Yes, Bush Can; No, Bush, Can’t!
By Sanjay Trehan

Politics make for strange bedfellows. And turncoats are not just a speciality of India’s politics. Call it revelation, delayed reaction, the impact of Fahrenheit 9/11 or the call of conscience, a non-partisan organisation, Yes, Bush Can, that was dedicated to re-electing George Bush and Dick Cheney now says "No, Bush Can't!".

Yes, Bush Can has now given up on Bush and endorsed John Kerry’s candidature. After the split, that have launched an email campaign against Bush exhorting voters to “join thousands of others in helping make sure that Bush can do no more damage to America's economy, security, and dignity.”

Interestingly, before they developed distaste for Bush, the Yes, Bush Can team drove around the length and breadth of US in support of the President “in a campaign bus they had equipped with sound and light systems, confetti cannons, and various props and costumes.” It’s the same campaign bus that they have now made a symbol of their protest. At a press conference on Tuesday, they defaced and abandoned the bus they had outfitted for the campaign. During the campaign, the group had given dozens of stump speeches, distributed videos and "USA Patriot Pledges," and performed patriotic songs to audiences across US.

On its website, www.yesbushcan.com, the group explains its disillusionment with Bush. "In the course of our travels, we ended up learning more about Bush's policies than he wanted us to know," said Harmon Spellmeyer, one of the Yes, Bush Can team. "We came to see that this administration is a catastrophe for most people."

Before splitting with Bush, the Yes, Bush Can team worked dedicatedly to support him. The email says “they went to the Pacific Northwest to promote Bush's Healthy Forests Initiative--and discovered it was enabling the logging industry to cut down our last old-growth forests…In western Pennsylvania, while promoting the President's energy policy, they learned that it allows coal emissions which kill 23,000 people a year.”

Besides the Internet campaign, the Group now plans to initiate a door-to-door campaign to "get out the vote" in cities throughout Florida. Coming in the wake of the November 2 election, this surely makes for an interesting development.

(30th October, 2004)