|
Support Our Troops! Bring them home!
(why is that message so hard to understand?)
Happy Memorial Day! Let's celebrate the folks who fought and who continue to fight. Their sacrifices cannot be overstated, and they cannot be over-rewarded for their dedication to our country.
Unfortunately, for some reason President Bush and his good buddy John McCain disagree with that statement. They both oppose the new GI Bill of Rights, a bipartisan bill proposed by Democrat Alan Webb and Republican Chuck Hagel. The supposed reason is that if the post-military college benefits are too high, military retention would decrease and the country would be weakened.
Boy, that argument has so many holes I'm not sure where to start. True, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the proposed bill would decrease retention by 16%. ON THE SAME PAGE OF THE REPORT, the CBO also estimates that recruiting would increase. By 16%. The CBO also points out that an increase in college benefits would be especially attractive to higher-achieving, college-bound recruits. For years, the military has been steadily decreasing its minimum requirements to hit recruiting goals. With this new bill, the military may very well have less need to grant "waivers" for felons to fill the ranks.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/21/AR2008042103295_pf.html
So, why do Bush and McCain hate the troops? Well, OK, they don't -- that was just mean. What they hate is that if the bill passes, Democrats will largely get the credit. After a bunch of Republicans signed on to the bill, a group of neo-conservative lawmakers proposed their own, watered-down version, and bullied many Republicans into backing off their support of the Webb-Hagel bill.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/26/opinion/26mon1.html?ref=opinion
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/09/cbo-webb-hagel/
Now the good news -- the new GI bill has passed both the House and the Senate by veto-proof margins. Of course, Bush could still veto it, and then be embarrassed when his veto is over-ridden and he has to sign the bill into law anyway. Everyone in Washington is kind of holding their breath on that one. Even Republicans, for the most part, are praying that Bush isn't that stupid. More and more of them are distancing themselves from Bush every day.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/26/everybody-hates-george-bush/
OK, on to a new topic, because it is so unbelievable that I can't stop thinking about it. On Sunday, Liz Trotta, a Faux News contributor and former New York bureau chief of the Washington Times (NOT to be confused with the Washington Post, which is a real newspaper), said that she would like Obama's assassination just as much as she would Osama Bin Laden's. Yes, of course she was "joking," and of course it was a "slip of the tongue" and she's "sorry." But here's what she actually said:
"And now we have what some are reading as a suggestion that sombody knock off Osama — Obama. Well, both, if we could."
Seriously -- after mistaking Obama for Osama (something, by the way, which happens almost every single day on Fox, but only on Fox), she said that if she could she'd have them both "knocked off." This is on a nationally televised station that claims to be "news." The host of the show did not argue with Trotta's statement.
Uhh, isn't it illegal to even joke about killing a presidential candidate? Shouldn't she be in at least as much trouble as someone joking about a bomb at the airport? To my knowledge, no authority is investigating the incident.
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/25/fox-news-contributor-jokes-about-assassinating-obama/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-seitzman/is-the-secret-service-inv_b_103565.html
One last thing -- no one is talking about it, but Ron Paul continues to show strongly against McCain. In Oregon, 50,000 registered Republicans voted for Ron Paul, and fewer than 300,000 voted for McCain. For the record, Democrats out-voted Republicans 612,998 to 329,935, continuing a nation-wide trend.
Speaking of nation-wide trends, I believe there is an ancient tradition of Tuesday night beer drinking following national holidays. Or any other Monday. So, come on down to the Publick House and join us!
--Rafi
What: Drinking Liberally
When: Tuesday, May 27, 7:15ish
Where: Publick House
2307 Devine Street
Columbia, SC 29205
(803)256-2207 for directions
|
