Mendacity and the New York Times

Here are some interesting developments which in all likelihood will not be covered by the MSM!
Wavels




December 31, 2006 The New York Times' own Rathergate

Thomas Lifson
[FONT=times new roman,times]Byron Calame, public editor of the New York Times, has laid out a carefully worded exposé[/FONT][FONT=times new roman,times] of the utter breakdown of editorial standards at the New York Times. The fact that paper prominently published a falsehood is only the beginning of the problem. When the falsehood was exposed, two senior editors of the paper issued a defense of the article without bothering to check the readily available court documents which critics had cited. Based on this negligent defense, the newspaper's publisher, Pinch Sulzberger, has rebutted critics who have written in.
[/FONT]

[FONT=times new roman,times]Worst of all, even after the proof of the lie, the paper's editor and publisher refuse to publish a correction or even an editor's note. The paper is therefore content to let the lie stand, officially. If it were interested in honest reporting, it would be duty-bound to issue a retraction, one as prominent as the original lie.[/FONT]

[FONT=times new roman,times]This situation is functionally equivalent to the behavior of Dan Rather, who has never admitted that the Texas Air National Guard memorandum he broadcast about George W. Bush is a forgery. Of course, Dan Rather eventually lost his job. The miscreants at the New York Times, standards editor (!) Craig Whitney and New York Times Magazine editor Gerald Marzorati, continue in their jobs. And publisher Pinch Sulzberger blissfully continues to occupy the top job he inherited as scion of the family which controls the corporation, despite owning less than 10% of its shares, thanks to a dual class system of electing directors.[/FONT]
Here is what happened:

American Thinker Blog: The New York Times' own Rathergate
related piece:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/31/opinion/31pubed.html?_r=1&oref=slogin


More fibbing as follows:
The Times Lies About Enemy Combatant Law [Andy McCarthy]
The Times is flat dishonest in its campaign against subjecting enemy combatants to military proceedings, which the Grey Lady passes off as a page-one news article. Correspondent Tim Golden writes: It's hard to quantify how inaccurate (and, one is compelled to conclude, disingenuous) this is.
First, the law that governs these detainees is not the Military Commissions Act that President Bush signed in October. As that act makes clear, the review of Combatant Status Review Tribunals is actually governed by a law the president signed a year earlier, the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 — specifically, Section 1005 of that law.
entire article
The Corner on National Review Online

[SIZE=+1]PRESIDENT BUSH'S AMAZING ACCOMPLISHMENTS[/SIZE]

