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CNN: Just how bad were O'Neill's gaffes?
by Elonka at 2:54 pm EST, Jan 13, 2004

] NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Long a source of fun and fury on
] Wall Street and in Washington, former Treasury Secretary
] Paul O'Neill is back in the news for shooting his mouth
] off again.

Here's some information, pro and con, about O'Neill's history.

I'm still coming up to speed on the whole story, so I haven't made up my mind yet on whether or not O'Neill is credible. I do find it amusing though that many people who almost certainly had never heard of O'Neill before his book came out, and probably couldn't name any other cabinet members if their life depended on it, are jumping on O'Neill's bandwagon simply because they like *anything* that criticizes Bush. Or in other words, while O'Neill was *in* the administration, they would have perceived him as "one of them," a clueless idiot, but now that he's got some critical things to say about Bush, they praise him as a saintly whistle-blower.

This CNN article seems to do a pretty good job (IMHO) of trying to look at both sides of the issue. I look forward to more analysis in the future.

RE: CNN: Just how bad were O'Neill's gaffes?
by Rattle at 4:14 am EST, Jan 14, 2004

Elonka wrote:
] This CNN article seems to do a pretty good job (IMHO) of
] trying to look at both sides of the issue. I look forward to
] more analysis in the future.

His book just came out.. After few weeks have passed, people have read it, pondered on it, and done some fact checkin. It will be made apparent if this story has any teeth. It could go either way.

I will fully admit my bias.. Something just tells me that Bush is an idiot. Gut feeling. Its an easy sell. I and many other people will be easy to manipulate into that one. I'm pretty sure the brains in the current White House reside elsewhere. I'm sure Karl Rove is well aware of all this. Its going to be very hard to make Bush look smart. He just doesn't seem to do that, ever..

When is the last time we heard press about how Bush was not seeing eye-to-eye with someone? We don't really.. He directs the meetings, he is on time. That's what we hear. The President seems to get along great with all his staff, all the time.. His staff doesn't though, so we know we are seeing some of the human condition present over there. Rummy and Colin for instance. There are some brains in this administration, no doubt.. But I just picture Bush nodding a lot.

However, I will also put forward that this could be a product of what I've/We've been managed to perceive. In an ideal world Rummy and Colin get along great, Bush is always challenging everyone, and Karl is just PR'ing everything to all hell. But thats still not good, because I'm all about transparency in government. There really isn't a way this can be spun where I don't find something about it I seriously dislike.

O'Neil wouldn't have gotten whacked from his position without a number of people thinking he was a problem.. The child with the loaded gun comment was kind of amusing.. I remember a number of the foot in mouth episodes being recounted in the press when he got the boot. Its also important to remember that it doesn't necessarily mean that he is not being truthful when he recounts something. Let the court of public opinion take a few lessons from the court of law on that one.

... But this leads into another point that is just as important. Being the election is coming up, I keep finding myself steering all issues in that direction. This, brings up a very key one.

Who the hell are Dean's (or for that matter the Dem's) people? The President could be a Rhodes scholar and his staff is still going to matter just as much if not more then he does.. So who the hell is the oppositions staff? We already know all about Bush's staff, and have formed our opinions. Who is in the Dem's wing?

If there are real intentions of taking Bush down, not only is a president and vice president needed, but also a party and a team. As previously stated, I have a bias to dislike Bush. However, I want to vote for someone, rather then vote not-Bush.