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Thanks for the memories, Bush

Once again, Mark Fiore will have you rolling on the floor laughing:

And of course, there is my all time favorite political flash animation:

I think it is safe to say that if voters remember enough stories like this:

Most ground zero workers still suffer from health problems two years after Sept. 11 and many do not have health insurance or job security, doctors told a congressional panel Tuesday.

Several of the workers testified at a Manhattan hospital before the committee, saying they had trouble breathing, suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and no longer had the strength to do their old jobs.

"I can't tell you how hard it is living like this," said David Rapp, a construction worker who spent five months at the World Trade Center site and now always carries an oxygen tank and uses three inhalers. "The fear of not being able to take my next breath is unbearable."

Rapp said he built docks and rebuilt cars before Sept. 11, 2001, but can no longer take out his garbage or change a flat tire.

John Graham, a carpenter and emergency services worker who spent three days a week at the site for several months, said he has asthma and is sometimes too sick to work.

"I'm a chronically ill man who's anxious about my ability to support my family," he said.

And this:

In the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center, the White House instructed the Environmental Protection Agency to give the public misleading information, telling New Yorkers it was safe to breathe when reliable information on air quality was not available.

That finding is included in a report released Friday by the Office of the Inspector General of the EPA, "EPA's Response to the World Trade Center Collapse: Challenges, Successes and Areas for Improvement."

"When the EPA made a September 18 announcement that the air was 'safe' to breathe, it did not have sufficient data and analyses to make such a blanket statement," the report says. "Furthermore, The White House Council on Environmental Quality influenced ... the information that EPA communicated to the public through its early press releases when it convinced EPA to add reassuring statements and delete cautionary ones."

On the morning of Sept. 12, according to the report, the office of then-Administrator of the EPA Christie Whitman issued a memo: "All statements to the media should be cleared through the NSC [National Security Council in the White House] before they are released." The 165-page report compares excerpts from EPA draft statements to the final versions, including these:

...A warning on the importance of safely handling Ground Zero cleanup, due to lead and asbestos exposure, was changed to say that some contaminants had been noted downtown but "the general public should be very reassured by initial sampling."

The report also notes examples when EPA officials claimed conditions were safe when no scientific support was available.

Game over. Come November 2, 2004, the Bush administration will be history:

The people I grew up with in Robbins, North Carolina, my own father, people all across the real America, they don't ask much from government, but what they ask for matters. They want their leaders to honor their values, have the courage of their convictions, keep their country safe and strong, and give them a chance to make the most of their lives. George W. Bush does not work for them. Never has, never will.

He is out of touch, out of tune, and in November 2004, he will be out of time!

We will call him to account for his broken promises!
We will challenge him on his duplicity!
And we will hold him responsible for his failures!

I will offer a clear alternative!
I will offer an honest vision!
I will place my trust in the people of this country!

And we will prevail!

Posted by Mike at October 29, 2003 06:38 PM | TrackBack