Bush's "Wolves" Ad a complete lie:

The Bush campaign accused Kerry of "a pattern" of trying to cut intelligence funding. Bush personally accused Kerry of attempting to "gut the intelligence services" with a "deeply irresponsible" 1995 proposal.

It's true that Kerry proposed cuts in 1994 and 1995, and the his 1994 proposal was criticized on the Senate floor by some members of his own party. But the proposal Bush criticized would have amounted to a reduction of roughly 1%. And senior congressional Republicans supported a cut two-thirds as large at the time.

Analysis

President Bush said March 8 at a political fundraiser in Dallas that Kerry's 1995 proposal to cut $1.5 billion over five years was "deeply irresponsible."

His bill was so deeply irresponsible that he didn't have a single co-sponsor in the United States Senate. Once again, Senator Kerry is trying to have it both ways. He's for good intelligence, yet he was willing to gut the intelligence services. And that is no way to lead a nation in a time of war.

"Gut" intelligence? It was 1%

It's true that Kerry's 1995 proposal called for cutting intelligence funding by $1.5 billion over five years. The actual amount of intelligence spending is classified, but according to the Boston Globe, the Washington Post and others, the US was spending roughly $27 billion on intelligence at the time. So the $300-million cut would have amounted to a little over 1 percent. Hardly a "gutting."

It's true Kerry's measure had no co-sponsors and died without a hearing. But that's hardly evidence it was "deeply irresponsible" as the President claimed. On the contrary, there was bipartisan support for cutting what was seen as wasteful spending of classified intelligence funds.

In fact, Kerry's proposal came five days after the Washington Post had reported that one intelligence agency, the super-secret National Reconnaissance Office, had quietly hoarded between $1 billion and $1.7 billion in unspent funds without informing the Central Intelligence Agency or the Pentagon. The CIA was in the midst of an inquiry into the NRO's funding because of complaints that the agency had spent $300 million on unspent funds from its classified budget to build a new headquarters building in Virginia a year earlier.

"Irresponsible?" But Republicans Approved.

Also, the very same day Kerry proposed his $1.5 billion cut, the Senate passed by voice vote an amendment proposed by Republican Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania to eliminate $1 billion in intelligence funds for fiscal year 1996. Specter made clear he was attempting to recoup $1 billion in unused intelligence funds from the NRO:

It has alleged that the NRO has accumulated more than $1 billion in unspent funds without informing the Pentagon, CIA, or Congress.

Kerry co-sponsored a companion measure to the Specter amendment, along with Republican Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama. The cut eventually became law as part of a House-Senate package endorsed by the Republican leadership.

And in fact, the reports of an NRO slush fund turned out to be true. According to former CIA general counsel Jeffrey Smith, who led the investigation:

Our inquiry revealed that the NRO had for years accumulated very substantial amount as a 'rainy day fund.'

Smith, quoted by Slate Magazine, said Kerry's proposal was an attempt "to re-assert adequate Congressional oversight of the intelligence budget."

A "pattern?" Well, not exactly

The Bush campaign in a March 9 document accused Kerry of "a pattern of intelligence cuts." But aside from the 1995 proposal, the only evidence of a "pattern" offered was a 1994 deficit-reduction bill Kerry sponsored (S. 1826) that included a $1 billion a year in cuts to the intelligence budget for 1994-1998.

It is true that some members of Kerry's own party criticized that proposal. Sen. Dennis DeConcini said intelligence funds already had been cut $3.5 billion:

I continue to believe that last year's intelligence cut was as deep as the intelligence community can withstand during its post-cold-war transition.

And Sen. Daniel Inouye echoed that:

An additional $1 billion would severely hamper the intelligence community's ability to provide decisionmakers and policymakers with information on matters vital to this country.

On Feb 10,1994, Kerry's amendment was defeated 75-20 with 38 Democratic Senators voting against it.

But it is also true that even at that time there was growing concern about the how effectively the intelligence agencies were spending the money they had. Later in 1994 Congress formed the Aspin Commission to assess the state of the intelligence services. It was bipartisan. Following the death of former Secretary of Defense Les Aspin, for whom the panel was named, it was headed by another former Secretary of Defense, Harold Brown, and by Republican former Sen. Warren Rudman of New Hampshire.

When the 17-member panel completed its report two years later, it said intelligence funding, despite recent cuts, was still 80% higher than it had been in 1980 even after adjustments for inflation. And while the commission did not recommend any more cuts, it acknowledged that balancing the federal budget would probably require that cuts be made.

And the commission stopped well short of claiming further cuts would "gut" the intelligence services:

Reductions to the existing and planned intelligence resources may be possible without damaging the nation's security. Indeed, finding such reductions is critical . . . (I)t is clear a more rigorous analysis of the resources budgeted for intelligence is required.

My name is TomJ and I go around to conservative blogs and post DNC/Kerry talking points. I'm sorry for such a long post above.

