The White House has changed its mind (must be “Kerry’s flip-flop” influence…at least I’m sure it’s not Bush’s fault) and decided that the 9/11 panel won’t be limited to hour with Bush.
McClellan’s comments suggested the administration had undergone a second change of heart about the commission. Bush originally had opposed the panel’s request for a two-month extension of its work but he eventually relented.
The pundits will hash out what this really means long into the weekend, but I have my own theory. The line getting the most mileage about this stemmed from Bush’s attendance at NASCAR’s Daytona 500, for which reportedly he took four hours out of his busy schedule, prompting the line “One Hour for 9/11 Commission, Four Hours for NASCAR.” It’s too catchy a line for Rove to let it get much further down the campaign road…hence the sudden change of heart, IMHO.
Sorry, Edward, for the tag-along post. Great minds and all.
Okay, I’ll post here too. Kerry’s line re time for a rodeo and not the commission was getting even more play the last few days. And the transcript up at TPM doesn’t make it clear that they’ve changed their position at all, other than their unwillingness to actually define it.
It really was incredibly foolish of them to have set the time-limit before-hand. Really tin-eared.
Hmm, Bush ‘flip-flops’ on a one hour time limit, Kerry ‘flip-flops’ on his 1991 stance on the war against Iraq within weeks (from opposition to support) and then in 2002 flip-flops again (from support to opposition) within months.
Please make a commercial highlighting this frightening parallelism.
Also, please don’t throw me into the briar patch.
Sebastian, I think we’ll just point out Bush’s oscillations on NK, the Dept of Homeland Security, states’ rights/gay marriage, trade policy, and the rest of the DailyKos list, thanks. But since for some reason the public seems to care about the 9/11 commission, you might consider whether you just punched a tar baby.
I actually haven’t seen any oscillations on NK. Now it may very well be that he could go back to fueling and feeding their despotic regime, which would count as a major flip-flop if not accompanied with verifiable cessation of nuclear programs. But that hasn’t happened so far.
Trade policy I’ll give you. The steel thing was awful, and may have contributed to the slow recovery, but it is tough for Democrats to complain about since they are protectionist.
The Department of Homeland Security issue wasn’t exactly a big deal either way.
So far you haven’t pointed out anything that compares to the Iraq quadruple flip-flop. But high level Democrats don’t seem to think much about having a sensible foreign policy, so I guess it is ok.
You mean the Homeland Security thing that was a major issue in the 02 Congressional elections? (One is reminded of the Saxby Chambliss ads against Max Cleland on this subject…) Seemed like a big deal at the time…