Abortion & Traditional Values
1. Banned Partial Birth Abortion — by far the most significant roll-back of abortion on demand since Roe v. Wade.
2. Reversed Clinton's move to strike Reagan's anti-abortion Mexico Policy.
3. By Executive Order (EO), reversed Clinton's policy of not requiring parental consent for abortions under the Medical Privacy Act.
4. By EO, prohibited federal funds for international family planning groups that provide abortions and related services.
5. Upheld the ban on abortions at military hospitals.
6. Made $33 million available for abstinence education programs in 2004.
7. Supports the Defense of Marriage Act — and a Constitutional amendment saying marriage is between one man and one woman.
8. Requires states to conduct criminal background checks on prospective foster and adoptive parents.
9. Requires districts to let students transfer out of dangerous schools.
10. Requires schools to have a zero-tolerance policy for classroom disruption (reintroducing discipline into classrooms).
11. Signed the Teacher Protection Act, which protects teachers from lawsuits related to student discipline.
12. Expanded the role of faith-based and community organizations in after-school programs.
Budget, Taxes & Economy
1. Signed two income tax cuts, one of which was the largest dollar-value tax cut in world history.
2. Supports permanent elimination of the death tax.
3. Turned around an inherited economy that was in recession, and deeply shocked as a result of the 9/11 attacks.
4. Is seeking legislation to amend the Constitution to give the president line-item veto authority.
5. In process of permanently eliminating IRS marriage penalty.
6. Increased small business incentives to expand and to hire new people.
7. Initiated discussion on privatizing Social Security and individual investment accounts.
8. Killed Clinton's "ergonomic" rules that OSHA was about to implement; rules would have shut down every home business in America.
9. Passed tough new laws to hold corporate criminals to account as a result of corporate scandals.
10. Reduced taxes on dividends and capital gains.
11. Signed trade promotion authority.
12. Reduced and is working to ultimately eliminate the estate tax for family farms and ranches.
13. Fight Europe's ban on importing biotech crops from the United States.
14. Exempt food from unilateral trade sanctions and embargoes.
15. Provided $20 million to states to help people with disabilities work from home.
16. Created a fund to encourage technologies that help the disabled.
17. Increased the annual contribution limit on Education IRA's from $500 to $2,000 per child.
18. Make permanent the $5,000 adoption tax credit and provide $1 billion over five years to increase the credit to $10,000.
19. Grant a complete tax exemption for prepaid or college tuition savings plans.
20. Reduced H1B visas from a high of 195,000 per year to 66,000 per year.
Character & Conduct as President
1. Changed the tone in the White House, restoring HONOR and DIGNITY to the presidency.
2. Has reintroduced the mention of God and faith into public discourse.
3. Handled himself with enormous courage, dignity, grace, determination, and leadership in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 hijackings and anthrax attacks. He almost single-handedly held this country together during those searing days:
Just three days after the attacks, in his address at the National Cathedral, the President reassured the nation when he said: "War has been waged against us by stealth and deceit and murder. This nation is peaceful, but fierce when stirred to anger. This conflict was begun on the timing and terms of others. It will end in a way, and at an hour, of our choosing."
On Friday, September 14, 2001, President Bush visited Ground Zero. Standing on a crushed and burned fire engine atop the smoldering pile at Ground Zero, he put his arm around a retired firefighter who had volunteered to help, and began speaking to the crowd. Rescue workers shouted that they could not hear him. Someone handed him a small American flag and bullhorn. The President spontaneously shouted: "I can hear you. The rest of the world hears you. And the people who knocked these buildings down will hear all of us soon." The crowd roared with cheers and chants of "USA! USA! USA!" Then he raised that American flag and rallied a nation.
Education & Employment Training
1. Signed the No Child Left Behind Act, delivering the most dramatic education reforms in a generation (challenging the soft bigotry of low expectations). The very liberal California Teachers union is currently running radio ads against the accountability provisions of this Act.
2. Announced "Jobs for the 21st Century," a comprehensive plan to better prepare workers for jobs in the new millennium by strengthening post-secondary education and job training, and by improving high school education.
3. Is working to provide vouchers to low-income students in persistently failing schools to help with costs of attending private schools. (Blocked in the Senate.)
4. Requires annual reading and math tests in grades three through eight.
5. Requires states to participate in the National Assessment of Education Progress, or an equivalent program, to establish a national benchmark for academic performance.
6. Requires school-by-school accountability report cards.
7. Established a $2.4 billion fund to help states implement teacher accountability systems.
8. Increased funding for the Troops-to-Teachers program, which recruits former military personnel to become teachers.
Environment & Energy
1. Killed the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty.
2. Submitted a comprehensive Energy Plan (awaits Congressional action). The plan works to develop cleaner technology, produce more natural gas here at home, make America less dependent on foreign sources of energy, improve national grid, etc.
3. Established a $10 million grant program to promote private conservation initiatives.
4. Significantly eased field-testing controls of genetically engineered crops.
5. Changed parts of the Forestry Management Act to allow necessary cleanup of the national forests in order to reduce fire danger.
6. Part of national forests cleanup: Restricted judicial challenges (based on the Endangered Species Act and other challenges), and removed the need for an Environmental Impact Statement before removing fuels/logging to reduce fire danger.
7. Killed Clinton's CO2 rules that were choking off all of the electricity surplus to California.
8. Provided matching grants for state programs that help private landowners protect rare species.