Huh. So the central claim of the ad - that Kerry sought to cut intel spending after the first al Qaeda attack on the WTC is true. You're just quibbling about details. Try putting your details in a 30-second ad, TomJ. It won't have near the impact of "Wolves" because, A) it will confuse and bore people and, B), Wolves plays into an existing belief about Kerry - that he is a liberal who consistently votes to cut defense. And that belief is based on facts. Kerry IS a liberal who consistently votes to cut defense. Remember the 1984 memos - the ones where he called for ending whole defense weapons programs that, had he prevailed, would leave us virtually unarmed and unable to fight the war today.

Bill, I assume you can read and that you noticed that the vote was for a $1.5 billion cut, and not a $6 billion cut, as was incorrectly stated in the ad. Also, Kerry went against his party in voting for the cut and the Republicans supported the cut with Kerry -- it was a conservative measure to cut "gubment waste"! And Bush is using it to attack Kerry for being soft on terrorism? What a weak attempt.

See below for a true portrait of how Bush's failed and irresponsible military adventurism has affected every day Americans:

http://www.winbackrespect.org/ads/ad5_wmp.html

By the way, Kerry was hardly alone in proposing intelligence cuts. Around the same time, in 1995, Rep. Porter Goss—who was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee—co-sponsored another omnibus budget-trimmer, which among other things would have cut intelligence personnel by 4 percent a year in each year from 1996 to 2000. Goss, of course, is the man that President Bush recently appointed as the director of the Central Intelligence Agency. If the wolves are coming after anyone, they have more cause to howl at Porter Goss—and, by implication, George W. Bush—than at John Kerry and the Democrats.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27092-2004Aug23.html

Tomj, No matter how you try to defend him. He is a liberal senator from Mass. who would rather us the UN to defend this country than have us do it ourselves. No matter what little inconsistancies you find in a RNC or Bush ad the facts speak for themselves.

John Kerry will go back to the Clinton years where we treated terrorists like petty criminals. We can not do that anymore. Not after what happened to us on September 11, 2001.

Wake up TomJ. Wake Up!

Bill,

The play buttons on your post don't render in Firefox. If you do your own web design, you might want to test it, since a lot of people use Firefox these days (including me).

Dave

Why do conservatives consistantly avoid talking about *why* terrorists hate America so? Isn't understanding the enemy part of winning the battle?

Here's a very inexpensive tactic that would make America safer: Stop Supporting Israel.

You want to talk about rogue states? Let's talk about rogue states. They possess nuclear weapons and systematically oppress millions of people because of their ethnicity. And they do all of this with the USA's blessing, thus making us hated by Muslims the world over.

You reap what you sow.

Hey tom,

Just saw Neil Cavuot on FoxNews...someone wrote an email to the show that Neil read. It was pretty deragotory towards Cavuto and signed "Tom J." Was that you? Be honest.

sherm:

I'd rather have the Israelis as friends; at least they've managed to build a productive society out of the desert. Of course, the Arabs have many times the land and resources, but that can't make up for unwillingness to work hard rather than relying on someone else to do it for them.

The issue of why has been bandied about for a long time now, if you've been sleeping since 9/10. And if you think we're going to stop supporting Israel, the only long-standing stable democracy in the Middle East, in favor of a bunch of vile mullahcracies, you've got another thought coming.

Links don't work for me either. Using Firefox 1.0PR

SDN said:
"Of course, the Arabs have many times the land and resources, but that can't make up for unwillingness to work hard rather than relying on someone else to do it for them."

True. Guess why? Oil. Our prodigious use of oil only makes the problem worse. Oil keeps the Middle East in the Dark Ages. When is the last time a great invention or idea came out of the Middle East? No need to think when you can pump gold out of the ground!

Big Dog said:
"And if you think we're going to stop supporting Israel, the only long-standing stable democracy in the Middle East, in favor of a bunch of vile mullahcracies, you've got another thought coming."

I say, we should support neither. Israel is a huge security liability for us. We should have a hands-off attitude towards the whole thing. Let all of them fight over palestine, what do we care? It's not our problem.

Considering they have hated/fought each other for thousands of years, choosing a side to support isn't just silly, it's dangerous. If Israel can't defend itself without our support, too bad. We have more important things to worry about.

I'm not sure why so many Arabs think if we stop supporting Israel the problem would go away. If we suddenly claimed "nuetrality" and cut off funding to Israel, would Syria, Egypt and Iran see this as an opening to attack Israel? What would the likely result of that event be? How about more Israeli-occupied Arab lands?

The only thing stopping Israel from crushing all it's foes is us...we're not propping up Israel, we're reining them in.

Considering they have hated/fought each other for thousands of years, choosing a side to support isn't just silly, it's dangerous. If Israel can't defend itself without our support, too bad. We have more important things to worry about.
Yes, because we have no strategic interests in the Middle East, and it's not in our interest to support the growth of freedom and death of tyranny for our long-term security or anything.

I believe what I see in Kerry's record and I believe the information brought back from personel in Iraq. I personally saw where Kerry did not vote for the body armor to our troops. KERRY WILL NEVER GET MY VOTE! Liar liar pants on fire.

