Denys writes:

> You even think Bush led us to war in Iraq to assure his re-election. Why
>  that would help is re-election, that has never been explained to me.

Allow me the honor of being the first to explain it to you then. Please see:

     http://img70.exs.cx/img70/9281/aproval_vs_alert_chart_NEW.gif

When a president's approval rating falls below 50%, he's generally not
re-elected. But every president also knows that the easiest way to raise that
approval level is to demonstrate that he's in charge, against all enemies, foreign
and domestic.

As you can see in the chart, on the occasions of 9/11, the invasion of Iraq
and the capture of Saddam all had truly significant, but diminishing effects on
GW Bush's approval ratings. The author of the chart has also marked the time
of each terror alert, with the orange alerts being specially noted. The author
of the chart has also noticed that each time Bush's approval ratings have
dropped significantly, an orange alert has been issued shortly thereafter and the
desired effect has been achieved, but that could just be coincidence of
course.

Wirt Atmar

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