My Press Release to the <u>Plano Star Courier</u> concerning Sam JOhnson's praise of the State of the Union Speech

My Press Release to the Plano Star Courier concerning Sam JOhnson's praise of the State of the Union Speech

GOP Challenger Blasts Rep. Sam Johnson for Criticizing Nixon in Comments Praising State of the Union Address

Bob Johnson offers alternate views from those of the incumbent’s on President Bush’s leadership, domestic and foreign policy

Republican congressional candidate Bob Johnson today accused his opponent, incumbent Congressman Sam Johnson (3rd Dist.-Texas), of disrespecting the role President Richard Nixon played in securing the release of American prisoners from Vietnam. Bob Johnson also criticized his opponent’s support for the Bush Administration’s war in Iraq and his support for the People’s Republic of China.

“While we all respect Sam Johnson for his military record and have empathy for his past sufferings, the incumbent has insulted the very man who got him out of the Hanoi Hilton by negatively comparing him to George W. Bush,” Bob Johnson said today in response to an article on the front page of the Feb. 1 Plano Star Courier. In that article, Sam Johnson was quoted as praising Bush by saying, ”I wish we had this kind of steady and strong leadership while I was a prisoner of war in Vietnam.”

According to candidate Bob Johnson, Nixon was president during most of the years Rep. Johnson was in captivity in Vietnam. Thus the congressman’s remarks would seem to be critical of Nixon’s leadership during the war. “In fact, Nixon inherited the war from previous Democratic administrations and set a timetable for withdrawing American troops from Vietnam,” Bob Johnson said. “By comparison, Bush doesn’t have a plan to bring troops home from a nation that the U.S. already successfully conquered, in Bush’s own words, almost three years ago.” He claims there are greater similarities between Bush and President Lyndon Johnson than there is any merit in depicting Bush as a superior leader to Nixon.

Candidate Bob Johnson called on Rep. Sam Johnson to apologize for his remarks concerning President Nixon. “How ironic that Sam Johnson has just returned from a visit to Hanoi yet insults the memory of the man who got him out of there” at the end of American involvement in Vietnam. I urge Sam Johnson to realize that in Vietnamizing the war and ending the draft, Nixon did a world of good compared to Bush’s Presidency, and I must wonder whether the people of the 3rd District want someone who still sees himself as an airman who merely stands up and salutes the President even if the President is wrong, or whether we want a leader who thinks for himself.”

Bob Johnson went on to question his opponent’s position concerning the so-called war on terror. “President Bush hasn’t made the war on terror better by invading Iraq, he’s made it worse -- yet Sam Johnson praises Bush for his ridiculous State of the Union speech,” Bob Johnson continued. “Before we invaded Iraq, there was no connection between Al Qaeda and Iraq. Now, Al Qaeda has cells in Iraq. Our continued occupation also makes things worse since Shi’a-led government has said we’re holding them back from crushing the insurgents. Our presence there as so-called infidels is the best recruiting tool for the insurgents and Al Qaeda.”

“If Sam Johnson would show in the political arena the same kind of courage he showed in war and join with Murtha to call on Bush to withdraw troops over a six month period, we could not only save over 16 American soldiers’ lives each week, we’d save on the energy prices that are enriching ExxonMobil and avoid the upcoming tragedy Al Qaeda has planned for us along the lines of the Madrid and London bombings. Gas prices went down 60 cents in November after Murtha’s speech calling for withdrawal, but rose back up 30 cents when Bush’s so-called ‘plan’ ended up having no deadlines.”

“One of the worst aspects of the misconceived war in Iraq and our equally misguided desire to stay there is the fact that we are now holding down the vast bulk of our troops in a nation we’ve already successfully conquered as of May 1, 2003. God forbid we find we actually need our troops to be deployed in a war that, as we’d say in Texas, ‘needed’ fighting. We wouldn’t have the troops! Yet Sam Johnson feels we should stay even though the political party which controls Iraq claims that we’re holding them back from restoring civil order.”

Bob Johnson went on to criticize his opponent for overlooking America’s more obvious military threats following the end of the Cold War. “The real, long-term military threat to the US after the demise of the USSR was obviously Red China. Yet Sam Johnson has voted consistently for Most Favored Nation or Permanent Normal Trade Relations with Red China since he was elected in 1991.”

Comparing trade with China to buying fenced stolen cars, Bob Johnson said “they rip off our patent-holders and thus bleed the 3rd District’s high-tech base. They use slave labor to compete against our paid labor, and are thus building up their military from their economic growth rate and savings rate. We didn’t have MFN with the USSR, and the way we brought down the USSR was by doubling our defense expenditures combined with Jackson-Vanik, not by unrestrained trade with the enemy.

“How anyone could have fought against the Chinese Communists in Korea and have been in a Communist slave labor camp for seven years in Vietnam, and yet could support MFN status for Red China is absolutely beyond me,” Johnson continued. “Karl Marx said that the capitalists would sell the hangman the rope with which to hang the capitalist. That’s exactly what Sam Johnson’s corporate contributors have done. I call on my opponent to introduce legislation to end MFN with Red China and to stop playing to the interests of the Neoconservative power elite as he did a year ago with his ‘nuke Syria’ remarks.”

The candidate added comments critical of the incumbent for his stands on economic and judicial issue. “Even on economic and judicial matters, Sam Johnson didn’t get it right. That Bush ‘created’ jobs in 2004 and 2005 ignores that jobs that were lost on net in 2002 and 2003 due to unsolved corporate corruption and LBJ levels of spending on No Child Left Behind, the Prescription Drug Benefit, and of course the war in Iraq. Here again Sam Johnson has flip-flopped from wishing to abolish the Department of Education and send Medicare to the states in December 2000, almost as if he were taking dictation from Bush. The stock indexes aren’t really any better than when Bush took office – what does that say?”

“Sam even improperly analyzed the Alito nomination when he said, ‘He’s shown leadership in the confirmation of Supreme Court nominee Sam Alito.’ Sam is forgetting that Bush’s first nominee was Bush crony Harriet Miers. She may be a good personal lawyer but not the sort you put on the Supreme Court, and not even all that conservative it turned out. Even the conservative AM talk radio base revolted. Everyone from Laura Ingraham to Rush Limbaugh got their digs in, Bork included. As Rush said to liberal critics, ‘this isn’t the conservative crack-UP, this is the conservative crack-DOWN!’ Sam doesn’t seem to get that perhaps the conservative crack-down will come back to haunt him March 7th. The Virginia GOP Gubernatorial candidate lost in 2005 thanks to Bush ‘helping’ him at the last minute.

“We all respect Sam Johnson for his military record and empathize with him for his sufferings in the Hanoi Hilton, and welcome him back from his recent painful trip down memory lane there,” Bob Johnson concluded. “But the representative from this district needs to be less of a Bush sycophant and more of his own man. This district needs a leader in Congress, not a Bush ‘yes man.’”