Ivan said:
" If we suddenly claimed "nuetrality" and cut off funding to Israel, would Syria, Egypt and Iran see this as an opening to attack Israel? What would the likely result of that event be? How about more Israeli-occupied Arab lands?"

Who cares? It's not our problem. They can all bomb each other to rubble--It's not our business.

Big Dog said sarcastically:
"Yes, because we have no strategic interests in the Middle East, and it's not in our interest to support the growth of freedom and death of tyranny for our long-term security or anything."

What about the freedom of the Palestineans? They can't even vote. What about the tyranny of the Israeli regime? Israel is no ally of the USA; they are a huge liabilty. The sooner we leave them alone, the more safer we'll all be.

It's unfortunate people don't realize the extreme danger our crazed Zionist/Pre-Millennialist foreign policies create for us, along with our irresponsible energy policies.

Go ahead and fill up that SUV, Bubba--never mind the fact you are helping pay for extremist Islamic schools in Saudi Arabia where children are taught to hate the US.

These are the two things we should be focusing on, if we really care about the long-term safety and prosperity of the United States:

1.) End all support to Israel, Egypt, etc. Don't take sides in their silly wars.
2.) Adopt an agressive plan to wean the US from oil over the next 20 years.

The end result would be incredibly beneficial for our economy and security.

Will it happen? Not as long as Republicrats are elected.

Sherman, pull your cranium out of the sand. Isolationism is not the answer. I'm curious...did you strenuously object to our involvment in Kosovo during Allied Force? Or was that an OK war since a Democrat launched it (without UN support or approval, by the way)? Further, Bill Clinton himself said he'd "get in the trenches and fight with Israel."

Zionist/Pre-Millennialist foreign policies? What the hell are you talking about? Please explain. That sounds like something out of Logan's Run.

Everyone shoud support the poor displaced Palestinians...starting with the other Arab countries. Why did Jordan and Libya kick them out? Why won't Syria take them in? Why didn't Saddam? Everyone is "fighting for the Palestinians" but nobody seems to want anything to do with them. I might actually support their call for a homeland...once they stop blowing themselves up and killing innocent Israelis. On 9/11, where was the Palestinian sympathy for the US? I missed it among all the dancing in Gaza.

I might take your advocacy for disengagement from the Middle East seriously if you meant it. You don't...your comments about the "freedom" of the Palestinians and "Zionists" and "Republicrats" (what that does mean, anyway?) betray your leftist thoughts. Somehow I think you'd support a war AGAINST Israel...hardly a nuetral stance. Hypocrite.

Ivan:

How simpleminded you are to assume that if I'm not a Republican/conservative/right-winger, I must therefore be a Democrat/liberal/leftist.

"Zionist/Pre-Millennialist foreign policies? What the hell are you talking about? Please explain. That sounds like something out of Logan's Run."

If you don't know about the US government's Zionist/premillennialist policies since Truman, I can't help you. Read a book.

"On 9/11, where was the Palestinian sympathy for the US? I missed it among all the dancing in Gaza."

Of course they were dancing. We've been actively supporting the Israeli boot on their face for five decades.

"I might take your advocacy for disengagement from the Middle East seriously if you meant it. You don't...your comments about the "freedom" of the Palestinians and "Zionists" and "Republicrats" (what that does mean, anyway?) betray your leftist thoughts. Somehow I think you'd support a war AGAINST Israel...hardly a nuetral stance. Hypocrite."

Republicrat is a derogatory term for Republicans and Democrats, suggesting they are both part of the problem.

Ivan, I recommend you go to www.lp.org and learn something.

"The boot in their faces." Yes, because they keep blowing themselves up around innocent civilians. They want to declare war on their immediate neighbor, they better be ready for their neighbor to fight back, especially if that neighbor isn't living in the thirteenth century.

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Contrary to the idea that Israel would crush its enemies in our absence, the fact is that it would be overrun instead. Our support is crucial to its existence.

This is one of the three reasons for the war in which we have engaged; the other two being the opening act of the PNAC agenda and the other being the irresistable lure of lucrative business opportunities.

Why should it seem perverse that a nation of people would be removed from their own land and others put in their place and not expect them to reinstate their previous condition?

I believe that this is the only root cause of the Muslim-centered terrorism we see today, and that the Muslim world is looking the other way because of it. I think that it will clean its house of these reprehensible tactics if a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian problem can be brought about.

Not to be derogatory or anything, but anyone that believes the reason Al-Qaeda declared war on us is only due to our support of Israel has been smoking too much weed. Just re-read their 1998 fatwa (which is the 2nd fatwa that was issued during the Clinton era:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/terrorism/international/fatwa_1998.html

1) First, for over seven years the United States has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula.....
2) We are only out to kill Muslims
3) Support of Israel

This was the 2nd fatwa, which came 6 years after WTC I. The original fatwa that came out nearly 3 years before this one stated the reasoning as occupation on the Arabian Peninsula (Gulf War I); Westernization of Muslims (through secularism) and the US pushing its ideology on Middle Eastern countries (via Israel), but everyone wants to forget about the orginal fatwa.