By Scott Wright

If you're a Republican voter who's having second thoughts about wasting your time casting a ballot this November, recent national polls show you're not alone. A headline in the Oct. 3 edition of the pro-Bush Wall Street Journal blared out the cold, hard facts: “Bush, Republicans slip in poll amid scandal, intelligence report.”

According to the article by John Harwood, the “hailstorm of unfavorable publicity” unleashed in recent weeks by Bob Woodward's latest look inside the Bush administration, along with a recent intelligence report and the House sex scandal indicates the American people believe the GOP has “lost the political initiative at a crucial point in the midterm election campaign.”

There's still a month to go before Nov. 7, so anything can happen. But it sure looks like the power-hungry president and the cowering GOP-led Congress are in a heap of trouble come election day.

I'm not even going to address the disgraceful behavior of Republican Florida Rep. Mark Foley. Unless the GOP House leadership willfully tried to sweep the congressman's elicit emails under the rug -- which I've seen no solid evidence of so far -- the matter has no bearing on important political matters, as far as I'm concerned.

Instead, let's stick to the indisputable facts we already have before us.

The Journal reported that 46 percent of Americans now believe the Iraq war is hurting more than helping the fight against terrorism. Also, 57 percent of Americans now say the country's safety from terrorism does not depend on success in Iraq. As a result, a majority of voters (34 percent to 23 percent) think it's time to let the Democrats have a shot at running the Congress.

That sounds about right although, sadly, it's probably not an accurate reflection of the mood in Alabama. Somehow the ignoramus in the White House still has fans in this part of the world.

Don't ask me how.

Still, the overall poll numbers are good news for the country as a whole, because the war in Iraq is, as USA Today labeled it, a “calamity … born of a ruinous mix of arrogance and naivete from President Bush and his key deputies,” and more and more Americans are beginning to understand that the Rubber Stamp Gang in Congress aren't going to do anything to correct the commander-in-chief's errors in Iraq.

Need more evidence? Glad to oblige.

Watergate reporter Bob Woodward asserts in his new book, “State of Denial: Bush at War Part III,” that Sec. of Defense Donald Rumsfeld managed to win the initial battle for control of Baghdad, only to ignore advice from the former general he hired to become the first Iraq administrator, Jay Garner, regarding how best to deal with the aftermath of the invasion. As USA Today reported after reading excerpts from Woodward's book, “Rumsfeld cut others out of Iraq decisions and planning; for a time, he would not return the phone calls of then-National Security adviser Condoleezza Rice, until ordered to do so.”

Woodward found that Garner specifically told Rumsfeld there were three areas where the United States had made crucial, but reparable, errors in post-war planning. First, Woodward reported, Garner told Rumsfeld not to ban Baath Party members from the new government; second, Garner said the U.S. should reverse its decision to disband the Iraqi army; and third, he suggested involving a post-war triumvirate of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds in the negotiations to establish a new government.

According to Woodward, Garner's advice was ignored by Rumsfeld. As a result, the Iraqis slowly began to turn on their American occupiers and thousands of former Iraqi soldiers, still armed and without any form of income, were left wandering the countryside, vulnerable to the recruitment tactics of insurgents.

Woodward also found hard evidence that the Bush administration knew years ago that these horrible failures of policy and decision-making were making the situation on the ground in Iraq exponentially worse. But instead of admitting their errors and/or trying to correct them, Bush and Cheney decided to pretend instead that everything was going great, and to try and sell that lie to the American people.

For example, when Vice President Dick Cheney told Larry King in May 2005 that the Iraqi insurgency was in its “last throes,” the statement was a lie and Cheney knew it. At one point in 2003, Woodward reported, President Bush told his cabinet and top advisers he didn't even want to hear the word “insurgency” anymore in his presence (p. 266). Apparently, the truth about Iraq was (and still is) taboo in the Bush White House. "Bush was in denial about Iraq," Woodward wrote, reflecting the view of State Department official Richard Armitage after leaving that White House meeting.

As it always does, USA Today offered a member of the Bush administration a chance to submit a rebuttal to its critical Oct. 3 editorial. Last week, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley tried his luck at spinning the Iraq catastrophe.

In a column titled “He didn't take the easy way,” Hadley argued that President Bush “made a clear choice” to “root out the terrorists” after Sept. 11. Hadley asserted that Bush is “fully engaged in leading this long war. He is well aware of both the good news and the bad. He reviews intelligence reports.”

That's great Mr. Hadley. Only problem is, the nation's top 16 intelligence agencies reported earlier this month that the war in Iraq has actually made terrorism against Americans worse, not better. And Bush looked right into a TV camera two days after that information was first reported and basically said that wasn't the way he read it.

Well, it was in plain English. Goodness knows, Bush has proven time and again he's never quite gotten the grasp of that language.

Regardless of whatever President Bush does nor does not read, judging by his article's next assertion it seems clear to me that Mr. Hadley does not read the Washington Post. If he did, surely he would not have made the following argument in favor of the administration's post-war Iraq policy.

“We have redoubled our efforts to train Iraqi police so that they can earn the confidence of all the Iraqi people,” Hadley wrote proudly. “We have sought new approaches to construction and economic development.”

Hold it right there, Mr. Hadley. You really should get outside the walls of the Oval Office more often -- like maybe down to the newspaper rack at the local Stop-N-Shop -- because five days earlier the Washington Post ran a front page story beneath the headline “Heralded Iraqi police academy a 'disaster'.”

It seems the United States has already spent over $75 million to build the largest police academy in Iraq in order to train those Hadley-heralded Iraqi policemen. But according to Amit R. Paley's lengthy column on Sept. 28, the project “has been so grossly mismanaged that the campus now poses health risks to recruits and might need to be partially demolished.”

The article reports: “The Baghdad Police College, hailed as crucial to U.S. efforts to prepare Iraqis to take control of the country's security, was so poorly constructed that feces and urine rained from the ceilings.”

According to the article, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction, Stuart W. Bowen, Jr., said the police academy project is a “disaster.”

“They may have to demolish everything they built,” Robert DeShurley, a senior engineer with Bowen's office, told the Washington Post. “The buildings are falling down as they sit.”

So, we know Mr. Hadley is just about as adept at making an argument as the rest of the members of this administration have been since the Iraq war started. And we also know -- thanks to Woodward and many other media sources -- that Bush administration is either incapable of telling the truth about what's going on in Iraq, or they're completely incompetent. Or both.

I'd love to tell you the Republican-controlled Congress has taken notice of all this waste and mismanagement, all the lies and distortions, and endeavored to do their job to oversee the executive branch and put an end to all this malfeasance, correct all the mistakes. But they're too busy covering their own asses, giving themselves raises, or working overtime to make sure they get themselves reelected in November.

If you're an Alabama resident who thinks our Republican representatives are doing a good job, vote for them on Nov. 7. But according to that Wall Street Journal poll, you'll definitely be in the minority.

Like those Iraqi police recruits, most of people in this country have figured out it's not truth, competence and a sincere desire to learn from past mistakes that the Bush administration is dropping on their heads.

It's about time, too, because the stench is becoming unbearable.