#2004 Election

[deadpresidents]

If for some reason George W Bush had run against Jeb Bush for the republican nomination who would have won?

That's a pretty great idea for a topic for historians to debate.

I think people forget how effective of a campaigner that George W. Bush was. Yes, he was pretty goofy at times and a master of malapropisms. But he was pretty incredible on the campaign trail in front of smaller crowds and as a one-on-one retail politician. Much like Lyndon B. Johnson, those skills did not translate to television and, on many occasions, it reinforced the idea that Bush was dumb. But simply believing that Bush was dumb is one of the reasons why so many people underestimated him -- and that made him a very dangerous opponent for pretty much everybody that he ran against beginning with Ann Richards in his first race for Governor of Texas to John McCain and Al Gore in 2000 and finally to John Kerry in 2004. That was evident in his Presidential debate performances. In my opinion, Bush probably lost the first of his three debates to John Kerry in 2004, but I've always felt that he won the other two debates against Kerry and all three debates against Al Gore in 2000.

George W. Bush was also one of the most disciplined leading Presidential candidates of the past 40-50 years. He stayed on message, no matter where he was campaigning, who he was campaigning against, or what other news might have been seeping into coverage of him at the time. That was a credit to his enormously talented political teams over the years, but it was also the result of hard work. He'd still say something odd or mangle a few sentences at every campaign stop, but you never had to guess where he stood on the positions he built his campaigns upon.

While he was certainly no Ronald Reagan or Barack Obama when it came to charisma, George W. Bush did have his own unique brand of charisma. Despite his background and the privileges he had from day one due to his family name and his father's accomplishments, Bush had a real ability to connect with people while campaigning. People genuinely liked him. I mean, that's even better understood now when you hear about his relationship with his surprise BFF Michelle Obama or with fellow Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Many of his political opponents have noted in interviews or books that they've found it hard not to like him once they got to know him. Again, that's an attribute that doesn't translate well to television, but it was clearly a strength when he was meeting folks while campaigning. He made a lot of people want to vote for him -- as opposed to John Kerry, whose personality didn't inspire a whole lot of fervent supporters in 2004 (I say that with personal experience).

Jeb Bush was a more serious, wonky politician -- with a personality more similar to that of their father whereas George W. famously took after his outspoken, direct mother. Jeb did not easily connect with voters, and was a more naturally cautious politician while George W. was more emotional and decisive (for better and worse). One example of Jeb's cautious nature is demonstrated by the poor timing of his eventual candidacy for President. Once Jeb finally decided to run for President in 2016 he was nearly 10 years removed from the end of his term as Governor of Florida. He jumped into a crowded field where it was difficult to distinguish himself despite his famous last name (and the exclamation point behind his first name on his campaign logo) and was steamrolled by Donald Trump. I think George W. probably would have defended himself and his family against Trump's attacks better than Jeb did if George W. had been the candidate in 2016 instead of an ex-President in retirement. Jeb's 2016 campaign was almost sad in how timid he came across at times against Trump.

Both brothers were born with more advantages than most people will ever have come their way in a lifetime. But I do think George W. tried to be someone other than his father's son more than Jeb ever did. George W. ran for Governor of Texas in 1994 despite the fact that his opponent was the legendary Governor Ann Richards. Jeb ran for Governor of Florida the same year, and their parents believed that Jeb was the Bush son with the real political future and kind of saw George W.'s candidacy as a hopeless cause. But on Election night in 1994, George W. was victorious and Jeb was not. I think that Jeb Bush wanted to follow in his father's footsteps, but George W. wanted to surpass George H.W. Bush's legacy. He didn't in terms of the quality of his Presidency, but George W. Bush did get reelected as President while George H.W. Bush was only a one-term President.

