Thursday, July 01, 2004

Now Watch This Drive

Am I the only that’s amused when President Bush says that in the F9/11 trailer?

It does amuse me and here’s why. It reminds me of that moment in one of the Bush-Gore debates from 2000 when Al Gore stepped right up next to then-Governor Bush while he was answering a question. I think Al was hoping to throw W off his rhythm, to distract him from finishing his thought and thereby making W look as dumb as he was perceived to be.

Only it didn’t work that way for Al. Instead, W merely paused, nodded coolly at Al, and without even moving a step away and with Al in his personal space, continued his response. It was brilliant. He completely dismissed the intruder and moved ahead with purpose and with barely a pause in stride.

I get that same thing from that clip from the movie trailer. The press is hounding him about the war on terror while he’s trying to play golf. Not that the war isn’t important to the President, it is. But every reasonable person knows that everyone needs a break from stressful situations (I think we can all agree that the American Presidency is probably the most stressful job, no?), so the President was playing a round of golf. He answers their pestering questions, which are probably repeated ad nauseum because they didn’t like his answers, until he reached the point where he was done with them and was ready to move on. “Now, watch this drive,” he said dismissively. It cracks me up every time I see it.

Posted by at 11:59 PM
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This Is No Surprise To Me

I heard about this local news on my way home tonight:

Authorities searched an Islamic institute and mosque in northern Virginia Thursday.

News4’s Jeff Napshin reported a search warrant was served on the organization, which is located in the ... Merrifield area.

The FBI, immigration and customs officials and the Internal Revenue Service were involved in the search of the Institute of Islamic and Arabic Sciences in America.

Yeah, so I used to work in the building right next door to this Institute. My Dad worked for the same company, too, so he’ll remember some of this. It was before the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 when we first made note of the Institute and it’s patrons. About every month or so several black cars, usually Mercedes or other luxury cars, would park on the street in front of the building and robed and suited men and women of Middle Eastern descent would unload from the cars and go into the building. We found it interesting and noteworthy and continued to watch from our office windows every month.

After the WTC bombing in 93, the watch became a little more pointed and we would joke about the “terrorist meetings” taking place. On 9/11/01, as I was driving to my mother’s house after the Pentagon was attacked, I wondered about the Institute and I’ve continued to wonder about it ever since. With each mention of local arrests of potential terrorism suspects, I seriously expected that the Institute would be mentioned, yet it never was. Until today’s search.

Do I think that terrorists met there? Not really, it’s too obvious and the building is clearly marked. Do I think the Institute supports terrorists, maybe. I’ll be interested in learning more about this search - what they were looking for and found.

Posted by at 09:42 PM
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THNK U

I forgot to mention this earlier. On my commute in this morning, I was behind a car with a US Marine Corps personalized license plate. We have a ton of plate options here in the Commonwealth - I have the Fight Terrorism plate.

Anyway, this guy’s plate read:

UR WLCM

Clever.

Posted by at 09:07 PM
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Bush’s Formulaic Win Prediction

I got the link to this article via email (thanks, Ace!).

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Polls may show the presidential race in a dead heat, but for a small band of academics who use scientific formulas to predict elections President Bush (news - web sites) is on his way to a sizable win.

That’s the conclusion of a handful of political scientists who, with mixed results, have honed the art of election forecasting by devising elaborate mathematical formulas based on key measures of the nation’s economic health and the public’s political views.

Most of these academics are predicting Bush, bolstered by robust economic growth, will win between 53 and 58 percent of the votes cast for him and his Democratic opponent John Kerry (news - web sites).

Their track record for calling election outcomes months in advance has often been surprisingly accurate. In 1988, the models projected Bush’s father, former President George Bush, would win even though Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis enjoyed a double digit poll leads that summer.

I’m pretty confident that the President will be re-elected. I’ve said before that this summer reminds me of 1988, when the media were all but declaring Dukakis to be the next President instead of Bush 41. Even if we have a major terrorist attack within our borders, I think the President will win reelection - think about it, we know how he will respond to an attack because we’ve already seen how he responds. We have no clue how a President Kerry will respond and I shudder to think how a Kerry administration will handle the War on Terror. I think most Americans will vote with their safety, and the safety of their kids, in mind.

That said, the academics did get one election prediction gloriously wrong.

...they predicted in 2000 that Democrat Al Gore (news - web sites) would win easily, pegging his total at between 53 and 60 percent of the two-party vote.

Why were they so wrong?

The forecasters chalk up the 2000 error to Gore’s campaign, which distanced itself from the Clinton record. All the models assume the candidates will run reasonably competent campaigns, said Thomas Holbrook, a professor at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee.

Heh. Posted by at 04:26 PM
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Thought for Thursday

Ponder this…

Drug addicts - victims or volunteers?

I forget where I read the volunteer idea, but it really struck a chord with me. And I think the difference in the thinking behind the two ideas will correspond with how people think that drug addicts should be treated.

So let me know what you think in the comments.

Posted by at 12:53 PM
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