Yes, Virginia, There Really Is A Third Rail!

If you're at all familiar with Baltimore Sun columnist, Jules Witcover, you know that he has almost always been a big fan of Bear & Squirrel Stew...

You know the recipe: To a pot of water, add 1 squirrel and 1 bear.

Equal amounts of each type of meat, right?

If 272 Republicans commit atrocities in the name of compassionate conservatism, Jules can always find 1 Democrat who, while not exactly in on the actual atrocious act, responds to the accusation with a diplomatic statement instead of calling such atrocities... well... Atrocities.

Et violà!

Jules has presented both sides of the story, thereby fulfilling his (cough) journalistic (cough) duty.

Straddling the political fence has always been Jules' forté.

Here's Jules BEFORE the Republicans decided to steal our Guaranteed Social Security Safety Net...




Today, however, Jules Witcover decided he had to jump off the fence and do something to save all of those nuts we've been counting on to keep us off the park benches of Homeless Old Age.

Here's Jules today...

Presidential shell games
Jules Witcover

Originally published Mar 9, 2005

Jules Witcover

WASHINGTON - If George W. Bush were not president of the United States, he would make one great bunco artist in a traveling carnival.

In his more than four years in the White House, he has shown himself to be the master of the old bait-and-switch: Offer the customers one thing, and when they nibble, peddle them something else.

The latest illustration of his political sleight of hand is his deceptive campaign to reform Social Security by allowing young and middle-age taxpayers to divert some of the payroll tax to stock market investment.--snip--

Without calling attention to his past fence-straddling, Jules lists several BushCo shell game policies...

# Pledging to get Osama bin Laden and the other perpetrators of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, he invaded Iraq, which was not responsible for those atrocities.

# Insisting the invasion was imperative because Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, he switched to "regime change" - deposing Saddam Hussein - as the justification for the invasion when no WMD were found.

# When the occupation bogged down and the "liberation" turned into an occupation, with its mushrooming American cost in lives and dollars, he broadened the objective to "bringing democracy" to the Middle East.

# At home, he cited the budget surplus he inherited to justify huge tax cuts, which mainly benefit the rich. When a huge deficit resulted, he cited the tax cuts as the way to stimulate the economy and combat the deficit.

# Under the guise of creating an "ownership society" through partial privatization of Social Security, he made a frontal assault on the basic rationale for the system - that it is intended to provide a safety net for the elderly, not an enrichment scheme. LINK

But Wait! There's More!

Jules even cites George W.'s campaign promises not to participate in nation building and to be a compassionate conservative.

Some of Jules' more colorful word choices today:

Bait-and-switch
Bunco Artist
Peddle
Sleight of hand
Deceptive
Divert
Actuarial crystal ball
Cripple
Dumping
Standard scam
Mushrooming American cost in lives and dollars
Benefit the rich
Frontal assault
Enrichment scheme
Spectacle
Mockery

Wow, Jules!

You have to keep running now that you're off that fence!

There's no turning back now.




You don't want to end up in that famous BushCo Bear & Squirrel Stew, do you?