In the last days before an election, tiny ripples in teapots have a way of becoming tempests, and so it was with the furor surrounding Sen. John Kerry’s dumb remark about getting stuck in Iraq.
Now that Kerry has apologized — after first fiercely refusing to do so — GOP strategists are jubilant. They should be. With the war going badly and the polls looking grim, a straw man happened along at a very convenient time. And he was bearing gifts.
No matter how obvious it was that Kerry’s original remark was a mangled jest aimed at President Bush, Republicans wasted no time casting the remark as further evidence of Democratic disdain for the military. For the Democrats, damage control meant joining the chorus. Said one Democratic strategist: “He has already cost us one election. The guy just needs to keep his mouth shut.”
Probably not a bad idea. But Republican outrage over his remark was overwrought, and Republican glee now is just unseemly.
Meanwhile, Democrats tried a counterattack, criticizing House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, who in an interview Wednesday seemed to shift blame for the problems in Iraq from Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to the generals. “John Boehner ought to be ashamed,” said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. “He’s blaming our troops for failures in Iraq.”
Posted by Dave Knadler
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198 Comments
You’ve brought too much to the discussion at one time, Dave. You need to stick with one issue and address it with one liberal spin at a time.
The lefties are already starting to melt down on this BLOG. Please don’t over load their circuits!
Hank
It WAS a dumb thing for Kerry to have said. He should have thought about how people will interprete it.
BUT, it also shows to how much higher a standard everyone holds Kerry compared to Bush.
Bush says stupid stuff all the time and we all expect it.
Because he’s kinda stupid.
“The terrorists never stop thinking of ways to harm our country, and neither do we.” GW Bush
Hank Price,
So tell us, who IS responsible for getting us “stuck in Iraq”?
Yet another reason I hope Hillary does not get the nomination. I don’t like to give rewards for crass opportunism and political cowardice.
Logic, truth, and reality…
‘Bush owes troops an apology, not KerryOlbermann: Bush ‘appearing to be stupid’ about Kerry’s joke’http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15519404
Cosmos,
Your question is loaded with a false premise of us being stuck in Iraq.
When did you stop beating your wife?
cosmos
Everyone in congress that voted for it.
And this is the second thread devoted to this non story in 3 days.
Olberman pretty much covered it.
Instead of rehash threads, how about a thread about Todd Tiahrt thumbing his nose at his constituents and our political traditions? We have been asking for one for a month. Only 4 days left for the Eagle to try and prove Toady Todd doesn’t have them in his pocket.
Let’s have a quick vote…
Are we stuck in Iraq?
yes
Wow…
This is not even a thread against Kerry and there are calls for it to be dropped?
Almost every thread on this blog is against Bush, against Rumsfield, or some antagonistic thing against Republicans.
Oh no…
WE MUST HAVE MORE!
Cry me a river JR, Cry me a river
yes.
we dont seem to be able to win and we dont seem to be able to leave.
I think that is the definition of “stuck”.
Nathan,
“Your question is loaded with a false premise of us being stuck in Iraq.”
So you, and all the troops can come home now?The exit strategy was figured out, put in place, and is working?Civil war there is over, and the local government and police are in control?Bechtel and Kroll haven’t pulled out?The electicity and sewer are working 24/7?
Your answer is based on denial.
“Everyone in congress that voted for it.”
TT Boy voted for it, hold him accountable!
Cosmos,
I apologize, I guess your definition of stuck and the way you used it were not what I was thinking of.
We are stuck in Iraq, just like FDR got us stuck in WWII, George Bush Sr got us stuck in Desert Storm, Clinton got us stuck in Somolia, and Clinton got us stuck in the Balkins.
The only gaffe Kerry made was to remind voters, in this last week of a campaign, that the libs hate the military and cannot be trusted to defend this country.
Well, I see hotlick’s staying on message. . .
explain that to us hotlick I thought Kerry was talking about Bush, Not the troops.
Actually, Nathan, it was G.H.W. who got us “stuck” in Somalia. Clinton got us out.
Well lets face it,
The Democrats have been known to insinuate or out right blatantly say that only poor minorities and uneducated people get stuck in the military.
So, when Kerry said this, Lord forbid we assume he was keeping in tune with the same kind of statments which do come from the Democrats about our military.
Oh, we were supposed to know he was just joking?
Seems like it took a couple of days for the Democratic strategists to finally convince Kerry to just apologize.
No more comment for this thread except to answer “are we stuck in Iraq?” My answer is “for now”
Nathan’s staying on message, too. . .
http://www.slate.com/id/2127487/
war stories: Military analysis.The Dumbing-Down of the U.S. ArmyAnd some modest proposals for countering the trend.By Fred KaplanPosted Tuesday, Oct. 4, 2005, at 4:41 PM ETFurther evidence that the war in Iraq is wrecking the U.S. Army: Recruiters, having failed to meet their enlistment targets, are now being authorized to pursue high-school dropouts and (not to mince words) stupid people.
This year the Army set a goal of recruiting 80,000 active-duty soldiers, but it wound up with just 73,000—almost 10 percent short. As a result, the Army Times reported this week, the Pentagon has decided to make up the difference by expanding the pool—by letting up to 10 percent of new recruits be young men and women who have neither graduated high school nor earned a General Equivalency Diploma.
I think this was posted yesterday. They are recruited on delayed Entry pending a diploma or GED.
Sol, I guess you got my other email?
Here’s a clue for Democrats…
Instead of trying to attack all things Republican and say they did this and that, blah blah, whine whine…
How about discussing this issues without once referring to a personal attack…
Don’t get a brain hernia trying Dems.
There are intelligent people in this country and when you constantly use bash and slash rhetoric to convey your message, you lose 99 percent of your audience.
you mean like the swift boat crew talk radio guys fox news ect.
morg-You think wrong. He was talking about the troops. He has a history of trashing the troops. He did it again. The lie that it was a joke is, well, a lie.
Nathan,
So you think we are “stuck in Iraq”, “just like” we were “in Desert Storm”?How long did that one last? It was an international coalition, in response to Kuwait being invaded, etc…
Looks to me more like a conflict you didn’t mention in your list, that killed over 58,000 U.S. troops.
“Oh, we were supposed to know he was just joking?”
There’s a thing called CONTEXT.
Kerry was telling jokes just before the bungled “stuck in Iraq” joke. The previous one was that Bush used to live in TX, but now lives in a state of denial.
Yup. Good talkin with you Tracy. Y’all have a good one.
Well Nathan
Keith Olberman said it all a lot better than I could. I hope you check that out.
I guess it was fair to assume Kerry was intentionally attacking the military. The evidence of why he would do so is all over the place!
He clearly had disrespect for the Navy when he joined it. Probably he did that so he would feel like the smartest guy in any given situation. Hey he musta been right, they made him a captain. And we can be sure he had contempt for the military when he volunteered for one of the only duties the Navy was in combat operations in in Vietnam. Why a man who loved the military would have served right here in the good old USA! And who is he to call anyone subpar for intelligence? He managed to get himself hurt 3 times. What a maroon!
But that just reinforced his hatred for the military. His tour over, why he had the nerve to start trying to deny others the opportunity to die for their country! Just because HIS war was over he wanted to deny that war to others the selfish bastard! If it weren’t for him and folks like him that big black wall coulda been even bigger with space for more heroes. How many did he cheat of their space on that wall. Their only shot at immortality and he took it from them!
His record since then gives us even further cause to suspect he hates the troops. In advocating and voting benefits for veterans, he was shilling for people no longer in the military. The key there is “no longer in.” Kerry may as well have been running ads against active duty!
The final bit of evidence? He voted against the 87 billion for the troops. What’s his problem anyway? What he expected that money to actually be available instead given away to tax cuts and added to the debt? Everyone knows “you go with the military you’ve got”! Kerry was CLEARLY insulting our servicemen by demanding their equipment and supply be funded for real instead of on paper. He just doesn’t respect the capability of our troops to innovate and supply themselves under fire?
Yeah there’s all sorts of prior evidence that Kerry was making fun of the troops and not the p(resident). All ya gotta do is look.
Olbermann heads a show with hardly any ratings. No one watches. He is a lib putz.
Looks to me like the joke was on Kerry.
Sometimes timing is everything.
A buddy and I were talking about sport cars and color schemes, I blurted out loud “I like mine black.”
At that very moment, a group of young black women came through door on the way to the cafeteria. They were not amused.
I had an extra large order of “foot” for lunch that day.
Hotlick how do you know? what reason as a public figure would he trash the troops especially this close to an election even Kerry isn’t that stupid.You can trash the Dem’s on national security but your side has dropped the ball and made thousands of mistakes.Now the majority of people want out.It’s not worth dying for.
morg-You have made my point very well.Libs = won’t defend the country
Oh look! It’s hotlick the blogfart. Pace yourself son! Don’t try to read any of the big words here. I’m sorry I can’t address you better. It’s hard to put together a post of one syllable words for you.
