Folks, let's get one thing straight: the only thing Bush has been consistent on is his willingness to lie. And that includes telling blatant falsehoods about John Kerry, to paint him as waffling on issues.

I've looked at John Kerry's record. He's a smart man, and a detailed man. He understands different sides of issues. And yes, unlike Bush, Mr. Kerry has changed his mind over time on certain issues, just as a normal person should, as new facts come to light.

But John Kerry is a man of deep convictions, enduring principles and remarkable consistency. As one lobbyist told the Washington Post: "He wouldn't carry anyone's water".

So the next time you hear the Bush campaign saying John Kerry's a "flip-flopper", consider the source. If there's one thing George Bush has not flip-flopped on, it's being willing to say anything, absolutely anything, in order to win.

That's not strong, consistent leadership. That's being a craven worm. There's a slight difference.

Looks like the Grinch is making an early appearance--in the form of a Bush administration proposal to cut rent subsidies for poor families:

The Bush administration has proposed reducing the value of subsidized-housing vouchers given to poor residents in New York City next year, with even bigger cuts planned for some urban areas in New England. The proposal is based on a disputed new formula that averages higher rents in big cities with those of suburban areas, which tend to have lower costs.

If left unchanged, the proposals could have a "significantly detrimental impact" in some areas by forcing poor families to pay hundreds of extra dollars per month in rent, according to United States Representative Christopher Shays, a Connecticut Republican. That extra burden could be too much for thousands of tenants, "potentially leaving them homeless," Mr. Shays wrote in a recent letter to the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The changes would affect most of the 1.9 million families who participate in the Section 8 program, the government's primary housing program for the poor, including 110,000 in New York City. People in the program receive vouchers to help them rent private apartments from landlords who agree to participate.

But remember: Bush feels your pain. He just feels the pain of billionaires a little more.

As Josh Marshall notes today, the effort on the right to distort and downplay John Kerry's superb speech on Iraq yesterday has begun. Basically, it comes down to the assertion that Bush is already doing what John Kerry is suggesting. The implication is that Kerry has nothing new to offer, so why change?

These are, of course, Bush campaign talking points. And they ignore a crucial aspect of what Kerry brings to the table: someone with respect for other countries, an ability to work diplomatically with them and who hasn't burned all his bridges and credibility with them.

It's important to remember that many of Bush's problems aren't just the result of other countries being belligerent. That's what Bush would like people to think, but the reality is that Bush has been snubbing the international community his entire term -- that's not a process that began in the Iraq War runup.

So what does Kerry bring to the table? New blood and new ability. Bush would like us to ask the question, "why should John Kerry be any better at getting other countries to help us?" When the question should be "how can we ever succeed at getting other countries to help us if we stick with a leader who has no credibility with those countries and no real interest in working with them?"

The whole point isn't to offer a brand new set of broad ideas for getting us out of Iraq. Bush hasn't failed because of the idea of international involvement itself. He's failed because he's not up to the task. The point is to let someone else, someone with more ability, more experience and more interest to have a crack at it.

And that's the point that Bush desperately wants people to avoid considering.

As Nick Confessore notes, calling for Dan Rather's resignation over failure to fully vet documents before going public with them has become all the rage on the right. Given that no one got killed over the Burkett memos, we can only imagine how strongly the same resignation-hawks must feel about Bush's use of bogus intelligence regarding Iraq's WMD without proper vetting -- indeed, when Bush specifically ignored doubts about it.

We eagerly await the calls for Bush to do the right thing.

Matthew Yglesias puts things perfectly:

Bush didn't try to back out of the "town hall" debate because he was afraid of the format. That was just a clever trick. He's going to kick ass in all three debates, but especially in the town hall. John Kerry's nuanced ways may go over okay with the elite press corps, but when he gets to speak mano a mano with average Americans, George W. Bush's rhetorical skills are unmatched. Like regular people he eschews details in favor of broad principles and compelling moral language, positively exuding the combination of decency and boldness that people are looking for in a leader. The debates are going to be a rough ride for Kerry, whose strength lies in the formal address. If he manages to get through the ordeal without utterly humiliating himself, I'll be happy.

Exactly. God help Kerry. This is the part I've feared ever since -- well, ever since I realized the Democrats had to run someone against Bush. The guy is nearly unbeatable, and his talent for flawless delivery and steel-trap command of the facts are an extremely potent combination.

It will be a victory in and of itself if Kerry can just get through the debates against Mr. Bush, without losing it completely.

It would seem that the Bush campaign is eagery attempting to capitalize on Bill Burkett's forged documents. They are implying that the Kerry campaign had something to do with the documents:

White House press secretary Scott McClellan says the CBS statement admits for the first time those documents ''were likely forged.''
McClellan says there are now questions that need to be answered about the source, Bill Burkett -- who he says has reportedly had senior level contacts with the John Kerry campaign.

Folks, let's be clear about something: McClellan's full of crap. You knew that already? Good for you.

The "senior level contacts" McClellan is referring to is one person: Max Cleland. And here's the story:

Former Sen. Max Cleland, a surrogate for the Kerry campaign, says he knew nothing about the contents of potentially forged documents questioning President Bush's National Guard service, depite talking last month with the man who gave them to CBS.

. . .

In an interview with The Associated Press, Cleland said Monday that he had a brief conversation last month with Burkett, who told him he had information about Bush to counter charges against Kerry's Vietnam War service. The Georgia Democrat said he gave Burkett's name and phone number to the campaign's research department.

"People call me with stuff all the time," said Cleland, who was campaigning in Ohio for Kerry on Monday. "I don't know whether this guy is legit or fraudulent. I have no idea. I just referred him to the campaign."

Kerry spokesman David Ginsberg said nobody in the campaign's research department followed up on Burkett's offer of information, but Ginsberg couldn't confirm whether there was any future contact between Burkett and others in the campaign.

