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PAGE 10A FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS W*dn—day, April 2», 2004 Opinion Bush keeping lead in polls despite numerous blows WASHINGTON—ApriI should have been George W. Bush's crudest month. In April, the Sept. 11 Commission heard testimony that accused the White House of hindering the fight against al Qaeda and terrorism in order to conduct an unneces sary war against Iraq. The commission also heard testi mony that members of the administration were not really interested in terrorism before Sept. 11 and that key warnings of the attack were ignored. In April, the U.S. death toll mounted dramatically in Iraq as rebel forces led uprisings across the country. The U.S. media reported that key roads to Baghdad had been cut and the city was experiencing a shortage of food for civilians and ammunition for U.S. troops. In April. Bob Woodward's Remaining the American people ... could be enough. new book was released, con taining explo sive charges that Bush himself had little faith in the evidence that Iraq har bored weapons of mass destruction, that funds were diverted without the knowledge of Congress from fighting the war in Afghanistan to launch a war against Iraq and that Saudi Prince Bandar promised to lower oil prices to help Bush get re-elected this November. In April. Bush held a shaky press conference in w hich he stated that before Sept. 11 he actually believed that the Atlantic and Pacific oceans would protect the United States from attack. "After 9- 11, the world changed for me, and I think changed for the country." he stated. "It changed for me because, like many, we assumed oceans would protect us from harm. And that's not the case. It's not the reality of the 21st century . Oceans don't protect us. They don’t protect us from killers." Which left the obvious (but unasked) question: Considering that on Feb. 26. 1993, foreign terrorists exploded a bomb inside the World Trade Center that left a crater 22 feet wide and five stories deep, killing six and injuring more than 1,000. how could anybody still believe in 2001 that our "oceans would protect us from harm"? One would think that an April like this with events like these to say nothing of high < *wHH z Yi I \ I WE RE I new can we wan aw® ||B ~. '. J W>. CARE Os IRE f:s® OUTSOURCING X— ' I I I I I /""''"'x ps> o> z IB M I af*"s"“ l .— ■- ■ J ( I k. *** ,Roger Simon gasoline prices and a continu ing job slump would give Bush's opponent. John Kerry, a big lead in the polls. Instead, polls show Bush leading Kerry. In an ABC- Washington Post poll. Bush leads among registered voters 48 percent-43 percent (with Ralph Nader at 6 percent), and in a CNN-USA Today-Gallup poll. Bush leads among likely voters 50 percent-44 percent (with Nader at 4 percent). So what is going on here? Possible explanations: 1. These polls don't mean anything and are not measur ing anvthing significant, espe- cially consid ering most people are not paying atten tion to an elec tion that does not take place until Nov. 2. 2. George Bush is a lik able, confident leader untroubled by self doubt who does well when the subject is terrorism even if the details tend to indict his leadership because Americans are reminded that he is a wartime leader who saw us through a terrible attack and is now fighting a war against terrorism (or so the administration claims) in Iraq. 3. Kerry has yet to hit his stride as a campaigner and is still unknown to most Americans. In the end. this might not matter. If it is true that this election is about George Bush alone and whether the American people want to re-hire him for another four years, then if Bush becomes unpopular enough either through a worsening war or a worsening economy or both then Kerry’ would win by default. As Kerry said recently at a S2S,(XX)-a-plate breakfast at the 21 Club in Manhattan. "Their goal is to define me and make me unacceptable. Our goal has to be to keep that acceptability." Remaining "acceptable" to the American people is a very modest goal. But it could be enough. Roger Simon is a national ly syndicated columnist. He can be e-mailed at Write Roger @aol. com. CARTOONISTS' VIEWS ON THE NEWS \ I / & X 1k _L- ' I ' 0 ■ "Too bad the pollen count is the one part of Spring you can count on!" Partisan meanness disservice to all I am trying to move across a room a TV set that is roughly the size of the Space Shuttle. My wife Reny is shouting orders and accurately pro claiming in her stem German accent why I would never suc ceed in the furniture-moving business. And Ed