Bush is like a "blind man in a room full of deaf people"...

[D2bets]

Says Former Bush Treasury Sec'y Paul O'Neill

...actually this is exactly how I've envisioned him. Rove tells him what they're going to do and cabinet meetings are just a sleepy exercise.

 

[EverFresh]

and this is news?

Good article, illustrates the kind of brain dead leadership that stumbled it's way into war based on faulty and confused intelligence and hidden agendas.

 

[SENDITIN]

Thank God Bush got rid of O'Neill and enacted the tax cuts! And Doctor Dean wants to roll them all back...oh wait..he just changed his mind again and wants to keep the middle class tax cuts. Let's wait until Monday and maybe we'll get another position.

 

[D2bets]

Not to defend Dean, but getting rid of the Bush tax cuts and enacting new oes of his own doesnt't mean he's "keeping them".

Clark this week announced an A+ tax plan that would take millions off the tax rolls entirely and would enact a 5% surchage on income over 1 million and eliminate the Bush tax cuts for those making over 200K. Everyone making under 100K (and some making more) would pay less under Clark's plan than they pay now. Somehow Rove & Co. will spin this as a tax hike though I'm sure.

 

[D2bets]

Paul O'Neill is a brave man. Anyone who doesn't believe that the Bush Admin. planned Saddam's demise from day one, exagerrated evidence to fit their goals and used 9/11 as a an excuse for war....is a gullible fool (or a blind Republican). Now maybe you think he was right to do this. But it really can't be denied that the chicken hawks have have had their eyes on this war for years. As General Clark said...the 'joke' at the Pentagon right after 9/11 was "if Saddam wasn't involved in 9/11, too bad, he should have, because we're gonna get him anyway."

 

[FloydGondolli]

Oh please. Is it me or does O'Neill sound just like a disgruntled ex-employee trying to get back at the boss who fired him by telling the media exactly what it wants to hear. At this point O'Neill has about as much credibility as Kato Kaelin or Scott Peterson. Like Pete Rose, O'Neill is trying to sell books by saying whatever it takes to stir up publicity.

Is it a coincidence that O'Neill was fired as Treasury Secretary in December of 2002 and since then the economy has show great improvement in nearly every category? Clearly this guy was an idiot that Bush should never have appointed in the first place.

"Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man." - The Dude, 1998

 

[FloydGondolli]

d2,

Clark's tax plan won't work. His large increases on those making 200k+ will blow up in his face and lead to the unemployment rate jumping to 10% or more and a lowering of the overall revenue the governement takes in.

Who are the people making 200k+? Business owners for the most part. And do you think they will just eat the extra taxes that Clark proposes? Of course not. They will cut their own costs primarily by cutting their largest overhead cost, which is of course employees. So the class warfare tactic you and Clark seem to love so much will just succeed in putting a lot more working class people out of work, thereby lowering the overall tax revenue even though you have raised rates. Rates mean nothing, overall revenue means everything.

"Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man." - The Dude, 1998

 

[D2bets]

Floyd, you can't be serious. Clark would return the rates on 200+K earners to where it was before Bush's cut, during the Clinton Admin from '93-'00. Somehow they, and the economy, managed to overcome it during those years with more employment and more wealth. What you're saying is the same thing said in '93 when Clinton raised taxes -- that didn't put more people out of work, did it?

 

[D2bets]

Floyd, so you think O'Neill is flat out lying about what he's saying? I don't doubt that he's vindictive, but I also don't think he's lying. A lot of what he is saying is supported by documents as well.

 

[Shotgun]

O'Neil was fired because he was an incompetent Treasury Secretary. Of course he has ulterior motives...just read how he reacted to losing his job a year ago.

A bit more on his 'new information'...

"in his appearance this evening on "60 Minutes," Ron Suskind, author of The Price of Loyalty, based to a large extent on information from former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill, made an astonishing, very serious misstatement.

Suskind claimed he has documents showing that preparations for the Iraq war were well underway before 9-11. He cited--and even showed--what he said was a Pentagon document, entitled, "Foreign Suitors for Iraq Oilfield contracts." He claimed the document was about planning for post-war Iraqi oil (CBS's promotional story also contains that claim): http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/01/09/60minutes/printable592330.shtml

But that is not a Pentagon document. It's from the Vice-President's Office. It was part of the Energy Project that was the focus of Dick Cheney's attention before the 9/11 strikes.

And the document has nothing to do with post-war Iraq. It was part of a study of global oil supplies. Judicial Watch obtained it in a law suit and posted it, along with related documents, on its website at: http://www.judicialwatch.org/071703.c_.shtml

Indeed, when this story first broke yesterday, the Drudge Report had the Judicial Watch document linked (no one at CBS News saw that, so they could correct the error, when the show aired?)

And what are we to make of O'Neill's bigger claims, including that the Iraq war was planned from the first days of the Bush administration (cited by Wesley Clark today to buttress his assertion that there was no need for the war, it was all political)?