So, in a head-to-head race, I think George W. would probably smoke Jeb. He was just that much more skilled as a politician. Plus, a brother vs. brother matchup would probably be emotionally difficult for anybody and I think George W. clearly had more of a killer instinct than Jeb ever did (that's probably a perfect setup for a drone strike or war crimes comment). Bush had no problem running a ruthless campaign, either. If you don't know what I mean, look up the 2000 South Carolina GOP primary campaign against McCain and the Swift Boat ads against Kerry in '04 (he was also one of the hatchet men for his father during the 1988 campaign against Michael Dukakis, which was one of the nastiest campaigns in American history up to that point). Anyway, I just think George W. was a better politician than Jeb ever hoped to be. In fact, from a purely political perspective -- as a campaigner out on the trail, as a one-on-one retail politician, even as a debater -- George W. was probably a more talented politician than his father. Of course, George W. was nowhere near as experienced or competent as George H.W. Bush was as President. But George W. would easily defeat his brother in a one-on-one campaign and I think he'd even give his father some trouble on the trail in a one-on-one race between them. And then if he was elected, he'd promptly become the really bad President we all remember him as!

Great question and interesting thought experiment!

#Presidents #History #Politics #George W. Bush #Jeb Bush #George H.W. Bush #President Bush #Bush Family #First Families #Elections #Political History #Campaigns #What if? #1994 Gubernatorial Elections #Governor of Texas #Governor of Florida #2000 Election #2004 Election #John Kerry #Al Gore #Presidential History #Presidential Politics #Bush 41 #Bush 43 #Jeb!

[pandabibble]

it's a common myth that the political terms "left" and "right" come from the seating in the 18th century french parliament, when in reality it comes from the the position of the starter pokemon in professor oak's laboratory in firered/leafgreen.

FireRed/LeafGreen had released on september 9th 2004 two months before the 2004 presidential election, so Bush was asked what his starter pokemon was as a softball & he said "oh the red one, love that little guy" and when John Kerry picked Squirtle "because it's blue" he was attacked for picking that one just because it countered bush's pick, including accusation by Bush's team that Kerry actually picked bulbasaur when he originally played Red/Blue.

A famous Washington Post (which was owned by Sun Myung Moon, head of the Unification Church cult at the time) article by Libby Copeland then simplified the entire argument down to the position of each pokemon on Professor Oak's table, accusing Kerry of "pretending" to be a "strong centrist" as squirtle was in the centre-most pokeball but "really being a job killing, green, leftist", in reference to Bulbasaur's position on the left-hand of the table, who struggled against the "right, winged" (because the Copeland mistakenly thought charmander had wings like charizard does) choice of Bush, which led to conservatives being labelled dirisively as "ring wingers" & conservatives calling democrats "leftists", which caught on

#history #2004 election #political terminology #pokemon #pokemon firered #pokemon leafgreen

[memes-from-the-past]

Yes, politics has always been this divisive.

#ancient internet #memes from the past #politcs #2004 election #kerry edwards #john edwards #john kerry

[mapsontheweb]

Swing between the 2004 and 2008 US presidential elections. Blue areas show where Obama did better than Kerry, while red areas show where McCain did better than Bush.

#maps #us elections #2004 #2008

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

#us politics #2022 #republicans #conservatives #donald trump #democrats #national debt #global recession #recession #economics #economy #vote blue #2022 elections #2022 midterms #federal deficit #job growth #quotes #2004

[tomorrowusa]

Mainstream acceptance of the LGBTQ+ community continues to grow in the United States. But Republicans and their fellow travelers on the far right still think that homophobia is a winning issue for them.

It's true that trans acceptance is lagging, but even that is headed up rather than down.

In 2004, GOP-controlled state legislatures used anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives to try to drive up far right voter turnout in the presidential election that year. While all 11 ballot initiatives succeeded, it's unclear how much effect they had on the actual presidential vote.

So the use of homophobia by Republicans to excite their base is nothing new. But this far into the 21st century it will bring them diminishing returns.

Small but hyperactive groups of hatemongers have taken it upon themselves to engage in high profile activities designed to undermine support for the LGBTQ+ community. Their pressure on Bud Light and Target are examples of such actions.

Politicians and businesses need to understand that there are more disadvantages than advantages for them to cave in to the anti-LGBTQ+ hate campaigns.

