Ben Franklin Weighs In On George W. Bush

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By Jack Walters

In
the annals of sales and salesmen, perhaps the most effective sales closing technique
ever devised is the “Ben Franklin” close, also known as the “Balance Sheet”
close. Used by salesman for decades, the essence of this sales technique is
that it brings the prospect to a buying decision. By way of history, here’s
how it all started: Old Ben advised an English scientist friend how to make
an important personal choice his friend otherwise couldn’t seem to make—not
unlike the decision many of us are struggling with this coming November 2^nd.
<st1:City
w:st="on">Franklin wrote that the difficulty in making an important choice is
because “all Reasons pro and con are not present to the mind at the same
time…”  <st1:City
w:st="on">Franklin suggested dividing a sheet of paper into two columns, designating
one as “FOR” and the other “AGAINST”. Then, over a period of time, filling
in each column as thoughts occurred to him so that “when each reason is thus
considered separately and comparatively, and the whole lies before me, I think
I judge better and less likely to make a rash step…”

size=3>Americans now face a crucial and perplexing decision in whether or not
to send Mr. Bush back to the Whitehouse for another four years. If ever there
was a time for careful evaluation, this is it! So, in the tradition of Benjamin
Franklin, let’s do a balance sheet on George W. Bush:

<TABLE class=MsoNormalTable
cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=3 width=450 border=0 bgcolor="#333333">

<TD vAlign=top width=600 bgcolor="#FFFFFF">

Should I Vote To Re-elect Bush?

<TABLE class=MsoTableGrid
cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=3 border=0 bgcolor="#000000">

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman"> VOTE
YES 

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman"> 
VOTE NO

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush is working hard fighting terrorism and
bringing freedom to the Middle East.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">The phony war on terrorism is a cover for attacking
any nation with resources, and “freedom” cannot be enforced on anyone
at the point of a gun.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush punished Saddam for 9/11

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11. This completely
false insinuation by the media is, however, believed by over half the
country.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush talks to God: “God instructed me to strike
at Saddam”.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Many tyrants throughout history have claimed divine
authority for heinous acts. Apparently “Divine Right of Kings” is alive
and well in <st1:place
w:st="on">Washington.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush stopped Saddam from using weapons of
mass destruction and launching chemical weapons in 45 minutes.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">No weapons of mass destruction have been found in
<st1:place
w:st="on">Iraq to date.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush is fighting for <st1:country-region
w:st="on">America in <st1:country-region
w:st="on">Iraq and winning hearts
and minds.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">What? How is illegally invading and occupying a sovereign
country, killing thousands in the process, and angering the entire world
“fighting for <st1:place
w:st="on">America”? And, if we were winning hearts
and minds, why are we receiving over 80 attacks per day?

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush has made us safer here by fighting terrorism
over there.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Our violent interventionist policy in the rest of
the world means we are safe nowhere.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush has given <st1:place
w:st="on"><st1:country-region
w:st="on">Iraq back a sovereign government.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">We have no sovereignty to grant as the war was illegal.
The puppet government Bush installed has even less support than Vichy
<st1:country-region
w:st="on"><st1:place
w:st="on">France.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush has created over 300,000 jobs.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Over 5 million jobs have been outsourced in the past
four years by Mr. Bush’s corporate friends.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush has cut taxes.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Yeah. For the upper 2%

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush wants smaller government.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Government has grown by a third these past four years.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush wants amnesty for illegal aliens.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Great. First create a problem by wide-open borders.
Then solve the created problem by granting amnesty, further burdening
state and local governments with increased welfare and medical costs.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush has given us the “best economy in twenty
years”.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">Oh Susanna, don’t you cry for me…

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush supports our troops.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">By not attending a single funeral of a fallen soldier,
not to mention cutting veterans’ benefits and keeping our wounded soldiers
hidden away often in squalid conditions.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush has made us safer with the Patriot Act.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">A cleaver name often belies evil intent.

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">This “Patriot Act” deceptively sold to the congress
and <st1:place
w:st="on">America, is the greatest assault on our Constitutional
freedoms ever undertaken and compares eerily to Hitler’s Enabling Act.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush would never lie to us.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">The justifications for attacking <st1:place
w:st="on">Iraq have been all shown to be complete lies.
In fact, one is hard put to find any major issue this Administration has
been truthful about.

<TD vAlign=top width=309>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">George Bush is helping the “Chosen People” by fighting
<st1:place
w:st="on">Israel’s enemies, as millions of fundamentalist
“Judeo-Christians” believe.

<TD
vAlign=top width=308>

<FONT
face="Times New Roman">So is this the real reason for this war? Why haven’t
we been told?

size=3>So there you have it, a Ben Franklin balance sheet on George W. Bush. Old
Ben would be proud. But in actuality, what this sheet reveals is sinister and
disturbing. You see, the fanatic Bush supporters, wearing their blinders proudly,
believe only the information in the FOR column, while a few of us, willing to
consider the whole of the vital issues expressed above, have seen through the
looking glass and discovered that the AGAINST column is a damning assessment
of this dangerous administration that is not only bankrupting our country but
placing us in grave risk of world war. It is apparent, with armies mobilizing
all over the world, that the Bush cabal has engendered a war cycle. Just as
nations formed a coalition to stop Hitler from waging pre-emptive wars of aggression,
nations could very well ally themselves against us for the same reason. Judging
from the bellicose, war-threatening words against Iran
and <st1:country-region
w:st="on">Syria, and talk of a new draft,
Bush hasn’t even begun to fight his planned wars.

size=3>When you vote November 2^nd, remember Ben Franklin’s sound advice
and consider the “whole” of the matter.

