Political Dictionary

The Bush administration, contrary to political campaign proclamations, began a systematic process of nation re-engineering that followed Hawkish rhetoric with a military build up on the borders of targeted nations. The process of converting the US military into a more flexible, geographically distributed organization has been referred to by the Bush administration as "spreading democracy."

Bush administration term used to refer to the administrations mindless support for a specific policy. The term steadfast is used to imply that the administration will not change direction or reconsider tactics regarding the issue in question.

The term is also used to attempt to show support for friendly nations who are following the same policy as in "the international community has been steadfast" regarding opposition to Iran's nuclear program.

This term is used to describe a process whereby the US extends existing troop deployments in Iraq and accelerates ongoing deployments so that the actual number of troops on the ground expands by a few thousand for a couple of months. By their nature, surges must be temporary because some of the troops whose deployments are being extended will be on the ground for 18 to 20 months as a result of the additional deployment. Unfortunately, the surge is also not backed by a rise in recruitment, so inevitably the troop level must fall back down lest the military have insufficient troops to support other actions.

The term undocumented worker, also undocumented immigrant, is an unfortunate outgrowth of some attempts by the Left to change the conversational framework of debate in the US.  While we commend the Left on attempting to make this change, this particular term suffers in several ways.  Most notably, the term feeds into the Right's attempt to blur the lines between legal and illegal immigration which helps promote policies that encourage the employment of illegal immigrants by US companies.  We also suggest that if something is illegal, it should be called illegal.  The act of changing the framing of the term does no real good unless the underlying legal framework is also changed.  Until so-called undocumented immigration becomes legal, illegal immigrants will continue to be illegal.

The amount it costs to train a new Army recruit.

The record amount of emergency budget requests anticipated to be spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan during 2006.

(Re; WWII) A definitive surrender of the German and Japanese governments and a return to political problem solving after the devastation of war.

(Re: Iraq) An indefinable milestone that will indicate that the American investment in the Iraq invasion, occupation, and eventual withdrawal will have been worth the expense. President Bush dangles the term as a carrot before the US population as in "We will achieve victory in Iraq." In other cases, Bush has used the term to chastise political opponents, suggesting that Democrats and others who oppose the war are "against victory."

Three major outcomes of the War on Terror have been 1) the president has asserted the authority that he has the ability to void any law or treaty in 'defense' of the US, 2) the administration has redefined torture to allow physical discomfort up to the level of organ failure, and 3) the adminstration has asserted that foreign territory occupied by the US military is outside the reach of US courts and is not subject to the Bill of Rights.

Misinformation and fear surround the poor creature, of which only a couple of thousand at most live in the lower 48 US states. In fact, wolves account for fewer livestock kills than either lightning, old age, or disease. The money spent on protesting the wolf could easily be spent on farmer-remuneration funds for wolf-killed wildlife.

In recent years, with the reintroduction of the wolf to Wyoming and other areas, it has been conclusively shown that the wolf is responsible for controlling wild herbivore populations that, unchecked, decimate vegetation near streams and lakes.