#lgbtq+ #lgbtq acceptance #ali velshi #usa #homophobia #the far right #republicans #election 2004

[somethingusefulfromflorida]

Nickelodeon Magazine, November 2004 issue

This was one year before Supernatural. After what happened in 2020, I thought tumblr might like to see this ahead of the midterms.

#jared padalecki #sam winchester #supernatural #2004 #2005 #gilmore girls #history #2004 presidential election #tumblr #hellsite #midterms #2022 elections

[rotationalsymmetry]

so I’ve been listening to the entirety of Feather Summarizes the Silmarillion, a podcast on Patreon that is somewhat misleadingly titled in that yes it follows the Silmarillion, no it is not in any sense of the term a summary. It’s good though.

A large part of the reason it is not a summary but is quite good, is that Feather will go off on long sidelines about all sorts of semi-related topics, and in the long peace part 4 bonus episode (I do not know what I’m going to do with myself when I finish this thing) one of those semi-related topics is about how people tend to misremember history and specifically how people tend to misremember protest culture as being basically non-existent around 9/11 when it wasn’t, and oof, yeah, I know. I was there.

And it’s not surprising people tend to misremember this. Who wants to tell the story? The neoconservatives don’t want to tell a story of large scale anti-war protests. And the sorts of people who approved of the protests also don’t want to talk about it, because we tend to be kind of invested in the narrative that if you get large numbers of people protesting in the streets you’ll get what you want. That protesting works.

And it kinda didn’t.

And that’s not just a “well, non-violent protests…” we were blocking freeways and shit, ok? It didn’t work.

(I mean, not that blocking a freeway is an act of violence. But you’d think it was the way commuters get pissed off about it.)

this is getting into interpretation of events so I’m not sure how to fact check it as such, but my personal understanding of (left wing) protest culture in the late 90’s and early 2000’s is there was this rising wave of energy and enthusiasm focused against globalization — free trade agreements, the IMF/World Bank, I don’t know if people were talking about “austerity measures” at the time but that sort of thing, and the “race to the bottom” where corporations are free to move to wherever the labor is cheapest and has the fewest regulations and then the actual people aren’t allowed to move into the countries with better labor laws.

(I’m trying to be careful to explain what I mean by globalization because at least at the time, progressives and radicals would start talking about the problems of globalization and liberals/moderates would…intentionally or unintentionally misunderstand what you were objecting to. And at least some conservatives, anecdotally, would go “yeah we think the UN is scary too” and uh, no, not what this is about.)

Anyhow, growing anti-globalization movement in the US (and very much in other places, but I’m talking about the US here) then got massively derailed by 9/11 itself (there was a DC protest I planned on going to with some friends a couple months after 9/11 and they all bailed because they figured any protest that criticized US policy so soon after 9/11 would seem out of touch and insensitive) and by the war on Afghanistan and the war on Iraq because people have finite organizing energy and the wars, mostly the Iraq War, became the main focus.

And then as far as I can tell things stalled out for a bit until Occupy. The peace protests still went on, and I imagine protests around a number of other things that got relatively consistent if not overwhelmingly news-worthy presences. But they didn’t have the same energy.

Except of course for the gay rights movement, especially the marriage equality fight, which was substantial and highly successful.

#I did look up occupy and I did remember the timing accurately so go me #I know I got the marriage equality right because again I was personally involved in it #I mean not in a significant role? But I knocked on a few doors #And I was present when Gavin Newsom started going ‘eh laws schmaws let’s just give some people some marriage certificates #What are the courts going to do about it?’ #And the answer turned out to be surprisingly little actually #Valentine’s Day but I was in SF and living with my parents so… 2006 at latest #I think he got elected in 2003 so 2004 at earliest #I think I was in other places in 2005 and 2006 so I’m going to say 2004 #Which is earlier than I would have given a raw guess on go figure #But yeah internet agrees 2004 #That was overall a spectacularly shitty time in my life I gotta say #So that may be why I have relative trouble with the dates of things around 2002-2005