Somebody step on that cockroach and put him outta my misery.
your right hotlick I feel much safer with you guys in charge. Love the way you secured the borders.
bash and slash rhetoric
is that like the republican
fear and smear tactic?
Wassa matter boy, you can dish it out but you cant take it?
Olberman’s show is the highest rated one on MSNBC. His audience is growing and O’liely’s is shrinking.
Come on dicklick. Research, remember?
Why dont you show us all your vast intellect by posting keith’s ratings and then posting falafel boy’s tanking numbers?
You can do that… right?
.morg,
Indeed. And I love how this “Adminstration” has now decided to leave a man behind by throwing a kidnapped U.S. soldier to the wolves at the behest of Muqtada al Sadr.
How does that make YOU feel, Nathan?
I think the NYT does a nice job calling out the Wingnut ‘leadership’ for what it truly is: fully incompetent, venal, and dishonest.
*********************************
The Great DividerE-MailPrint SavePublished: November 2, 2006As President Bush throws himself into the final days of a particularly nasty campaign season, he’s settled into a familiar pattern of ugly behavior. Since he can’t defend the real world created by his policies and his decisions, Mr. Bush is inventing a fantasy world in which to campaign on phony issues against fake enemies.
In Mr. Bush’s world, America is making real progress in Iraq. In the real world, as Michael Gordon reported in yesterday’s Times, the index that generals use to track developments shows an inexorable slide toward chaos. In Mr. Bush’s world, his administration is marching arm in arm with Iraqi officials committed to democracy and to staving off civil war. In the real world, the prime minister of Iraq orders the removal of American checkpoints in Baghdad and abets the sectarian militias that are slicing and dicing their country.
In Mr. Bush’s world, there are only two kinds of Americans: those who are against terrorism, and those who somehow are all right with it. Some Americans want to win in Iraq and some don’t. There are Americans who support the troops and Americans who don’t support the troops. And at the root of it all is the hideously damaging fantasy that there is a gulf between Americans who love their country and those who question his leadership.
Mr. Bush has been pushing these divisive themes all over the nation, offering up the ludicrous notion the other day that if Democrats manage to control even one house of Congress, America will lose and the terrorists will win. But he hit a particularly creepy low when he decided to distort a lame joke lamely delivered by Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts. Mr. Kerry warned college students that the punishment for not learning your lessons was to “get stuck in Iraq.” In context, it was obviously an attempt to disparage Mr. Bush’s intelligence. That’s impolitic and impolite, but it’s not as bad as Mr. Bush’s response. Knowing full well what Mr. Kerry meant, the president and his team cried out that the senator was disparaging the troops. It was a depressing replay of the way the Bush campaign Swift-boated Americans in 2004 into believing that Mr. Kerry, who went to war, was a coward and Mr. Bush, who stayed home, was a hero.
It’s not the least bit surprising or objectionable that Mr. Bush would hit the trail hard at this point, trying to salvage his party’s control of Congress and, by extension, his last two years in office. And we’re not naïve enough to believe that either party has been running a positive campaign that focuses on the issues.
But when candidates for lower office make their opponents out to be friends of Osama bin Laden, or try to turn a minor gaffe into a near felony, that’s just depressing. When the president of the United States gleefully bathes in the muck to divide Americans into those who love their country and those who don’t, it is destructive to the fabric of the nation he is supposed to be leading.
This is hardly the first time that Mr. Bush has played the politics of fear, anger and division; if he’s ever missed a chance to wave the bloody flag of 9/11, we can’t think of when. But Mr. Bush’s latest outbursts go way beyond that. They leave us wondering whether this president will ever be willing or able to make room for bipartisanship, compromise and statesmanship in the two years he has left in office.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/02/opinion/02thu1.html
How sad for all you Repukes. No surprise to see you furiously digging around for someone to distract from the disastrous situation you have created. It’s always someone else’s fault, isn’t it?
Are “two part” system is a vile fraud, yet you sheeple engage in partisan hysterics come very election cycle. Pavlov’s mutt had nothing on you folks, pathetic!!
The whole election is just a show.
by James Buchanan
Americans never get to vote on things that can seriously affect their lives. Americans didn’t get to vote on “busing.” Some judicial tyrant ruled that Blacks should be bused into White neighborhoods and liberal politicians made sure that it happened. Conservatives were hiding under their beds too afraid to oppose it.
The same can be said for illegal immigration, the outsourcing of millions of manufacturing jobs, anti-White racial quotas and allowing hundreds of thousands of Indians and Pakistanis to immigrate here legally to flood the labor market . Apparently us peasants can’t be trusted to vote correctly on any of these issues.
We’re supposed to be represented by elected politicians. Unfortunately, the cost of being elected to Congress has shot up into the millions of dollars and politicians are more loyal to corporations than they are to the voters. The elections seem to be put on as a show. Our elections often seem just like wrestling matches where the winner is predetermined and the whole election is just a show.
During the 2004 election, whenever Bush was on the ropes and his popularity sinking, Kerry would sabotage his own campaign. It was exactly like a wrestling match, where the wrestlers pretend to injure each other. They overreact when they are “hit” and eventually the wrestler, whose turn it was to win, wins.
Back in 2004, when everyone was disgusted with Bush for saying if he had it to do all over, he would invade Iraq again, Kerry came out and said almost exactly the same thing. Kerry had a chance to do a flying body slam on a dazed George Bush, but he didn’t. Jon Stewart of the Daily News exclaimed “He’s trying to lose.” Well, he probably was trying to lose.
Remember the “Swiftboat vets for ‘truth.’” Karl Rove found some Swiftboat vets who hated Kerry and let them spread rumors and lies about Kerry’s service. None of those vets served on Kerry’s boat.
Kerry just let himself be beaten up for two months without defending his military record. Kerry should have gotten the men who actually served on his Swiftboat to speak up for him immediately, not after Americans heard unchallenged lies for two months. (If Kerry were running a serious campaign, he would have already contacted his war buddies and had them doing commercials for him from the very start of the campaign.)
Rove, Cheney and Bush were running around with frat buddies in the 60s and 70s drinking too much and NOT serving in the Vietnam War, but these three cowards convinced many Americans to condemn Kerry because ONE of his THREE wounds was “only” a small shrapnel wound.
I wouldn’t want a Massachusetts liberal as president, but that Swiftboat episode was absolutely shameless. Shirkers complaining about one of three wounds suffered by a real war veteran. Egads!!
Americans want the Mexican border sealed off, but all we’re going to get out of the 2006 election is a possible spanking of the Republicans and a fence. If the 20 million illegals in the US aren’t deported and if the fence and unfenced portion of the border doesn’t have enough agents, the fence will be meaningless, just like a wrestling match.
Full articlehttp://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=10603
Viva La Revolucion Blanco!!!
O’liely??hahahahah, heheheheh, hahahhhaaaahha!!(deep breath and repeat)O’liely and limpballs.Those two would screw mother terresa if they thought there was a buck in it for them.
But who would provide the shovel?
Damnit Ian, just put a paragraph or two and then the link.Everbody just scrolls over your shit anyway.Make it short, you’re slowing us down.
Ian Santiago,
My favorite description by the Swift Boaters was Kerry’s third wound, when medics extracted some sort of rice grains out of his buttocks from an exploding rice cooker.
JM, compared to GW’s bravery…takin some rice in the buttocksIS HONARABLE!!HA
Hey dicklick, Fux news ratings have dropped 24 % since 2005.
Since you are research challenged, let me help.
http://www.medialifemagazine.com/artman/publish/article...
Oh yeah, but Olberman is a putz nobody watches.
Sounds like yogi saying that place is so popular nobody goes there anymore….
hotlick, I just now got it.That is FUNNY man, funny.
I’d just about bet that those two would get Halliburton to supply the shovel, Fux news to film the necrophilia while bloviating about how damned patriotic this screwing is.Oh, and one of the drug companies would have to provide the get it up pills.And Brownback and Roberts would certainly fund the whole thing for millions, they are on the appropriations commitees, ya’ know.
Tracy,
I dunno, GW Bush was a fighter interceptor pilot in the Texas Air National Guard. It takes large cajones to fly one of those things.
Imagine a roller coaster car, put a plastic bubble over it and now it flies off the track at 400 miles per hour and does a loop and roll. That is, a jet fighter. aircraft.
http://www.hoffmania.com/blog/2006/11/now_boehner_on_.html
By Rick MazeMilitary Times
In the wake of Sen. John Kerry’s belated apology for offending troops deployed in Iraq, House Majority Leader Rep. John Boehner of Ohio is being asked by Democrats to apologize for seemingly blaming senior military officers for any problems with the Bush administration’s Iraq strategy.
Boehner, however, does not appear to be budging.
“Good try,” he said when asked about demands for an apology.
In a Wednesday appearance on CNN, Boehner was asked for his view on Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the U.S. policy in Iraq.
