Promoting ownership
"I don't remember a politician ever wholly endorsing the idea that
ownership is a great way to solve societal problems quite the way Bush
has," said economist Kevin Hassett of the conservative American
Enterprise Institute. "He's applying themes for a lot of conservative
reforms in a way that hasn't been done before…. It's a big-think,
big-idea approach."
Among the key "ownership" proposals endorsed by Bush are:
·
Homeownership: President Bush will provide
assistance to help America to meet his new goal of creating 7 million
new, affordable homes in 10 years.
·
Social Security Reform: President Bush will
strengthen and enhance Social Security, guaranteeing no changes in
benefits for current retirees and near-retirees, while giving younger
workers the opportunity to use their Social Security payroll taxes to
build a nest egg for retirement that can be passed on to their
families.
·
Help Small Businesses: President Bush will help
small businesses in a number of ways, including by allowing them to
band together to provide more affordable health care for their
employees through Association Health Plans.
·
New tax-preferred vehicles for long-term savings.
"Lifetime savings accounts" would allow Americans to accumulate
tax-free funds for job training, college tuition, home purchases and
retirement. "Retirement savings accounts" would consolidate and expand
several existing types of retirement accounts.
You can read the Bush Agenda for America document on the following (link).
Many of the Liberal mainstream newspapers in America have written
negative articles about Bush’s proposal to move Americans away from a
welfare state to a ownership society. In addition, the liberal think
tank individuals have begun to wage war against the concept.
"These programs were designed to be insurance systems," said former
Clinton administration Labor Secretary Robert B. Reich. "If you
privatize them, you leave individuals vulnerable to bad luck. The very
nature of social insurance is that it is social."
This is sure to be a big differential in the upcoming debates.
"It's a way for the president to tie together a number of programs
that have this common theme of giving average Americans more control
and more ownership over the important aspects of their lives," said
David Boaz, executive vice president of the Cato Institute. It has
been pushing Social Security privatization since the 1980s. "In that
sense, it has more real meaning than 'New Deal' or 'Great Society,'
which could have been anything. 'Ownership society' anchors you to
something specific."
CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll:
Bush 52, Kerry 45
The newest CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll shows President Bush with a
sizeable lead over Sen. John Kerry: Bush 52, Kerry 45. The poll was
conducted Sept. 3 through 5.
And in the battleground state of New Mexico, Bush has pulled ahead of
Kerry. The poll (done by Research and Polling Inc. for the Albuquerque
Journal, Aug. 27-Sept. 1) shows the following results: Bush 45, Kerry
42, Others 3, Undecided 10.
Both polls have an error margin of +/-4.
Kerry would abandon Iraq
Sen. John Kerry emphasized that his goal on Iraq would be to get out
of Iraq. Kerry said about the War in Iraq that it is "the wrong war in
the wrong place at the wrong time"
Despite advice from top Democrats, Kerry failed to have the discipline
to keep the focus on the economy. Kerry repeated an often-stated
comment: "I would not have done just one thing differently than the
president on Iraq, I would have done everything differently than the
president on Iraq," Kerry said.
It was unclear whether Kerry would sacrifice stabilizing Iraq before
withdrawing American troops from Iraq. He has frequently stated that
he would internationalize the troops in Iraq despite the fact that
countries have stated that they will not send troops to Iraq even if
Kerry is elected.
"We want those troops home and my goal would be to try to get them
home in my first term and I believe that can be done," Kerry said.
Vietnam duality challenges Kerry
The Boston Globe has a story titled, "Vietnam duality challenges
Kerry." The subheading is "War emphasis grows thornier." The story
covers how Kerry came to bring his record in Vietnam front and center
in his bid for President.
The Globe offers this analysis. They also ad in the word "some"
soldiers committing war crimes. Kerry never said “some”:
Kerry has made Vietnam far more central to his presidential campaign
than in his previous seven political races. Yet interviews with aides,
friends, and fellow veterans of Kerry show that his decisions to
showcase his war past in the White House bid was far from automatic.
As with Brinkley's book, one constant danger always loomed: Talking
about his combat heroism inevitably invited talk about his antiwar
activism after returning home, most notably his 1971 statement to the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee that some US soldiers had committed
rape, torture, mutilation, and other "atrocities" in Vietnam.
The article is long and although it tries to be a cross between an
apologist piece and attack on linking Bush and swift boat veterans
together, it winds up doing neither:
"One of the reasons our convention stressed the themes of strength and
national security was we knew this would be an attack," senior adviser
Joe Lockhart said of Republican criticism of Kerry's leadership
ability. "[The Bush campaign] had to resort to character
assassination, and frankly, it's the Bush family political playbook."
Kerry is reported to have had an hour and a half conversation with
President Clinton, prior to his heart surgery, where Clinton advised
that Kerry should move away from talking about Vietnam. Clinton
advised Kerry to focus on ‘the economy, stupid.’ The shake up of the
Kerry campaign indicates that Kerry intends to try to change the
Vietnam subject. After making Vietnam the center of his campaign, it
will take a Houdini type trick to make that happen.
Kerry Campaign shake-up
Kerry’s campaign is now divided into two camps and most are betting on
the former staff of President Clinton. The Clinton camp includes Joe
Lockhart, a former White House press secretary; Joel Johnson, a former
senior White House aide; and Doug Sosnik, a former Clinton political
director. And Howard Wolfson, a former chief of staff to Hillary
Rodham Clinton,
James Carville said that Kerry "is not satisfied with the state of his
campaign." Carville promised that Kerry would reshape his campaign.
Carville’s stated that he had talked with former President Clinton in
his hospital bed and the knowledge that Sen. John Kerry spent an hour
and half on the phone with Clinton last night combined with the new
former Clinton staff demonstrates the changes.
"It's true," Kerry strategist Tad Devine told "Fox News Sunday." "Our
message could not get through the way we wanted it to in August,"
because of the Swift Boat ads.
The Mary Beth Cahill ace in the hole is John Sasso -- best known as
campaign manager for Michael S. Dukakis's failed presidential bid in
1988 -- to begin traveling with him full time and become his on-site
political counselor. Cahill worked with Sasso before. Sasso is a
22-year friend of Kerry’s.
It’s the economy stupid:
Expect the Clinton strategy to come into play. No matter what the
question, expect the Kerry people to answer that America can’t be
respected unless we have a strong economy and President Bush is the
only President since Herbert Hoover to have lost jobs during his
Presidency. Then, there will be the fact that 43 million uninsured
Americans contributes to America’s weakness. Of course, rising higher
education costs and not adequately funding No Child Left Behind makes
America vulnerable. An additional, economic factor in making America
weak and vulnerable to attack will be the lack of importation of drugs
from other countries.
This will be the way that the Kerry’s campaign will try to move the
subject from Vietnam to the economy. They will make it a two for one
operation. In order to have a secure nation we have to be strong
economically.
Of course, the problem is that the economy is coming back strong.
Then
there is this historical fact. "There's never been a challenger that
has come back after being down double digits after the convention,
after their incumbent's convention. That's never happened," Bush
strategist Matthew Dowd told "Fox News Sunday
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