Can Obama beat McCain?

[KnowItAll]

>> why his message of change is popular.

With the hippies and yuppies perhaps....

If one were to believe the counts on here ( RealClearPolitics - 2008 Elections - Democratic Vote Count ) then one could say, half the democrats have not voted for Obama - hardly a clear winner.

[aussiegal]

Bush did what he had to do to guarantee that Americans would be able to continue driving their huge four wheel drives.

I never liked the idea of the Iraq war and still don't however from a machiavellian point of you i guess someone has to make the hard decisions if a nation wants to continue guzzling oil.

I just wonder what will happen when the next terrorist attack happens in the US and Obama is out the back having a smoko.

[Sleuth]

'I don't think anyone can say that 9/11(arguably the biggest thing that has happened to the US during this admininstrations tenure) is a result of anything that Bush or his admin themselves did but most things they have done since have been in reaction to it.'

wasnt it bushes decision alone to go to war in iraq not anything the previous administration did. He sold it to the Americans that saddam was behind 9/11 , in fact he had nothing to do with it and sadam was actually suspicious of bin laden as he saw him as a threat to his power base. Its funny how the facts get ignored. As for bushes reversal of legislation to protect the envorment thats a whole other story....
.

What aussielegal said was that Bush did not cause 9/11 and that most of his policies have been a reaction to it.
What you said was that Bush decided (alone--more on that later) to invade Iraq.
Iraq came after 9/11; it was a reaction to 9/11. 9/11, as you point out, was one of the biggest reasons for the invasion.
And the Mid East and US Mid East policy, the world's Mid East, policy has been a mess for years so each adminsitration does have to deal with the mess left by the previous ones.

Your comment does not follow from aussielegal's.
Unless you are also making the argument that Bush would have invaded Iraq without 9/11, but you don't say that so I assume that is not what you are getting at.
And Bush did not make the decsion alone. He had the support of the neo-cons as well as a majority of the American people and funding support from Congress. Now, in hindsight, his reasoning was wrong. Perhaps even a lie. And most of the people that voted for the war are now voting against it, but he didn't decide alone. He's a President, not an absolute monarch.

[Sleuth]

Sleuth are u McCain supporter? do you think the current administration has done a good job?

Given the choices, yes I support McCain over Obama. And Obama over Hillary.
No, the current adminstration has not done a good job on many issues.

I do wonder what this administration would have done if 9/11 hadn't happened. And I do not think Gore nor Kerry would have done any better.

[Football16]

Bush did what he had to do to guarantee that Americans would be able to continue driving their huge four wheel drives.

I never liked the idea of the Iraq war and still don't however from a machiavellian point of you i guess someone has to make the hard decisions if a nation wants to continue guzzling oil.

I just wonder what will happen when the next terrorist attack happens in the US and Obama is out the back having a smoko.

Oil had nothing to do with the decision to topple Saddam and invade Iraq.

It is like the old myth that was perpetuated during the Vietnam War that the United States was there to protect its interests or for some economic purpose which it was not. The "domino" theory articulated by George Kennard led the US to that fight they lost badly. This theory suggested that if one country like Vietnam fell to Communism, then like dominoes the whole south east Asia region would fall similarly so it had to be stopped. It was a foreign policy containment strategy that emerged in the Eisenhauer - Nixon era that JFK operated by as he put more people in there as advisors, then it became fighting and a lost war.

The origins of the Iraq invasion was in the "Project for the New American Century" whose signatories included Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz - these were the architects of the Bush disaster in Iraq.

I just tried to open that website to find it gone or something. I can't find it now but there are lots of articles on it. In a nut shell these guys felt that it is time for new century in which the USA put its stamp on the world in a harking back to the Reagan era and "bring down that wall" rhetoric with the Russians. The USSR went broke so that worked so why not try it with Iraq.

The trigger to go to Iraq was 911 but the origins were in that group in Bush power structure who buy this type of thinking. I can see why they took down that website.

edit to add wikipedia version:

The Project for the New American Century (PNAC) is an American neoconservative think tank based in Washington, D.C., co-founded as "a non-profit educational organization" by William Kristol and Robert Kagan in early 1997. The PNAC's stated goal is "to promote American global leadership."[1] Fundamental to the PNAC are the views that "American leadership is both good for America and good for the world" and support for "a Reaganite policy of military strength and moral clarity."[2]

It has exerted strong influence on high-level U.S. government officials in the administration of U.S President George W. Bush and strongly affected the George Bush administration's development of military and foreign policies, especially involving national security and the Iraq War.[3][4][5] As of May 20, 2008, The Project for the New American Century website was inoperable. A message saying that the account has been suspended and to contact the billing department was put on the sites page.