“There are a lot of people who want to blame what’s happening in Iraq on Donald Rumsfeld, but when you look at the transformation that our military has been through, it’s nothing short of remarkable,” Boehner said. “The fact is, the generals on the ground are in charge.”
Just for nathan!
And finally tonight, a Special Comment.
On the 22nd of May, 1856, as the deteriorating American political system veered towards the edge of the cliff, Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina, shuffled into the Senate of this nation, his leg stiff from an old dueling injury, supported by a cane. And he looked for the familiar figure of the prominent Senator from Massachusetts, Charles Sumner.
Brooks found Sumner at his desk, mailing out copies of a speech he had delivered three days earlier — a speech against slavery.
The Congressman matter-of-factly raised his walking stick in mid-air, and smashed its metal point, across the Senator’s head.
Congressman Brooks hit his victim repeatedly. Senator Sumner somehow got to his feet and tried to flee. Brooks chased him, and delivered untold blows to Sumner’s head. Even though Sumner lay unconscious and bleeding, on the Senate floor, Brooks finally stopped beating him, only because his cane finally broke.
Others will cite John Brown’s attack on the arsenal at Harper’s Ferry as the exact point after which the Civil War became inevitable.
In point of fact, it might have been the moment — not when Brooks broke his cane over the prostrate body of Senator Sumner – but when voters in Brooks’s district started sending him new canes.
Tonight, we almost wonder to whom President Bush will send the next new cane.
There is tonight no political division in this country that he and his party will not exploit, nor have not exploited; no anxiety that he and his party will not inflame.
There is no line this President has not crossed — nor will not cross — to keep one political party, in power.
He has spread any and every fear among us, in a desperate effort to avoid that which he most fears — some check, some balance against what has become not an imperial, but a unilateral presidency.
And now it is evident that it no longer matters to him, whether that effort to avoid the judgment of the people, is subtle and nuanced — or laughably transparent.
Senator John Kerry called him out Monday.
He did it two years too late.
He had been too cordial — just as Vice President Gore had been too cordial in 2000 — just as millions of us, have been too cordial ever since.
Senator Kerry, as you well know, spoke at a college in Southern California. With bitter humor, he told the students that he had been in Texas the day before, that President Bush used to live in that state, but that now he lives in the state of denial.
He said the trip had reminded him about the value of education — that quote “if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you can get stuck in Iraq.”
The Senator, in essence, called Mr. Bush stupid.
The context was unmistakable: Texas;the state of denial;stuck in Iraq. No interpretation required.
And Mr. Bush and his minions responded, by appearing to be too stupid to realize that they had been called stupid.
They demanded Kerry apologize — to the troops in Iraq.
And so he now has.
That phrase “appearing to be too stupid” is used deliberately, Mr. Bush.
Because there are only three possibilities here:
One, sir, is that you are far more stupid than the worst of your critics have suggested; that you could not follow the construction of a simple sentence; that you could not recognize your own life story when it was deftly summarized; that you could not perceive it was the sad ledger of your presidency that was being recounted.
This, of course, compliments you, Mr. Bush, because even those who do not “make the most of it,” who do not “study hard,” who do not “do their homework,” and who do not “make an effort to be smart” might still just be stupid — but honest.
No; the first option, sir, is, at best, improbable. You are not honest.
The second option is that you and those who work for you deliberately twisted what Senator Kerry said to fit your political template. That you decided to take advantage of it, to once again pretend that the attacks, solely about your own incompetence, were in fact attacks on the troops — or even on the nation itself.
The third possibility is, obviously, the nightmare scenario; that the first two options are in some way conflated.
That it is both politically convenient for you, and personally satisfying to you, to confuse yourself with the country for which, sir, you work.
A brief reminder, Mr. Bush: You are not the United States of America.
You are merely a politician whose entire legacy will have been a willingness to make anything political — to have, in this case, refused to acknowledge that the insult wasn’t about the troops, and that the insult was not even truly about you either — that the insult, in fact, is you.
So now John Kerry has apologized to the troops; apologized for the Republicans’ deliberate distortions.
Thus the President will now begin the apologies he owes our troops, right?
This President must apologize to the troops — for having suggested, six weeks ago, that the chaos in Iraq, the death and the carnage, the slaughtered Iraqi civilians and the dead American service personnel, will, to history, quote “look like just a comma.”
This President must apologize to the troops — because the intelligence he claims led us into Iraq proved to be undeniably and irredeemably wrong.
This President must apologize to the troops — for having laughed about the failure of that intelligence, at a banquet, while our troops were in harm’s way.
This President must apologize to the troops — because the streets of Iraq were not strewn with flowers and its residents did not greet them as liberators.
This President must apologize to the troops — because his administration ran out of “plan” after barely two months.
This President must apologize to the troops — for getting 2,815 of them killed.
This President must apologize to the troops — for getting this country into a war without a clue.
And Mr. Bush owes us an apology… for this destructive and omnivorous presidency.
—
We will not receive them, of course.
This President never apologizes.
Not to the troops.
Not to the people.
Nor will those henchmen who have echoed him.
In calling him a “stuffed suit,” Senator Kerry was wrong about the Press Secretary.
Mr. Snow’s words and conduct — falsely earnest and earnestly false — suggest he is not “stuffed” – he is inflated.
And in leaving him out of the equation, Senator Kerry gave an unwarranted pass to his old friend Senator McCain, who should be ashamed of himself tonight.
He rolled over and pretended Kerry had said what he obviously had not.
Only, the symbolic stick he broke over Kerry’s head came in a context, even more disturbing: Mr. McCain demanded the apology, while electioneering for a Republican congressional candidate in Illinois.
He was speaking of how often he had been to Walter Reed Hospital to see the wounded Iraq veterans, of how, quote “many of the have lost limbs.” He said all this while demanding that the voters of Illinois reject a candidate who is not only a wounded Iraq veteran, but who lost two limbs there: Tammy Duckworth.
Support some of the wounded veterans. But bad-mouth the Democratic one.
And exploit all the veterans, and all the still-serving personnel, in a cheap and tawdry political trick, to try to bury the truth: that John Kerry said the President had been stupid.
And to continue this slander as late as this morning — as biased, or gullible, or lazy newscasters, nodded in sleep-walking assent.
Senator McCain became a front man in a collective lie to break sticks over the heads of Democrats — one of them his friend; another his fellow veteran, leg-less, for whom he should weep and applaud, or at minimum about whom, he should stay quiet.
That was beneath the Senator from Arizona.
And it was all because of an imaginary insult to the troops that his party cynically manufactured — out of a desperation, and a futility, as deep as that of Congressman Brooks, when he went hunting for Senator Sumner.
This, is our beloved country now, as you have re-defined it, Mr. Bush.
Get a tortured Vietnam veteran to attack a decorated Vietnam veteran, in defense of military personnel, whom that decorated veteran did not insult.
Or, get your henchmen to take advantage of the evil lingering dregs of the fear of miscegenation in Tennessee, in your party’s advertisements against Harold Ford.
Or, get the satellites who orbit around you, like Rush Limbaugh, to exploit the illness — and the bi-partisanship — of Michael J. Fox — yes, get someone to make fun of the cripple.
Oh, and sir, don’t forget to drag your own wife into it.
“It’s always easy,” she said of Mr. Fox’s commercials — and she used this phrase twice — “to manipulate people’s feelings.”
Where on earth might the First Lady have gotten that idea, Mr. President?
From your endless manipulation of people’s feelings about terrorism?
“How ever they put it,” you said Monday of the Democrats, on the subject of Iraq , “their approach comes down to this: the terrorists win and America loses.”
No manipulation of feelings there.
No manipulation of the charlatans of your administration into the only truth-tellers.
No shocked outrage at the Kerry insult that wasn’t; no subtle smile as the First Lady silently sticks the knife in Michael J. Fox’s back; no attempt on the campaign trail to bury the reality that you have already assured that the terrorists are winning.
Winning in Iraq, sir.
Winning in America, sir.
There, we have chaos: joint U.S./Iraqi checkpoints at Sadr City, the base of the radical Shiite militias — and the Americans have been ordered out by the Prime Minister of Iraq… and our Secretary of Defense doesn’t even know about it!
And here — we have deliberate, systematic, institutionalized lying and smearing and terrorizing — a code of deceit, that somehow permits a President to say, quote, “If you listen carefully for a Democrat plan for success, they don’t have one.”
Permits him to say this while his plan in Iraq has amounted to a twisted version of the advice once offered to Lyndon Johnson about his Iraq, called Vietnam.
Instead of “declare victory — and get out”… we now have “declare victory — and stay, indefinitely.”
And also here, we have institutionalized the terrorizing of the opposition. True domestic terror:
– Critics of your administration in the media receive letters filled with fake anthrax.
– Braying newspapers applaud, or laugh, or reveal details the FBI wished kept quiet, and thus impede or ruin the investigation.
