Reply #59: It's funny that when it's framed as a partisan issue ...

[Philostopher]

they'll make any excuse for the Naked Emperor they can find, and often get angry with you for bringing it up.

But when it's something that happens to them, and they've told you about it, and you can link it directly to this administration's policies ... they get deathly quiet and then change the subject.

I don't know if I affected any votes or not, but I hope I did at least make some people who were willing to vote fear understand that what they feared most, Bush wasn't necessarily going to protect them from -- like losing their jobs or their health insurance -- and that in fact, his administration had directly articulated or implemented policies to make those things more difficult for American business to manage to the employee's benefit.

It'll be harder for me to be coy about it for a while -- I so much want to just say, 'yeah, well, it's Bush's fault and you probably voted for him,' but I know that won't make any difference. By articulating it in a way they can't argue or dismiss what I've said, even if they continue to apologize for Bush, it'll eventually back them into the corner on certain issues that he genuinely can be proved to be bad on.