Republicans create bad publicity

Things aren't looking too great for the Republicans since Cheney's slip of the tongue and the publishing of the report that Bush's weapons of mass destruction (WMD) were never found in Iraq, in fact the country hasn't been able to produce them since 1991.

During the vice-presidential debates Tuesday night, Vice-President Cheney blundered and directed the audience to a Web site that merely hosts adverts. Shortly after being mentioned by Cheney, the page was redirected to the anti-Bush Web site of George Soros. Soros' homepage states in bold, "President Bush is endangering our safety, hurting our vital interests and undermining American values." For many undecided Americans, this slip will make a difference in their voting decisions. Being directed to an anti-Bush site by President Bush's right-hand man is not a positive thing so close to election time.

The mistake was something so simple as confusing a .com with a .org, something that could happen to anyone and is quite understandable, but it certainly is ironic that during a nationally televised debate viewers would be directed to a Web site promoting exactly the opposite of what Cheney is campaigning for. This will hurt President Bush's campaign by publicizing negative information about his administration and himself.

In addition to Cheney's slip-up, a U.S. report stated that despite popular belief in the Bush Administration, Iraq eliminated all of their WMDs in the 1990s after the Persian Gulf War.

According to the report by United Nations inspector Charles A. Duelfer, the last biological weapons plant in Iraq was destroyed in 1996 and the country has made no efforts since then to create more weapons plants.

The common liberal belief that there are no WMDs in Iraq has finally been confirmed just weeks before the election. Even without the weapons, Saddam Hussein was probably still a threat to America, but not nearly as severe as he was made out to be. Americans can relax now without wondering if every cold they get is biological warfare stemming from the Iraqi threat.

Going into an Iraqi war to disarm the country was unfounded, as there is nothing to disarm. The report states that there is no way Iraq has nuclear weapons because it would have taken them years to develop nuclear technology and could not have made chemical weapons for at least a year. Combined with the fact that Hussein and the attacks of Sept. 11 are not connected, the Republican party is taking a major hit.

Even the administration's efforts to create democracy in Afghanistan have backfired. Though Afghanistan will undergo elections in the next few days, the country's citizens aren't free. The country is providing most of the world's supply of opium under the control of the warlords that controlled the country before the Taliban. America's wars in the Middle East have not created a benevolent image of the States.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been extremely important points for the two main candidates, but Cheney's slip and the Iraq weapons will figure negatively in the campaign for the Republican candidate.