Defense & Foreign Policy
1. Successfully executed two wars in the aftermath of 9/11/01: Afghanistan and Iraq. 50 million people who had lived under tyrannical regimes now live in freedom.
2. Saddam Hussein is now in prison. His two murderous sons are dead. All but a handful of the regime's senior members were killed or captured.
3. Leader by leader and member by member, al Maida is being hunted down in dozens of countries around the world. Of the senior al Qaeda leaders, operational managers, and key facilitators the U.S. Government has been tracking, nearly two-thirds have been taken into custody or killed. The detentions or deaths of senior al Qaeda leaders, including Khalid Shaykh Muhammad, the mastermind of 9/11, and Muhammad Atef, Osama bin Laden's second-in-command until his death in late 2001, have been important in the War on Terror.
4. Disarmed Libya of its chemical, nuclear and biological WMD's without bribes or bloodshed.
5. Continues to execute the War On Terror, getting worldwide cooperation to track funds/terrorists. Has cut off much of the terrorists' funding, and captured or killed many key leaders of the al Qaeda network.
6. Initiated a comprehensive review of our military, which was completed just prior to 9/11/01, and which accurately reported that ASYMMETRICAL WARFARE capabilities were critical in the 21st Century.
7. Killed the old US/Soviet Union ABM Treaty that was preventing the U.S. from deploying our ABM defenses.
8. Has been one of the strongest, if not THE strongest friend Israel has ever hand in the U.S. presidency.
9. Part of the coalition for an Israeli/Palestinian "Roadmap to Peace," along with Great Britain, Russia and the EU.
10. Pushed through THREE raises for our military. Increased military pay by more than $1 billion a year.
11. Signed the LARGEST nuclear arms reduction in world history with Russia.
12. Started withdrawing our troops from Bosnia, and has announced withdrawal of our troops from Germany and the Korean DMZ.
13. Prohibited putting U.S. troops under U.N. command.
14. Paid back UN dues only in return for reforms and reduction of U.S. share of the costs.
15. Earmarked at least 20 percent of the Defense procurement budget for next-generation weaponry.
16. Increased defense research and development spending by at least $20 billion from fiscal 2002 to 2006.
17. Ordered a comprehensive review of military weapons and strategy.
18. Ordered a review of overseas deployments.
19. Ordered renovation of military housing. The military has already upgraded about 10 percent of its inventory and expects to modernize 76,000 additional homes this year.
20. Is working to tighten restrictions on military-technology exports. 21. Brought back our EP-3 intel plane and crew from China without any bribes or bloodshed.

Globalization & Internationalism
1. Challenged the United Nations to live up to their responsibilities and not become another League of Nations (in other words, showed the UN to be completely irrelevant).
2. Killed U.S. involvement in the International Criminal Court.
3. Told the United Nations we weren't interested in their plans for gun control (i.e., the International Ban on Small Arms Trafficking Treaty).
4. The only President since the founding of the UN to essentially tell that organization it is irrelevant. He said: "The conduct of the Iraqi regime is a threat to the authority of the United Nations, and a threat to peace. Iraq has answered a decade of UN demands with a decade of defiance. All the world now faces a test, and the United Nations a difficult and defining moment. Are Security Council resolutions to be honored and enforced, or cast aside without consequence? Will the United Nations serve the purpose of its founding, or will it be irrelevant?" We all know the outcome and the answer.
5. Told the Congress and the world, "America will never seek a permission slip to defend the security of our country."
Government Reform
1. Improved government efficiency by putting hundreds of thousands of jobs put up for bid. This weakens public-sector unions and cuts undeserved pay raises.
2. Initiated review of all federal agencies with the goal of eliminating federal jobs (completed September 2003) in an effort to reduce the size of the federal government while increasing private sector jobs.
3. Led the most extensive reorganization the Federal bureaucracy in over 50 years: After 9/11, condensed 20+ overlapping agencies and their intelligence sectors into one agency, the Department of Homeland Security.
4. Ordered each agency to draft a five-year plan to restructure itself, with fewer managers. 5. Converted federal service contracts to performance-based contracts wherever possible so that the contractor has measurable performance goals.

Health
1. Strengthen the National Health Service Corps to put more physicians in the neediest areas, and make its scholarship funds tax-free.
2. Double the research budget of the National Institutes of Health.
3. Signed Medicare Reform, which includes:
A 10-year privatization option.
Prescription drug benefits: Prior to this reform, Medicare paid for extended hospital stays for ulcer surgery, for example, at a cost of about $28,000 per patient. Yet Medicare would not pay for the drugs that eliminate the cause of most ulcers, drugs that cost about $500 a year. Now, drug coverage under Medicare will allow seniors to replace more expensive surgeries and hospitalizations with less expensive prescription medicine.
More health care choices: As President Bush stated, "…when seniors have the ability to make choices, health care plans within Medicare will have to compete for their business by offering higher quality service [at lower cost]. For the seniors of America, more choices and more control will mean better health care. These are the kinds of health care options we give to the members of Congress and federal employees. What's good for members of Congress is also good for seniors. New Health Savings Accounts: Effective January 1, 2004, Americans can set aside up to $4,500 every year, tax free, to save for medical expenses. Depending on your tax bracket, that means you'll save between 10 to 35 percent on any costs covered by money in your account. Every year, the money not spent would stay in the account and gain interest tax-free, just like an IRA. These accounts will be good for small business owners, and employees. More businesses can focus on covering workers for major medical problems, such as hospitalization for an injury or illness. At the same time, employees and their families will use these accounts to cover doctors visits, or lab tests, or other smaller costs. Some employers will contribute to employee health accounts. This will help more American families get the health care they need at the price they can afford.