[Claire ex-ax]

Oil had nothing to do with the decision to topple Saddam and invade Iraq.

McCain has said differently during his campaign: "My friends, I will have an energy policy that we will be talking about, which will eliminate our dependence on oil from the Middle East. That will prevent us from having ever to send our young men and women into conflict again in the Middle East."

And Iraq was invaded after it announced its oil bourse would change to euros - I'm not saying there is a reason of course because the US (with help from Blair) had another excuse in its pocket but it was another nail in Iraq's coffin. The first thing the "liberators" did was to reverse the petroeuro; it made sure the Oil Ministry wasn't bombed to facilitate this. OK, technically this point isn't directly about oil but about the US protecting its currency and the petrodollar.

[worldsgreatest]

PNAC are the views that "American leadership is both good for America and good for the world" and support for "a Reaganite policy of military strength and moral clarity."

Hold on a muniute....America appoints itself the leader of the world? ''military strength and moral clarity.".??!!!

[Claire ex-ax]

US foreign policy has never been altruistic, quite the contrary. Everthing it has done has been for its own ends; it supports dictators left, right and centre - including Saddam - and causes democracies to tumble when it 'disagrees' with elections! Okay, every country has similar foreign policies, but the US is rather more blatant about it. So, IMHO, PNAC is about what's good for America is good for America and screw the rest of the world.

[Football16]

McCain has said differently during his campaign: "My friends, I will have an energy policy that we will be talking about, which will eliminate our dependence on oil from the Middle East. That will prevent us from having ever to send our young men and women into conflict again in the Middle East."

And Iraq was invaded after it announced its oil bourse would change to euros - I'm not saying there is a reason of course because the US (with help from Blair) had another excuse in its pocket but it was another nail in Iraq's coffin. The first thing the "liberators" did was to reverse the petroeuro; it made sure the Oil Ministry wasn't bombed to facilitate this. OK, technically this point isn't directly about oil but about the US protecting its currency and the petrodollar.

I am breaking up with laughter. That is how the GOP spinmeisters will spin this war and linking it to the higher costs of gas (oil) - an issue dear to the hearts of every American with a car/truck/bus.

You want to know how dummies like Bush get elected? You surround yourself with people who know how to develop and work a message box which that kind of message is.

The reality is this. Despite Iraq's oil wealth and "peak oil" past us there are/were far cheaper ways to explore and develop oil flields than spending $9 billion per month in Iraq fighting a war.

Iraq like the middle east has cheap easy to get at oil which yes, under Saddam were clearly not available to US or British companies like it would have been to friendlier nations like France, China and Russia but for the embargo on Iraq's oil. You don't need to fight a war to get to the oil. There is no creditable source to make that claim but examine what McCain is doing with that statement they entered Iraq for oil. I dislike Bush and this war and I know it has its origins in the cabal of Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Cheney who all wanted a supreme American century. Yes, Jeb Bush signed that document too!!!

I will grant you that the US foreign policy in the Middle East has an oil interest in it, yes, but toppling Saddam and oil was not top of mind when Dubya sent the troops to Iraq.

Mr. Bush senior - also a POTUS- made it clear in his book that he didn't let the troops chase Iraqi's to Baghdad in the Gulf War as he knew there was no exit strategy.

McCain has to take care to not overly criticize the war or he will alienate the GOP base he needs. So what does he do? He links it to the higher costs of gas and says he will have an energy policy to avoid relying in Middle East oil.

Bush could have incented energy/oil exploration with a 1/10 of that money and major oil companies would be finding oil all over the place. Oil fields today don't put out the oil like the good old days but today's drilling methods are vastly improved but that is another debate.

About.com

"The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has estimated the cost of "prosecuting" a war against Iraq at up to $9 billion per month, on top of an initial outlay of up to $13 billion for the deployment of troops to the Persian Gulf region.

In a letter to the House and Senate budget committees, CBO provided Congress with cost estimates for an armed conflict with Iraq, based on recent similar U.S. military operations including those in the Balkans, Afghanistan, and the 1990 Gulf War.

Summary of Iraq War Cost Estimates
CBO estimated the following costs for an Iraq war:

* Initial deployment of troops: $9 billion to $13 billion
* Conducting the war: $6 billion to $9 billion per month
* Returning forces to US: $5 billion to $7 billion
* Temporary occupation of Iraq: $1 billion to $4 billion per month

[KnowItAll]

How much of that money has gone to the GOP base - Haliburton etc?