Bombers could cost Bush the White House

[Judi Lynn]

Bombers could cost Bush the White House

With every atrocity, assurances of peace and progress ring more hollow as war and terror become part of the politics of re-election

Edward Helmore in New York
Sunday August 24, 2003
The Observer

The Bush administration is showing concern that the spiralling chaos of events in Iraq and Israel may damage the President's re-election bid.
Although senior Republican strategists decline to discuss the prospect openly, some are whispering that the centrepiece of the Bush administration - handling of national security, and the war in Iraq in particular - could now become a vulnerability rather than an asset. One senior administration official conceded that the suicide attacks in Iraq and Israel last Tuesday made 'by far the worst political day for Bush since 9/11'.

In less than a month since Bush proclaimed that 'conditions in most of Iraq are growing more peaceful' and pronounced that 'pretty good progress' was being made toward Middle East peace and a Palestinian state within two years, the illusion of progress has been shattered.

With the road map to peace in Israel deeply troubled, Iraqi resistance to foreign occupation growing stronger, and the US returning both to the UN to ask for help in Iraq and calling on Yasser Arafat to rein in Hamas, Bush is being advised to revise his political message that conditions are improving with realism that there is unlikely to be a 'peace dividend' by the time of the election in 15 months.

'We should not try to convince people that things are getting better,' said former Reagan official Kenneth Adelman. 'Rather, we should convince people that ours is the age of terrorism.' (snip/...)

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,1028374,00.html

[Booberdawg]

1. Didn't we know this would happen??

That this would end up a mess?? *sigh*.

At least it is some consolation in the fact that the war is becoming his liability instead of his strength. But geeze!

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. But his freeper base

still stand behind him. On another board, a freeper said that the bombing was the total result of those godless Muslims whose sole purpose in life is to kill people. Showed no appreciation for the fact that Shrub and Co have made a mess of things, esp. in regards to security. No, I didn't answer him (though he taunted me for my lack of response). I've explained Islam to him before, and he just doesn't want to hear it-just like he doesn't want to hear that Bush isn't God. Let's hope there are some Americans out there that have a brain or two and are realizing the mess this Administration has got us into.

[Paschall]

3. Unfortunately, the subtext here...

...is that as the election draws closer, the anti-American violence is only likely to escalate. Shrub has created quite a few enemies who possess killing power and I fear they'll use it to snuff out his re-election. But it will be our troops--or, god forbid, civilians--who will shed the blood.