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Is The White House Completely Losing Touch With Reality?

By Jeralyn, Section War on Terror
Posted on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 04:27:26 AM EST
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Jim Hoagland wrote yesterday in the Washington Post that a White House aide told him, in attempting to defend the NSA warrantless surveillance program, Guantanamo and secret renditions:

"The powers of the presidency have been eroded and usurped to the breaking point. We are engaged in a new kind of war that cannot be fought by old methods. It can only be directed by a strong executive who alone is not subject to the conflicting pressures that legislators or judges face. The public understands and supports that unpleasant reality, whatever the media and intellectuals say."

Federal judges are appointed for life. What kind of pressures do they face besides their view of the dictates of the Constitution? That's about the stupidest thing I've heard in years.

Dan Froomkin appears to be equally non-plussed by the aide's statement. So much so, that he offers to turn his Friday column over to "red-staters." Here are the questions he'd like answered:

Is that an accurate analysis of the situation on the ground? Is there a silent majority out there that understands and supports the need for a strongman in the White House? Is this White House -- so often accused of making up its own reality -- in this case actually more in touch with the "unpleasant reality" of post-9/11 America than the media and intellectuals?

They were invited to post their answers here. I only read the first ten of them, but of those, no one defended Bush's position.

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    Is The White House Completely Losing Touch With Reality? | 15 comments (15 topical)
    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#1)
    by Edger on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 02:18:30 AM EST
    The public understands and supports that unpleasant reality, whatever the media and intellectuals say. Incredible. You can almost hear the wind whistling through this WH aides ears from here: Is there a silent majority out there? Historical Bush Approval Ratings Graph Well, sort of a graph... More like a drop off a cliff.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 03:01:17 AM EST
    Is The White House Completely Losing Touch With Reality? "Losing"? Wrong tense.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#3)
    by Edger on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 04:47:45 AM EST
    U.S. public trust and confidence in the Bush White House are slipping toward the threshold of self-sustaining political disaster.
    Hoagland is being overly polite here. The Bush WH is a "self-sustaining political disaster." It has killed thousands of Americans, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, ruined Americas reputation in the world, squandered her leadership position in all ways except capability for destruction, created a public debt of $8.2 Trillion, a debt that has been increasing by $2.17 billion per day since September 30, 2005, systematized, institutionalized and encouraged massive corruption, by example does it's unqualified best to erode respect for the law and constitutional rights, undermined freedom of the press, made manipulative propaganda king, and turned truth to lies on a daily basis.
    A serious schism within the Republican Party itself is no longer unthinkable if the White House cannot demonstrate minimal competence
    Schism? Maybe. Stampede of fleeing elephants? Just possibly.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#4)
    by DonS on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 05:33:55 AM EST
    whatever the media and intellectuals say." This is arrogant, stupid, inaccurate, and Orwellian and McCarthyesque all at once. You have to wonder what they are stealing out the back door while they're keeping all of us agog with their tap dancing in the front yard. So far, imagination hasn't been sufficient to keep up with their capacity for the outrageous, not to mention illegal and immoral.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 05:34:49 AM EST
    "Is The White House Completely Losing Touch With Reality?" That ship sailed a long time ago.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#6)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 05:49:44 AM EST
    Is there a silent majority out there
    Ah, yes, I've been waitin' for the "natterin' nabobs of negativism" nonsense. I've missed it so. The wacks keep blowin' their cues, eh, edge? Ya try to bring a little variety and culture to their act, but no... I'm sittin' here listenin' to C-SPAN. Don Lambro and his shrub shillin' lunacy talkin' about free trade and the World wanting the products made in this Country. And what products would those be? Pink slips?

