Matt Yglesias quips:
Incidentally, at dinner the other day I remarked to a girl that Al Gore never acually said that he’d invented the internet. She was shocked.
Imagine how shocked she would have been if you told her the truth about Bush 1 and the grocery scanner. Why do I bring this up? Because when it suits Democrats, they will resort to using out and out lies- remember, the Bush1 grocery scanner incident served as the perfect fodder for a campaign running on “It’s the Economy, Stupid.” Funny how I never heard Carville debunking that story…
Incidentally, while Yglesias is dismayed by the treatment Gore got for his stupid and perhaps over-stated (but not deceitful) remarks, he continues to believe Oliver Willis’s hyperbole, rather than the military reports themselves.
Says Oliver:
In 2000, George Bush spit in the face of the military when he said “if called on by the commander-in-chief today, two entire divisions of the Army would have to report …, ‘Not ready for duty, sir.'”
That very same military beat the Taliban, is engaged in the global hunt on terror, deployed in the Phillipines, and will be used to invade Iraq.
But then, George has shown that he’ll say and do anything to be elected.
Matthew characterizes Bush’s remarks as one off his sleazier moments.
Here is the CNN Report on the issue:
WASHINGTON (CNN) — The U.S. Army has rated two of its 10 divisions as unprepared for a major war, a move the Pentagon said reflects the strain of deployments for peacekeeping duties in the Balkans.
A recent classified assessment placed the 10th Mountain Division, based at Fort Drum, New York — which has a brigade deployed in Bosnia — and the 1st Infantry Division, based in Germany — which has a brigade based in Kosovo — at “C-4,” the lowest level of readiness, Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki said.
It marks the first time since the 1970s that any Army division has dropped to the lowest of four possible readiness levels, officials said. A C-4 rating means the units in question need additional manpower, equipment or training.
Shinseki said the problem for these units was mainly a shortage of military personnel. The two divisions each have about half of their troops involved in peacekeeping operations.
Asked whether he was worried about the slip in readiness, Shinseki said, “Sure, anytime a division commander reports C-4, we are concerned. We’ll see what corrections need to be made.”
Bush has a lot of things to explain for since he took office. What is amusing is that the left wants to re-fight the 2000 election, and they still can’t get it right.
Henry Hanks
It’s hardly the first time…
tvh.blogspot.com/2002_09_22_tvh_archive.html#82105833
HH
Hardly the first time…
HH
P.S. It’s not “perhaps” at all, it was an overstatement, which is a nice way of saying he stretched the truth, which was one of the big complaints about Gore in the first place.
reason.com/9905/ed.vp.source.html
Gore’s tireless defenders want to deal with what Gore actually said… except they won’t. One of the best known defenses is from Vinton Cerf, who said it was absolutely 100% just fine for Gore to say claim credit for “creating an environment for the internet to thrive.” Except Gore didn’t say that just as he didn’t say he “invented” it. Other defenders, without saying so in so many words, twist what he said into Gore saying he helped a whole lot with the internet. But he said what he said and if it’s wrong to attack him for what he didn’t specifically say, it’s just as wrong to defend what he didn’t specifically say.
HH
Sorry for the double posting… P.S. It’s not “perhaps” at all, it was an overstatement, which is a nice way of saying he stretched the truth, which was one of the big complaints about Gore in the first place.
reason.com/9905/ed.vp.source.html
Gore’s tireless defenders want to deal with what Gore actually said… except they won’t. One of the best known defenses is from Vinton Cerf, who said it was absolutely 100% just fine for Gore to say claim credit for “creating an environment for the internet to thrive.” Except Gore didn’t say that just as he didn’t say he “invented” it. Other defenders, without saying so in so many words, twist what he said into Gore saying he helped a whole lot with the internet. But he said what he said and if it’s wrong to attack him for what he didn’t specifically say, it’s just as wrong to defend what he didn’t specifically say.
HH
archive.salon.com/news/feature/1999/08/04/gore/index.html
“Vinton Cerf, the Stanford researcher who sketched out a design for the Internet in 1973, seconds that emotion: ‘It is entirely fitting that the vice president take some credit for helping to create an environment in which Internet could thrive.'” Salon, of course, didn’t tell its readers here of Cerf’s connections to the Clinton/Gore White House.
Walt Pohl
So you don’t think Bush was distorting the significance of the military reports to score cheap political points? How many divisions are going to be unready for a major war once we’re occupying Iraq? 5? If a Democratic leader started blathering about how 1/2 the U.S. Army is “unready for duty”, wouldn’t you agree he was, well, lying?