BET: $500 says Bush will claim ignorance about Iraq, a la Reagan's alzheimers
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http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36586
I warned Bush about O'Neill
Posted: January 14, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
I hate to say it, but I told you so.
I warned President Bush and the American people about Paul O'Neill a long time ago.
Now, President Bush deserves all the flak he gets for his appointment of the former treasury secretary.
Here's what I said about the appointment Dec. 28, 2000, in a column titled, "Those Cabinet appointments <http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=21078>":
One of those (disastrous appointments) is Paul O'Neill for treasury secretary. The better known right-fielder for the New York Yankees of the same name would have been a superior choice to this Alcoa Aluminum executive. Why is he so bad? In 1992, the nominee met with Bill Clinton and embraced a proposal for a new energy tax. He has never renounced this wacky idea publicly.
Now the chickens have come home to roost for Bush.
Firing O'Neill, a man who never should have been appointed in the first place, ensured that he would do exactly what he has done - write a scathing book about the Bush administration.
It seems O'Neill was dabbling in foreign policy as well as economic matters while serving as treasury secretary. He now says the planning for the invasion of Iraq was under way long before Sept. 11, 2001.
Of that I have no doubts. Planning for the invasion of Iraq was done in the two previous administrations and was taking place as late as 1998 while President Clinton was still in office. Should it surprise anyone that contingency plans were being made to deal with this long-standing international threat? It would surprise me if they weren't.
He also says there was no evidence of weapons of mass destruction before the attack. I wonder where he gets such an assessment? The CIA believed they were there. British intelligence believed they were there. Again, the previous administration believed they were there. Saddam Hussein had all but announced he had them.
What kind of historical revisionism takes place so soon after the actual event? And why are so many Americans so eager, willing and able to buy into it?
O'Neill is a loser - he always was. Bush was right to dump him. But he made a huge mistake choosing a disloyal, disgruntled treasury secretary who never believed in tax cuts. Thus, once again, Bush is responsible for all the criticism he's facing right now.
I said back then at the end of 2000 that Bush only had a limited time to demonstrate to the American people that Republicans have a better grasp of governance than the Democrats. They had control of the Congress and the executive branch for the first time in half a century.
Bush squandered the time he had.
He made no efforts to reform or eliminate massive, out-of-control federal bureaucracies that continue to diminish our personal, inalienable, God-given liberties.
Now Bush is alienating more of his constituency with a plan to legalize millions of lawbreaking aliens. He has already created giant new bureaucracies and confiscated billions more from taxpayers with massive giveaways to corporate farmers and prescription-drug plans. He has signed on to Big Brother-style invasions of privacy in a supposed fight against terrorism, even while leaving our borders wide open and our airline pilots defenseless. He has pushed a hopelessly misguided agenda for the creation of a Palestinian state that will backfire and increase international terrorism, not diminish it.
How appropriate that Bush would be undone by one of his own stupid Cabinet choices. I still say the former right-fielder for the Yankees would have been a better selection than the other Paul O'Neill.
I warned Bush about O'Neill
Posted: January 14, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
I hate to say it, but I told you so.
I warned President Bush and the American people about Paul O'Neill a long time ago.
Now, President Bush deserves all the flak he gets for his appointment of the former treasury secretary.
Here's what I said about the appointment Dec. 28, 2000, in a column titled, "Those Cabinet appointments <http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=21078>":
One of those (disastrous appointments) is Paul O'Neill for treasury secretary. The better known right-fielder for the New York Yankees of the same name would have been a superior choice to this Alcoa Aluminum executive. Why is he so bad? In 1992, the nominee met with Bill Clinton and embraced a proposal for a new energy tax. He has never renounced this wacky idea publicly.
Now the chickens have come home to roost for Bush.
Firing O'Neill, a man who never should have been appointed in the first place, ensured that he would do exactly what he has done - write a scathing book about the Bush administration.
It seems O'Neill was dabbling in foreign policy as well as economic matters while serving as treasury secretary. He now says the planning for the invasion of Iraq was under way long before Sept. 11, 2001.
Of that I have no doubts. Planning for the invasion of Iraq was done in the two previous administrations and was taking place as late as 1998 while President Clinton was still in office. Should it surprise anyone that contingency plans were being made to deal with this long-standing international threat? It would surprise me if they weren't.
He also says there was no evidence of weapons of mass destruction before the attack. I wonder where he gets such an assessment? The CIA believed they were there. British intelligence believed they were there. Again, the previous administration believed they were there. Saddam Hussein had all but announced he had them.
What kind of historical revisionism takes place so soon after the actual event? And why are so many Americans so eager, willing and able to buy into it?
O'Neill is a loser - he always was. Bush was right to dump him. But he made a huge mistake choosing a disloyal, disgruntled treasury secretary who never believed in tax cuts. Thus, once again, Bush is responsible for all the criticism he's facing right now.
I said back then at the end of 2000 that Bush only had a limited time to demonstrate to the American people that Republicans have a better grasp of governance than the Democrats. They had control of the Congress and the executive branch for the first time in half a century.
Bush squandered the time he had.
He made no efforts to reform or eliminate massive, out-of-control federal bureaucracies that continue to diminish our personal, inalienable, God-given liberties.
Now Bush is alienating more of his constituency with a plan to legalize millions of lawbreaking aliens. He has already created giant new bureaucracies and confiscated billions more from taxpayers with massive giveaways to corporate farmers and prescription-drug plans. He has signed on to Big Brother-style invasions of privacy in a supposed fight against terrorism, even while leaving our borders wide open and our airline pilots defenseless. He has pushed a hopelessly misguided agenda for the creation of a Palestinian state that will backfire and increase international terrorism, not diminish it.
