[Mb-civic] Bush league

Wed Sep 8 22:46:44 PDT 2004

The Polls Come Back to Earth
    t r u t h o u t | Staff Report
    Tuesday 07 September 2004

    It has been a wild week for numbers. Immediately after the Republican
Convention, Time and Newsweek released poll numbers indicating a
significant bounce for George W. Bush, and an 11 point lead over John
Kerry. A few days go by, however, and the air appears to have been let out
of the tires.

    The new Rasmussen poll has the two Presidential candidates tied 47.3%
    to
47.3%. This leads to an inescapable conclusion: If all these numbers are
correct - Time, Newsweek and Rasmussen - then Mr. Bush has suffered an
historic cratering in his poll numbers within 100 hours of the close of
his party's convention.

    But perhaps the ballyhooed post-convention lead enjoyed by Bush never
existed at all. Pollster John Zogby says, "I have Mr. Bush leading by 2
points in the simple head-to-head match up - 46% to 44%. Add in the other
minor candidates and it becomes a 3 point advantage for the President -
46% to 43%...it simply is not an 11 point race. It just isn't."

    It should be noted that Rasmussen provided the core data for both the
TIME and Newsweek polls. Their independent interpretation of the very same
data produced dramatically different conclusions than those reached by
TIME and Newsweek.

    The 'Bush bounce' after the convention has either disappeared
completely, or never existed at all. Neither bodes well for the incumbent.
Gallup, which has on many occasions appeared to be working as a PR arm of
the Bush election campaign, paints an interesting political perspective:
"Bush's two-point convention bounce is one of the smallest registered in
Gallup polling history, along with Hubert Humphrey's two-point bounce
following the 1968 Democratic convention, George McGovern's zero-point
bounce following the 1972 Democratic convention, and Kerry's "negative
bounce" of one point among registered voters earlier this year. Bush's
bounce is the smallest an incumbent president has received."

***

BUSHGREENWATCH
Tracking the Bush Administration's Environmental Misdeeds
http://www.bushgreenwatch.org
***************************************

September 8, 2004

BUSH FLIP-FLOP ON ROADLESS FOREST RULE TRIGGERS STORM OF 
PROTEST

Soon after the Bush administration took office, it promised to
uphold the Clinton administration's Roadless Area Conservation
Rule, enacted in 2001 to protect some 58.5 million acres of
America's last unspoiled National Forests from logging, mining
and drilling. 

But this summer President Bush flip-flopped. The
administration's U.S. Forest Service announced it is repealing
the rule, which was designed to protect vital sources of clean
water and wildlife habitat. Since the year 2000, the timber
industry alone has given $25 million to the Bush administration
and its Congressional allies. 

The Bush reversal has set off a torrent of protests by the
conservation community, which is calling on Forest Service Chief
Dale Bosworth to extend the public comment period beyond the
current expiration date set for next Tuesday, September 14th.
The environmental community is calling for a 45-day extension. 

Conservationists feel especially betrayed not only by the Bush
flip-flop, but also because the rule was enacted by the Clinton
administration only after three full years of open public
dialogue and extensive scientific analysis. Over 600 public
hearings were held nationwide. A record 1.5 million comments
were submitted, with over 95% supporting the Roadless Rule. Yet
the Bush administration is now portraying the rule as a
last-minute process. 

According to a recent study by the Campaign to Protect America's
Lands (CPAL), the Bush repeal not only endangers the nation's
few remaining unspoiled forests, but also threatens 23 nearby
national parks and monuments in 16 states. [1] Among them are
Yosemite, Yellowstone, Rocky Mountain and Olympic National
Parks. The 23 sites are visited by some 40 million Americans
every year. 

As CPAL Director Peter Altman told BushGreenwatch, "The parks
will suffer from the collateral damage of timber clearcuts,
destroyed wildlife habitats and migratory corridors, streams
destroyed by sediment, and the noise and stench of industrial
development." 

Coalition of Concerned National Park Service Retirees
spokesperson Bill Wade called on Interior Secretary Gale Norton
to oppose the action by the Forest Service, which is part of the
Department of Agriculture. "No Interior Secretary worth his or
her salt would stand by and allow this indirect attack on our
national parks to go unchallenged," said Wade. 

### 

TAKE ACTION
Send your comments before the public comment period ends on
September 14: http://ga3.org/ct/g11g7oM1jQ-q/. 

### 

SOURCES: 
[1] CPAL report, Jul. 28, 2004,
http://ga3.org/ct/611g7oM1jQ-N/.

-------

Bush by Numbers: Four Years of Double Standards
by Graydon Carter, The lndependent/UK, September 3, 2004
(Extract from "What We've Lost", by Graydon Carter, published by Little 
Brown on 9 September)

George Bush: Military man
1972 Year that Bush walked away from his pilot duties in the Texas National 
Guard, Nearly two years before his six-year obligation was up.
$3,500 Reward a group of veterans offered in 2000 for anyone who could 
confirm Bush's Alabama guard service.
600-700 Number of guardsmen who were in Bush's unit during that period.
0 Number of guardsmen from that period who came forward with information 
about Bush's guard service.
0 Number of minutes that President Bush, Vice-President Dick Cheney, the 
Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, the assistant Defence Secretary, Paul 
Wolfowitz, the former chairman of the Defence Policy Board, Richard Perle, 
and the White House Chief of Staff, Karl Rove  the main proponents of the 
war in Iraq served in combat (combined).
0 Number of principal civilian or Pentagon staff members who planned the 
war who have immediate family members serving in uniform in Iraq.
8 Number of members of the US Senate and House of Representatives who 
have a child serving in the military.
10 Number of days that the Pentagon spent investigating a soldier who had 
called the President "a joke" in a letter to the editor of a Newspaper.
46 Percentage increase in sales between 2001 and 2002 of GI Joe figures 
(children's toys).
Ambitious warrior
2 Number of Nations that George Bush has attacked and taken over since 
coming into office.
130 Approximate Number of countries (out of a total of 191 recognised by the 
United Nations) with a US military presence.
43 Percentage of the entire world's military spending that the US spends on 
defence. (That was in 2002, the year before the invasion of Iraq.)
$401.3bn Proposed military budget for 2004.

A soldier's best friend
40,000 Number of soldiers in Iraq seven months after start of the war still 
without Interceptor vests, designed to stop a round from an AK-47.
$60m Estimated cost of outfitting those 40,000 soldiers with Interceptor 
vests.
62 Percentage of gas masks that army investigators discovered did Not work 
properly in autumn 2002.
90 Percentage of detectors which give early warning of a biological weapons 
attack found to be defective.
87 Percentage of Humvees in Iraq not equipped with armour capable of 
stopping AK-47 rounds and protecting against roadside bombs and 
landmines at the end of 2003...

LOTS MORE AT: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0903-04.htm

-----

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