Results from the AP-Ipsos poll on President Bush and the economy

12 questions were asked. Percentages are from early Feb and Jan (in parentheses).

If the election were held today, would you …

* Definitely vote to re-elect Bush as president, 37 (41)
* Consider voting for someone else, 18 (24)
* Definitely vote for someone else, 43 (33)
* Don’t know-refused, 2 (2)

Notice that’s a change of 10 percentage points towards NO; some from the Maybes and some from the Yeses. IN ONE MONTH! mjh

As Bush campaign nears money goal, volunteers can turn attention to GOP

[By the end of 2003, Bush] had taken in about $133 million, beating the presidential record of $106 million he set in the 2000 primaries. Bush raised almost as much as the original 10 Democratic candidates combined.

By late January, Bush’s total topped $144 million. Should the recent pace of $2 million to $4 million a week continue, he can expect to have his $150 million by mid-February.

Bush is doing so with help from at least 423 volunteer fund-raisers. They include at least 156 “rangers”; 245 “pioneers,” who collected at least $100,000 each; and 22 “mavericks,” who brought in at least $50,000 each.

Why does an incumbent President need so much money? Because he can’t win on merits (as we saw in 2000). mjh

Capitol Hill Blue: ‘Hard Evidence’ Shows Cheney’s Staff Outed CIA Operative

Federal law-enforcement officials said that they have developed hard evidence of possible criminal misconduct by two employees of Vice President Dick Cheney’s office related to the unlawful exposure of a CIA officer’s identity last year. The investigation, which is continuing, could lead to indictments, a Justice Department official said.

Obviously, Dick Cheney is going to graciously decline to run again as Veep (instead of resigning in shame, like Republican VP Spiro Agnew). Perhaps he’ll claim health problems. Maybe he’ll take the blame for everything the Radical Right has done wrong.

Bush will pick someone like Hatch (or McCain!) as the new Veep. Show people he’s shaking things up and won’t put up with any implications of corruption (yeah, wink, wink). It stinks all the way to the Oval Office. (Thanks, Jas!) mjh

This scandal should not be allowed to fade from view. This is the first article I’ve seen that points out CHENEY’s culpability, not just Scalia’s (who should know better). mjh

Cheney faces impropriety claims

Fresh revelations about a shooting trip taken by US Vice-President Dick Cheney and a Supreme Court judge are fuelling renewed allegations of impropriety. …

[F]resh revelations have worried Bill Allison, of the Center of Public Integrity.

‘t does raise the level of closeness a little bit higher,” Mr Allison told the Washington Post.

”It makes it seem more like Cheney was courting Scalia.”

Op-Ed Columnist: Tuning Out the G.O.P.’s Siren Song By BOB HERBERT, NYTimes

Maybe it’s too much to hope for. But I wonder if we aren’t watching the beginning of a decline in the effectiveness of the Republican Party’s divide-and-conquer strategy.

For nearly half a century the G.O.P. has displayed an unparalleled mastery of the ugly art of devising campaigns that appeal to the very worst in us. It’s always the whites against the blacks, the middle class against the poor, the conservatives against the hated liberals, with the word ”liberal” spat out with the kind of disgust that’s usually reserved for child molesters. …

What seems to be unsettling to large numbers of voters (not just hard-core anti-Bush Democrats) is the notion that events are slipping — or have slipped — out of control, that there is no endgame in Iraq, no plan to rein in runaway deficits, no strategy to put Americans back to work, and no limit to the Bush administration’s willingness to shower its friends with favors and public dollars.

The Democratic primaries and caucuses have drawn record turnouts and sparked genuine excitement. Republicans are expressing concern that the administration has been thrown on the defensive. Already there is an attempt by the G.O.P. to divert attention from the real issues by chanting incessantly about gay marriages and the fact that John Kerry is — uh-oh — a liberal from Massachusetts.

That would be a travesty, and I hope the voters don’t allow it.

Op-Ed Columnist: Get Me Rewrite! by Paul Krugman, NYTimes

Right now America is going through an Orwellian moment. On both the foreign policy and the fiscal fronts, the Bush administration is trying to rewrite history, to explain away its current embarrassments.

Let’s start with the case of the missing W.M.D. Do you remember when the C.I.A. was reviled by hawks because its analysts were reluctant to present a sufficiently alarming picture of the Iraqi threat? Your memories are no longer operative. On or about last Saturday, history was revised: see, it’s the C.I.A.’s fault that the threat was overstated. Given its warnings, the administration had no choice but to invade. …

I’d like to think that the administration’s crass efforts to rewrite history will backfire, that the media and the informed public won’t let officials get away with this. Have we finally had enough?