RETURN TO ORIGINAL SIN: Democrats in late 2007 fighting the battle that Vice President Al Gore REFUSED to fight in 2000: then Texas Governor Bush's SLASHING of pre-school, after-school, and HEALTH CARE for Texas SCHOOLCHILDREN, in favor of huge TAX CUTS for Texas BILLIONAIRES and multi-millionaires!
Bush veto for child health bill
by BBC world news
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7026454.stm
<< It is only the fourth time President Bush has used his veto power
US President George W Bush has vetoed a bill to expand a children's health care insurance scheme, after it was passed with a large majority in the Senate. >>
RETURN TO ORIGINAL SIN: Al Gore made at least three crucial errors in his presidential election campaign, all revolving around Mr. Gore's BUYING IN TO the Right-Wing Republican "MORAL VALUES" themes. Bill Clinton may have been a self-absorbed narcissist, but as a "child of the '60s" from a broken household on the wrong side of the tracks in the small Deep South town (Hope, Arkansas), Clinton realized how much WILFUL IGNORANCE and "MORAL VALUES" had been USED as theme to MAINTAIN and PERPETUATE SEGREGATION, disenfranchisement, and violent, criminal abuse of people's Civil Rights- and as a "liberal Democratic" politician, Clinton rejected those abusive, unconstitutional, and often violent themes that revolved around "Moral Values" as the center of their justification. Mr. Gore, having been brought up a senator's son, may have worked hard as a youth and during his career, but never really experienced the struggle to make ends meet that growing up on "the wrong side of the tracks" meant to millions of Americans. So, following the failed IMPEACHMENT (no conviction) by the lame-duck Tom DeLay Republican Congress of President Bill Clinton in the senate in 1998, Vice President Gore EMBRACED the notion that HIS "MORAL VALUES" were SUPERIOR to President Clinton's "moral values," and in falling for this Republican "moral values" con, Mr. Gore selected... leading Democratic critic of the Clintons, Senator Joe Lieberman, to be his running mate.
For the TREACHERY of not being faithful to "the one who brung him to the dance" (Clinton selected an out-of-Washington Gore to be his running mate), Gore was repaid by Lieberman's even crasser TREACHERY: Lieberman REFUSED to drop out of his SENATE RE-ELECTION CAMPAIGN, signalling to the ENTIRE WORLD (except the cuckolded Mr. Gore) THAT LIEBERMAN WAS MORE CONCERNED ABOUT RETAINING HIS SENATE SEAT, THAN WINNING THE ELECTION FOR HIS RUNNING MATE! Mr. Gore's FAILURE to DEMAND that Lieberman REJECT HIS SENATE BID, or DROP OUT as VP candidate, signaled Gore's dismal lack of executive skills.
It only got worse from there, because FALLING VICTIM to Republican "MORAL VALUES" propaganda is THE HEART AND SOUL of the American political equilibrium existent today. Gore had been unable to undermine insurgent ex-senator BILL BRADLEE's "I COULD DO BETTER" primary challenge, and in "going negative" against Bradlee's so-called "liberal" themes, Gore ALIENATED the very "liberal" Democratic voters ('base') who SHOULD HAVE BEEN HIS MOST ARDENT SUPPORTERS! ALL Gore had to do was point out that, in the face of the 1994 Gingrich "Republican Revolution," Senator Bill Bradlee - with an almost GUARANTEED re-election - REFUSED TO EVEN TRY to run again, thereby ASSISTING the Gingrich right-wing authoritarian (and, we would soon learn, "moral values" HYPOCRITE!) revolution!
BILL BRADLEE _DROPPED OUT_ of the fight vs the Gingrich revolution in 1996, but came roaring back in 2000, to claim the Democratic mantle as presidential candidate?
Unfortunately, by not being able to knock Bradlee out bloodlessly, Gore learned THE WRONG LESSON: in the general campaign against George Bush, Gore would NOT let his campaign go NEGATIVE... against the DISMAL RECORD of Texas Governor GEORGE W. BUSH!
IF EVER a candidate for high-office deserved a NEGATIVE CAMPAIGN against his very public (but often secret) record, it was the Texas governor who had gone AWOL from the Texas Air National Guard during the Vietnam War, whose gubernatorial administration had WRECKED Texas' BUDGET SURPLUS by giving TAX CUTS TO BILLIONAIRES and Texas' wealthiest corporations, whose state was wracked with government corruption scandals (funeral-gate), and whose administration had, in the process, turned Texas into the MOST POLLUTED STATE in the union!
It is this later "hands off Bush' record" tactic that is now REVISITING the Democrats SEVEN YEARS LATER: not only did then Texas Governor Bush WRECK the Texas BUDGET SURPLUS left him by Democratic Governor Ann Richards.... but Bush did so, WHILE SLASHING social services to Texas citizens - including PRE-SCHOOL, AFTER-SCHOOL, and HEALTH CARE for TEXAS SCHOOLCHILDREN!!!
DEMOCRATS are REFIGHTING THIS BATTLE in OCTOBER 2007... because AL GORE REFUSED to fight the "good fight" _genuine_ "MORAL VALUES" battle in 2000 (the health and welfare of America's children should be THE most "moral values" isse of them all), and Democrats have REFUSED TO MAKE AN ISSUE OF IT EVER SINCE!
For SEVEN LONG YEARS Democrats REFUSE TO HIGHLIGHT THE TRUE COSTS of Mr. Bush's TAX CUTS FOR BILLIONAIRES - CEDING the moral values HIGH GROUND on this issue, the issue that is at the very heart of American democratic governance, and thereby ALLOWING the "major media" corporate-dominated press and broadcasters to IGNORE THE REAL ISSUES, TRIVIALIZE or SMEAR Democratic candidates and leaders, and instead continue propagating the Righ-Wing propaganda narrative "SLASH HEALTH CARE FOR CHILDREN - in name of 'free market capitalism" agenda!
