Thursday, May 08, 2003


TOP GUN GATE UNRAVELS DEMOCRATS

Matt Miller, columnist, former OMB official in the Clinton Administration and liberal, writes about the triviality of recent attacks on Bush for his USS Abraham Lincoln speech.
Every so often you come across evidence that a political party is losing its mind. Something like that is happening to Democrats over President Bush's fabulous "top gun" photo-op aboard the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln. It's a case study in how Bush and Karl Rove have left so many Democrats undone.
. . . .

Rep. Henry Waxman of California has asked the General Accounting Office to provide a full accounting of the landing's costs, since the event had "clear political overtones." Sen. Robert Byrd, who, as longtime appropriations czar, is in no position to throw stones over dubious uses of taxpayer money, lashed out at Bush instead for "flamboyant showmanship," saying the White House had no business using the carrier "as an advertising backdrop" for the president's speech. Democratic staffers are working overtime to gin up media interest in the "scandal."
. . . .

Isn't it obvious even to Democrats that, if you took a vote of the sailors on board, they'd have unanimously hailed the idea of a visit from their commander in chief to deliver the thanks of a grateful nation? It's a moment they'll cherish for the rest of their lives and tell their grandchildren about. Democrats, inspired perhaps by the trial lawyers who bankroll the party, are acting as if these troops are good prospects for a class-action suit.
How much will that GAO investigation cost, anyway?

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