[bobbie-robron]

I reckon that’s the key. Retrace her steps, work out what she was doing that day that was DIFFERENT and we’re halfway there. (Part 1)

D-day is approaching for Katie and Robert. Now that a ‘shrink’ is seeing Victoria, it’s only a matter of time things come to light and that’s all Katie’s focused on. For Robert, he just wants his irritating talkative sister back. Back from the psychiatrist, Victoria’s been diagnosed with elective mutism brought on by trauma and to top off that, the suspicion of abuse has Jack reeling. This leads Jack and Diane scrutinizing Robert before his birthday tea about what might have caused the problem. Once again, Jack loses his temper toward Victoria destroying Alfie in the process.

20-Apr-2004

#classic ED #classic ED Robert’s story #episode 3718 #20040420 #part one of the episode #classic ED 2004 #200404 #time for Robert’s birthday tea #elective mutism #jack loses his temper again #robert sugden #karl davies #andy sugden #katie sugden #jack sugden #diane blackstock #victoria sugden #donna windsor

[fionasparrow]

FREE GOOGLE TRAFFIC WITH GPT?

Free Google Traffic With GPI 🤔 FREE GOOGLE TRAFFIC WITH GPT? 😲 YES, WITH 3s AIs!Use Chat-GPT To Bank $160 to $5,940 Per Day With This NEW App That “Chats” With Google To Effortlessly Suck In FREE Traffic That Swiftly Turns Into Traffic, Buyers & Commissions With ZERO Human Interaction! Click Here to Get Access Click Here to Get traffic on you Handles.

View On WordPress

#9japals #All News sources were from AFP #and Also TWITTER.THESE ARE THE BREAKING NEWS HEADLINES FOR YOU TODAY. #BBC news in pigin #dailyprompt #dailyprompt-1900 #dailyprompt-1910 #dailyprompt-1913 #dailyprompt-1915 #dailyprompt-1916 #dailyprompt-1987 #dailyprompt-1990 #dailyprompt-2001 #dailyprompt-2004 #Diverse Endeavour #Europe and Rome. #Nnamdi Kanu reacts #number 1 trusted news platform in charge of U.S 2020 Election #Smiling Coast of Africa #The Gambia.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

In a scandal that will surely make Mitt Romney—who famously strapped his family dog atop the roof of his car for a road trip—look like a PETA activist, a review of 75 studies published by Mehmet Oz between 1989 and 2010 reveals the Republican Senate candidate’s research killed over 300 dogs and inflicted significant suffering on them and the other animals used in experiments.

Oz, the New Jersey resident who’s currently running for U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania, was a “principal investigator” at the Columbia University Institute of Comparative Medicine labs for years and assumed “full scientific, administrative, and fiscal responsibility for the conduct” of his studies. Over the course of 75 studies published in academic journals reviewed by Jezebel, Oz’s team conducted experiments on at least 1,027 live animal subjects that included dogs, pigs, calves, rabbits, and small rodents. Thirty-four of these experiments resulted in the deaths of at least 329 dogs, while two of his experiments killed 31 pigs, and 38 experiments killed 661 rabbits and rodents.

In the early 2000s, testimony from a whistleblower and veterinarian named Catherine Dell’Orto about Oz’s research detailed extensive suffering inflicted on his team’s canine test subjects, including multiple violations of the Animal Welfare Act, which sets minimum standards of care for dogs, cats, primates, rabbits, and other animals in the possession of animal dealers and laboratories. The law specifically requires researchers and breeders to use pain-relieving drugs or euthanasia on the animals, and not use paralytics without anesthesia, or experiment multiple times on the same animal.

