[bayourod]

"the Vieques decision." So Bush made a bad decision for purely political reasons, and then gets no political benefit from it. "

I don't buy your assumption that President Bush's decision to withdraw from Vieques was made for the purpose of picking up Hispanic support.

As I understand the facts, Congress passed a bill last year allowing the citizens on Vieques to vote on whether we could stay. It was obvious that the vote was going to go against us. This would have been a tremendous anti-American publicity disaster. So instead of letting a couple thousand locals kick the American military off their island, President Bush prempted them by announcing that we would leave in a couple years.

Sort of like a person resigning from his job instead of being fired.

[Zack Nguyen]

Perhaps you are right. I would certainly prefer it your way. Our military needed the post, however.

Any comment on the rest of the post?