– A series of reactionary columnists encourages treason charges against a newspaper that published “national security information” — that was openly available on the internet.
– One radio critic receives a letter, threatening the revelation of as much personal information about her as can be obtained — and expressing the hope that someone will then shoot her with an AK-47 machine gun.
– And finally, a critic of an incumbent Republican Senator, a critic armed with nothing but words, is attacked by the Senator’s supporters, and thrown to the floor, in full view of television cameras, as if someone really did want to re-enact the intent and the rage of the day Preston Brooks found Senator Charles Sumner.
Of course, Mr. President, you did none of these things.
You instructed no one to mail the fake anthrax. Nor undermine the FBI’s case. Nor call for the execution of the editors of the New York Times. Nor threaten to assassinate Stephanie Miller. Nor beat up a man yelling at Senator Allen. Nor have the first lady knife Michael J. Fox. Nor tell John McCain to lie about John Kerry.
No, you did not.
And the genius of the thing, is the same, as in King Henry’s rhetorical question about Archbishop Thomas Becket: “Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?”
All you have to do, sir… is hand out enough new canes.
JM, I’ve worked aircraft before.I’m well aware of what it’s all about.And you’re right.It take some balls to thumb your nose at THE WHOLE WORLD, and your own country, while trashing the constitution, international law, and about everything else that our civilization stands for.BIG BALLS.Yep, that’s GW!!
Thank you dave s olberman.A link would have done nicely.Wingers are gonna’ get about three lines into it and quit reading anyway.
“After all, Kerry is an awful politician, a human toothache with the charisma of a 19th-century Oxford Latin tutor”
See I read beyond the first 3 lines Tracy :-)I especially enjoyed the following paragraph:
“One can’t rule out the possibility that he simply botched a joke. If it was a joke, it was a pretty bad one, even for him. First, Bush got better grades than Kerry at Yale. More relevant, if launching the Iraq war is a sign of stupidity and a failure to do one’s homework, Kerry should avoid calling attention to the fact that he voted to approve it and defended that vote throughout his 2004 presidential campaign. But whether or not it was a joke, it certainly sounded like Kerry was talking about the troops, because that’s the way Kerry talks about everything . . . All of his ideas were formed from his experience as an anti-Vietnam crusader.”
I think this says more about where the “joke” was truly directed. This is a man who served, but now hates our military. People want to act as if that’s not possible.
I can’t belive people really believe the joke was directed at troops. Even Bill O’Reily of Fox News said, he wasn’t demining the troops, he just botched the joke. When Bill O’Reily is defending John Kerry, you know the conservatives are desperate. :)
I read dave s very long post. I agree, he needs to link it or get his own website if he’s gonna publish a book in a blog. Should be limited text in a blog,no one likes to scroll, scroll and scroll to get through one message.
JM,
“It takes large cajones to fly one of those things.”
It also took about a million $’s of taxpayer money to train each pilot.
Why did he ground himself before his committent was up, by refusing to take his medical? Lose them?
Bill O’Reilly is an idiot.
Cosmos,
I dunno why “he grounded himself” and I doubt that is possible. It’s usually the Squadron Commander that does the grounding due to safety, medical, administration and other reasons.
Why don’t you ask Kerry why he threw his medals away and then waves them around twenty years later when its politically convenient to say “look I’m a war hero.”
My personal opinion on people who receive purple hearts for superficial wounds is not very high.
If it were me, i would feel embarrassed to wear a purple heart for a scab wound standing next to someone who lost a limb(s), eyesight or some other horrible injury.
Either it is a wound or not. There are no degrees of woundness with a Purple Heart. Yeah, it probably is abused, and yes, some people are hurt worse than others. But the medal recognizes the fact that the person put him/her self in harm’s way for the country and got tagged. That’s the way it should be.
Criteria:
For wounds or death sustained in action against an enemy of the United States;
In any action with an opposing armed force of a foreign country in which the Armed Forces of the United States are or have been engaged;
While serving with friendly foreign forces engaged in an armed conflict against an opposing armed force in which the United States is not a belligerent party;
As a result of an act of any such enemy of opposing armed forces;
As the result of an act of any hostile foreign force;
After 28 March 1973, as a result of an international terrorist attack against the United States by a foreign nation friendly to the United States, recognized as such an attack by the Secretary of the department concerned, or jointly by Secretaries of the departments concerned if persons from more than one department are wounded in the attack; or
After 28 March 1973, as a result of military operations, while serving outside the territory of the United States as part of a peacekeeping force.
After 7 December 1941, by weapon fire while directly engaged in armed conflict, regardless of the fire causing the wound (friendly fire).
While held as a prisoner of war or while being taken captive.
One could argue that according to many libs, purple hearts should not have been given out in Vietnam or now Iraq as Vietnam was not and Iraq is not an “enemy’s of the United States.”
One could argue????
That’s you making stuff up.
Dennis,
We I was in Germany, I talked to an old WWII Ranger that married a German woman and decided to settle there. He talked to me about landing on the ‘beach’ and came out without a scratch.
He then said a few choice words about how after the War was over, he got hit by an Army truck which broke several of bones and left him with a permanent limp.
He said, not only was he not eligible for a purple heart, but his commander gave him a ‘chewing’ out for being careless and for being in that bar when the truck hit him.
heh
Those German bars can be dangerous. I spent more time that I like to admit in some of them.Peacetime Army
How many times has it been said by liberals on this blog that Iraqi’s and/or Terrorists are not the enemy?How many times has it been referred to as a war of agression?Or an illegal war?
If any of those were true, then the wounds and casulties sustained in this war would not warrant a purple heart based on the criteria.
“If any of those were true, then the wounds and casualties sustained in this war would not warrant a purple heart based on the criteria.”
kia your logic escapes me, one statement is a political opinion the other is a physical manifestation of a real event
“How many times has it been said by liberals on this blog that Iraqi’s and/or Terrorists are not the enemy? ”
What a ridiculous statement. Please differentiate between terrorists and Iraq. The two are not synonymous, and no liberal that I know of on this blog has said they are. You seem to be holding onto the Bush doctrine that if you are against the war in Iraq you are for terrorism, AND you hate the troops.
Nothing could be further from the truth. What liberals, and myself for that matter, want is a sensible program on combating terrorism that does not include invading countries we have no business invading, for instance, Iraq.
Iraq is not the problem. It is, or was, run by some tin-pot dictator, just like many other countries in the world. The difference is not terrorism, but oil. Korea has none; Dufar has none, so we don’t invade them, at least not yet. Hell, give bush the time and he would invade mexico.
As for the troops over there: I would suspect all liberals have nothing but the greatest respect and admiration for the ones serving over there. My only real complaint is they are dying in a war that never should have happened.
Every soldier serving over there deserves all medals he or she get. So, mr kia, you are way off on your last statement on both Viet Nam and Iraq, but what else would I expect from you and your kind? Keep your tin-hat tuned to Rush, and you wont have to think anymore, which is exactly what you are failing to do with your last statements.
Damn, you asswipes tick me off. Trying to combine ending the war with hating the troops is about as low as you can get. GFY!
Libs = weak on the warLibs = “I loathe the military”
hotlick=irrelevant kook
The mostly Saudi terrorists had very limited attack capability. Government employees, including FBI agents tried to warn their superiors that there was tip-off activity, like foreign persons taking lessons on how to fly, but not take-off or land, jets (reported by suspicious flight-school operators) and Tenet’s insistent personal meeting with then NS Advisor Rice that identified an imminent attack. Disregarded.
Look sheeple, these “Islamofascists” want one thing: control of their own highly valuable oil resource. You can say “They can’t have it because we found when they didn’t even know what it was, we need it because we have an oil-dependent economy, and we can take it if we want.” But they know the value of it now.
We’ve become intoxicated with a wrong idea. The use of massive amounts of oil is only a century old. Humanity has existed for millenia without it. Anyone who says that humanity is threatened without cheap oil is either ignorant, demented or dishonest.
http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/47/18039
The troops have drawn different conclusions about fellow citizens back home. Asked why they think some Americans favor rapid U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq, 37% of troops serving there said those Americans are unpatriotic.
GFMS? Perhaps you’d like to tell the 37% of the troops who think the way I do the same thing then.
hotlick what divison are you serving in?
Wingnuts = Nazis
Wow, hotlick, thanks for turning me onto this new method of persuasion. It sure beats research, facts and cogent arguments! Gosh, you’re smart.***************As soon as I heard the remark, I cringed because I knew how terrible it sounded. The man should have sucked it up and apologized right away instead of trying to spin it. I don’t believe for a second he was trying to insult our troops but he should have known that’s the way it would be interpreted…
Yeah, hotlick, tell us about your father’s military service, your own military service, and your children’s military service. Go ahead, don’t be afraid. But tell the truth.
morg-Long
Can’t believe this is still going on.
It has got be the most stunning omission of a two letter word I’ve ever seen.