Homeland Security, Border Enforcement & Immigration
1. *See Government Reform above. Under President Bush's leadership, America has made an unprecedented commitment to homeland security.
2. Has CONSTRUCTION in process on the first 10 ABM silos in Alaska so that America will have a defense against North Korean nukes. Has ordered national and theater ballistic missile defenses to be deployed by 2004.
3. Announced a 9.7% increase in government-wide homeland security funding in his FY 2005 budget, nearly tripling the FY 2001 levels (excluding the Department of Defense and Project BioShield).
4. Before DHS was created, there were inspectors from three different agencies of the Federal Government and Border Patrol officers protecting our borders. Through DHS, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) now consolidates all border activities into a single agency to create "one face at the border." This not only better secures the borders of the United States, but it also eliminates many of the inefficiencies that occurred under the old system. With over 18,000 CBP inspectors and 11,000 Border Patrol agents, CBP has 29,000 uniformed officers on our borders.
5. The Border Patrol is continuing installation of monitoring devices along the borders to detect illegal activity.
6. Launched Operation Tarmac to investigate businesses and workers in the secure areas of domestic airports and ensure immigration law compliance. Since 9/11, DHS has audited 3,640 businesses, examined 259,037 employee records, arrested 1,030 unauthorized workers, and participated in the criminal indictment of 774 individuals.
7. Since September 11, 2001, the Coast Guard has conducted more than 124,000 port security patrols, 13,000 air patrols, boarded more than 92,000 vessels, interdicted over 14,000 individuals attempting to enter the United States illegally, and created and maintained more than 90 Maritime Security Zones.
8. Announced the Student and Exchange Visitor Information System (SEVIS), an internet-based system that is improving America's ability to track and monitor foreign students and exchange visitors. Over 870,000 students are registered in SEVIS. Of 285 completed field investigations, 71 aliens were arrested.
9. This week, the US-VISIT program began to digitally collect biometric identifiers to record the entry and exit of aliens who travel into the U.S on a visa. Together with the standard information, this new program will confirm compliance with visa and immigration policies.
10. Eliminated INS bureaucratic redundancies and lack of accountability.
11. Split the Immigration and Naturalization Service into two agencies: one to protect the border and interior, the other to deal with naturalization.
12. Signed the workplace verification bill to prevent hiring of illegal aliens.
13. Established a six-month deadline for processing immigration applications. 14. Information regarding nearly 100% of all containerized cargo is carefully screened by DHS before it arrives in the United States. Higher risk shipments are physically inspected for terrorist weapons and contraband prior to being released from the port of entry. Advanced technologies are being deployed to identify warning signs of chemical, biological, or radiological attacks. Since September 11, 2001, hundreds of thousands of first responders across America have been trained to recognize and respond to the effects of a WMD attack.