 

size=3>Jack Walters

<FONT
size=3 face="Times New Roman">P.O. Box 512

<FONT
size=3 face="Times New Roman">Columbia, MO
<st1:PostalCode
w:st="on">65205

size=3>573-474-4449

 

<A
href="mailto:Rapid.press@verizon.net"> size=3>rapid.press@verizon.net

 

size=3>Jack Walters is a former GOP County Chairman who resigned March 10, 2003
to protest the <st1:place
w:st="on">Iraq war. His resignation letter was widely published,
and can still be found on many websites.

Missouri GOP Chairman Resignation Letter

I grieve for our nation, and the untold suffering that will be wrought. As history has
shown, you can possess the greatest armaments in the world, but if your cause
and motives are not right, only catastrophe will result.

Jack Walters
P.O. Box
512, Columbia, MO 65205 - 573-474-4449
Email: rapid.press@verizon.net

OUR COUNTRY ABOVE POLITICS

As the Bush administration moves toward certain war in the Middle
East—a war which I believe nothing good will come from, a war which is unjust,
unnecessary, and a war which will undoubtedly widen, perhaps even into world war,
thereby placing our nation in dire peril—I have made a decision regarding my position
as Boone County Republican Chairman.

Wars are easy to get into, but very difficult
to get out of. They can sap the moral and spiritual fiber of a nation, squander
lives and resources, deplete scarce funds, cause undue hardship on all involved,
destroy families, and engender hopelessness.

I have questioned both the motives
for military action at this time, and the ever-changing, illogical justifications
presented to us in what has to be one of the greatest media propaganda blitzes
ever force-fed a populace. Any time ground troops are deployed, serious questions
must be asked and real answers demanded. The jingoistic rhetoric we are receiving
does not constitute legitimate answers.

The consequences of our planned attack
on Iraq (and also probably Iran, given the size of our forces and their location
in proximity to Iran), should cause us all to pause. The Pentagon has announced
that we will hit Baghdad with a force almost equal to the bombing of Hiroshima.
Obviously many thousands of civilians will perish, with untold thousands maimed.
And for what? To liberate them? To bring them freedom? Or democracy? Or is it
to really secure the world’s second largest oil reserve and establish a base from
which to subjugate other Middle Eastern nations? Is it also the plan for Israel
to use the cover of war to forcibly relocate the Palestinian population (as has
been publicly stated by some members of Israel’s current government)?

How on earth
have we arrived at this crucial juncture in our country’s history? How has a war
on terrorism been converted into an attack on Iraq? What threat does Iraq pose
to us? We must lay the blame squarely on our congress, who according to our Constitution,
only has the power to declare war. For congress to cede it’s war-making power
to the executive branch is unconstitutional on the very face of it and effectively
destroys our three branches of government. Circumventing our Constitution is very
bad, and the undeclared wars, which have resulted in our recent history, have
had disastrous results. Undeclared wars have no declared objectives, and therefore
can widen at will, and our foray into the Middle East will likely set in motion
a long-term wave of retaliation. Indeed, I believe that the administration would
like to entice Iraq into firing the first blow so some justification could be
paraded at the United Nations. If the United States government can adopt this
unreal doctrine of preemptive attack on any nation, anywhere, at any time, so
can other nations! This is how world wars begin. If the President goes into Iraq
alone without a UN resolution, he will be in violation of the war powers given
him last October by congress which was contingent on UN approval. A constitutional
crisis will occur.

What we are about to do in the Middle East is abhorrent to
me. It is made doubly so since this is a contrived and fraudulently justified
war with hidden objectives. The coming mass slaughter of innocents, the harm our
own troops are being placed in, and the potential for wars on several fronts have
brought home to me the sobering realization that by remaining Boone County Republican
Chairman, I would be giving tacit approval to this imminent war, and tacit approval
to the belligerent and reckless language coming from the White House. The safety
and integrity of our country outweighs politics.

I therefore resign as Chairman
of the Boone County Republican Central Committee effective at noon, March 10,
2003. I do not wish to be Chairman when this tragedy starts. I am not resigning
to placate those who have demanded same .I do not fear them in the least. I was
quite willing to stand and face an ouster vote. I am resigning because I cannot
support the Republican position on this war. I only sought the position of Chairman
originally in the hope that I could recruit God-fearing, thinking, pro-life believers
in our Constitution to stand for office.

I grieve for our nation, and the untold
suffering that will be wrought. As history has shown, you can possess the greatest
armaments in the world, but if your cause and motives are not right, only catastrophe
will result.

Jack Walters, March 8, 2003