No Escaping the Red Ink as Bush Pens ’04 Agenda By RICHARD W. STEVENSON and EDMUND L. ANDREWS, NYTimes

Howard Dean, issued a statement this week asserting that the White House’s fiscal policy would ultimately come back to haunt the country.

”This president’s approach,” Dr. Dean said, ”is the equivalent of mortgaging your house to get spending money for the weekend.”

At the same time, Mr. Bush is coming under intensifying pressure from conservatives in the Republican ranks who want him to do more to choke off what they see as an orgy of spending since he took office.

Op-Ed Columnist: The Promised Land by David Brooks, NYTimes

Republicans now speak in that calm, and to their opponents infuriating, manner of those who believe they were born to rule.

The Democrats, meanwhile, behave just as the Republicans did when they were stuck in the minority. They complain about their outrageous mistreatment by the majority. They are right to complain. The treatment is outrageous. But the complaints only communicate weakness. Democrats indulge in the joys of opposition.

Discussions with Dean, Edwards, Kerry, Lieberman, Gephardt, Kucinich, Moseley Braun, and Sharpton. washingtonpost.com

Between Nov. 3rd and Nov. 7th, washingtonpost.com and The Concord Monitor hosted a series of live discussions with each Democratic candidate in the presidential race.

2004 Is Now for Bush’s Campaign By Dan Balz and Mike Allen, washingtonpost.com

Bush’s campaign Web site already has signed up 6 million supporters, 10 times the number that Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean has, and the Bush operation is in the middle of an unprecedented drive to register 3 million new Republican voters. …

The entire project, which includes complementary efforts by the Republican National Committee (RNC) and state Republican parties, is designed to tip the balance in a dozen-and-a-half states that both sides believe will determine the winner in 2004.

“I’ve never seen grass roots like this,” said a veteran GOP operative in one of the battleground states. …

Having the biggest presidential campaign treasury ever — more than $105 million raised already and heading toward $170 million — and no primary opposition gives Bush the luxury of focusing now on general-election organizing. …

Thus, the Bush team is trying to build an army of millions of volunteers to go door-to-door next year to talk to potential voters.

If Bush’s huge warchest of campaign funds and this massive organization effort alarm you, as they do me, DO SOMETHING! Above all, register and get everyone you know to register. Create your own website or blog. Contribute money and time to some candidate. mjh

Bush back from surprise Iraq trip BBC NEWS

The BBC’s David Bamford, in Washington, says that politically speaking, this was a spectacularly well-planned event, one year ahead of presidential elections.

In America the visit is being hailed as a public-relations coup that was a central topic of conversation around the nation’s Thanksgiving dinner tables.

The Washington Post described it as the third key image of the Bush presidency – alongside Mr Bush with a loudhailer atop the rubble at Ground Zero, and the president declaring the war on Iraq a “mission accomplished” on board the USS Abraham Lincoln in May.

But it adds that “it is too soon to know whether the image of Bush in his Army jacket… will become a symbol of strong leadership or a symbol of unwarranted bravado”.

a pathetic betrayal By Cal Thomas, Los Angeles Times Syndicate

The time when the Republican Party stood for something worth standing for is over. The ”G” in GOP might as well stand for government. Smaller, less intrusive government with less spending and lower taxes is the stuff of history books and fond memories for a party that once had a purpose.

But Republicans, having tasted power, are now drunk with it. …

It is a pathetic betrayal of the faith many had put in the Republican Party to reduce the size and role of government in our lives.

This very harsh upbraiding of the Republican Party is particularly noteworthy because it comes from calcified Cal Thomas; it’s hard to find someone more conservative than Cal. Not only does he say some important things here, he also gives us the joy of seeing the Radical Right eat their own. Happy Thanksgiving! mjh

This Republican Congress, in addition to increasing spending on entitlements and expanding big government – like the Democrats they once criticized – also dished out $95 billion in tax breaks and pork-barrel projects.

[M]andatory government spending will reach 11.1 percent of GDP this year, a record high, and non-defense discretionary spending in 2003 will amount to 3.9 percent of GDP for the first time since 1985. [T]axes will inevitably have to be raised to pay for it all. …

Smaller government and less spending? That’s a joke. …

Now that Republicans are doing precisely what Democrats did when they were in the majority, what shall we call these overspending Republicans? Hypocrites? Liars?

The Wall Street Journal editorialized on Monday: “The Republican Congress is turning into something of an embarassment, if not a crackup.” Who is going to pay for all this stuff? …

We are moving rapidly, under Republican “leadership”, past the nanny state and the welfare state to what might be called the state as family. The government will be our keeper….

G.O.P. Worries Face From Past Will Haunt Florida Senate Race By ABBY GOODNOUGH, NYTimes

It would seem that the last thing President Bush needs as he seeks re-election next year is anything that reopens the profound wounds from the Florida presidential recount of 2000.

So it is little wonder that when Representative Katherine Harris, who became the globally known face of the recount as Florida’s secretary of state, expressed interest in running for the Senate in 2004, Mr. Bush’s advisers shuddered, Republicans say.

[Imagine] the image of Ms. Harris campaigning alongside Mr. Bush in Florida next fall, stirring up partisan memories and potentially driving Florida Democrats to the polls in record numbers….