that Illinois is not a democratic state. The population of Chicago, which as a big city, tends to skew opinions to the left, dominates the political landscape of the state. I don't have any facts to cite, but based upon personal experience, I would suggest that Illinois is overall a conservative state, but the population of Chicago tips the scale, come election time. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.101.233.172 ( talk • contribs) 16:51, April 29, 2006
So Illinois is really a republican state but just happens to be blue for the presidential vote? Are people who live outside of Chicago but inside of Illinois suppose to have their votes counted more than once or something?
dirt don't vote. -- me
Please update. Washington Post Article on Lumber
1-The alleged manipulation of NASA information seems to warrant inclusion in the Science section. http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/03/31/nasa.media.policy.reut/index.html
2-Saudi Flights is problematic, because Michael Moore's scurrilous politicking as resource must defer to the 9/11 commission report, which addressed these allegations and unambiguously dismissed them. I don't believe this section belongs under GWB.
3-Why is Katrina all but completely omitted from this bio? The Public Perception section indicates that the administration was faulted for a "slow" response; this is a very generous euphemism, and does not impartially reflect the truth of the matter--allegations of negligence, the perceived betrayal of promises regarding Homeland Security, and the impression that the administration was more preoccupied with political fallout than disaster management. It would seem that this defining moment of his second term, his response to the most visible natural disaster in the nation's history, would warrant a section of its own. DBaba 02:04, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
Richard Clarke, a WELL KNOWN BUSH CRITIC had already admitted to letting the Bin Ladens leave the country. This was AFTER the flight ban had been lifted, not before..... [44] -- 71.198.141.63 17:41, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
Wouldn't it make sense to start a Wikipedia page on the "George Bush Controversy"? It would include things in the news that have caused commotion based on events, appointees and laws that Bush has made. It would also include the thoughts of pundits on both sides of the arguments. As well as excerpts from this talk page. In a way, it would be kind of like the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry page in that both sides would get their opinnions stated. Discuss: User:Secret
I made a few edits here tonight. If you disagree, please do not blanket revert. Please dialog here. Merecat 02:53, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
I've reinserted this section because I felt it was removed for insufficient cause. Yes, it's true that Moore's insinuation - that the Saudis were flown out during the no-fly period - was false. However, his chief point - that these Saudis, some of them members of the Bin Laden family, were not detained and questioned regarding the crimes of their infamous relative - is definitely important enough to be notable. While I agree that it's likely that Moore's omission was deliberate (and therefore kind of slimy), it's not sufficient grounds for removing the section. Wikipedia isn't the right place to judge what Moore knew or didn't know. Kasreyn 20:34, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
The only possible reason for inserting this meretricious gossip is to have people walk away saying, "Hm, might be something in it!" There's nothing in it. Bloviate is indeed a fair verb to describe what Mr. Moore does in his doccos. If you want to discuss the allegation, then do it on a Michael Moore article, not on an article about one of his victims. Or create a new article called "The Saudi flights fantasy." I have an external link for it already! -- Cubdriver 22:09, 30 April 2006 (UTC)
Kasreyn is correct here. The Saudi flight is no fantasy, and its source need not be Mr. Moore. The Saudi flight was written about in a Tampa newspaper shortly after 911 and confirmed after the movie mentioned it. There was at least one flight on 9/13 and more on 9/14. I believe this is already covered elsewhere in wikipedia. Richard Clarke did take responsibility for approving the flight after the 911 Commission report was published, but when he was asked about it during the hearings, he said that the flights were likely approved either by the white house or the state department.-- csloat 08:15, 1 May 2006 (UTC)
If Clarke himself says (at best) "I don't know" and the 9/11 Commission (page 329) says: "We found no evidence that anyone at the White House above the level of Richard Clarke participated in a decision on the departure of Saudi nationals", then this information does not belong on Bush's article, but in does belong in Clarke's article. After all, Clarke did authorize the flight, but does not know (and therefore cannot say) if White House told him to. There has been a finding of "no evidence" against Bush/WH on this and Clarke does not offer any ("I don't know"). To put this in Bush's article is sheer conjecture. Merecat 13:20, 1 May 2006 (UTC)