Judiciary & Tort Reform
1. Is urging federal liability reform to eliminate frivolous lawsuits.
2. Killed the liberal ABA's unconstitutional role in vetting federal judges. The Senate is supposed to advise and consent, not the ABA.
3. Is nominating strong, conservative judges to the judiciary.
4. Supports class action reform bill which limits lawyer fees so that more settlement money goes to victims.
Politics
1. His leadership resulted in Republican gains in the House and Senate, solidifying Republican control of both houses of Congress and the presidency.
2. Signed an EO enforcing the Supreme Court's Beck decision regarding union dues being used for political campaigns against individual's wishes.
Second Amendment
1. Ordered Attorney General Ashcroft to formally notify the Supreme Court that the OFFICIAL U.S. government position on the 2nd Amendment is that it supports INDIVIDUAL rights to own firearms, and is NOT a Leftist-imagined "collective" right.
2. Signed TWO bills into law that arm our pilots with handguns in the cockpit.
3. Currently pushing for full immunity from lawsuits for our national gun manufacturers.
4. *See Globalization & Internationalism.
Traditional Values, Compassion & Volunteerism
1. Endorses and promotes "The Responsibility Era." President Bush often speaks of the necessity of personal responsibility and civic volunteerism. He said, "In a compassionate society, people respect one another and take responsibility for the decisions they make in life. My hope is to change the culture from one that has said, if it feels good, do it; if you've got a problem, blame somebody else — to one in which every single American understands that he or she is responsible for the decisions that you make; you're responsible for loving your children with all your heart and all your soul; you're responsible for being involved with the quality of the education of your children; you're responsible for making sure the community in which you live is safe; you're responsible for loving your neighbor, just like you would like to be loved yourself."
2. Started the USA Freedom Corps, the most comprehensive clearinghouse of volunteer opportunities ever offered. For the first time in history, Americans can enter geographic information about where they want to get involved, such as state or zip code, as well as areas of interest ranging from education to the environment, and they can access volunteer opportunities offered by more than 50,000 organizations across the country and around the world.
3. Established the The White House Office and the Centers for the Faith-Based and Community Initiative — located in seven Federal agencies. The faith-based initiative supports the essential work of these important organizations. The goal is to make sure that grassroots leaders can compete on an equal footing for federal dollars, receive greater private support, and face fewer bureaucratic barriers. Work focuses on at-risk youth, ex-offenders, the homeless and hungry, substance abusers, those with HIV/AIDS, and welfare-to-work families.
4. The White House released a guidebook fully describing the Administration's belief that faith-based groups have a Constitutionally-protected right to maintain their religious identity through hiring — even when Federal funds are involved.
5. Issued an EO implementing the Supreme Court's Olmstead ruling, which requires moving disabled people from institutions to community-based facilities when possible.
6.Increased funding for low-interest loan programs to help people with disabilities purchase devices to assist them.
7. Revised the Department of Housing and Urban Development's Section 8 rent subsidies to disabled people, permitting them to use up to a year's worth of vouchers to finance down payments on homes. HUD has started pilot programs in 11 states.
8. Committed US funds to purchase medicine for millions of men, women and children now suffering with AIDS in Africa.
9. Heeding the words of our own Declaration of Independence, the president laid out the non-negotiable demands of human dignity for all people everywhere. On January 29, 2002, he said, "No nation owns these aspirations, and no nation is exempt from them. We have no intention of imposing our culture. But America will always stand firm for the non-negotiable demands of human dignity." As stated by the President, they are a virtual manifesto of conservative principles: Equal Justice Freedom of Speech Limited Government Power Private Property Rights Religious Tolerance Respect for Women Rule of Law.

Wow, Vi, that’s a thorough, ambitious piece of posting....*lol*

Well, I'm no real Bush fan, but that is an impressive list.
I like most of them.

It is unfortunate that Bush has let us down so grievously regarding immigration and govt. spending and largesse.

G.W. Bush - Our Third Worst President

Ranking presidents, especially the worst, can be done by a number of different criteria. If you look at how unqualified they are, Harding would probably top (or is it bottom) the list. But I think the need for competency is a major criteria. In other words, how bad did a president's ineptitude hurt the U.S.
For Harding and many others, they did not have the opportunity to seriously damage the country, no matter how inept they were. If not for 9/11 G.W. Bush would have probably gone down on the lower end of the list (mainly for his damage to the economy), but not near the bottom.
The Worst

1. Without question this is Buchanan. Maybe no one could stop the Civil War at that point - both sides were hardening in their positions. But his behind the scenes support for the Dred Scott decision, as well as many other actions, poured aviation fuel on the fire. And he made no effort to stop secession or actively protect federal supplies. This time, and Washington to Jefferson were the two times the country could have disintegrated. With Washington, Adams, and Jefferson we had statesmen who while not perfect, did a superb job of keeping the country together. With Buchanan we had someone who helped push the country from disagreement to war.
2. This is a closer call but I think Hoover was clearly worse than G.W. Bush. The depression could have led to almost anything. Probably not a breakup of the country, but we could have easily gone down the road of fascism, communism, or some unique form of populism. In any of these cases, it would have almost certainly meant a harder life for the people in this country and who knows what would have happened in WWII. Hoover was completely unwilling to realize that the depression was so unprecedented that it required trying new things. (In this way he is much like Bush in his unwillingness to learn.)
3. G.W. Bush is clearly third. I cannot think of another president (other than the two above) that has done anywhere near as much damage to this country. And unlike the first two, his ineptitude has damaged many other countries - although that may be more a function of the global economy. (And Smoot-Hawley under Hoover did help worsen the global depression). Taking away the political differences I have with Bush and concentrating just on his competence we have:

