He Said, She Said...

Today, we get a lovely little case of he-said, she-said, courtesy of everyone’s favorite two parties, the Dems and Repubs. The subject of dispute? Which party actually distributed the documents that CBS used to build a 60 Minutes segment on President Bush’s National Guard Service. CBS itself has released a statement which states that it was, upon further review, unable to authenticate the documents. Was that a journalistic mistake? Yup, a pretty big one. But both parties are using it as an excuse to accuse the other of nefarious deeds.

The Republicans are suggesting that Bill Burkett, the source of the documents, collaborated with various Democrats. Now, it certainly wouldn’t astound me, but since as of yet the veracity of the documents has yet to be determined, I’m not sure RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie should be saying that they were “faked forged memos.” Besides being unnecessarily redundant, that’s a fairly serious accusation to make without any sort of evidence. Oh, and so is saying that CBS should immediately identify their sources. Not that this is a new tactic for the RNC, they’ve been demanding that ever since the story broke.

The Democrats, on the other hand, are alleging that those with “a known history of dirty tricks, such as Karl Rove or Ralph Reed,” as well as Roger Stone, may have been involved because they refused to deny involvement. So, Roger Stone refuses to deny that he was the source of the documents, and Karl Rove has a history of this stuff, so they’re both already guilty? Hey, why not.

Meanwhile, back in the world of things that actually matter, President Bush addressed the U.N. General Assembly today, looking for support in the War on Terror. Pointing to recent terrorist activities in Russia and Istanbul, along with Baghdad, he stated that “all civilized nations are in this struggle together, and all must fight the murderers.”

Additionally, he pointed to various U.S. humanitarian acts, from funding the fight against AIDS to efforts to ban cloning. However, on the AIDS front, Bush has gone from pledging $15 billion in early 2003 that included funds for generic drugs and condoms to a new stance that strongly emphasizes abstinence and marital fidelity. I’m not sure that the fight against a disease that had infected 42 million people by 2002, supporting specific religious beliefs is the greatest idea.

Lastly, in brief environmental news, the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, a presidential commission, revised their report on offshore drilling. The report is the first comprehensive review of federal oceanic policy in 35 years. The commission proposed $5 billion annually for a variety of programs, included doubling the budget for oceanic research. The money would be drawn from offshore oil and drilling royalties. The President now has 90 days to respond to the recommendations. The changes were made at the behest of several governors concerned about potential increases in offshore drilling.

Kerry Invades NYU

So, John Kerry made an appearance at New York University today. Of course, it’s not as if the general NYU community was, say, made aware of it. Those who carefully scan the NYU LiveJournal community might have known about it.

But even knowing about it might not have made a difference for those who wanted to go. As seems to be more and more common with political outings, the audience was carefully screened for compliance and agreement, not the chance for a legitimate discussion of ideas.

In a move reminiscent of the Republican Loyalty Oath, in order to be put on the ticket list for the event, you had to be on the College Democrats mailing list.

So if for some reason you happened to not be registered with the College Democrats, you were S.O.L. if you just wanted to see the Democratic presidential nominee.

Since I’m most decidedly not a registered College Democrat (or College Republican, I’m a staunch independent), of course I was not able to actually, say, attend the event. But I’ll be talking to those who did in the next day, so stay tuned for that. Today, you get my deconstruction of Kerry’s speech.

Well, if you didn’t actually know any better, you would have thought that the only subject of importance this election was Iraq. By my count, the word “Iraq” or “Iraqis” appeared 88 times in the speech. Oh, and Senator Kerry, do you think the President might have, say, been wrong about Iraq? The word “wrong” showed up nine times, and “mistake” and “error” three times each.

As you might gather, I found it a bit odd that in a speech before 300 or so college students, the only topic was Iraq and the War on Terrorism. While certainly an important issue to many voters, I can’t imagine that Kerry hopes to win the young vote solely on the slight differences between his and President Bush’s foreign policies. Kerry advocates a continued War on Terrorism, saying “In fighting the war on terrorism, my principles are straight forward. The terrorists are beyond reason. We must destroy them. As president, I will do whatever it takes, as long as it takes, to defeat our enemies.” I can’t imagine President Bush would argue with that.

The only real difference I can see is that Kerry makes some claims about involving our allies, such as they are, in the rebuilding process. He says that “we cannot hope to succeed unless we rebuild and lead strong alliances so that other nations share the burden with us,” but his only real suggestion as to how we should assuage the hurt feelings of our former allies in Europe is to allow them a stake in Iraq’s oil resources. Of course, Iraq might just need those resources so that they can rebuild their shattered infrastructure, but who’s counting?

Finally, I found it disheartening that a good 85% of the text was devoted to telling everyone just how wrong President Bush was to go to war in Iraq, while trying to avoid blame for having voted for the war. Only in the last bit of the speech does Kerry offer anything but “they were wrong.” Ok, so his proposals might or might not be good, but it does lead credence to those who say this election is more about a referendum on the president, and not a vote of confidence in John Kerry.

The First Time is Always the Hardest

Welcome to The Virgin Voter, a blog dedicated to examining the 2004 electoral process through the eyes of a first-time voter. People aged 18-25 tend not to vote in great numbers, for a myriad of reasons, but in this, one of the more important elections in recent memory, we may consititute an important voting bloc.

My efforts in this blog will be divided into several different areas:

1. Bringing to the forefront news items which will greatly affect first-time voters. From various registration policies, to appearances by presidential candidates, to issues-based stories that first-time voters seem to be interested in. These may include, but are not limited to, universal healthcare, foreign policy, environmental issues, education, and even the economy.

2. First-hand reporting on the way the electoral process is affecting members of this voting group here in New York City, and particularly at New York University. Such stories might include polls, quotes, and even anecdotes of on-campus activites.

3. My own personal take on the elections, in the form of an editorial piece, which will attempt to tie #s 1 and 2 together in order to form a more comprehensive view of the election through the eyes of the Virgin Voter.

Questions and comments will be welcome, as will criticisms (justified, of course). Thanks for reading, and get out there and vote.

-Zachary Geballe