Butting Heads

They say the country is deeply polarized, just about 50-50. Well I of course will be supporting John Kerry so sometimes it seems strange to me that half of the country still supports Bush. I understand that there are issues like abortion and gay marriage where there can be no compromise, they are absolutely against these things and will not support a candidate that allows for either. But the Republicans I know keep making the same arguements about how they are so good at keeping us safe from terrorism, and how we are fighting the War on Terror in the best way possible.

This is outrageous. We are not fighting the War on Terror responsibly, we are using torture as a means of interrogation and deliberately confusing a real war with a metaphorical war. To fight "the war on terror" involves checking Visas, controlling immigration, airport security. To fight a war in Iraq requires tanks, missiles, jet fighters, air craft carriers, etc. These are obviously two different wars we're talking about now.

So I recently had a conversation with my friend Bret, who is a hard core Republican. And I asked him if he though Rummsfeld should resign because of Abu Ghraib. He said no. Turns out Bret doesn't follow current events very closely.

I printed up for him page 112 of the Schlesinger report which is a chart entitled "Evolution of Interrogation Techniques- GTMO". I explained that this chart is the irrefutable proof that Rummsfeld did in fact order techniques that would legally be defined as torture by the US Code and the Geneva Conventions. After I had shown it to him, Bret stood by his viewpoint, declaring that he does not care if non-Americans are tortured if it is to protect Americans. I pointed out that Americans probably were tortured at Gitmo, because it's not just foreigners being detained there. I also pointed out that the Bill of Rights in Ammendment 9 does not allow for the Constitution to be used to deny people their rights.

My friend's logic is absolutely screwy, and what is worse, he refuses to use evidence to back up his extremely emotional reaction to voting for Bush. For him, it is all emotional- he feels terrorized and is afraid that Al Qaeda is deperately trying to kill him, and me, and everyone we know. He believes that all steps taken by the current government are necessary and will not be easily swayed by even the most irrefutable proof of malfeasance or abuse of power.

I hope those that find this blog are more open minded than my friend.

The goal of this website is to provide irrefutable evidence that Bush is wrong for this country. You can be for Bush, you can be for Kerry, but you are no longer allowed to be ignorant. If the facts support Kerry, and I believe they do, then the American people have the right to hear the facts.