Bush – Kerry Debate – Where the Smart Money is Going
By Michael Hussey09/30/2004
Futures markets were born out of a desire for businesses to hedge against the uncertainty of various factors affecting their business. As futures and derivatives have become ever more important to business stability, more and more markets have been created. It was only a matter of time before markets were created around the expected outcome of political campaigns.
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From a Republican: Bush was not at his best
By Damon Dimmick09/30/2004
For Republicans, the last two weeks have been good. President Bush seemed to have regained the “big mo” and was widening his lead on Democratic rival John Kerry. In swing state after swing state, voters were moving from undecided to Republican. Tonight’s debate, however, provide a road bump in that heady journey, and although President Bush’s performance was not a disaster, it probably put a damper on some of the premature victory party celebrations being planned.
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Kerry - Bush debate times
By Editor09/29/2004
The first of three presidential debates will be held tomorrow at the University of Miami. The vice-presidential debate will take place on Oct. 5. The second and third presidential debates will occur on Oct. 8 and 13. All debates are expected to last 90 minutes and are scheduled to begin at 9:00 p.m. E.T.
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N.A.S.A., Make Room For Growth
By James A. Landrith, Jr.09/29/2004
With the successes in recent years of N.A.S.A.'s Odyssey and Mars Rover missions, the American space agency is flying pretty high. The disappointment of Beagle 2 notwithstanding, the European Space Agency has made great strides in their space exploration programs recently with the success of their Mars Express orbiter. Further, through a communications link established by the Mars Express orbiter and the Spirit Rover the E.S.A. and NASA have helped establish "the first working international communications network around another planet," according to the E.S.A.'s Rudolf Schmidt.
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Charley, Frances, Ivan, Jeanne and Dubya
By Eric A. Webb09/28/2004
On a day when thousands of Floridians are standing in line for clean water and food, their homes devastated by an unprecedented fourth hurricane of the year, I look at the Republican Party of Florida’s website (link) where state GOP chairman Carole Jean Jordan says that “open-armed conservatism in government will lead to stronger families, less government intervention, more freedoms and more personal responsibility”. In a year where feckless war-zone profiteers sell bottles of water for $10 while undermanned state troopers try to maintain a sense of order, the RPOF’s mission statement states an unabashed fervor for “the free enterprise and the encouragement of individual initiative and incentive”. While our volunteer Florida National Guard is called is out to help in the rehabilitation of their devastated neighbors and families, the state’s GOP continues to push an agenda of square-jawed individualism.
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Summer Book Reviews, pt. 1 - Politics/Economics
By Hunter Williams09/25/2004
I'll be posting a series of short reviews of the books I read this summer while in China, with the first round being those related to politics/economics.
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A window into the UN's peacekeeping missions
By Marcos Rodriguez09/24/2004
The following are excerpts from a report published on the South African Independent Online. It is not an easy read, and it should make anyone sick before mighty anger begins to build up at those responsible: namely, Kofi Annan's United Nations and his European enablers.
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Media downplays Bush lead over Kerry
By Editor09/24/2004
Terry Neal of the Washington Post today suggests that the presidential race is getting close -- too close, in fact, to declare Bush a clear leader.
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Bush, Kerry, and the Exorcism of Vietnam
By Hunter Williams09/22/2004
For more than thirty years, the American psyche has been haunted by a spirit that infects us with self-doubt, whispers “quagmire” at every obstacle, and makes wannabe-hippie protestors believe they're heroes of democracy. Vietnam shattered our sense of unity and our confidence in victory, but more than anything else, Vietnam crushed our national optimism and faith in America’s role in the world. To this day, we have not been able to fully escape that spirit of pessimism and doubt.
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No Good Options in Iraq
By Jeff Myhre09/21/2004
If the media tear themselves away from the self-destruction of CBS News, we might get to the point in this campaign where both sides can start talking about January 21, 2005 instead of various dates in 1972. Then again, with the situation in Iraq as it is, maybe it will be easier to change the past than to chart a way out of the quagmire of Iraq.
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Who is the bigger dupe: Dan Rather or George W. Bush?
By Mike Thomas09/20/2004
Bush apologists are now demanding a retraction and an apology from CBS News and Dan Rather over the apparently forged National Guard documents. CBS was apparently duped into running a story on 60 Minutes II that was based on the bogus memos.
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Kofi's Epiphany
By Marc C. Johnson09/16/2004
It took Kofi Annan quite a while to come to the conclusion that the invasion of Iraq was illegal, didn't it?
