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Originally Posted by host
Sorry alansmithee, your argument does nothing to address the damage to the perception of the Bush admin., and of Republicans. Perceptions are everything, especially when they are associated with people's pocketbooks and the economy
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What damage? There were some people switched on a largely inconcequencial conference. Nobody really cares, not one vote will be gained or lost over this. Were you or guy44 huge Bush supporters before hearing about this? No. This is a non-issue; for dems/Bush-haters it's just another proof of how petty, partisan, vindictive, etc. he is. To the others, it's just business as usual; either old-school cronyism or the just appointment of people who share the admin's views on the issues that may arrise from the conference's findings.
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The two companies mentioned in the lead article,
<a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=nok">Nokia</a> and <a href="http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=qcom">Qualcomm</a>, have combined market capitalization of $130 billion. That dollar figure represents an investor interest in the success, linked to maintaining a technical lead in a still emerging and cutting edge technology, of both of these companies.
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Well, those companies should have either supported Bush, or sent rep's that supported Bush if they wanted a say in policy. Or at least not send reps that didn't want him in office.
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I think that your apologist stance in the wake of poor and petty decision making of Bush admin. officials, is off the mark nearly as much as Bush and his people are on this one. The Nasdaq tech stock index has not recovered from it's 80 percent decline between March 2000, and March, 2003. This article appears in the new Time magazine. Is not the risk that Bush will be spun as unsupportive of leading tech companies and their shareholders, much greater than any future political support of a party that already owns the business lobby can hope to gain?
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What apologist stance? I was merely pointing out that this is business as usual. This kind of thing has been going on by both parties since there were parties. This isn't limited to just one side or the other, as much as the Bush haters would like to think.
And what does the NASDAQ not recovering have to do with anything? Dems still seem hung up on the phony economy of the mid/late '90's. The NASDAQ's great rise during that period wasn't based on solid economic growth, but on pipe dreams. If you were to have studied any of the main financial metrics of 90% of the companies that contribute to the NASDAQ, people would have seen this themselves. And why should a sitting Pres worry about how he's going to be "spun"? No matter what Bush does, it will be spun negatively by certain elements. The best way to operate is to ignore those elements.
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This is a juvenile and petty new practice on the part of this administration, and IMO, you work against your own reputation as a thoughtful participant on these threads by supporting this disenfranchisement and deliberate interference in the management decisions of these tech companies, since employees planning to attend this conference were, if not selected by their superiors, were certainly approved by them to spend the time and the money to represent the interests of the companies who they work for.
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This is not a new practice. The same thing has been going on for at least 200 years. I really don't care who goes to this conference. But I felt it necessary to respond to yet another tired attack on the Bush administration. It's obvious that some people hate Bush and everything he does, but that doesn't mean that everything he does creates some new nadir of evil, nor that it's even noteworthy.
And Bush is not interfering in the management decisions of any company. Obviously it is at the admin's discretion as to who goes, so it is the admin's choice. The tech companies are operating in a consulting/nominating role, nothing more.