How do these folk get away with this. I guess it’s just Kerry’s karma to be reduced to meaningless sound bytes.
Didn’t he say somewhere that this is a joke that he’s used in a few different places.
Aren’t there some recordings that can be found of him saying it correctly.
He definitely needs to keep talking about the truth about Iraq and do what damage control he can concerning his vorpal joke (only head he’s cut off it seems is his own), but it definitely isn’t one of his finest moments.
here’s mine hotlick USAF 1973-78 honorable discharge
One’s military service makes not one bit of difference. If this is an attempt to say that if one has not served in the military then one has no standing, then the argument is dead before it starts. Nice try, but silly.
Hey Maybe you should fill in Brownlee since he still wrote that Kerry meant the troops.
Like, my Grandpa was too young to serve in WWI, and too old to serve in WWII. But his older brother put himself in harm’s way in WWI, and died in a VA retirement home. My dad served in WWII. I was a high-school and college student in Vietnam. I was 1-A in the draft. I never applied for a student deferment like the chicken (coward) hawks Cheney and Rove. I just didn’t get drafted. I have a volunteer-Army son.
So hotlick, tell us how your family has put themselves in harm’s way.
BTW, my son served 4 years, and he re-upped.
ADFS,
Indeed. I want to be a Republican so I can lie with impunity about what someone else said, have the media browbeat him for a couple of days, and then shame him into retracting sentiments he never uttered. Republicans are MAGIC.
Sadly, their ability to spread their delusions doesn’t seem to extend beyond the borders of the United States. Just ask the 100’s of thousands of dead Iraqis, and the tens of thousands of dead and wounded American service personnel.
Republicans’ hate for the troops consists in sending them into harm’s way, underequipped, and by turning away from the needs of veterans who come home needing our help.
The thing that irritates me most about the political system is that when a Republican says something politically incorrect there is an immediate cry for resignation. Republicans quickly fold and resign. Here we have a senator insulting the US military by his words, intended or not. No calls for his resignation are made. Instead an “apology” is demanded and after two days received. Had a Republican made the same kind of remark about a black, Mexican, gay person, etc they would already have resigned. But this guy gets a pass with some posted apology. REMEMBER WHEN HE INSULTS THE MILITARY HE INSULTS PEOPLE OF COLOR, GAYS, WOMEN, AND EVERY OTHER MINORITY. But hey, he’s a Democrat so it’s okay. Afterall it’s just the military.
I still don’t see what difference it makes. One of the greatest Americans who ever lived, Bill Clinton, didn’t serve in the military, but he was a great commander in chief. When we were attacked by terrorists, he fought back despite his lack of formal military training.
Anon, he insulted the President, not the military. The only reason why the military was insulted was because Bush cut the link so it make it look like Kerry was insulting them. So by rights, it was BUSH who insulted the military.
The only reason why the military was insulted was because Bush cut the link so it make it look like Kerry was insulting them.
Explain please.
Kerry didn’t impugn our troops. A WEBlogger posted a link to Keith Olberman’s MSNBC disclosure of Kerry’s full statements. Kerry was referring to GWB, not our troops.
heh heh
Even Hillary Clinton scolded Kerry.
Obviously, the effect despite the motive had a bad effect.
Deal with it.
Indeed. This deliberate misunderstanding on the part of Mr. KIA is as dishonest as it is par for the course.
It’s only natural to see the GOP go after Kerry: it’s all they can do. The last thing they want to talk about is their own record of cutting and running from their responsibilities to American service personnel, whether this involves abandoning kidnapped American troops, inadequately supplying them, or putting them on trial for the deeds they were ordered to do by their superiors.
Bush has been stabbing American troops in the back for years, and all you Republicans have had your own hands on the knife.
Thank goodness for youtube.
“The context was unmistakable” Oblermann says, adding that there was “no interpretation required.”
Really? Is that why millions of Americans, including many U.S. troops from all around the world were offended by Kerry’s remarks?
But, of course, Keith Olbermann is clearly much smarter than all those people who were “too stupid” to get Kerry’s lame joke – even though he “botched” it.
That’s exactly the sort of elitist attitude that Americans hate, whether it’s coming from a stuck up Senator from Beacon Hill or a stuffed shirt former sports broadcaster who now fancies himself the reincarnation of Edward R. Murrow.Personally I always thought Dan Patrick was the brains of the outfit.
CF: You have a selective memory.
What about when that dope Trent Lott said at poor old Strom Thurmond’s 100th burthday party; “When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we [Mississippians] voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years.”
Well, you’d have thought he’d called MLK the “n” word. The Democrats fanned a firestorm that erupted over what? Lott being gracious to an old man. Then he wet all over himself apologizing for nothing. Still cost him his job as Senate Majority Leader.
So please CF, spare us the white as snow, innocent, Democrat crap.
outlander,
Well, that certainly had nothing to do with anything. And your point was…?
Well CF, I thought it was you who had posted above. Damn trolls. Besides, nobody has been takin’ you on lately. You don’t want that. You’ll lose your edge.
Maybe I should call you a name or something to get you stirred up. Never mind.
outlander,
Those posts were mine, but I’m not sure about what the issue was.
Anyway, gotta go teach: three hours on Emmanuel Levinas for my poor students. TTFN
JOhn Kerry got 4 “D” grades in his Freshman year.He is not very smart.
Well yeah, if you take out what Kerry said BEFORE, obviously you’re going to think Kerry meant the troops. Thank goodness we have video that shows CLEARLY that Kerry was referring to Bush.
You might want to read the WHOLE thing, instead of just the part the repubs sold.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15519404/
“No matter how obvious it was that Kerry’s original remark was a mangled jest aimed at President Bush, Republicans wasted no time casting the remark as further evidence of Democratic disdain for the military.”Posted by Dave Knadler
Dave, Dave, how could Kerry be aiming that at Bush when Bush’s grades were higher that Kerry’s at Yale?
John Kerry will NEVER be President. Al Gore and Hillary Clinton will be the FIRST to reprint and rebroadcast Kerry’s commnents.This story has “legs” because Kerry’s comments accurately reflect Kerry’s elitist views.Political mom, quit spinning. Kerry is toast and most of the leaders of the Dem party admit it.Veterans just don’t like Kerry. He is involved in yet another lawsuit over his anti-Vietnam War activities:http://www.vvlf.org/default.php?page_id=76
Did you see what a Minnesota Guard Unit in Iraq did? This is funny:http://www.nypost.com/seven/11022006/news/nationalnews/gis_drop_smart_bomb_on_kerry_nationalnews_todd_venezia_in_n_y____and_ian_bishop_in_washington.htm
Bush says stupid stuff all the time and we all expect it.Because he’s kinda stupidPosted by: CapnAmerica | November 02, 2006 at 01:07 PM
If Bush is kinda stupid then Kerry must be real stupid since Bush’s make higher grades than Kerry at Yale and his IQ test scores were higher.
Libs = weak on the warLibs = “I loathe the military”Posted by: hotlick | November 02, 2006 at 04:59 PM
LOL
GOP = stupid on the warGOP = “Fuck the military, they signed up for this shit”
Right Angle says “Bush is kinda stupid”.
Glad you feel that way about our president too.
Who thinks RA should apologize for calling the president stupid?
JM,
“I dunno why “he grounded himself” and I doubt that is possible.”
Aren’t annual physicals required of military pilots? Aren’t the pilots aware of that? Were there exemptions to that rule?
If not, IMO, he “grounded himself” by failing to take the physical the year drug testing was added to it.
“Why don’t you ask Kerry why he threw his medals away…”
Why don’t you do some research?
Kerry threw away some of his ribbons, and the medals belonging to vets in wheelchairs who asked him to.He also argued for the less dramatic act of placing the decorations on a table — but lost.
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/04/27/i_watched_kerry_throw_his_war_decorations/
“Who thinks RA should apologize for calling the president stupid?”
Posted by: political_mom | November 02, 2006 at 06:33 PM
Sorry, I apologize to all the persons who can not read and think that I called the president stupid.
And I guess Kerry should have apologized that the President’s men couldn’t show a whole clip in context.
It’s nice to see that Hardball’s Chris Matthews understood what Kerry was saying the other day.
Bush admitted to being a C student. Just how special does that make him?
IQ scores only tell how well you can learn, not how much you know. Kerry and Bush’s scores were only a few points apart, so it’s really hard to tell. What would be more telling is if those tests were given today.
Outlander said two words that bear repeating.
Trent Lott.
Never liked Trent much myself but he got much worse for saying nothing.
I know the story Cosmos, I was on active duty back then. I was around to see such things, were you? :)
But just in case you weren’t paying attention, here’s the long boring version.
Yeah, Kerry threw someone else’s medals away (gutless). However, he did stand up before a crowd while holding a microphone and denounced all his medals he received.
By the way, whether you know this or not, ribbons have a medal version. There are minature versions for wearing with ‘mess dress’ and the full version that accompanies the ribbon when the award is presented.
