No one said you guys were unpatriotic or made that announcement. Only you guys have said that we said that. Bush and Cheney never said it. It was never said at the convention either, despite Kerry saying so. No one has ever said being critical is unpatriotic.

Conservatives criticized Clinton as you know and we have criticized Bush.

We have been critical of prescription drugs added to Medicare, immigration, education spending and w/out vouchers, etc.

Paul?

Snap out of it. You're scaring me now. Honest. Just because your President is the master of flip-flopping, doesn't mean you have do it too! If he jumps off a bridge, will you follow him? Come on now.

"No one said you guys were unpatriotic or made that announcement."

Holy mother of God. Do you suffer from memory problems? Just....go back and read the archives on this site, ok? That might refresh your memory.

Give me a name of someone who said that!

Rush Limbaugh in the article two items prior to this one.
http://www.bradfriedman....og/archives/00000598.htm

Are you on drugs, dude? Or are you simply that much of an uneducated Bush voter that you're unfamiliar with the meaning of the word "patriotism"? Here it is in case you're unfamiliar with it and/or a Bush voter.

Mmmm...Kool-aid...drink up, Paulie!

The anti-war left does hate the military. That does not mean they are unpatriotic! I disagree with Rush on the anti-America part. However, Rush has criticized Bush and many issues and that gets back to the original statment by FDR.

The quote was TR, not FDR.

Either way, you're an asshole to suggest that those who are against this ridiculous and pointless war "hate the military", Paul. You're pathetic. I guess those soldiers who have spoken out against the war, hate themselves. Idiot.

Paul,

i am an anti-war leftist. i am about as far to the left as it is possible to get on the political spectrum. i can state without equivocation that i do not hate the military. My nephew is in the arm (shout out to PFC Will). WHat i do not like, what those of us on the left will never coddle up to are the uses to which the military is put. What we despise is the creation of a political and economic nexus that creates crisis after crisis in order to justify the creation of a bloated miltary budget. A sane approach to foreign policy, an approach based on human rights rather than the rights of a small proportion of the world's population to expropriate for sale the natural resources of various nations with disregard to the populations of those nations, would require much less military spending.

As an aside, let me note that my nephew agrees with many of the sentiments recently reported in the press concerning the political opinions of those soldiers in Iraq. As of now he is stationed at one of the largest military bases state side and he does not know an enlisted soldier who is checking off Bush during this next election. He and i had a conversation a few days ago; i told him that help is on the way. He said, i hope so. Why is his story interesting? because until last year he, his mother, and the rest of my family were died in the wool republicans. Today, none of them are voting Bush. Mr. Bush lost a whole extended family in a red state. i wonder how many families have similar stories? How many families who did not register to vate in 2000 are registering now to vote for the safety of their family members in 2004?

My family is another one of those groups. Myself, my dad and brother-in-law haven't voted for a Democratic Presidential candidate. Until now.

Bush is an utter disaster, enough so that I am willing to put a man I know I disagree with on a number of issues in the White House.

BTW, an excellent source for a quote, Brad.

Teddy,

i really think we need to rethink the idea that Mr. Bush is a disaster. We forget to ask the seminal question when we use words like failure, disaster, mission uncomplished and so forth. That seminal question: "for whom"?

This war has NOT been a disaster for Kellogg Brown & Root or its parent company. Boeing, i am quite sure is doing well. Bechtel? i am sure they've eaten heavily from the trough. CH2M Hill? They've been fed over a billion. Contrack International? Creative Associates? Over a quarter billion in Iraq. Dataline? more than a billion. Environmental Chemical? Explosive Ordnance? both more than a billion. Parsons Corp? 5 billion. This list is not exhaustive.

My point, of course, is that this war regime has been very good for these companies and many many others. The average American? The average enlisted women and men? Those who have spilled their blood for this war? Their investments are not on par with those of the war machine. Those 1035 (plus) coffins? Sure the war has been an unmittigated disaster for these families. The American tax payer? No doubt. But as Bush once said of his investors/contributers: "Ya dance with the one that brung ya." Malevolent? Certainly, but it really is just that simple.

Johnhp - my heart bleeds.

My brother-in-law got out of the military because of his allergies. He just went back to Iraq as a civilian to train Iraqi's in counterintelligence. Ah, he and his older brother and his older sister and his father are voting for Bush.

I found it amazing yesterday that Kerry basically called Prime Minister Allawi a liar. That means that PM Allawi is more pro-American than Kerry is. Kerry is unfit to command, the polls show it, and we shall see if the leftists can win with a leftist. They never have before - Dukakis, McGovern, etc.

Paul,

i understand that you couldnt care less about our soldiers who did not choose this war but had it forced upon them by an unwise policy decision of this Administration. That much is obvious. Understandably your brother, who apparently now works for a company benefitting from the corporate pig trough that is this war would vote for Bush. Thanks for demonstrating the point i made.

Regarding Allawai (the second choice behind an iraqi agent to head Iraq; also a man referred to by British intel as a person who who "lacked domestic credibility" in documents more than 2 years old; gues Bush didn't have those read to him), you left out a major part of Kerry's statement. he was judging Allawi's word by the man's own previous statements on the subject.