How appropriate that Bush would be undone by one of his own stupid Cabinet choices. I still say the former right-fielder for the Yankees would have been a better selection than the other Paul O'Neill.
Would you hire a convicted felon in your company?
http://www.dreamscape.com/morgana/reagan.htm
Former Iran-Contra figures who have been given jobs in the Bush administration:
-JOHN POINDEXTER. Reagan national security adviser during Iran-Contra, the retired admiral is director of the Pentagon's Information Awareness Office. Created after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the office uses computer technology to detect and analyze new kinds of military threats, including those from terrorist organizations. Poindexter was convicted in 1990 on five felony counts of conspiracy, making false statements to Congress and obstructing congressional inquiries. In 1991, an appellate court overturned the convictions and similar ones against former White House aide Oliver North. The court held that the government had improperly used immunized congressional testimony against them.
-ELLIOTT ABRAMS. A former assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, Abrams was hired by Bush last year as special White House assistant for democracy and human rights. Abrams pleaded guilty to withholding Iran-Contra information from Congress and was among six Iran-Contra figures pardoned on Dec. 24, 1992, by the first President Bush.
-OTTO REICH. Serving as assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, Abrams' old job. From 1983 to 1986, Reich led a State Department office accused of running an illegal covert domestic propaganda effort against Nicaragua's leftist Sandinista government. Senate Democrats blocked his nomination last year. Bush installed him with a "recess appointment,'' allowing him to serve for a year. The formal nomination was resubmitted recently.
-RICHARD ARMITAGE. As deputy secretary of state, Armitage is No. 2 at the State Department after Secretary of State Colin Powell. The first President Bush nominated him to be Army secretary, but Armitage withdrew after his knowledge of Iran-Contra dealings as a top Pentagon official became an issue. In congressional hearings, he denied he had met an Israeli official to discuss the Iran arms sales. A classified Israeli intelligence report suggested otherwise.
-JOHN NEGROPONTE. A veteran diplomat serving now as U.N. ambassador, Negroponte's nomination was stalled for months by Democrats. They criticized his work as ambassador to Honduras in the 1980s, when the Central American country was used as a base for the U.S.-backed Contra rebels. He was approved quickly, however, after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
-MITCH DANIELS. Currently director of the Office of Management and Budget, Daniels was Reagan's political director who participated in a White House political damage-control effort in 1986 and 1987. Daniels privately complained to associates at the time, however, that the White House account of the secret diplomatic initiative to Iran was not believable, according to various reports.
-COLIN POWELL. In 1968, as a staff army major in Vietnam, Colin Powell played a direct role in suppressing the inquiry into the My Lai massacre, and into related atrocities against civilians. As a White House fellow during the Watergate years he earned a reputation -- but only for keeping his mouth shut.
As a military assistant to Caspar Weinberger during the Reagan administration, he helped to deceive Congress about the trading in heavy weapons with Iran, about the exchange of those weapons for hostages, and about the diversion of the illicit proceeds to finance another illicit operation in Nicaragua.
http://www.dreamscape.com/morgana/reagan.htm
Former Iran-Contra figures who have been given jobs in the Bush administration:
-JOHN POINDEXTER. Reagan national security adviser during Iran-Contra, the retired admiral is director of the Pentagon's Information Awareness Office. Created after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the office uses computer technology to detect and analyze new kinds of military threats, including those from terrorist organizations. Poindexter was convicted in 1990 on five felony counts of conspiracy, making false statements to Congress and obstructing congressional inquiries. In 1991, an appellate court overturned the convictions and similar ones against former White House aide Oliver North. The court held that the government had improperly used immunized congressional testimony against them.
-ELLIOTT ABRAMS. A former assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, Abrams was hired by Bush last year as special White House assistant for democracy and human rights. Abrams pleaded guilty to withholding Iran-Contra information from Congress and was among six Iran-Contra figures pardoned on Dec. 24, 1992, by the first President Bush.
-OTTO REICH. Serving as assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, Abrams' old job. From 1983 to 1986, Reich led a State Department office accused of running an illegal covert domestic propaganda effort against Nicaragua's leftist Sandinista government. Senate Democrats blocked his nomination last year. Bush installed him with a "recess appointment,'' allowing him to serve for a year. The formal nomination was resubmitted recently.
-RICHARD ARMITAGE. As deputy secretary of state, Armitage is No. 2 at the State Department after Secretary of State Colin Powell. The first President Bush nominated him to be Army secretary, but Armitage withdrew after his knowledge of Iran-Contra dealings as a top Pentagon official became an issue. In congressional hearings, he denied he had met an Israeli official to discuss the Iran arms sales. A classified Israeli intelligence report suggested otherwise.
-JOHN NEGROPONTE. A veteran diplomat serving now as U.N. ambassador, Negroponte's nomination was stalled for months by Democrats. They criticized his work as ambassador to Honduras in the 1980s, when the Central American country was used as a base for the U.S.-backed Contra rebels. He was approved quickly, however, after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
-MITCH DANIELS. Currently director of the Office of Management and Budget, Daniels was Reagan's political director who participated in a White House political damage-control effort in 1986 and 1987. Daniels privately complained to associates at the time, however, that the White House account of the secret diplomatic initiative to Iran was not believable, according to various reports.
-COLIN POWELL. In 1968, as a staff army major in Vietnam, Colin Powell played a direct role in suppressing the inquiry into the My Lai massacre, and into related atrocities against civilians. As a White House fellow during the Watergate years he earned a reputation -- but only for keeping his mouth shut.
As a military assistant to Caspar Weinberger during the Reagan administration, he helped to deceive Congress about the trading in heavy weapons with Iran, about the exchange of those weapons for hostages, and about the diversion of the illicit proceeds to finance another illicit operation in Nicaragua.