I think you're dreaming when you sit and consider that most of the policies these last four years were put into place by Congress to begin with.
That's not what Beek said. "Put in place" is an entirely different thing to where the policies started. Most things that made it through Congress were (fortunately) toned down a fair bit.
Much of the damage Bush has done to the country was accomplished through Presidential appointments and executive orders. Once Bush is gone, Kerry can reverse the damage with a simple signature. The budget crisis will be much harder to fix, but I'm sure Kerry will have enough support to allow the tax cuts to expire and be replaced by cuts aimed at the middle class.
Im kinda torn on the international relations thing.
I know a guy that was in "intellegence" he was in special forces, seems like he was a Seal or a Ranger that went into intellegence, he wouldnt talk a lot about what he did, but once the US started talking about enforcing sactions to Iraq, he laughed at the Germans and French responses. He then told me that part of what he did was missions in Iraq before this Iraq want and after the Desert Storm war. He basically hid in the desert with a camera that had a really long lens like a couple of feet long. His job was to take pictures of airplanes that came in to Iraq on the route to a big airport there. The camera was good enough to read the numbers on planes.
The intellegence he gathered allowed them to look up the planes manifests and track them back. Turns out the French and Germans were illeagally selling banned stuff to Iraq at contraband level prices. And they were flying the stuff in a big way.
No wonder France and Germany were against forcing Iraq to comply. Geez they were not gonna kill the golden goose. I know all governements are corrupt to one degree or another. But this cost us possibly of not having to go to war and american lives, had a united front of countries demanded Saddam comply. The more I dig into the UN and the corruption there, I get kinda sick, to the point I just dont wanna know any more. They recently reported that it will take over 20yrs to follow the paper trails of the UN and Saddams illeagal finacial arrangements.
I doubt you can ever make a corruption clear international body. Nature of people and power I suppose. But Germany and French officials more than crossed the line on this one. When we started finding French anti aircraft missles in Iraq dated after the embargo to Iraq. I mean at that time US was the only country doing fly overs to enforce the embargo.The french were selling Iraq weapons that could only be for use against us.
The guys had thier fingers (no not fingers they were clear up to their arm pits) in the cookie jar and Bush broke freaking jar. Sadly had they be supportive, the jar may not have needed to be broken. =(
Makes me sick. It's why I know I couldnt ever be an elected official, even if you are clean you have to deal with dirty stuff. Not only do you have to deal with it, you have to shake its hand, smile and say what a great guy it is. (French and Germany) =P
How is Kerry going to improve relations?? Put his arms around the French and Germans, tell them how wrong we were and what great guys the French and Germans are? Offer them the same sweet deals getting really cheap oil illeagally. Bend over for them and tell them we really like it, please continue as before.
Im sorry, I m just really ticked, I know we international relations are important, but I find it kind of hard to sit down after all the screwing I as a US citizen have recieved from them. =(
The Queen's own Red Dwarf
Over the mountians of the moon,
Down the valley of the shadow,
Ride boldy ride,
If you seek for Eldorado.
That story sounds like it has about as much "truth" in it as a Mike Moore movie. If your "friend" was covert ops and was telling you all this stuff he's breaking all sorts of laws - enough to make him completely untrustworthy in the first place. To date, I've heard stories about Iraqi weapons with French, German, US, Israeli, Iranian and Russian serial numbers stamped on them - all after the "ban"! I'm betting you've been taken in by yet another fish story.
You also need to get your facts straight. The US was never solely enforcing the no fly zone. Britain at a bare minimum was there also.
False dichotomies are also bad. Not pissing off the world (as Bush has managed to achieve) doesn't mean embracing everyone and grovelling. There's such a thing as middle ground - something both the French and the US seem remarkably unfamiliar with lately.
And lastly, while you're going after corruption, the US's shit ain't so pretty either. There's corruption on almost every level of every government and quite frankly it's hypocritical for anyone to stand tall and scream "ZOMG - THEY R CORRUPTZ".
He has a limp he got from being in the service. When asked about it he just says it was a training accident and wont talk about it.
He has been out of the military for a while when he told me about the mission. He wont talk about anything else much and is now a policeman. It's why I was surprised when he talked about the opservation of airplanes, seemed he found the German and French stand amusing, he wouldnt talk about anything else except that the training to be in specail forces was pretty rough. He only told me about the airplanes and the origin of them being from France and Germany, the rest I got from following articles and TV. Not the most reliable granted.