Anyway, here some long, boring research for you.
Did Kerry throw his combat decorations away in an antiwar protest 33 years ago?
Take 1: Yes. As The Boston Globe reported on April 24, 1971, “John Kerry . . . said before he threw his medals over the fence: `I’m not doing this for any violent reasons, but for peace and justice, and to try to make this country wake up once and for all.’ ”
Take 2: A. Yes. In a Nov. 6, 1971, interview with WRC-TV, he recalledthat the protesters had decided to “renounce the symbols which thiscountry gives . . . the medals themselves.” When the interviewer asked, “How many did you give back, John?” he answered: “I gave back, I can’t remember, six, seven, eight, nine.” The interviewer noted that Kerry hadwon the Bronze and Silver Stars and three Purple Hearts. Kerry: “Well, and above that, I gave back my others.”
Take 3: “Good Morning America” anchor Charlie Gibson said he was there 33 years ago when Kerry threw medals over the fence. “I saw you throw medals over the fence, and we didn’t find out until later (interrupted)that those were someone else’s medals,” Gibson said. Kerry, not listening to the end of Gibson’s statement, said, “Charlie,Charlie, you’re wrong. That is not what happened. I threw my ribbonsacross. And all you have to do…” [Gibson tried to clarify that Kerry threw someone else's medals over the fence, but Kerry would not give him an opportunity. Kerry eventually clarified that he did throw two medals (not his) over the fence at the request of two veterans.]
Take 4: Afterward, he joined a dramatic political-theater display at the Capitol steps, where hundreds of vets took a microphone and, one by one, stated their name, identified their combat medals and flung them over apolice fence on the steps. Kerry renounced his Bronze Star, his Silver Star and his three Purple Hearts.
I’m so sick of those that take any opportunity to twist something and make it out to be other than what it was. So Bush got higher grades in college than Kerry? His IQ tested higher (I have a hard time believing that one!)? I’m no John Kerry fan, but the truth is that Kerry served his country in the military and Bush didn’t. Bush has been a joke ever since he put on the flight suit and landed aboard the aircraft carrier and played soldier for a photo op with the real soldiers. Anyone who thinks Bush is someone who deserves respect is a fool.
So what are you saying Mary?
Is someone only fit to serve as Commander in Chief if they have served in the active military?
I’m a fool under your defnition and really quite proud of it.
Posted by: Mary Caruso | November 02, 2006 at 07:18 PM
“…but the truth is that Kerry served his country in the military and Bush didn’t. Anyone who thinks Bush is someone who deserves respect is a fool.”
Oh well, there it is then, call me a fool. :)
Bush did serve his country by joining the Air National Guard where he trained as a Fighter Interceptor Pilot.
There were many people that joined the Army or Air Guard during that time. You want to tell them they didn’t serve their country either?
Many guard units and reservers were activated during the Vietnam era as well as during the First Gulf War and the more recent one.
Are you going to tell those people they didn’t serve their country?
“JOhn Kerry got 4 “D” grades in his Freshman year.He is not very smart.”
Brilliant . . . simply brilliant.
And Kerry’s running for what? Damn, you people amaze me . . . not!
JM, you’re kidding right? He may have JOINED the guard, but he never finished! His “military” record can’t even compare to Kerry’s.Mr KIA, I think if a president is so willing to send our youth to war, he should have experienced what war is. Bush is a fool, and so are you if you think he deserves any respect at all. He has done more damage to our country than any other president I’ve seen in my lifetime, and I’ve been here since Eisenhower.
JM’s titade against Kerry’s stance during the Nam war is from a guy who wasn’t there. I was. I know the feelings of the soldiers who went through that fiasco. I know how many were completly disenchanted with how the war was being fought.
I know Kerry did what many of us wanted to do. What he did, as well as many others, is what helped turn the tide and get us out of there. It was manufactured as a war we could never win.
It was run by politicians for politicians, and the service people over there were nothing more than pawns. They were dying for something they did’nt understand because what they were doing was not what they were taught in training: defeat the enemy and secure victory.
And there could be no victory then as there can be no victory now. What bush is calling a victory is nothing more than words. Civil war is going to split the country into as many parts as there are factions. Democracy is the furthest thing from many sectarian groups there: it will never happen. There are over 2000 years of history to back me up.
So go on with your namby pamby name calling and the rest of the spoon fed, rush coulter repuke spin. But remember: Our people are getting killed over there, and you have no exit stratagy. So tell me: Who cares about the military? It certainly ain’t the republicans.
That should read, “republicants.”
Amen, Walker!
Damn that sounded a bit like MOTHER, didn’t it?
Thank you JM, on behalf of my father, who DID serve in Vietnam and has said similar things to me.
I meant JM Walker
Yeah, it kills me that Kerry’s military records are an open book, but you can’t even examine Bush’s because they were “lost.” Right about the time his political career took off.
Cough. How convenient.
Like somebody said upthread, you have two glaringly different standards here, and the lesser is the only one the Bushies want applied to Bush. It’s been this way ever since that bozo was elected president, too: there is literally no standard you guys won’t gleefully lower to accomodate your admiration of Bush.
What is up with that? How can you possibly compare a guy with combat decorations to a guy whose daddy arranged to have his substandard military records “lost?” How in your god’s name can running down the former lift up the latter?
It’s like Moynihan’s phrase, “defining deviancy down,” has been retooled under Bush. Respecting Bush the man, ok. I guess. Respecting the performance of the USA under Bush as president, though, is the Moynihan equivalent of defining stupidity down.
No problem, p m. My hats off to your dad.
Last sentence should read:
Respecting Bush’s performance as president, though, is the Moynihan equivalent of defining stupidity down.
Added:
Way down.
President Bush is not stuck in Iraq. President Bush is in Washington DC, our troops are stuck in Iraq. What is the solution to the problem?
All I hear from the democrats is to retreat, draw back, back away, run away, withdraw, flee.
Is that really the answer?
If Kerry is so damn smart why was he suckered into voting for the war?
Posted by: J M Walker | November 02, 2006 at 07:48 PM
“JM’s titade against Kerry’s stance during the Nam war is from a guy who wasn’t there.”
You’re right, my feet didn’t touch the soil of Vietnam. I was assigned to Udorn AFB in Thailand where our group of F4 phantoms were used for reconnaisance in Vietnam.
I don’t disagree that the War was badly mismanaged. However, it doesn’t lessen the service of anyone who served during that time , regardless if they were Active Duty, Reserve or in the Air Guard.
“All I hear from the democrats is to retreat, draw back, back away, run away, withdraw, flee.”Posted by: Right Angle | November 02, 2006 at 07:59 PM
What a steaming load.
Bullshit. You never listen to the Democrats. You prefer to listen to what the Republican party says the Democrats say.
There you go Right Angle. I have been asking for a few days what the left would do. All I get is rhetoric (especialy from Farm grrl) about stay the course. It is real easy to sharp shoot from the sidelines, but when you’re number is called and you have to deliver……
http://pff.hostkansas.com/pffimages2/irak_2.jpg
My favorite description by the Swift Boaters was Kerry’s third wound, when medics extracted some sort of rice grains out of his buttocks from an exploding rice cooker.Posted by: JM | November 02, 2006 at 03:02 PM
However, it doesn’t lessen the service of anyone who served during that time , regardless if they were Active Duty, Reserve or in the Air Guard.Posted by: JM | November 02, 2006 at 08:04 PM
No, of course not. Guys like you do that.
What Kerry did in Nam is kind of a mystery as accounts differ. What he did in the press after he came back is inexcusable. He would have been a good bed buddy for Hanoi Jane Fonda
Posted by: Pedant | November 02, 2006 at 08:12 PM
“No, of course not. Guys like you do that.”
I just thought it was a rather curiously amusing wound.
Bullshit.
You were happy to lessen the service of someone who served during that time, regardless if they were Active Duty, and now you can’t admit it.
Bullshit. Kerry lessened his own service when he came back and dishonerd the men still fighting
Posted by: Pedant | November 02, 2006 at 08:18 PM
“You were happy to lessen the service of someone who served during that time, regardless if they were Active Duty, and now you can’t admit it.”
Awww, poor frustrated Pedant, can’t think when he gets mad, so he has to swear. :(
Kerry renounced the Vietnam war, he renounced his service, he renounced his medals, all in a very public eye. He went before Congress and accused his fellow service men of atrocities, it’s in the Congressional Record, check it out. His views were well known as being anti-military and anti-war (anti-war is not a bad thing though.)
He’s a little older and wiser now and he realized he made many mistakes back then and admitted so on Camera during the 2004 Presidential campaign.
But Kerry is the one who renounced his service, not me.
Like you said, his record after Nam is open game.
But what he did in service should not be. By opening up old war records and subjecting Kerry’s wartime behavior to the kind of second-guessing bullshit that eventually ended up calling Max Cleland unfit for office because in throwing a grenade away he’d displayed stupidity if not cowardice, in doing that you idiots are demeaning the service records of every vet who ever fought.
