House passes revised S-CHIP bill: Well, the House of Representatives has passed a revised version of the S-CHIP children's health insurance bill. From MSNBC News;
WASHINGTON - The House passed a revised children's health proposal Thursday, but not by the two-thirds margin that supporters will need if President Bush vetoes the measure as promised.
The 265-142 vote was a victory for Bush and his allies, who urged House Republicans to reject Democrats' claims that changes to the legislation had met their chief concerns. If the same vote occurs on a veto override attempt, Bush will prevail, as he did earlier this month when he vetoed a similar bill.
Liberal groups continue to run attack ads against Republicans siding with Bush on the issue, which many Democrats consider a winner for their party.
Democratic leaders said changes to the bill, which would add $35 billion to the State Children's Health Insurance Program, had addressed critics' concerns about participation by adults, illegal immigrants and families able to afford health insurance. But GOP leaders called the changes insignificant and politically motivated.
The first thing I would have to note is how MSNBC is calling this story a victory for the Bush administration. I'm not sure if it is a victory yet for the Bush White House. First, you need to remember this October 17, 2007 CBS News story reporting that 80 percent of Americans support this S-CHIP expansion program. Republicans, who are goose-stepping with the Bush administration in opposing the S-CHIP bill, will again feel the political pressure of attack ads for going against the American public on this bill. And it is a serious problem for these Republican congressmen. By continuing to support the Bush White House on this children's insurance program, these GOP congressmen are threatening their own political careers as their opposition, and votes, become ammunition for Democratic candidates attacking them in the 2008 election. Second, the Democrats are going to continue introducing revisions of this bill, again and again. The more that these GOP congressmen vote against the S-CHIP bill, the greater the voting record that can be used against them in the elections. It is a situation where the Republicans are giving President Bush a tactical victory, but at what strategic cost? What is the cost of Republican seats going to be in 2008, as this issue becomes an election issue?
Giuliani on torture: This is through The New York Times;
DAVENPORT, Iowa — At a town hall meeting here last night, Rudolph W. Giuliani expanded upon his views of torture. Here is a transcript of the exchange.
Linda Gustitus, who is the president of a group called the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, began her question by saying that President Bush’s nominee for attorney general, Michael B. Mukasey (who happens to be an old friend of Mr. Giuliani’s) had “fudged” on the question of whether waterboarding is torture.
“I wanted to ask you two questions,’’ she said. “One, do you think waterboarding is torture? And two, do you think the president can order something like waterboarding even though it’s against U.S. and international law?’’
Mr. Giuliani responded: “O.K. First of all, I don’t believe the attorney general designate in any way was unclear on torture. I think Democrats said that; I don’t think he was.’’
Ms. Gustitus said: “He said he didn’t know if waterboarding is torture.”
Mr. Giuliani said: “Well, I’m not sure it is either. I’m not sure it is either. It depends on how it’s done. It depends on the circumstances. It depends on who does it. I think the way it’s been defined in the media, it shouldn’t be done. The way in which they have described it, particularly in the liberal media. So I would say, if that’s the description of it, then I can agree, that it shouldn’t be done. But I have to see what the real description of it is. Because I’ve learned something being in public life as long as I have. And I hate to shock anybody with this, but the newspapers don’t always describe it accurately.”(Applause)
This is just sheer lunacy. Rudy Giuliani is saying that he doesn't know if waterboarding is torture, or even if the "liberal media" can be trusted to define what constitutes torture. So the question I would have to pose is specifically who defines torture? The Bush White House?
Further into the statement, Giuliani continues, saying:
“Now, on the question of torture. We should not torture. America should not stand for torture, America should not allow torture. But America should engage in aggressive questioning of Islamic terrorists who are arrested or who are apprehended. Because if we don’t we leave ourselves open to significant attack.”
“And the line between the two is very delicate and very difficult. But we can’t abandon aggressive questioning of people who are intent on coming here to kill us. Or killing us overseas. I think that that’s the point that the attorney general designate was trying to make.”
“And the powers of the president are pretty significant in protecting the national security of the United States. They always have been. So I think what he was also trying to do was protect the powers of the United States to deal with unforeseen circumstances like the hypothetical we were asked during one debate – I’ve forgotten which one: If there was a terrorist attack on an American city, and it was clear that there were all going to be additional attacks, some of them were going to be nuclear, and they were planned for the next couple of days and one of the people involved in it was arrested, and the head of the C.I.A. came to you and said we have to do certain things to get the information from him, would you authorize it? And I think most of us answered it, yes we would, we would authorize doing whatever we thought was the most effective to get that information.”
“The president has to have that kind of leeway. We’ve got to trust our president well enough to allow that. If we surround this so much with procedure, we’re going to have some unforeseen circumstance in which a president’s not going to feel comfortable making the right decision, particularly if you have the wrong person there. “
What Giuliani is saying here is that the president can define what torture is, when and how to use it. Giuliani never specifically answers whether waterboarding is torture or not--he simply claims he doesn't know if waterboarding is defined as torture. What is more, by parsing both his I-don't-know answer with his hypothetical terrorist-attack-and-we-must-use-torture-to-stop-it, Giuliani is really saying that he supports the Bush administration's use of torture, even as he publicly states that America should not use torture. It is complete insanity.
Iran Sanctions Are Meant to Prevent War, Bush Aides Say: The insanity continues on. This is from The Washington Post;
In approving far-reaching, new unilateral sanctions against Iran, President Bush signaled yesterday that he intends to pursue a strategy of gradually escalating financial, diplomatic and political pressure on Tehran, aimed not at starting a new war in the Middle East, his advisers said, but at preventing one.
Bush believes Tehran will not seriously discuss limiting its nuclear ambitions or pulling back from its involvement in Iraq unless it experiences significantly more pressure than the United States and the international community have been able to exert so far, according to administration officials and others familiar with the president's thinking.
With yesterday's actions, which included the long-awaited designations of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps as a proliferator of weapons of mass destruction and of the elite Quds Force as a supporter of terrorism, Bush made clear that he is willing to seek such leverage even without the support of his European allies.
"The president does not want to be stuck -- and doesn't want his successor to be stuck -- between two bad choices: living with an Iranian nuclear weapon or using military force to prevent Iran from building nuclear weapons," said Peter D. Feaver, who recently left a staff position on the National Security Council. "He is looking for a viable third way, negotiations backed up by carrots and sticks, that could resolve the Iranian nuclear file on his watch or, failing that, offer a reasonable prospect of doing so on his successor's watch."
Even so, the administration's actions yesterday immediately rekindled fears among Democrats and other countries that the administration is on a path toward war. Bush's charged rhetoric in recent months, including a warning that Iran could trigger a "nuclear holocaust," and his close consultations with hard-liners -- such as former Commentary editor Norman Podhoretz -- have led many outside the White House to conclude that the president will order airstrikes to eliminate any Iranian nuclear capability.
The WaPost story reports that these new sanctions the Bush administration is imposing will be the first time that the U.S. "has tried to punish another country's military," and is "the broadest set of punitive measures" imposed on Iran since the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis. These punitive measures consists of a call for countries and companies to stop doing business with three Iranian banks. Russia and China are balking at approving these new sanctions until two new reports on Iran's nuclear program are submitted to the United Nations next month by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the European Union. I'm guessing that the Bush administration doesn't want to wait until the results of these reports are published, since their conclusions may cause cracks in administration's arguments that Iran is building nuclear weapons, and must be stopped now. Why do I get the feeling that I'm looking at the same playbook that the Bush administration used to market the U.S. war with Iraq?
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