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Back to the Future in Russia
By Marc C. Johnson09/14/2004
Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday announced an overhaul of the entire Russian political system, with the ostensible objective of making the country stronger in its ability to contend with terrorism. Setting aside to some extent the question of Beslan (and the other catastrophic terrorist incidents in Russia's recent past), this move will almost certainly result in less freedom for ordinary Russians at the very moment when they need more. It calls to mind the hoary (and apparently anonymous) statement by an officer in Vietnam, "we had to destroy the village to save it."
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DNA Legislation Hits Snags
By Bill Wallo09/13/2004
Efforts to pass the so-called Advancing Justice Through DNA Technology Act have hit roadblocks: despite significant bipartisan support for the bill in both the House and the Senate, it appears caught in political wrangling over issues of compensating those wrongly convicted of crimes, possible frivolous appeals, and the chance that it might - horror of horrors - somehow "undermine" the death penalty system.
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Dan Rather is an early casualty in the war over truth in reporting
By Michael Hussey09/12/2004
There is a war under way for truth in reporting and a defiant Dan Rather is about to become one of the first foot soldiers fighting for Big Media to go down. It is quickly becoming common knowledge that Dan Rather and CBS’s 60 Minutes rushed to judgment regarding the authenticity of Texas National Guard documents potentially damaging to President Bush’s reelection campaign. Rather has unapologetically defended the report, seemingly oblivious to the magnitude of his error and the damage it is going to cause CBS. The fact that Americans are more and more concerned about the authenticity and implications of the 60 Minutes report than the content of the documents is evidence that accuracy in reporting is the big story of this election session.
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No Sympathy for the Devil
By Bill Wallo09/11/2004
In a little less than two months, Americans will go to the polls and choose the man who will serve as their president for the next four years. Much like Bill Clinton before him (and perhaps moreso, the "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" notwithstanding), George W. Bush has been a polarizing force for many Americans, and this election has been full of heated rhetoric from both the right and the left. A great deal of this rancor and animosity stems from the Bush Administration's decision to invade Iraq last year: a preemptive strike many regarded as unjustified and perhaps illegitimate, and certainly a decision roundly condemned in many countries around the world.
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Canadian Garbage
By Mike Pechar09/10/2004
Obviously pandering for votes, candidate John Kerry announced that he would immediately ban the dumping of Canadian garbage in Michigan if elected president. The State of Michigan, Congress, and Canadian officials have been wrestling with the garbage issue for well over a decade without resolution. The issue has been politically contentious and, maybe, unreasonably so. According to the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality,
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NY Times Prints Unverifiable Charges Against Bush
By Stephen Macklin09/09/2004
The Official Kerry For President Newsletter (registration required) has a "news story" on the front page of its online edition continuing the party's efforts to flog the long dead horse of President Bush's National Guard Service. And they do so with the hypocrisy and half-truths you would expect from the official party propaganda organ.
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Bush was a disciplinary problem for the National Guard
By Mike Thomas09/09/2004
The latest documents to suddenly surface about George W. Bush’s National Guard service make it clear that Bush did not quit flying jets in 1972 at the behest of or with the support of his commanding officers, as the administration has implied. Rather he was “suspended” after flatly refusing
to carry out a direct order to undertake a medical examination.
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The National Guard Story Returns
By Stephen Macklin09/08/2004
Not satisfied with the devastation suffered as a result of the decision to base the entire campaign on John Kerry's four months of service in Vietnam, the Democrats have launched a counter offensive by attempting to revive the dead horse of George Bush's National Guard Service. Writing in the official Kerry Campaign Newsletter, aka the New York Times, Nicholas Kristof joins in the first wave of the attack with an Op-ED titled Missing in Action.
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Is Terrorism Ever Justified?
By Rand Fishkin09/07/2004
A recent article by Masha Gessen of Slate entitled 'What drives the separatists to commit such terrible outrages?' makes a strong point about the driving factors behind terrorism. Gessen outlines the modern history of Chechnya and notes the trials of the people at the hands of government oppression from Moscow.
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A.P. Abandons Objectivity
By Stephen Macklin09/04/2004
Everybody knows that the media is not biased, right? There is no tendency for their political leanings to influence their reporting. Reporters do not selectively include or exclude facts based on their own political views. No, that never happens.
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The Economist goes wobbly
By I.J. Reilly09/02/2004
I'm not the first to notice that the Economist has lost some objectivity in the previous few years, but this week's editorial on the Bush presidency was the first to prompt me to write a letter to the editor.
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Sound and Fury (Signifying Nothing)
By Marc C. Johnson09/02/2004
Although I’m not at the Republican National Convention, I know my fellow Republicans join me in thanking all those diligent protesters out there for showing up in New York. What would otherwise have been a relatively lackluster affair with only a handful of good speeches has gotten far more than its due in press coverage, and will probably get a post-convention “bump” far larger than anything Sen. Kerry got in Boston. So viva the First Amendment.
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