The stamped anti aircraft missles I got from CNN TV during the war. Granted CNN aint the best source of info. I got the part about the 20yrs to unwind the UN involment from AOL news report. Again maybe not the best resource. But everytime I follow articles into the UN and corruption it just gets disgusting. I quit doing it.
The Queen's own Red Dwarf
Over the mountians of the moon,
Down the valley of the shadow,
Ride boldy ride,
If you seek for Eldorado.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying he's lying at all. Just saying he's probably not completely in the loop. I've no doubt if he said he was there taking photos then he was there. The rest just doesn't add up, simply because it's trivial to track aircraft via radar - you don't need to go in and photograph them to find out which ones they are.
Germany and France (as well as the US and others) all had legitimate reasons to fly cargo in and out of Iraq. The question naturally becomes one of who was smuggling stuff they shouldn't have been?
I thought it was Russia that was caught selling AA missiles to the Iraqis, not France/Germany?
If you want to know what they have and what is shown to them try searching IDEX info
IDEX=International Defense Exhibit and has a few shows a year and is anything and everything that could be considered for military use for sale. The biggest exhibitors at the Gulf show is GTA(French company with lots of french models hanging around equipment) followed by the Russians, Germany and UK are about even, rest of euro companies with US companies bringing up the rear. IDEX info and Jane's info is your best source of what each country has. IDEX will show what was sold above board and Jane's will give all the unclassified info on equipment and numbers of items disclosed.
You'll see lots and lots of french and russian items.
The US companies are small in comparison to the others due to not all of our equipment is for sale and the company reps say that they can not compete with the other companies business practices at least according to the Sikorsky reps I worked with at one show.
I think I said "All countries seem to be corrupt to some degree or another".
What discusted me, was that IMO France & Germany, could have most likely stopped the war. But did not. I have no doubt that America has corruption as well, but I would hope that we would come together for the good of the whole if begged to as France and Germany were.
I mean back in the 70's when the cold war was going, I had a callegemate that had been in the nave in nuclear subs, was sent to France to inspect the making of the periscopes. The French at that time had some of the best optics in the world so they got the contract for our periscopes. When he took the tour of the facitily he was shown the place where France made the periscopes for the Soviet Union submarines. It seemed kinda odd at the time that France would be selling hard to make military stuff to both sides of the cold war, when they were part of NATO. Kinda a wierd feeling to have an ally selling military equip to an opposing military force. France showed their willingnees to do quite a bit for money to me at that point. But they weren't causing a war and it probably wasnt illeagle.
So it doesnt take much for me to believe that France did what I think it did. I have yet to see anything to disprove it and lots pointing to the fact it did happen. My police friend, comments made by Iraqi officials, ect. No one thing convinced me, just too much smoke for me not to believe there is a fire.
Oh a side show to watch, I expect also to see Germany and France, under the table, duking it out over who gets to be the big man of the EU.
The Queen's own Red Dwarf
Over the mountians of the moon,
Down the valley of the shadow,
Ride boldy ride,
If you seek for Eldorado.
I just want to start out by saying I'm voting for Bush. I do not agree with some of the things he has done but all and all hes not bad. The only problem I have with Sen. Kerry though is his focus towards dicussing how bad Mr. Bush is. I think if he were to start pushing his policies he would have a better turn out and a better lead ant the voting poles.
Aside from the Swiftboats vets ads and some minor other there isent much coming from the Republican side, but as i watch tv and all see is ads from moveon.org and moveon.pac and alot of other sites they all bash Mr. Bush, its starting to sicken me a little.
So I ask the question,
1) What are his major changes he plans to make
2) What can he do to bring our troops home faster
3) What can he do to thwart terrorism in this country
4) What can he do better for the USA, other then taking Mr. Bush out of office
As I stated before I do plan on voting for Mr. Bush, but if Sen. Kerry would focus on what he can do to better for this country and overseas I think he would have a better shot at winning my vote
What i really want to know though is what are his major plans for helping this Country. Sen. Kerry's Voting record sucks so i have nothing to go on. I'm trying to keep an open mind and hear things from both sides, but lets face the facts all were hearing from both sides is them bad mouthing each other.
Bahccster - One of the primary financiers of Smear Boat Liars for Bush is a longtime political associate of Karl Rove. It's a front for the Bush campaign, pure and simple.
Madrix - Soros? He's given money to both groups. Soros is not an advisor to nor a part of the Kerry campaign.
