I have a friend in the military who voted for Kerry in ’04 since he did not like what Bush did in Iraq. Previously, he voted republican. He tends to be pro-military and is tactful when discussing Iraq, yet I think his vote speaks to where his heart is.

I don’t know where to post this, so here seems like a good place:
http://www.thecheers.org/article_1850_10-Reasons-NOT-to-Trust-Dubya.html

I like very much the scientific math & formula at the end.

[Editor: keep in mind that the site mentioned has tons of casino, poker, and gambling ads.]

I sympathize, but obviously not everyone feels the same way, since there have been many who have re-enlisted for duty in Iraq.

The whole question of WMds and why we went to war was debated in the 2004 election or does no one remember this?

It’s not as if these same issues weren’t being raised then that are being raised now. So if the American people truly didn’t believe that President Bush’s policies regarding Iraq were correct or that his goals couldn’t be met then why re-elect him over the very people who criticized the whole premise in 2004?

The people should give him more credit. After all, he is doing exactly what he promised to do. Stay the course, help Iraq to get a stable government up and running, continue to fight alongside Iraqis until they can take the fight themselves and keep the terrorists occupied there rather than here. This is what he said was the mission in Iraq. He said in 2003 and again during the 2004 campaign that our involvement in Iraq would not likely end during his time as President. People still voted for him, 60 million of them — more than 3 million more than voted in opposition. So, despite all of the criticisms, all of the protests from the other side that said the mission was flawed or that the leaders were incompetent, President Bush is in the second year of a second term. And no one disagrees that we have to succeed in Iraq if we are to live the free lives we have at home.

I am in agreement with the common perception that some things need to change, be made fresh again and that a return to the more energetic and confident leadership would be a big help to everyone. But that doesn’t mean that we should have the same old debate we had in 2004 about whether or not Bush lied to get us into Iraq. The people rejected that when they re-elected him. This is rehashing old arguments.

I sympathize, but obviously not everyone feels the same way, since there have been many who have re-enlisted for duty in Iraq.Including this guy. Not to mention that recruitment and re-enlistment are at record lows.The whole question of WMds and why we went to war was debated in the 2004 election or does no one remember this?Very typical right-wing arguments–“we talked about this before, so it doesn’t need to be brought up again; the election proved us right on everything because 52% of less than half of all registered voters cast their ballots for Bush, so you can’t criticize us for anything that was on the table back then.” Ludicrous, and yet they keep popping up. Look at the polls now, look at how many disapprove of Bush, look at how many believe the Iraq war was a mistake, and look at all the lies that Bush told that so many believed back then but now we’re seeing more and more proof they were lies. To suggest that the 2004 elections were an eternal mandate on the Iraq War is a preposterously absurd claim.

If your point is that the majority of the American people are right, then currently you are now way on the wrong side.And no one disagrees that we have to succeed in Iraq if we are to live the free lives we have at home.Are you even serious?

I don’t usually confront these right wing fanatacs and their synocphantic drivel, because they are so lost it’s an impossible task to guide them back to reality. (Kind of like our fearless leader.) It also degenerates into a flame war more often than not. But once in a while, they are so irritating that I can’t restrain myself.

You can drone on and on about “3 million more votes” like a mantra all you want. Just don’t fool yourself into thinking that it’s an impressive statistic. It’s actually the smallest re-election margin for any incumbent in American history.

And Luis is one hundred percent right. This re-election win that Bush barely eked out is even more puny an insurance policy than Nixon’s re-election was against Watergate… and Nixon won by a much greater margin. The voters who returned Bush to office (barely) didn’t know back then what they know now about the Valerie Plame leaks. They didn’t know back then what they know now about the Iraq travesty. They didn’t know back then what they know now about the Abramoff scandal. They didn’t know back then what they know now about how indifferent and incompetant the administration would be during the Katrina disaster. Say whatever you want about 2004. We’ll get another chance to express our disgust and outrage in November. (If this were England, Bush would already be gone.) But if you think the poisonous poll numbers Bush and the other Republicans have been receiving for the past eight months or so isn’t proof that the country has turned on its leadership, then you’re a fool.

“the election proved us right on everything because 52% of less than half of all registered voters cast their ballots for Bush”

Well, you missed the point. Record numbers voted in 2004, so don’t even start pretending that the number of people who re-elected Bush doesn’t matter. 60 million people, not all of whom were Republicans and not all of whom were even huge supporters of Bush during his first four years. Many of these people voted for him because no one on the Democratic side could make a case that they could do better than President Bush, or that President Bush was doing the wrong thing.

By voting for Bush, 60 million people – more than any in history, were saying that they wanted to keep the president in as Commander-in-Chief for four more years. Yes 3 million more is a huge deal in today’s elections. If you recall that Bill Clinton couldn’t manage a majority vote in either of his two elections. When you consider that it had been 16 years (or four cycles of elections) since anyone got more than 50% it is an impressive acheivement. Especially since President Bush LOST the popular vote by half a million votes in 2000.

Every election sees many registered voters not vote. That’s their loss. Every election sees ignorant people who choose not to register. That’s their loss. These people, in my view, do not have the right then to complain that they didn’t get the kind of leader they want. They chose not to participate in the process. But it’s not like they didn’t have the chance.

The main debate during the election of 2004 was about the President’s conduct on the War on Terror, particularly Iraq. John Kerry and John Edwards, among others, accused the President of lying, misusing intelligence and botching the Iraq effort. The President made his case that none of these things are true. The people voted on what they thought. President Bush won the election with all of the accusations and all of the arguements on the table. So my point wasn’t that Bush won and should be considered the greatest feat of all time, but that he won because he made the case to the voters that they should stick with him on the important issues, which included to a large degree his policies in Iraq. So the voters gave him the job. Let him do it.