In late 2000 and early 2001, the Iraqi regime was trying increasingly hard to shoot down US planes enforcing the no-fly zones. That may well have opened up discussion about overthrowing Saddam in January and February 2001, as Suskind claims, but "Iraq News," which followed the issue very closely at the time, doubts very much that any decision was made to do so then. Perhaps tellingly, Suskind doesn't claim that those discussions continued beyond February.

Finally, O'Neill's statement to Time magazine, "I never saw anything that I would characterize as evidence of weapons of mass destruction," is bizarre. From 1995 on, UNSCOM reported that Iraq retained major elements of its proscribed weapons programs. That was the consensual view within the US intelligence community on the eve of the war, as well as every other country engaged in the issue."

 

[jimbutorac]

fyi Floyd, O'Neill ain't getting any money for the book.

 

[PatPatriot]

If you read any of Clintons speeches the last 3 adminstrations have been planning Saddams demise.
By the way this knocks the shit out of the notion that Bush wasn't doing anything against terroism before 9/11..

 

[PatPatriot]

If you read any of Clintons speeches the last 3 adminstrations have been planning Saddams demise.
By the way this knocks the shit out of the notion that Bush wasn't doing anything against terroism.

 

[D2bets]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Patriot:
By the way this knocks the shit out of the notion that Bush wasn't doing anything against terroism before 9/11..<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

No it doesn't, just the opposite. The Clinton Admin. clearly warned Bush that OBL and Al Qaeda were the biggest threat to our safety but instead of "strategizing" against them, he was just drooling from Day 1 at getting back at his daddy's nemesis at all costs.

 

[areeff]

"<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR> Who are the people making 200k+? Business owners for the most part. And do you think they will just eat the extra taxes that Clark proposes? Of course not. They will cut their own costs primarily by cutting their largest overhead cost, which is of course employees. So the class warfare tactic you and Clark seem to love so much will just succeed in putting a lot more working class people out of work, thereby lowering the overall tax revenue even though you have raised rates. Rates mean nothing, overall revenue means everything. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>


Why don't we extrapolate on this even further.. If they cut employees service will decline. If service declines customers will not patronize them anymore. If customers don't patronize them they will go out of business! So more taxes=you go out of business.

If you go out of business people will have nowhere to shop! If they have nowhere to shop they'll have piles of money laying around!

pffffffffffffffffft

Where do people come up with this logic?

 

[FloydGondolli]

Let me guess, you've never run your own business (you will of course reply that you do, which I will of course not believe, so don't waste your breath).

"If they cut employees service will decline."

This is a false premise, thereby stopping your extrapolation dead in its tracks.

"Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man." - The Dude, 1998

 

[PatPatriot]

D2.. then why didn't Clinton take OBL on a silver platter when Sudan had him in custody???

 

[TEASERGURU]

bUSH WANTS US LOWLIFE GAMBLERS ALL PUT IN JAIL.

 

[Java]

Floyd-

I'll give you a better extrapolation: If tax cuts are good, and bigger tax cuts better, then let's just eliminate the taxes all together.

Ooops. No money to pay for running government.

The REAL point of the book that got lost in this is that the Bush White House made decisions based on politics, rather than analyzing data to find the best policy.

There is a pervasive pattern of this adminstration making a decision, then ignoring ANY evidence or opinions to the contrary. The book sites examples of Cheney packing a panel with all people that already had his desired view/outcome. O'Neil had argued against this, stating a good policy can withstand multiple viewpoints on the panel.

Bush is insulated from opposing viewpoints by Cheney and Rove.

The "evidence" of nuclear weapons and uranium from South Africa had been discredited at least 3 months before Bush's State of the Union speech. Specifically, CIA Director Tenet had similar references removed from Bush's October speeches. They instead foisted upon the American people evidence that knew to be false, then tried to refer to the British report to divert the blame. Any opinion as to what they had in 1995, had long since been updated.

The "regime change" prior to Bush was sanctions and occassional bombings, but NOT ground troops or unilateral military action. The problem is the 'pre-emptive' doctrine is a complete violation of international law when the threat is not imminent. By that doctrine, Saddam could have attacked us first, since we posed a threat to him. The doctrine is now an excuse for any country to attack any other country.


Check out the book 'Shrub' (by Molly Ivans). This book was published before the 2000 elections and details Bush's adminstration in Texas. You'll find the same lack of engagement, un-funded mandates, reducing tax-revenues to the deficit point of killing education and environmental programs.

 

[SENDITIN]

Thank you for quoting Molly Ivans...now there's a real non partisan....and where the hell do you get unilateral? I guess the Brits, the Poles, the Italians, the Japanese, the Spanish and the many other countries in this coalition don't count.

And did you notice O'Neill now backtracking from the heading of this post? I wonder how much literary license was being taken by that schmuck Suskind. Anyway this story has all the staying power of a few days.