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I will turn 81 next month. I am a retired Air Force officer, and have served in three wars...WW II, Korea and Vietnam. I have flown many types of military aircraft...all multi-engine. Military history, aircraft, battleships, Naval vessels of all types are of interest to me. Politically I am progressive...conservative in some areas...liberal in others. I keep an open mind. I do not like the current Republican Administration. I consider it stupendously inept, corrupt and dangerous to our liberties. George Bush would not be welcome in my home, since my friends are all honest, courteous, and intelligent, qualities missing in the makeup of Mr. Bush. As far as religion is concerned, I am a secular humanist. I believe in human history, ends have always justified means. Whether they should or not, depends upon the situation. That makes me a situational ethicist, I suppose. I have been called a cynic, but never a hypocrite. I like to believe I am a realist. I am a writer,having written two books,one fiction and the other a memoir of sorts. My memoir, I paid to have published, and I must admit its readership is sparse. My dear wife and I have been married 53 years, and we have four grown children and eight grandkids. We both are in excellent health, and love to travel. We like cruising best, and have been on a total of sixteen cruises, mostly to the Caribbean and to Europe.

Blog Url: http://denver.yourhub.com/~RenaissanceMan

If Only it had Turned out Differently
Contributed by: Carl Group   on 2/6/2006

Because of an ethically challenged woman who was the Secretary of State of Florida, Katherine Harris by name, and because of groups of Republican activists who raged through polling places in Democratic districts, intimidating and verbally assaulting poll workers, and finally, because of  a Supreme Court which was controlled by its conservative majority, Al Gore was cheated of the Presidency of the United States. The election of 2000 in the State of Florida was the closest in the nation's history, and had it not been for the aformentioned people and actions, President Gore would now be in the middle of his second term .

How would our country have fared had he been elected and re-elected in 2004?

It is now February 6, 2006. It is likely the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center would still be standing. More than three thousand Americans, civilian and military, who died on September 11, 2001, would be alive and leading productive lives. Four fine commercial jet passenger aircraft would still be flying. Osama bin Laden would be dead, as would Mohammed Omar, leader of the Afghan Taliban.
America would not be involved in a tragic, unnecessary, incompetently planned and executed war in Iraq. Afghanistan would be a democratically governed country, overseen by an American civilian and military caretaker. The Taliban would NOT have had the resurgence it has now.  Saddam Hussein may have been still ruling Iraq, or not, depending upon the Iraqi people's response to our success in Afghanistan.

Why do I ponder these questions when practically all Republicans are thanking God that Al Gore was not President?

First, I ponder them because Al Gore is intelligent. He has a quick and intuitive grasp of political and international realities. He thinks. He reads. He read every Presidential Daily Briefing prepared for Bill Clinton. He read them, analyzed them, questioned them, discussed them with the President, and then with his boss, used them to craft policy. He read the intelligence briefings provided to him, made notes, talked to his intelligence staff. He did not want them reduced to Cliff Note size, and then further reduced to one paragraph.

George Bush doesn't think very much. He believes. He is an idealogue along with the neocons who surround him. He fits, massages, and twists national policy to conform to his preconceived ideology. His foreign and domestic track record to date has been an unmitigated disaster.

Does this mean that Al Gore is mistake-proof? Of course not. The biggest mistake of his career, and of his life, and also his biggest and deepest regret, was not allowing President Clinton to campaign for him. Bill Clinton made the offer, and Al Gore rejected it. Had he not, Florida would have made no difference. He would have been .elected decisively.

Al Gore and Joe Lieberman would have been tracking those Saudi wannabe pilots like glue, as soon as they were alerted by flying schools, whose suspicions were aroused by Arabs who (stupidly) wanted to be taught how to fly large jet aircraft, forget taking off and landing.

Obviously George Bush doesn't pay much attention to what his intellligence people tell him. He's not very interested in governance, being constantly involved in politicking. The Saudi terrorists were left to wander the country and to board airliners without question. When Condi Rice warned him that Osama bin Laden was planning a
terrorist attack on the United States, he ignored it.

America today under a Gore administration, would not have a military stretched to the breaking point, and a budget dedicating hundreds of billions to fighting a losing war in Iraq. We would have a socially conservative nation, progressive in the provision of efficiently targeted emergency services for natural disasters...conservative in the assurance that American high tech and high paid jobs would remain
in America, regardless of the short-term greed of incomparably stupid corporate executives, whose only talent seems to be running their businesses into bankruptcy.

But we do not have Gore administration, sadly. If only it had turned out differently in the election of 2000. But there is hope. The midterm election in November 2006, provides the opportunity to take the nation back from the incompetent and corrupt politicians who seem bent on destroying it.


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Showing 1 of 1 comments
Submitted By: Thomas Roberts
posted on 2/9/2006 @ 7:53:51 PM
(Not Rated)
This is a sorry sorry sorry bunch of worthless words. Al Gore is the perfect example of a political pi-s ant. George W. Bush is the best President in the last 100 years, next to Ronald Reagan. Sorry Carl, Sincerely, Thomas D. Roberts
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CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

Carl Group

Centennial , CO

Carl Group has posted 3 blog entries and 1 comment since joining on 2/4/2006. Carl Group 's average blog rating is 3.43.
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