You just wait and see.
I don’t always have to swear, JM.
But fuck you. :-)
The whole transcript has long since been released and it CLEARLY shows that Kerry was making fun of the p(resident) NOT the troops.
Frankly I find this overblown lying attack on Kerry contemptible and sickening and I will happily apply that label to each and every one of you participating in it. You should be ashamed of yourselves but you are so lost in you slavish love for the worst president in history that you have no capacity for shame. So I shall be ashamed for you and of you.
Max Cleland eh?
Why throw his name in a Kerry blog. I have nothing but admiration for ol’ Max, even have a letter signed by him from the VA.
But whatever floats your boat, bud.
And have a really nice day.
George W. Bush not only served, but he also VOLUNTEERED FOR SERVICE IN VIETNAM.The airplane he was flying was being decommissioned and the military did not want the expense of retraining Bush on another type of airplane.Bush’s job was to intercept Soviet nuclear bombers.Are you folks calling all of the people who work in our nuclear subs, nuke missle silos and on B-1 Bombers names now?That service is important.——-PendantBush’s records are an “open book.” Bush signed the forms to release his military records.John Kerry NEVER released all of his records.There is a STRONG chance the Kerry received a Bad Conduct Discharge or Dishonorable Discharge or Less Than Honorable Discharge.Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, it can be shown, have been involved in Kerry’s military records.Kerry was still a Reserve Officer when Kerry made false statements about our military and when Kerry knowingly asked men to “testify” about atrocities that KERRY KNEW had never been in Vietnam!
MaryYou need to calm down.Carter let the radicals take over Iran by dissing the Shah.Right or wrong, he hurt us.Carter “trusted” the Soviets and was “surprised” when the Soviets invaded Afganistan. (His words)
LBJ got us Deep into Vietnam, and LBJ tried to micro manage that war from the White House. LBJ was so disliked he didnt even try to run for a second term.
Nixon did some great things, playing the “China Card” against the North Vietnamese was one of the greatest. However, he let the country down on Watergate by covering up for his buddies. Watergate is small potatoes compared to LBJ and Clinton scandles, but Nixon was wrong and paid the price. (So did the Vietnamese “Boat People” we were so weakened by Nixon, and by Congress tying Nixons hands, that Nixon and then Ford could do nothing to save the Boat People or the Cambodians from Poll Pot
Clinton should have been impeached for Whitewater and Castle Grande, land deals designed to defraud retired people. Then you had the Rose Law Firm billing records, FBI file turning up in the White House, IRS files in the White House, etc.Monica probably saved Bill from being tossed out on something more important.
Regardless of your take on the Presidents listed above, it is impossible for a rational person to label Bush the worst President since Eisenhower.You have no credibility when you talk like that.
Bohner is trying to blame patriotic Generals, for Georges Boner!
Well JR, I’m sure that you found this contemptible when it happened. I posted this earlier.
“What about when that dope Trent Lott said at poor old Strom Thurmond’s 100th burthday party; “When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we [Mississippians] voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years.”
Well, you’d have thought he’d called MLK the “n” word. The Democrats fanned a firestorm that erupted over what? Lott being gracious to an old man. Then he wet all over himself apologizing for nothing. Still cost him his job as Senate Majority Leader.”
OK, you can’t tell me that wasn’t worse than the treatment Kerry is getting.
It’s all politics, you know that. And politicians of all stripes do it. Savvy people can see it for what it is.
Eisenhower was also a great man, but he made a bunch of mistakes during WW2, as “Supreme Allied Commander.”
We had dozens of battles in WW2 in which we lost more men than in Afganistan and Iraq put together. And we took more losses in a single day, several times in our history, than what we have lost in Iraq.
Those WW-2 losses were mostly necessary, but we made lots of mistakes.If things had been done differently, thousands of lives could have been spared.Hindsight is ALWAYS 20-20, then and now.—-Eisenhower did the best he could with what he had at the time, however this is a short list of mistakes:Letting the boats stop too far from the shore on D-Day, drowning hundreds of the troops.Parachute drops on top of enemy positions, getting our paratroopers killed before they fired a shot.Trying to use tanks on Iwo Jima, when the island is mostly volcanic ash and tank treads dont work well on that terrain.Fire Bombing Dresden, in Germany, a town with virtually no military value, which killed thousands of civilians.——-Mistakes happen in war, I am not criticizing anyone here.However, Mary, you need to study your history a bit more.War is NEVER easy.Mistakes ALWAYS happen.
Mr. Rosell you have absolutely no stake or understanding of the word credibility. You are a multi busted liar. You dirty the word. Mary Caruso has forgotten more about crediblility than you ever knew you lousy shill.
JM You have to be aware that the same Karl Rove and that gang that trashed Kerry were the ones who trashed Max Cleland. You do not get to applaud them for one act you approve of while condemning them for another. Not without inviting a charge of hypocrisy.
Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, it can be shown, have been involved in Kerry’s military records.Posted by: Paul F. Rosell | November 02, 2006 at 08:35 PM
LOL (I just can’t resist, you guys kill me)
You know what? I actually started responding to what you directed to me but when I got to that sentence I just couldn’t get any further.
I guess you’re going to have to lay out the proof on that one, Paul.
You just can’t write satire any better than what you guys write straight out, you know that?
JRYou have never caught me lying because I have never lied on this Blog.Not once.
— and JR, the Democrat Party is going to shut Kerry out in the Primary. Kerry is toast. Your Party will NEVER nominate him again.
JR, you are left of Hillary Clinton and most of the Democrats running for House or Senate this year.Nearly every one of them told Kerry to apologize.Kerry is being avoided by YOUR party.
Kerry said what he believed.What Kerry said resonates because this is not the first time Kerry has said such elitist, anti-military crap.
JR, read this, this is how most vets feel about Kerry:http://www.vvlf.org/default.php?page_id=76
And this, too:
“There is a STRONG chance the Kerry received a Bad Conduct Discharge or Dishonorable Discharge or Less Than Honorable Discharge.Posted by: Paul F. Rosell | November 02, 2006 at 08:35 PM
Do you have a non-NewsMax source for this?
LOL, am I gonna need to take a shower after I read your source on this one, too?
Sorry Out I did not mean to miss you. Rosell has to get whacked whenever he appears. His posts take away credibility points from both sides.
You will say I am being hypocritical. But I say that the Thurmond matter is not a fair comparison here. Lott actually meant to say what he said. He did not mispeak. There is no follow up information to tell us that he actually meant to say something entirely different as is the case with Kerry. Yes it was a small thing said to humor a very old man. But it was racial and as you know there are rightfully very deep scars there. So I’m sorry but I don’t see that as comparable. It only cost Lott his leadership post. The thing with Kerry has destroyed him on a national level permanently.
JR
I’ll applaud Max Cleland as I see fit. I’m not Karl Rove or anyone else.
I make my own decisions. Sorry, you can’t make a decision for me. That’s life, deal with it.
Paul F. Rosell,
George W. Bush has orchestrated the biggest foreign policy disaster in American history: the war in Iraq. Everything else you mention is a piddling trifle compared to this–including Vietnam, for which there was, at least, something of a geopolitical / strategic rationale.
George Bush: unquestionably the worst President in American history. Bar none. Without peer.
JM,
I trust a close eyewitness much more than I do you, and the assorted snips of remarks in your “takes”.
Why is it “gutless” to do what vets in wheelchairs request, who were unable to reach the fence.
I WAS aware of the ‘mess dress’ ribbons. Why didn’t you post that he “sort of lobbed” those ribbons, instead of “he threw his medals away”?
And it seems that you cannot explain a certain fighter pilot’s failure to fulfill his flight commitment. Hmmmmm…
Oh, and I notice gay-prostitute patronizing evangelical pastor Ted Haggard has now resigned his position. “Position.” Ha ha! Damn, sometimes I just kill myself, ah tell you what…
The GOP: closet homosexuality, pederastry, and epochal incompetence.
Vote Democratic–for a change.
Who’s going to be left to beat the Republican drum once all the repressed homosexuals in the GOP are outed?
JM you misunderstand.
It is the same gang of thugs attacking Kerry that ruined Max Cleland. I don’t see how you applaud them one and decry the other.
Mr Rosell
You are right. You’ve never lied here.
According to you. Since it is your deluded opinion that as long as anything you post here is not legally actionable and is your own personal truth it is therefore truth for everyone else.
I think you are universally reviled here Paul. I don’t have to go get an example of your destroyed credibility. Everybody has seen it or you will soon enough provide newer readers with new examples!
And now it turns out the man-whore who took down Ted Haggard, national director of the 30-million strong National Association of Evangelicals, will take a live lie-detector test on the Peter Boyles radio show tomorrow.
Jesus. Will the election PLEASE get here quickly?!? I don’t know how much more of this I can take.