The other point people are complaining about is about him doing his job the way he said he would. Well, duh, I say. If you vote for someone who says he will do his job a certain way, don’t complain when he follows through.

I will say again that i like President Bush. Not because he would make a “good drinking buddy.” I don’t drink, anyway. Not because he talks tough. That can be effective sometimes, but it isn’t a prerequisite for good leadership. It’s because he’s consistent when it matters. He knows the stakes are too high to start saying “oh the polls are down so i should withdraw from Iraq.” Give me a break. Any leader worth his salt is not gonna change an important policy just because his approvals are down. If Iraq is successful, President Bush will also be a success in the history books. If it fails, we may not live to disapprove thirty years from now. He took a bold direction in his first term and was re-elected to continue it. Let’s move on.

Note: I erred in my previous post. Bush did not win with 52%, he won with 50.7%.”the election proved us right on everything because 52% of less than half of all registered voters cast their ballots for Bush”Well, you missed the point. Record numbers voted in 2004, so don’t even start pretending that the number of people who re-elected Bush doesn’t matter.No, I didn’t miss the point, and I don’t have to pretend. A vote based upon lies and how much money a party could pour into advertising in a strategic manner is not, and never will be, an excuse, a mandate, or a rationale for anything. Nor were all those votes cast for the Iraq War–a great many, the tipover amount, were cast by people who want their religious beliefs integrated into the political system. No one issue drove all voters there.

As for the whole numbers, you forget that more people also voted against Bush than ever voted against any other president in history–so what does that say?If you recall that Bill Clinton couldn’t manage a majority vote in either of his two elections.Clinton faced significant third-party challengers in both elections, Bush did not. Ross Perot took 19% of the vote in 1992, and Perot and Nader took 9.1% of the vote in 1996 (in which Clinton got 49.2% of the vote anyway–more than Bush got in 2000). In the 2000 election, Nader and Buchanan only siphoned off 3.1% of the vote, and Bush still didn’t get a majority of the votes–hell, he got fewer than Gore did, as you yourself pointed out.

But in the 2004 election which you claim was such an absolute mandate for Bush, Bush only won a measly 50.7% of the vote with only 1% of all votes going to all third-party candidates. Had there been an even half-way successful third-party candidate in 2004, Bush would not have gotten a majority. And had there not been an all-out, artificial, yet highly effective religion-driven get-out-the-vote drive by the right wing, Bush would have lost to the largest vote in history against any sitting president. In 1984, Reagan won by a huge landslide–and get 4 million more people voted against Bush in 2004 than voted for Reagan in 1984. So what do sheer numbers tell you: that Bush is popular, or that the country has more people now?

The key number is 50.7%, the margin Bush won by in a race with only 1% being drained by third-party candidates.

Bush won the 2004 election by a 2.4% margin–which is the worst, repeat, the worst margin any president has been re-elected by. This does not a mandate make, for any issue, in any way. [For reference, previous re-election margins were: Clinton, 8.5%, Reagan, 18.2%, Nixon, 23.2%, Eisenhower, 15.4%, Roosevelt, 24.3%, 9.9%, and 7.5%, Wilson, 3.1%, and so on. Including presidents who took office mid-term, that would be Johnson, 22.6%, Truman, 4.5%, etc.]

So where’s your mandate now?

You’ve been listening to too much O’Reilly, Limbaugh, Coulter, and/or Malkin–you buy the half-truths, spins, and cherry-picked factoids far too easily. Do that, and you’ll get whomped like this in arguments all the time.When you consider that it had been 16 years (or four cycles of elections) since anyone got more than 50% it is an impressive acheivement.How is it an achievement for Bush that there was no serious third party challenger in 2004?

I didn’t say it was close, but that given the circumstances (which the Clintons didn’t have the second time around) where the stakes were higher. Don’t tell me that running against Dole and Perot the second time around was harder than running against Kerry and protesters with a war on.

It was a highly contentious vote, yes. I didn’t forget that Kerry won the second most votes, but he wasn’t the winner. I give him his die, althought the percentage was less than Gore got in 2000.

Fact remains that with all the articles and polls you and other bloggers and commentators and news organizations have been posting and writing about how Bush was the worst and that he was was doomed should teach a lesson here. In early 2004, as the article from Rolling Stone states, historians called Bush one of the worst presidents in history. Polls said he was in danger of losing his job. Exit polls said the morning of Kerry would clobber him. With all that ammunition the Democrats should have won. Why not? You down play the fact that Bush played his case so much better than Kerry did. When President Bush ended his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, there was an air of energy and an air of triumph. I don’t think even many Democrats felt that after John Kerry’s “I’m reporting for duty” speech. In fact, the liberals in my family (admittedly not many) said that he didn’t make his case. And this was before the debate. After the debate, Kerry looked slightly more electable, but not exactly Presidential to these people. So, I submit that your arguments about how much Bush won why are infused with your own feelings about Bush. I have to say that I see it differently, and that paints my view too.

But you are really down-playing the success on the basis of polls that are showing after Hurricane Katrina, Tom DeLay and Libby’s indictment and a lot of other stuff that don’t have much or very little to do with Bush himself. Bush offered help to the hurricane areas before the storm even hit. Only the local officials are allowed to request the guard. Until then, Bush’s hands were tied in almost every possible area to help. And even then, he took responsibility and pledged to rebuild New Orleans. None of this played any role in the election.

The election was won on other issues. I do not think that if a Perot has entered the race that Bush would have necessarily lost. It may have actually helped him. Anyway, that is all speculation.

Don’t count Bush out just yet though. He’s got time to recover. I for one am rooting for it.