In truth, Kerry is a bit of a wuss.

[Pure]

Kerry re-affirms his vote for the Iraq war



http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Co...357&call_pageid=968256290204&col=968350116795



Aug. 11, 2004. 01:00 AM


Toronto Star

Editorial: Kerry fails Iraq test



What do Americans need in their president, post-9/11? Strong leadership, of course. Clear vision. Common sense. And in a dangerous, fast-changing world, the capacity to learn from past mistakes would be helpful.

Senator John Kerry, the Democrat who hopes to elbow President George Bush from office on Nov. 2, promises all of the above and more.

But there was little of it on display Monday, when Kerry responded to Bush's challenge to spell out where he stands on the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

Rising to Bush's bait, Kerry said he would have cast the same Yes vote in Congress that he did on Oct. 11, 2002, to authorize the president to launch a pre-emptive war that began March 19, 2003, even if Kerry had known that Saddam Hussein had no ties with Al Qaeda terrorists, no weapons of mass destruction and posed no real threat to the world.

"I believe it's the right authority for a president to have," Kerry now says. Only he would have used that power more "effectively."

This amounts to a sweeping claim by Kerry that America has carte blanche to make war on even bogus grounds, and in defiance of the United Nations and world opinion, so long as the war is waged effectively.

It's depressing from a candidate who has attacked Bush for "misleading" the nation, who promises a better direction and who claims to want to re-engage with the world.

Kerry's vote in 2002, while misguided, was defensible. Bush had exaggerated Saddam's threat, and had won over 7 in 10 Americans to the view that the Iraq war was justified.

But since then, the U.N. has been vindicated. Saddam was contained; there were no ties to the 9/11 terrorists; and Iraq had no nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.

That leaves most Americans feeling misled, or duped. They can see the damage to U.S. prestige internationally. The loss of more than 1,000 American and allied lives, and 16,000 Iraqi lives . A $200-billion cost.

And they see no easy exit.

All this is baggage Bush should carry to the polls, alone. But Kerry has just re-endorsed his misguided policy, if not its clumsy delivery.

No wonder Kerry is struggling to pull ahead in a race with a president who has not delivered promised jobs and who is seen as a friend of the rich and powerful.

Practical politics undoubtedly prompted Kerry's reply. He is loath to admit he cast a foolish vote in 2002. He does not want to alienate voters who were similarly duped, and who are not keen to be reminded of it. And he must not be seen as "soft" on Saddam.

But Kerry comes off looking like "Bush lite" on Iraq, rather than as a candidate with better values and a sounder program. He seems weak. Muddled. Has he learned nothing from a slew of American investigations that have exposed the sloppiness of U.S. intelligence and the shabbiness of the rationale for war?

This is a letdown for American voters who yearn for a real alternative, and a healthier direction. It is not good news for the world, either.

 

[cantdog]

Exactly. The DNC chose the man for those reasons. The beneficiaries and potential beneficiaries of this policy are in charge. Unfettered American might, wielded by a president with "the right powers to have," will be better able to serve those people's interests.

He's no wuss. He knows exactly what he's doing. The reason it doesn't jibe with the majority feeling in the electorate is just too bad for the electorate.

It's the multinationals who matter, and they have to have an imperial president and a compliant one. The electorate is only to be feared if they do something.

cantdog

 

[shereads]

Hi Pure. Where have you been? Trying to find us another candidate?

 

[shereads]

J, I hope you won't mind a momentary hijack with something relative to the pre-war build-up that I just read at washingtonpost.com. I'd post it in the Sorry/Political/Asses thread, but I'm leaving for a meeting.

The Post on WMDs: An Inside Story
Prewar Articles Questioning Threat Often Didn't Make Front Page

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 12, 2004; Page A01


Days before the Iraq war began, veteran Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus put together a story questioning whether the Bush administration had proof that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction.

But he ran into resistance from the paper's editors, and his piece ran only after assistant managing editor Bob Woodward, who was researching a book about the drive toward war, "helped sell the story," Pincus recalled. "Without him, it would have had a tough time getting into the paper." Even so, the article was relegated to Page A17.

"We did our job but we didn't do enough, and I blame myself mightily for not pushing harder," Woodward said in an interview. "We should have warned readers we had information that the basis for this was shakier" than widely believed. "Those are exactly the kind of statements that should be published on the front page."

As violence continues in postwar Iraq and U.S. forces have yet to discover any WMDs, some critics say the media, including The Washington Post, failed the country by not reporting more skeptically on President Bush's contentions during the run-up to war.

An examination of the paper's coverage, and interviews with more than a dozen of the editors and reporters involved, shows that The Post published a number of pieces challenging the White House, but rarely on the front page. Some reporters who were lobbying for greater prominence for stories that questioned the administration's evidence complained to senior editors who, in the view of those reporters, were unenthusiastic about such pieces. The result was coverage that, despite flashes of groundbreaking reporting, in hindsight looks strikingly one-sided at times.