• He has trashed the U.S. economy. The economy has not grown because of his economic program, but in spite of it. Clinton left him the biggest surplus in history and he has turned it into a series of ever larger record deficits. He has made fixed entitlements worse with his drug plan while failing to address the biggest problems with existing entitlements (medicare & medicaid) and with social security had a proposal that would have put people more at risk while increasing cost. It's a sad day when the Democrats are the party of fiscal sanity.
• He has heavily damaged the moral standing of the U.S. with the war in Iraq. Not quite as much as Vietnam, but close. And much of this stems not from the decision to attack, but the unbelievable gross incompetence with which the wars was prosecuted. Standing by as the entire country was looted - with it all in living color on everyone's TV. Not realizing that the Abu Ghraib torture needed to be addressed quickly and with people at the very top fired was a disaster across the world.
• He has left this country defenseless. The Katrina disaster was the one we have faced so far. But the lack of security for chemical plants, ports, the food supply - in fact everything. Like everything else in his administration, politics determined funding so Wyoming got a ton of money and countries with lots of targets, which tend to be Democratic, got almost nothing. We will be attacked, there will be more natural disasters, and Bush has done nothing to stop it.
• He has violated the civil rights which is one of the core principals of what makes America Amercia. When citizens can be spied upon and imprisoned at the whim of the president, then we are no longer a democracy. We are a dictatorship. Granted we are not in a Stalinist police state. But he has gone beyond a balance of power to say he as President can do anything he wants to do and the only limit on his actions is his own self restraint.
• He has taken the political sphere and pushed it to the bottom. Granted he has had lots of help here and it started with the Republican assault on Clinton. But Bush/Cheney/Rove have done their best to make our political system as divided as possible. And those Democrats who do reach out tend to get screwed so bad, that there is no second time.
• He has shown an incredible inability to learn from his mistakes. Reagan & Clinton were masters at evolving their efforts as they learned on the job. They weren't perfect, but they improved on the job. The job of president requires that there be a constant effort to improve based on learning what works and what doesn't. Bush for whatever reason (his faith, an overprotective mother, a staff that won't tell him things aren't perfect) - seems totally incapable of learning. In his world there are no mistakes.

I could go on but I don't see any need to list out more. History will speak, first in 10 - 20 years, and then with more authority in 50 - 100 years. And when it does, G.W. Bush will go down as one of our worst presidents. The only questions is will he be 3rd worst. I will admit I might be wrong and he will turn out to be worse than Buchanan. Only time will tell.
The Best

This is easy - Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt (FDR) in chronological order. Close seconds - Adams (1st), Jefferson, Jackson, Roosevelt (Teddy), & Truman. As to anyone post-Kennedy, it's too soon to say. And yes, Wilson is purposely left off this list.
trackbacks: DailyKos, ColoradoPols, The Command T.O.C., The Indepundit, Mudville Gazette


</U>

Typical leftie ...

No comments on the good stuff, Med?

Vi

"Try as hard as I can, I can't even bring myself to read anything that might remotely say anything good about that man."

And there you have it in a nutshell, Med ... a closed mind.

Vi

Med ... is the appointment of constitutionist judges to the bench a good thing or bad?

Vi

med, the constitution was written as it was for a reason. The founding fathers understood human nature!
So far this grand human experiment known as the USA has worked out pretty well. It is not perfect, but it is clearly the best system yet devised by man!

This is one of the few areas in which Bush has pleased me....balancing the SCOTUS, and lesser courts.

If yoThis is one of the few areas in which Bush has pleased me....balancing the SCOTUS, and lesser courts. If you mean stacking the courts with right wing plutocrats is what pleased you then, of course we have differing views. Putting constitutionalist judges on the bench could be a good thing, but putting judges that side with corporations and the republicans at every turn is extremely harmful to the commoners well being, "The People", remember them, "The People", the constitution doesn't give any special priveledge to corporations, and by God it shouldn't, right wing judges do, and they shouldn't. A fair and balanced court is all we ask. That is a very hard thing to attain as each individual judge has baggage that he comes with. When judges are beholden to corporations, the law gets scewed and screwed. We need to return to Human rights, not business rights!

There is no room in a country founded on liberty for a "fair and balanced" court. Either we have judges that rule on constitutional law, or we have judges who legislate from the bench.

My question to you, Med, had to do with the good things president Bush has done. And in this regard, I agree with Wavels. Bush's federal judgeship appointments are one of the FEW things I like about what Bush has done.

Vi