The President Vanishes (washingtonpost.com) By Richard Cohen

Historians may someday say that the beginning of the end for Bush came last April when Time magazine’s John Dickerson asked the president at a televised news conference, “What would your biggest mistake be . . . and what lessons have you learned from it?” Bush, who said the question took him by surprise, said he could not come up with one.

Essentially the same question was asked by Linda Grabel, an ordinary voter, at the St. Louis debate. This time, it could not have been a surprise. But this time, too, Bush could offer not a single substantive example. Aside from making “some mistakes in appointing people,” everything had gone swimmingly.

This was a preposterous, dishonest answer. It was either the response of someone who is vastly deluded or sticking to a political strategy conceived by people who do not value truth.

[Thanks, Anne!]

Anti-terrorism agency threw $461,745 party, report says Associated Press

Awards were presented to 543 Transportation Security Administration employees and 30 organizations, including a “lifetime achievement award” for one worker with the 2-year-old agency. …

The investigation by the Homeland Security Department’s inspector general, Clark Kent Ervin, also found the TSA gave its senior executives bonuses averaging $16,000, and failed to provide adequate justification in more than a third of the 88 cases examined.

The report said lower-level employees were shortchanged, with a far lower percentage receiving bonuses.

In today’s paper, a Bush supporter writes the following — compare it to the exchange cited AND to the truth that follows. mjh

Kerry says that Bush says things, but the president never said those things. — Bush supporter

washingtonpost.com: Third Presidential Debate — President Bush and Sen. John Kerry

Kerry: Six months after he said Osama bin Laden must be caught dead or alive, this president was asked, “Where is Osama bin Laden?” He said, “I don’t know. I don’t really think about him very much. I’m not that concerned.”

We need a president who stays deadly focused on the real war on terror.

SCHIEFFER: Mr. President?

BUSH: Gosh, I just don’t think I ever said I’m not worried about Osama bin Laden. It’s kind of one of those exaggerations.

Of course we’re worried about Osama bin Laden. We’re on the hunt after Osama bin Laden. We’re using every asset at our disposal to get Osama bin Laden.
—
[I]n a news conference on March 13, 2002, Bush said when asked about the search for the al Qaeda leader: “So I don’t know where he is. You know, I just don’t spend that much time on him. . . . We haven’t heard much from him. And I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure. And, again, I don’t know where he is. I — I’ll repeat what I said. I truly am not that concerned about him.”
—

This isn’t some obscure point. Bush’s comments in March 2003 were shocking and widely reported. Now, Bush lies (“I never said…”) and his followers believe him as gospel. You can’t break that cycle of ignorance. mjh

ABC News: Injured Iraq Vets Come Home to Poverty By BRIAN ROSS, DAVID SCOTT and MADDY SAUER, ABC News

Following inquiries by ABC News, the Pentagon has dropped plans to force a severely wounded U.S. soldier to repay his enlistment bonus after injuries had forced him out of the service.

Army Spc. Tyson Johnson III of Mobile, Ala., who lost a kidney in a mortar attack last year in Iraq, was still recovering at Walter Reed Army Medical Center when he received notice from the Pentagon’s own collection agency that he owed more than $2,700 because he could not fulfill his full 36-month tour of duty.

Johnson said the Pentagon listed the bonus on his credit report as an unpaid government loan, making it impossible for him to rent an apartment or obtain credit cards.

“Oh man, I felt betrayed,” Johnson said. “I felt, like, oh, my heart dropped.” …

Many of the severely wounded soldiers returning from Iraq face the prospect of poverty and what they describe as official indifference and incompetence.