The war president

I'm disturbed by the rhetorical turn the campaign has taken. It seems to have become about which candidate will kill the most people.

Edwards:

We will find terrorists where they are and kill them before they ever do harm to the American people, first.

Cheney:

We've captured or killed thousands of al Qaeda in various places around the world and especially in Afghanistan.

Kerry:

I believe in being strong and resolute and determined. And I will hunt down and kill the terrorists, wherever they are.

But we didn't use American forces, the best trained in the world, to go kill [Osama bin Laden]. The president relied on Afghan warlords and he outsourced that job too. That's wrong.

I will never let those troops down, and will hunt and kill the terrorists wherever they are.

Interestingly, Bush never once during the debate used the word "kill" in the context of Americans doing the killing. The word "kill" is always applied to others ("This is a group of killers who will not only kill here, but kill children in Russia..."); America is always "defeating the enemy", "defeating their idiology", "defeating hatred". This is a man who ran for governor of Texas with a campaign that repeatedly critized his opponent for not sending enough people to Death Row. Once he became governor, he executed more prisoners than any governor before him. He, Rove, and Cheney have succeeded in also making this presidential campaign about who will kill the most people, and I'm disappointed in Kerry and Edwards in allowing themselves to be sucked into that.

Interesting reads and listens.
--Aaron Brown: Giving the People What They Want

Aaron Brown, host of the CNN program "NewsNight with Aaron Brown," says that if T.V. viewers think news these days is too slanted, too opinion-laden, too fluffy or too sensational they only have one person to blame: themselves. Brown says that, sadly, T.V. audiences have a bigger appetite for partisan red meat and celebrity scandals than they do for foreign affairs. He laments that while programs like his can try to serve up "Brussels sprouts," he can't make the audience eat them.

--related note: Warren St John on the blurring between news and satire.

--It's official: there were never any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

--Study Links Suburban Sprawl to Ailments