Today, I get to be a contrarian for both the Left and the Right! To paraphrase Salon's War Room, there's a chart that's seemingly bounced from one end of the Internet to the other this morning, which maps Bush's popularity against terror alerts. The chart is compiled by "Julius Civitatus", and is displayed and discussed at his blog . Julius has this to say: There are few things that are quite evident from the chart: - Whenever his ratings dip, there's a new terror alert....

Some Republicans Predict Upheaval Within the Party (Washington Post): Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), a man known for frank talk, offered a blunt description of the state of his party, which broke camp here Friday after nominating President Bush for a second term. "The Republican Party," he said, "has come loose of its moorings." Hagel was not referring to Bush's leadership or his prospects for reelection but instead to the impact of a presidency that has seen the party embrace the largest ...

New Group to Launch Anti-Kerry Ads Move over, MoveOn.org . The liberal-leaning group that has raised millions of dollars to run negative ads attacking President Bush now has a competitor on the right with a somewhat similar name. The conservative MoveOnForAmerica.org plans to blast battleground states with anti-John Kerry ads until Election Day. You know, I have no problem with "527" group attack ads, although I do wish the media would more prominently evaluate the truth of the ads, i...

Today in my blog: Republican leaders' scattershot slandering. Republicans deserve better leaders than these. First, the who's who: Chris Wallace is a Fox News anchor, Dennis Hastert is the Republican Speaker of the House, and George Soros is a major funder of Democratically aligned interest groups. This is from Fox News Sunday : HASTERT: I don't know where George Soros gets his money. I don't know where — if it comes overseas or from drug groups or where it comes from. And I... WALLA...

From MSNBC : After gauging the harsh reaction from Democrats and Republicans alike to Sen. Zell Miller’s keynote address at the Republican National Convention, the Bush campaign — led by the first lady — backed away Thursday from Miller’s savage attack on Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry, insisting that the estranged Democrat was speaking only for himself. Zell Miller was the featured keynote speaker at the convention, but now we're supposed to believe he was only speaking for hi...

When the Democrats held their convention in Boston, Mr. Kerry's advisers made a point of saying they were instructing speakers to refrain from going after Mr. Bush, a strategy that some Democrats questioned as the memory of Mr. Kerry's convention faded and polls showed Mr. Bush back on the rise. By contrast, Mr. Bush's aides said they were determined to use this week tearing down Mr. Kerry, in the calculation that Mr. Bush almost certainly cannot win unless voters are convinced that they can...

Hello Joeusers, This is a another post of a message-and-response regarding the big anti-Republican Convention march yesterday, in New York City. The original message comes from a Kerry supporter who's concerned about possible violence at these events. Many of us who believe in these political rallies are worried about how they'll be portrayed in the media. We want people to understand that we are simply unhappy that Bush has occupied our Democratic city with 50,000 of his most partisan ...

This is a snippet from a debate I had with Someone-On-The-Internet (tm) regarding whether New York City should let people protest in Central Park. SOTI wrote: ] Bloomberg usually sucks, but regarding the convention, ] he has acted with integrity. His primary duty is to take care ] of New Yorkers interests first (including protecting their ] beloved park from overburden), the welcome visitors second, ] and then the rights of a few terrorist sympathizers and ] democrats last. Sounds l...

Earlier today, I picked up the New York Times, and saw this bit : Bush said he is fighting ``a lot of entrenched interests'' in Washington, but said he would pursue the effort until it is accomplished. ``It's not enough to advocate reform; you've got to get the job done,'' the president told cheering supporters at a picnic. Now, I know that successful politicians are made of a cloth printed with "I'm a Washington outsider", but I'm amazed that people persist in seeing Dubya as ...

Top Scientists have discovered: Look at this enlargement from Section 2: Clause 4. If we magnify the image we see that the "h" in When and the are identical . This cannot be possible because at the time the framers of the constitution were using a Johnson-Matlock Quill pen, this was a very messy pen and did not allow for uniform letters. The earliest a uniform quill pen was invented was in 1793. Four years after this document was purported to be written. Clever. Very clever.

From Yahoo News : President Bush, who accuses his Democratic rival of keeping his budget plans secret, has yet to offer plans of his own for funding his campaign promises and cutting the deficit in half, fiscal conservatives said on Friday. "While it's true that Kerry hasn't provided a detailed plan, neither has the president," said Heritage Foundation budget analyst Brian Riedl. William Niskanen, chairman of the Cato Institute, said Bush's warnings about Kerry's spending plans were "i...

How cool is this?

From the Los Angeles Times : Pentagon investigators believe the CIA has held as many as 100 "ghost" detainees in Iraq without revealing their identities or locations, a much greater number than previously disclosed, a senior Defense Department official told Congress on Thursday. However, the precise number of undisclosed prisoners and the conditions in which they have been held remain a mystery, said Army Gen. Paul Kern, because CIA officials have refused to cooperate with Pentagon invest...

From Rasmussen Reports : Electoral College: Bush 213 Kerry 175 As part of the Bush Convention bounce, Michigan and New Jersey have moved to the Toss-Up column in our Electoral College projections. Both states had been leaning in Kerry's direction. The first Rasmussen Reports state polling data released after the Republican Convention showed Minnesota remaining firmly in the Toss-Up column. President Bush now leads in states with 213 Electoral Votes while Senator Kerry leads in state...

From the New York Times : Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion that the nation was more likely to "get hit again" by terrorists if John Kerry was elected was one of the toughest attacks launched in a presidential election in 40 years. But Mr. Cheney's latest assault on Mr. Kerry, which startled Democrats and Republicans alike, raised a central question even in this notably ferocious presidential campaign: Is it possible for a candidate to go too far, and alienate the very voters he is t...