Letters to the Editor
ondelette
Published Letters: 1984 Editor's Choice: 19
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No, Leoniceno...
[Read the article: To the attorney general's knowledge]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]He isn't saying someone else made the decisions. He's saying that he may have made the decisions without the knowledge that he had made them. It's very subtle, but apparently in this administration, nobody remembers what they did because regardless of whether you ask them one second or one year later, they have done so many important things in between that when you ask them it will be as if they've heard of it for the first time.
They are the smartest people in the country, and have more facts than any of us non-top government people, but they all agree with Ronald Reagan in front of the Tower Commission: "I don't remember and you can't prove it." I'm sure when they finally get Rove under oath, he isn't going to remember how it was that his email got erased either.
It's okay if you didn't remember that Gonzales didn't remember that he didn't remember whether his staff remembered that he didn't remember whether he was in a meeting about something he doesn't remember.
After all, he'd be confused too, if he could only remember.
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Hunh, what?
[Read the article: Iraq: American public opinion vs. a "small but powerful group"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Nixon may have been delusional enough to talk to portraits in the White House, but even he finally recognized that the public had turned against the war.
Nixon knew it all along. He ran, and won, in 1968 on a peace platform. Three months later, Strom Thurmond, then a Democrat, rose in the Senate to say "Mr. Nixon said he had a plan to end the War in 100 days. I wish to inform the President that he has two weeks left."
And then there was the quote, immortalized by Simon and Garfunkel in their "7 O'Clock News/Silent Night", "Former Vice-President Richard Nixon...also said that opposition to the War in this country was the single greatest weapon working against the U.S."
Bush gets it, he always has got it. He doesn't care because he thinks he's right. He already is on record as saying (when he fired Rumsfeld) that it is okay to lie to get things done.
It is apropos to what Glenn is talking about to quote Warren Rudman at the Iran-Contra hearings. Sorry for the long quote, but it is instructive in the current context (from Men of Zeal):
...I can tell you myself, Colonel North...as one who has with reluctance on occasion but in the final analysis found there was no other solution, voted for that aid to the contras--the people in this country just don't think that's a very good idea. And that is why this Congress has been fickle and vacillating...
...I want to point out to you, Colonel North, that the Constitution starts with the words, "We, the people." There is no way you can carry out a consistent policy if we, the people disagree with it, because this Congress represents the people.
The President of the United States, the greatest communicator probably we have seen in the White House in years, has tried for eight years [to gain American support for the Contras] and failed; you have tried, and I thing probably failed...and this relatively obscure senator from New Hampshire has tried with no success at all....
I guess the last thing I want to say to you, Colonel, is that the American people have the constitutional right to be wrong. And what Ronald Reagan thinks or what Oliver North thinks or what anybody else thinks makes not a w[h]it.
...There comes a point when the views of the American people have to be heard.
(My emphasis)
Dick Cheney was sitting right there, in the room, on the committee, when a member of his own party said this. It makes no difference whether these people think they're right. They have no right to be right.
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You missed the point shooter
[Read the article: Iraq: American public opinion vs. a "small but powerful group"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The President does not have the right to ignore the American people on grounds that he knows what he is doing is right. That is for the people to decide, they've decided, he is ignoring them. His power is delegated to him by the people. It is not his, intrinsically.
Sometimes I think you purposely misunderstand, under the misbegotten belief that it makes you seem clever. However, giving you the benefit of the doubt, if you believe that the AUMF gives him some sort of personal authority, then maybe you're right. Maybe Congress should repeal the AUMF. You know the guy better than I do, do you think that would make him listen?
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That was truly amazing
[Read the article: White House and guns: Stay the course]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I've looked at probably 7 comment boards since I heard about Va Tech. Before the first gun control advocate posted a thing, before anyone even knew there were more than 8 people killed, in one case while the terrified students were still posting for information and help, the NRA pro-gun people fanned out over the internet, universally blasting gun control, flooding liberal sites before their adversaries had even posted, battering people who want gun control who hadn't spoken yet, advocating that if the VA Tech campus had been bristling with more weapons than Iraq no one would have got hurt.
Too seamless, well coordinated, on message, and heartless for me.
It's a free country, and one that allows a lot of guns. You have the right to conceal a weapon, I have the right to assume you are a cold blooded killer if I find out you have it. You all proved the cold blooded part today. I don't want to wait for you to prove the killer part, I want your gun taken away.