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#7)
    by kdog on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 06:17:53 AM EST
    It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy to think WH aides are advocating dictatorship.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#8)
    by Edger on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 07:13:52 AM EST
    DonS: You have to wonder what they are stealing out the back door while they're keeping all of us agog with their tap dancing in the front yard. So where is the $8.2 Trillion debt being funneled to? Some, at least, is going to reconstruction contracts for bushco friends in Iraq: Dem. Policy Cmte. Exposes "Wild West" Fraud in Iraq Reconstruction
    On Monday Feb. 14th [2005] a hearing exposing the rampant fraud, waste and corruption by Paul Bremer led CPA in the months after the Iraq occupation was held by the Democratic Policy Committee. "Ex-Coalition Provisional Authority official Franklin Willis cited examples of this "chaos" at a hearing of the Senate Democratic Policy Committee and said he believed most abuse and waste could have been avoided. Willis showed a picture of himself and other U.S. officials holding up plastic-wrapped 'bricks' of $100 bills worth $2 million to pay security contractor Custer Battles, which the Defense Department has since suspended due to billing issues. "The Custer Battles case, which while anecdotal, reflects a general pattern of waste and inefficiencies which could have been avoided," said Willis of contracting abuses in Iraq. "A former U.S. occupation official in Iraq thought he was in the Wild West in 2003 as he watched colleagues pull $2 million in fresh bills from a vault and stuff them in a contractor's gunnysack... Because Iraq had no functioning banking system in 2003, money was kept in a basement vault in CPA headquarters...
    Blind Oversight and Custer Battles
    The hearings touched on a variety of outrages, including: Halliburton charging the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) for 42,000 daily meals for soldiers while only serving 14,000
    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#9)
    by Che's Lounge on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 07:23:28 AM EST
    I've lost any compassion for the amerikan people. Stupid, lazy, wasteful, easily led automatons. If a dumb midwestern boy like me can spot a dictatorship in my own country, these other 2oo million maroons have no excuse.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#10)
    by scarshapedstar on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 08:29:34 AM EST
    I've lost any compassion for the amerikan people. Stupid, lazy, wasteful, easily led automatons. If a dumb midwestern boy like me can spot a dictatorship in my own country, these other 2oo million maroons have no excuse.
    At least 100 million see the emperor's lack of clothes; that's a lot more than are willing to admit that the government's lying to us about 9/11.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#11)
    by Quaker in a Basement on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 09:27:53 AM EST
    "Is there a silent majority out there that understands and supports the need for a strongman in the White House?" No, there is a silent majority out there that has been told--by the White House, by the GOP, and by the press--that the other guys are so weak that this strongman in the White House is the only thing standing in the way of terrorists who want to roam the streets of Dubuque, Iowa with Kalashnikovs and dynamite. "Is this White House -- so often accused of making up its own reality -- in this case actually more in touch with the "unpleasant reality" of post-9/11 America than the media and intellectuals?" No, the answer is embedded in the question. This is a "reality" entirely invented by the White House and propogated in the media. The White House is clearly more in touch with the reality that their policies are subordinate to their message, and that their message--however cynical it is--will be eagerly and uncritically reported.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#12)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 10:32:10 AM EST
    If this 35 percent of loco peasants want a dictator so badly they can hit the bricks to argentina with the rest of the old nazis and take el presidente and the rest of that slime with him. adios muchachos.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#13)
    by Che's Lounge on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 10:54:07 AM EST
    Scar, point taken.

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#14)
    by oldtree on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 11:10:46 AM EST
    this is a clear indicator of the type of statement made for insiders, not for the public they are no more concerned for the public than is an amoeba (no insult ameboae) they are in it for the money, and we can all screw off, obviously

    Re: Is The White House Completely Losing Touch Wit (none / 0) (#15)
    by zak822 on Fri Mar 10, 2006 at 12:16:58 PM EST
    The worrysome thing is that so many people believe that the President must be above the law to protect the nation. We are talking about Americans who don't believe in the things that make America different. And better. And there are a lot of them.

    Is The White House Completely Losing Touch With Reality? | 15 comments (15 topical)