"The paper was not front-paging stuff," said Pentagon correspondent Thomas Ricks. "Administration assertions were on the front page. Things that challenged the administration were on A18 on Sunday or A24 on Monday. There was an attitude among editors: Look, we're going to war, why do we even worry about all this contrary stuff?"

In retrospect, said Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr., "we were so focused on trying to figure out what the administration was doing that we were not giving the same play to people who said it wouldn't be a good idea to go to war and were questioning the administration's rationale. Not enough of those stories were put on the front page. That was a mistake on my part."

Across the country, "the voices raising questions about the war were lonely ones," Downie said. "We didn't pay enough attention to the minority."

When national security reporter Dana Priest was addressing a group of intelligence officers recently, she said, she was peppered with questions: "Why didn't The Post do a more aggressive job? Why didn't The Post ask more questions? Why didn't The Post dig harder?"

Several news organizations have cast a withering eye on their earlier work. The New York Times said in a May editor's note about stories that claimed progress in the hunt for WMDs that editors "were perhaps too intent on rushing scoops into the paper." Separately, the Times editorial page and the New Republic magazine expressed regret for some prewar arguments.

Michael Massing, a New York Review of Books contributor and author of the forthcoming book "Now They Tell Us," on the press and Iraq, said: "In covering the run-up to the war, The Post did better than most other news organizations, featuring a number of solid articles about the Bush administration's policies. But on the key issue of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, the paper was generally napping along with everyone else. It gave readers little hint of the doubts that a number of intelligence analysts had about the administration's claims regarding Iraq's arsenal."

The front page is a newspaper's billboard, its way of making a statement about what is important, and stories trumpeted there are often picked up by other news outlets. Editors begin pitching stories at a 2 p.m. news meeting with Downie and Managing Editor Steve Coll and, along with some reporters, lobby throughout the day. But there is limited space on Page 1 -- usually six or seven stories -- and Downie said he likes to feature a broad range of subjects, including education, health, science, sports and business.

Woodward, for his part, said it was risky for journalists to write anything that might look silly if weapons were ultimately found in Iraq. Alluding to the finding of the Sept. 11 commission of a "groupthink" among intelligence officials, Woodward said of the weapons coverage: "I think I was part of the groupthink."

Given The Post's reputation for helping topple the Nixon administration, some of those involved in the prewar coverage felt compelled to say the paper's shortcomings did not reflect any reticence about taking on the Bush White House. Priest noted, however, that skeptical stories usually triggered hate mail "questioning your patriotism and suggesting that you somehow be delivered into the hands of the terrorists."

 

[shereads]

Exactly. The DNC chose the man for those reasons. The beneficiaries and potential beneficiaries of this policy are in charge. Unfettered American might, wielded by a president with "the right powers to have," will be better able to serve those people's interests.

He's no wuss. He knows exactly what he's doing. The reason it doesn't jibe with the majority feeling in the electorate is just too bad for the electorate.

It's the multinationals who matter, and they have to have an imperial president and a compliant one. The electorate is only to be feared if they do something.

cantdog

Howard Dean killed his campaign by being honest. Remember when he said, "No, the U.S. is not safer because Saddam is under arrest," how everybody rushed to distance themselves. I hadn't felt particularly threatened by Saddam Hussein, either. It was sad that only Dean had the courage to say it. Look where it got him.

 

[cantdog]

It got us all an "oppositon" candidate who is only more oppositional than Lieberman, out of the entire field of one-time candidates.

Anti-war? You're out.

Anti-PATRIOT act? You're out.

And now, we find that the "opposition" is supposed to prefer an imperial presidency. Kerry is running against a group who repudiated the Geneva conventions and who desire to be able to torture. One would, on the face of things, imagine that to be against torture is pretty darn American. It would be up there with apple pie and Mother if it weren't for those Brian Donlevy movies where the cops rubberhose them in the back rooms.

But Kerry does not discuss that his party might be against torture.

Are they?


cantdog

 

[shereads]

It got us all an "oppositon" candidate who is only more oppositional than Lieberman, out of the entire field of one-time candidates.

Anti-war? You're out.

Anti-PATRIOT act? You're out.

And now, we find that the "opposition" is supposed to prefer an imperial presidency. Kerry is running against a group who repudiated the Geneva conventions and who desire to be able to torture. One would, on the face of things, imagine that to be against torture is pretty darn American. It would be up there with apple pie and Mother if it weren't for those Brian Donlevy movies where the cops rubberhose them in the back rooms.

But Kerry does not discuss that his party might be against torture.

Are they?


cantdog

I've checked our campaign platform and torture hadn't been added yet. I'll keep you posted.

I sent an e-mail to Kerry's campaign before the convention (they send me lots and lots, and I knew they'd be hurt if they didn't hear from me. ) saying how tired i get of hearing both parties express their support for immigrants by repeating this bit: "They do the jobs Americans don't want to do." I asked whether it might not be more accurate to say that migrant workers are more likely than Americans to accept miserable living conditions and wages guaranteed to keep them in poverty.

Haven't heard back yet. I'll keep you posted on that too.



I'm counting on Theresa to keep our boy in line. Provided she doesn't lose the election by talkin' like a forrener.