Setzler is ringing the doorbell down stairs. Am 1 glad to see Ed, who lives just across the street. Ed can’t wait to tell me about his plans to run for the Legislature. I can’t wait to hear them, and my dear wife can’t wait for him to finish. The world’s biggest bookcase is next on her fumiture-to-move list. Before my conversation with Ed ends, he has volun teered to move the TV and bookcase while I catch my breath. In return, he receives a promise of two votes in the primary election plus Reny and Bill’s enduring gratitude. This is outdated "Ozzie and Harriet’ -style campaigning. A guy goes door to door intro ducing himself and asking for support. If there’s a chore to be done, he pitches in. He explains who he is and what he believes in. (Ed’s a Republican, a go-slow growth advocate and a devout church member. A native of Atlanta, he spent nine years as an Army officer, graduated from Furman and has a wife, Tracie. and three little-bitty kids.) After he explains his political Bill Shipp platform, he listens intently as I tell him what 1 believe. He thinks I’m kidding, but we get along well anyway. I give him a few bucks for his bid to replace Rep. Roger Hines, R- Kennesaw, who is running for Congress. I tell Ed that if he wins the election, he may be saddened at what he finds in Atlanta. "The Legislature is not what it seems," I tell him. He says he knows. His father, a lifelong Democrat, has already had "a little talk" with him. Dear reader. I relate this small tale of neighborhood politicking only because it stands in such stark contrast to the grand-scale political maneuvers now conducted across the state. For example, as Ed and I chatted about growth density. Gov. Sonny Perdue called a special session of the Legislature to gain an upper hand against Democrats who control the House. Perdue’s parallel, if not greater, intent was to make a giant splash in the newspapers and on TV to prove that The Governor Is In Charge. The governor says he is demanding the costly extra ses sion to correct an "unbalanced” THE IRAQIS' \ J1 >ofl \ MTS AHP IWSI (\ 5k WiU T w rxo&s ■ ■hk budget. Judging by some of Perdue’s latest pronounce ments and actions, more than the budget is unbalanced here. The 516.5 billion spending plan is out of kilter because the governor, in the last hour of a prolonged regular legislative session, refused to authorize a judicial agency to administer $57 million (most of it to be raised from court fees) to run a legal-defense fund for indi gents. No. he did not shred the entire budget and order the General Assembly to gather again in Atlanta simply because of money. The gover nor wants to make the courts subordinate to the governor’s office in controlling fees paid to lawyers for poor folks accused of crimes. Earlier this month, he pur posely threw’ the Legislature into chaos at the 11th hour when lawmakers refused to insert into the indigent-fund bill the following statements: "The governor shall have the authority to review the budget of the [judiciary ] council and make recommendations in the Governor's budget report. The budget of the council may be revised by the Governor." Still chafing from a judicial rebuff when he sought to take over the duties of the attorney general. Perdue apparently now wants to take over the courts. He has told the Legislature to return to Atlanta for at least five days to make the fixes he demands. "One way or the other, they are going to get this done," says Gov. Sonny. He issued this ultimatum just as he completed a 15-town swing around the state in a motor home that at times exceeded a nutty 80 miles per hour on winding roads. Along the way. he promised to announce the names of 20 law makers who had switched from the Democratic to the Republican Party. He. in fact, announced just four. This call for a special leg islative session makes little sense. The governor could cor rect the comparatively small discrepancy in the budget with a scratch of his pen or wait until the next regular session in January. Nosiree, not this fellow’. He is making a public show of political firepower just as if he were fully engaged in a cam paign for re-election. He might be doing just that, even though the contest is more than two years away. Such plainly partisan mean ness serves no one well (not even his own party) and makes decent and dedicated folks shy away from politics. Georgia needs more guys willing to flex their muscles to move bookcas es instead of flexing their wills to make headlines. Bill Shipp's column appears each Sunday and Wednesday. His e-mail address is bshipp@bellsouth. net.