There’s an earlier diary about the Paul Krugman New York Times column on election theft, but there’s an additional point and Krugman paragraph I want to highlight.

There’s another tidbit of news as well.  So if you think G.W. Bush hasn’t excelled at anything as president, or if you think only tin hatted folk don’t believe he won the job fair and square—or especially if you assume that we can count on a fair election anytime soon—you might read on.
Paul Krugman’s column
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/19/opinion/19krugman.html?incamp=article_popular

 says the Andrew Gumbel book, “Steal This Book” convincingly asserts that Al Gore won the 2000 election.  Gumbel doesn’t think it’s been proven that Kerry won in 2004, but Krugman makes his own case for thinking he might have, and certainly asserts that having gotten away with 2000, the Repubs repeated their pattern of tampering in 2002 and 2004.

But the most important thing is that Krugman says in the strongest possible terms that they are likely to do it again. Krugman concludes:

“Our current political leaders would suffer greatly if either house of Congress changed hands in 2006, or if the presidency changed hands in 2008. The lids would come off all the simmering scandals, from the selling of the Iraq war to profiteering by politically connected companies. The Republicans will be strongly tempted to make sure that they win those elections by any means necessary. And everything we’ve seen suggests that they will give in to that temptation. “

Could there be a stronger case made that election reform must be one of the top issues going into the 2006 campaign, and 2008?

As for G.W., well, some guys have all the luck. Or they make their own luck, by hiring the right sort of thieves, knaves and evildoers. Or maybe getting hired by them.

But stealing the office doesn’t mean he can’t excell at the job.  And he has, at least in one part of it.

The Daily Pick reveals that President Bush has broken the all-time record for most vacation days by a president of the United States. Ronald Reagan held the old record of 335 days, though Reagan did it over eight years. President Bush surpassed it in nearly half the time!

And despite the presence of Cindy Sheehan’s growing cadre of Gold Star Mothers and other protestors, not to mention world press, a few miles away, Bush has two more weeks on his current vacation—and three years and change to set a standard in brush-clearing obliviousness that will challenge the next generation of figureheads for election thieves.

Oh yes, he’s the Great Vacationer!

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