Perspective: ‘Screwing Up the Attack Machine’
01/17/2006
Paul Munnis
Today we listened to the GOP talking heads trying to spin Al Gores speech made yesterday concerning Executive Power and featured on CSPAN.
Specifically we heard Wolf Blitzer on CNN and Chris Mathews on MSNBC.
By now many of you have seen the speech and understand it was to be a joint effort by Vice-president Gore and Rep. Bob Barr, the GOP Conservative Representative to the U.S. House from Florida. Both are distinguished Constitutional Scholars and both are sharing identical concerns about the abuse of Executive Power by the Bush Administration.
The plan was to Have Rep. Barr introduce the subject, make a speech on the situation, then assure the audience that this was a bi-partisan concern, and then to introduce Al Gore.
All of this was to be done via a video hookup that fizzled due to technical problems.
Thus Al Gore was introduced and he explained the situation and assured the audience that both he and Bob Barr were on the same page. Gore then delivered the planned speech.
Today the talking-heads featured the speech as an attack by Democrats against Republicans.
Wrong.
It was a bi-partisan attack by concerned Constitutional Scholars and detailing the abuses of the Bush Administration’s use of Executive Power. It was delivered to a bi-partisan audience of both GOP and Democratic Libertarian Conservatives who are concerned about disregard for our American Constitution and our Bill of Rights. Many are lawyers who are trained in Constitutional law.
These talking heads are so quick to spin things that they can’t even get their facts right.
This is more incompetence from the White House. They need a quality control program for their propaganda machine.
Really!
Excerpt from the Transcript Of The Speech
And I want to commiserate with Congressman Bob Barr, who was connected live when we walked out on the stage, but having had similar occurrences with live video feeds before, I know what can happen and what he must be feeling right now.
GORE: And I want to thank all of you for coming.
I’d like to start by saying that Congressman Bob Barr and I have disagreed many times over the years. But we have joined together today with thousands of our fellow citizens, Democrats and Republicans alike, to express our shared concern that America’s Constitution is in grave danger.
In spite of our differences over ideology and politics, we are in strong agreement that the American values we hold most dear have been placed at serious risk by the unprecedented claims of the administration to a truly breathtaking expansion of executive power.
As we begin this new year, the executive branch of our government has been caught eavesdropping on huge numbers of American citizens and has brazenly declared that it has the unilateral right to continue without regard to the established law enacted by Congress precisely to prevent such abuses. It is imperative that respect for the rule of law be restored in our country.
(APPLAUSE)
And that is why many of us have come here to Constitution Hall to sound an alarm and call upon our fellow citizens to put aside partisan differences insofar as it is possible to do so and join with us in demanding that our Constitution be defended and preserved.
It is appropriate that we make this appeal on the day our nation has set aside to honor the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who challenged America to breathe new life into our oldest values by extending its promise to all of our people.