Dell’Orto testified that a dog experimented on by Oz’s team experienced lethargy, vomiting, paralysis, and kidney failure, but wasn’t euthanized for a full two days. She alleged other truly horrifying examples of gratuitously cruel treatment of dogs, including at least one dog who was kept alive for a month for continued experimentation despite her unstable, painful condition, despite how data from her continued experimentation was deemed unusable. According to Dell’Orto, one Oz-led study resulted in a litter of puppies being killed by intracardiac injection with syringes of expired drugs inserted in their hearts without any sedation. Upon being killed, the puppies were allegedly left in a garbage bag with living puppies who were their littermates. Dell’Orto’s allegations, made in 2003 and 2004, are detailed in letters from PETA to the university and USDA. In an interview with Billy Penn last month, she acknowledged PETA “is not a reliable source of information,” but said the organization’s letters honestly reflected what she told the organization and provided documentation for.

In May 2004, Columbia University was ordered by the USDA to pay a $2,000 penalty for violations of the Animal Welfare Act. The fine paid by Columbia was the result of a settlement between the university and the USDA, based on the findings of Columbia’s internal investigation of Oz’s research. The USDA accepted these findings, but according to Dell’Orto, the review was faulty, and “had investigators on the committee that were also complicit in this type of poorly designed, cruel animal experimentation.” Dell’Orto also noted that while Oz wasn’t the one who euthanized the dogs and puppies himself, “When your name is on the experiment, and the way the experiment is designed inflicts such cruelty to these animals, by design, there’s a problem.”

Months after paying the $2,000 fine, in December 2004, Columbia defended Oz amid the animal abuse allegations, calling him “a highly respected researcher and clinician” who adhered “to the highest standards of animal care,” but neglected to deny any of the specific allegations Dell’Orto had made against Oz. On Monday, Jezebel reached out to Columbia’s office of communications and public affairs as well as Oz’s Senate campaign. Columbia declined to comment, and Oz’s campaign has yet to respond. Notably, in April this year, the Daily Beast reported that the university had seemingly cut all ties with Oz, stripping his personal pages from the medical center’s website. Oz formerly held senior positions including vice chair of surgery and director of integrated medicine at the medical center.

Oz is currently running against Pennsylvania’s Democratic lieutenant governor John Fetterman. Owing to a number of bizarre gaffes on the campaign trail, including a comically out-of-touch campaign video of Oz calling vegetables “crudités” and the resurfacing of his history of creepy comments toward women, Oz has been trailing Fetterman for much of the race. But after a slew of obsessive, anti-Fetterman Fox News segments, and key police endorsements of Oz, the latest polling shows the race tightening.

In an interview with Jezebel last month, Fetterman’s wife, Gisele Barreto Fetterman, referenced long-running animal abuse allegations against Oz in a warning to voters. “I think if you look at a profile of someone who makes misogynistic comments, who abuses animals, who does all these things, you’re getting a picture of someone who’s a pretty dangerous person,” Gisele said. “That’s certainly not someone I would want making decisions on my rights or any other women’s and folks’ rights in the state, deciding whether doctors go to jail for performing life-saving services.”

Dog abuse allegations against Oz are a drop in the candidate’s proverbial bucket of scandals at this point—but given the all-American tradition of loving dogs more than humans, it might be hard to brush this one under the rug.

#us politics #news #dr. oz #dr. mehmet oz #mehmet oz #animal death #animal cruelty #animal welfare act #animal experimentation #Columbia University Institute of Comparative Medicine #Jezebel #peta #Catherine Dell’Orto #USDA #john fetterman #2022 midterms #2022 elections #2022 #2003 #2004 #vote blue #Gisele Barreto Fetterman

[deadpresidents]

It's funny how I haven't thought about John Kerry for years, then he appears twice to me in one day.

I read your recent blog post about Secretaries of State, which mentioned Secretary Kerry, then I looked up to see my wife watching a Vietnam War documentary. There on the screen is a young John Kerry outside the Capitol Building advocating for the end of the war.

John Milton Hay kind of stumbled into becoming a historical figure from being Lincoln's secretary and ending up as a SecState. John Kerry almost followed the same arc, first as a combat soldier, then eventually becoming a SecState himself.

American History is fascinating.