In an Aug. 21 e-mail to a list of Texas Democrats, Burkett said he spoke to Cleland after getting through "seven layers of bureaucratic kids" in Kerry's campaign. He says he had told him he had some information to counter questions about Kerry's military service.

In the memo, obtained by The Associated Press, Burkett says he asked Cleland whether he wanted to "counterattack or ride this to the ground and outlast it, not spending any money." Cleland told him to counterattack, he said, "so I gave them the information to do it with."

Burkett wrote that no one at the Kerry campaign called him back.

Cleland said he didn't recall telling Burkett to "counterattack" and had never heard of Burkett until he got the call on his personal cell phone.

"All I know is this guy called me out of the blue, said he's got some kind of George Bush information, something about Guard or whatever," Cleland said. "We haven't had anything to do with this guy."

So, let's recap.

1. The available evidence strongly suggests that the Kerry campaign didn't forge these documents. Had that been the case, Burkett wouldn't have had to contact the campaign in order to give the documents to them. In fact, there's no evidence at all to suggest that the Kerry campaign had any hand in the creation of these documents.
   
2. Everyone agrees that Burkett tried to work with the Kerry campaign regarding organizing a "counterattack", but after talking with Cleland, no one called him back, much to his frustration.
   
3. Burkett was a Democratic partisan who wanted to hit the Republicans back hard. He had also been talking to the media for years about stories of Bush military documents being destroyed. It's logical to conclude that, when the Kerry campaign didn't contact Burkett, he started talking more widely about his memos (in part, to internet discussion lists). CBS heard about it (they had been searching for such documents), and contacted him.

At worst, we're looking at a situation in which someone in the Kerry campaign contacted CBS with a news tip. I'm sure that's not an uncommon thing, and it's hardly a scandal. But to reiterate, there's no evidence at all that this took place (more's the pity. I'd like to think that the Kerry campaign could act on some juicy stuff with a little more effectiveness).

So, what do we have? Well, as you might have guessed, we're looking at attempts by the Bush campaign to smear John Kerry. Again.

Anything to get the public to stop concentrating on Bush's utter record of incompetence and failure. If that includes wild, unsubstantiated slanders, then so be it, right?

UPDATE: USA Today is reporting that CBS gave the Kerry campaign Bill Burkett's telephone number and requested that they contact him, apparently as a quid pro quo to get Burkett to turn over the forged documents. Burkett and Joe Lockhart both say they spoke briefly a few days before the CBS story ran as a result of the request, and that the conversation didn't involve the documents.

From this additional information, it would appear to be more clear than ever that the Kerry campaign wasn't involved in getting the documents to CBS, since CBS already knew about the documents before Burkett spoke with Lockhart.

Furthermore, it makes no sense that, if Burkett were coordinating with the Kerry campaign, that he'd need CBS to set up a phone call between them.

Burkett is appearing more and more like a bit of a nut who thought he was going to save the Kerry campaign by forging documents and giving the Kerry campaign advice on how to defend themselves.

RNC chairman Ed Gillespie is claiming this meeting might have had something to do with the Democrats' subsequent "fortunate son" TV advertisement. However, that ad used some footage from the 60 Minutes II broadcast (no insider information necessary) and didn't even use the Burkett documents.

I know, I know, that must have been because they knew the documents were forgeries, right? Well, considering how fast questions about the documents made the news, they wouldn't have needed to conclude that beforehand, would they?

Or maybe, just maybe, they had the spot mostly done with what they knew, then added 60 Minutes II footage for impact after that aired?

This has gotten truly silly. The Republicans are out to create a sense of impropriety, when even a cursory look at the reporting on the matter reveals that everyone involved agrees the Kerry campaign had very little to do with Burkett and nothing to do with his documents. Something to keep in mind as the Bush campaign tries to whip up this new scandal...

Today, Republican Speaker of the House Denny Hastert demonstrated the lack of judgement and ill-temperament that has gotten us into such trouble in the War on Terrorism. They are the same basic flaws shown so often by George Bush and his administration, so it's no coincidence that Hastert is backing Bush:

At a campaign rally Saturday in his Illinois district with Vice President Dick Cheney, Hastert said al Qaeda "would like to influence this election" with an attack similar to the train bombings in Madrid days before the Spanish national election in March.

When a reporter asked Hastert if he thought al Qaeda would operate with more comfort if Kerry were elected, the speaker said, "That's my opinion, yes."

Oh, but wait. It gets better. When asked about Hastert's comments, his spokesman dissembled:

His spokesman, John Feehery, said Sunday that the speaker's comments "were consistent with the speaker's belief that John Kerry would be weak on the war."

"If John Kerry is perceived as being weak on the war, then of course, his election would be perceived as a good thing by the terrorists," Feehery said in a written response to questions about Hastert's remarks.

"The fact that John Kerry can't make up his mind about the war only strengthens that perception."

This is pure Bush/Cheney propaganda, and is, of course, nonsense. Kerry has been entirely consistent on "the war", regardless of whether you're discussing the Iraq war or the War on Terror. The fact that Hastert and his spokesman confuse the two makes the Republicans' inadequacy for defending us from the threats that we face all the more clear. The party leadership doesn't even know who were fighting or why.

Of course, some Republicans get it:

WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 — Reflecting rising concerns, one senior Republican senator said today that the United States was in "deep trouble" in Iraq, another denounced administration "incompetence" in Iraqi reconstruction, while two others said that unless American-led forces quickly retake several areas from insurgents, credible elections cannot be held in January.

The senators' comments, made on televised political programs, underscored mounting worries even within President Bush's party about the murderous attacks of recent weeks, and about the coalition's failure to bring some Iraqi cities under control.

Something to think about.