It is kind of remarkable how forgettable John Kerry can be at times despite the fact that he was not only a major party Presidential nominee, but he very nearly won the 2004 election. George W. Bush won Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, and Virginia -- states that Democrats have won in every Presidential election since then and which would have put Kerry over the top in the Electoral College if they had gone his way. I mean, Kerry would have won if he had just flipped Ohio, which he narrowly lost.

#John Kerry #History #Presidents #Presidential Elections #Electoral College #2004 Election #George W. Bush #President Bush #Democratic Presidential nominees

[wikishitposting]

From: Political Google bombs in the 2004 U.S. presidential election - Wikipedia

#google #google bombs #2004 presidential election #election #president #wikipedia #wikishitposting #shitposting #image #wikiposting #wiki #2004

[mapsontheweb]

Shift in US presidential vote between 2004 and 2008, by county

#maps #us #elections #2004 #2008

[dontmean2bepoliticalbut]

#us politics #rep. lauren boebert #Colorado #gop #Republicans #conservatives #republicans be like #conservatives be like #2022 #2022 elections #2022 midterms #vote blue #2004 #2015 #chips act #violence against women act #campaign finance law #jayson boebert

[tomorrowusa]

Republicans try to restrict voting with the excuse that they are combating election fraud. Yet most of the recent high profile cases of election tampering feature Republican perpetrators. And they are quite open about it. Trump's phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger is available here.

A GOP woman in Iowa faces up to five years in prison for each of the 52 counts of election fraud she was just convicted of.

The wife of a Republican politician in Iowa has been convicted of dozens of criminal charges related to a 2020 voter fraud scheme aimed at getting her husband into office.

Department of Justice officials announced the verdict against Kim Phuong Taylor in a statement released on Tuesday, explaining that she had submitted absentee ballots on behalf of voters who had not given her permission to do so. She was convicted of 52 counts in total, including 26 counts of providing false information in registering and voting, 23 counts of voter fraud, and three counts of fraudulently registering to vote. She could face up to five years in prison for each charge. According to the DoJ, Ms Taylor “perpetrated a scheme to fraudulently generate votes for her husband in the primary election for Iowa’s 4th US Congressional District in June 2020”. She’s then accused of doing the same thing after his defeat when he would go on to launch a campaign for Woodbury County supervisor. Mr Taylor won that second race. Her husband Jeremy, an unindicted co-conspirator in the case whose campaigns were the intended beneficiary of her fraudulent actions, said in a statement to a local news affiliate, KCAU, that he and his wife had hoped for a verdict of not guilty but added that they respected the verdict.

CNN describes how blatant this scheme was.

Prosecutors say Kim Taylor visited households in the Vietnamese community, encouraging residents to fill out voter registration forms and absentee ballot request forms. Some of the residents couldn’t read or understand English, according to prosecutors, and she offered to help. Kim Taylor “submitted or caused others to submit dozens of voter registrations, absentee ballot request forms, and absentee ballots containing false information,” the Justice Department said in a statement. She also “completed and signed voter forms without voters’ permission and told others that they could sign on behalf of relatives who were not present,” the DOJ said.

We remember another major case of vote fraud a few years ago by a Republican operative in North Carolina.

North Carolina GOP Operative Faces New Felony Charges That Allege Ballot Fraud

Republicans don't care about rules any more. Their goal simply is to seize and hold on to power at all costs.

And this is nothing new. A segment of NPR's "This American Life" examined election-related fraud in the US back in 2004. You can listen to the segment at the link below. The allegations against Democrats in the segment, supplied by Republican Scott Hogenson, were mostly unverified or borderline comical. The allegations against Republicans were substantial and ultimately led to several convictions.

276: Swing Set: Act Two Cold-cock The Vote

From the viewpoint of a Republican candidate nowadays, these are the only possible results of an election:

"I won."

"The election was stolen!"

Never mind that they are the ones out to steal elections.

#republican election fraud #voter suppression #republicans #iowa #ia-04 #election 2020 #kim phuong taylor #jeremy taylor #donald trump #election stealing #leslie mccrae dowless #north carolina #jack hitt #this american life #election 2004