Posted by: cosmos | November 02, 2006 at 09:11 PM
“Why didn’t you post that he “sort of lobbed” those ribbons, instead of “he threw his medals away”?”
Kerry did worse, he renounced his awarded medals in public on microphone before a crowd. Kerry also renounced his service. Kerry did this, not me, why not ask him about his actions, I didn’t do that.
“And it seems that you cannot explain a certain fighter pilot’s failure to fulfill his flight commitment. Hmmmmm…”
Not sure what you mean by flight commitment. If you mean lost records, heck about anyone who has been in the military in the 70s and before has had records lost. There were no computers back then.
I remember having to repeat some training years later after the AF lost my records. Then they lost my medical records and finance records. So, yeah records do get lost.
If you mean the aircraft he was flying the F-102, don’t know what version. I don’t think there was a F-102 anywhere close to Vietnam after 1970. It was pretty much on its way out as the newer models of F4’s came on board.
Posted by: J R | November 02, 2006 at 09:21 PM
“It is the same gang of thugs attacking Kerry that ruined Max Cleland. I don’t see how you applaud them one and decry the other.”
What do the actions of others have to do with my appreciation of a guy like Max Cleland?
I think you are very much confused and believing your own rhetoric by assigning belief to a group of people even when someone is stating their individual belief.
There is a difference you know.
Add this to the list of Repubs who have not served in the military: Bushie, Jr.
Also, why is it that Bushie, Jr. can say something that confirms his IQ is BELOW ZERO like: “Democrats are genetically pre-disposed to taxing…”, which is his comment from either early this week or late last week… Obviously, most of the troops in Iraq were schooled in Texas…
Paul F(alsely claimed Margaret Sanger is a racist) Rosell,
“JOhn Kerry got 4 “D” grades in his Freshman year.He is not very smart.”
He was distracted during the first year while learning how to fly — had an 81 average in his senior year, and his total average was on par with Bush.
Do you REALLY want to accuse Kerry, a top student at the Naval Officer Candidate School, of being “not very smart” in this thread?
Rosell, you are INSULTING America’s military!
RA sticks his hoof in mouth yet again: “If Kerry is so damn smart why was he suckered into voting for the war?”
So you are admitting the Iraq war is a bad thing, being as how Kerry was “suckered into voting for the war.” I guess that means everyone who voted for the war was “suckered” into voting? Damn, you are one brilliant moron. Keep it up: I always need a good laugh.
As for JM: I never said anything about lessening the service of those who served; I said they were used. Big difference to those who understand the english language. If you were in Udorn, my hats off to you also, but your politics still sucks.
pauly,”George W. Bush not only served, but he also VOLUNTEERED FOR SERVICE IN VIETNAM.”
Yep, he also walked on the moon . . . shit, the record of that one’s been stolen, damn.
He also invented the cure for polio . . .o’ hell, Jonas Salk beat him up and stole that one.
He also developed the common yard bush: it’s called a shrub. They’re pretty common. He just won’t admit it . . . too bashful.
Posted by: J M Walker | November 02, 2006 at 10:07 PM
“As for JM: I never said anything about lessening the service of those who served; I said they were used. Big difference to those who understand the english language. If you were in Udorn, my hats off to you also, but your politics still sucks.”
So you agree then G.W. Bush serving in the Texas Air National Guard was a good thing and a service to his country.
Or you gonna backpeddle?
JM,
“Not sure what you mean by flight commitment.”
He signed an agreement to serve “as directed” etc. for 5 years, on 5/28/68. I assume you know what happened (and didn’t) in 1972.
I love my President. He is the right man at the right time and history will demand that his face be placed on Mt. Rushmore. This is because I unlike Kerry and you libs am a patriot. God himself has chosen George W Bush for us. If God is with us, who can be against us?My country right or wrong my country.
Cool, I have a troll. The message written at 10:55 is not me.
Posted by: cosmos | November 02, 2006 at 10:41 PM
“He signed an agreement to serve “as directed” etc. for 5 years, on 5/28/68. I assume you know what happened (and didn’t) in 1972.”
No, I don’t know, so explain. I’m guessing that’s when he went to college?
Let me clue you in on how the military worked back then
There was a program called Project Transition. It was a program that allowed “early outs” for military members if they have faithfully served all their commitments as required and approved by their Commander.
Some of the Project Transitions allowed as much as year to release Military members from their service commitment. That was mostly for college though. Most of the early releases were six months or less.
This appalling episode over Kerry is yet another example of theRepublican hate machine manipulating their allies in the corporate media (owned bythe same Republican-supporting corporate barons) to create anon-existent issue that serves to take America’s eyes off of thecorruption and theft running rampant in Republican-controlledWashington. I hope that people have been watching the Congressionalhearings on Iraq contracting (on C-SPAN) to witness Halliburton andother Republican-linked corporations committing atrocities againstour troops in the field (for example, Halliburton is supplyinguntreated sewer water to our troops for drinking and bathing, inanother fat contract given to them by their buddies in the WhiteHouse and Republican Congress!) I’m glad to see that theirdisgraceful fearmongering and hate spin is no longer successful inpulling the wool over the eyes of decent Americans. As long as thesecorrupt Republicans can distract us from reality, they can continuetheir policy of “Tax and Steal, Tax and Steal” and America will bebrought to its knees – bankrupted and broken, our Constitution in tatters. It’s time to stand up for our country and clean out corruption – let’s run, don’t walk, tothe voting booth Tuesday!!
I am getting a in the game a little late here but here is what I know based on the real world.
I did one and a half tours as a W2 flying slicks in the 101st in 70/71. Seemed like a good idea at the time. We (the vast majority of the guys I flew with) knew that the war was a GRF. I cannot remember anybody having a problem with the VVAW or anybody else who was protesting, testifying, whatever. If it was going to help get our asses out there it was OK with us. Remember FTA did not mean fun- travel…
Here’s my take on Kerry – he could have stayed at sea but he volunteered for the brown water navy. Two hearts or three…shit man one is plenty… what are you freakin idiots quibiling over? How many do any of you finger pointing weenies have?
Throw his medals back? Fine. Testify? In hindsite…He was, in the main, right. Anybody want to argue we should have stayed in Nam or that some really bad shit (perpetrated by nice young American boys) was not happening with pretty regular frequency? I don’t think so.
Here is my take on Bush and his Guard Service. (And I will preface this with the statement that the guard then was a hiding place. 95% of my boot camp company in 69 were NG’s from Alabama & NY…to a man they would admit to that. Always exceptions but come on…it was a factual part of the culture at the time. The guard today is a whole different deal, BTW)
Yes indeed some, NG/ER units got called up and sent over… and boy were those guys pissed because they felt as if some safety contract had been violated. But in the main it was a hiding place when you lost your 2S or just on GP’s and everybody who had the balls to enlist or the bad luck to be drafted knows it (and envied them t one time or another.
After I got off active duty I flew in the Guard to earn some $$$ while I was in college. The Army may be a little different from the AF but the prevailing opinion was if you joined the guard and did no active duty (and I mean in country) you were a world class pussy and not fit to kiss our…you get my point.
Anybody who was in the Guard or reserves in 72/73 also knows that the minute the war was in the last round (Early 73) a hell of a lot of the guard/reserve heros took a powder – literally they just quit going. Early out/project transition my ass…the just quit coming.
What was the Army (or AF) going to do…send you to Nam??? And as far as I (and the vast majority of my peers) am concerned that is exactly what Bush did.
And please spare me the he was a fighter interceptor pilot. To paraphrase Kerry’s foot in mouth gaffe…any dumb ass can learn to fly…Hell even I did.
Look, Bush used his family connections to get into a cush berth in the NG. Hey man good for you. But the minute the threat of actually having to go into harms way disappeared he hauled ass and did not look back. Happened all over the place
So quit referring to what the records say…Most people who were in know your records are mostly BS. What counts, as Hackworth said…is your bar room rep. Could you hack it or not?
Kerry hacked it…Bush packed it. End of discussion.
And to the mook who trotted out his SE Asia service at Udorn, Utapao, Whatever AFB Thailand…Attaboy for joining up pal but unless you were flying you might as well have been at Travis (except for the great women). That’s where we came for vacation, man!
“He signed an agreement to serve “as directed” etc. for 5 years, on 5/28/68.”
6 years, not 5 years. And he didn’t finish all 6. It depends on which account you read as to whether he was released early (8 months early to attend Yale) or just took off. There’s no paperwork available to back up that he was officially released.
I’ve seen Kerry’s DD 214 on the internet. No dishonorable anything, but keep spinning. There are plenty who want to believe you and do.
Great post, MDP.
Welcome to the WEBlog.
Has Bush apologized for his joke about looking for WMD behind a couch while thousands of Americans die? Has Bush apologized for the 105 dead Americans in October? Has Bush apologized for insulting the troops by not attending one dead soldier’s funeral?
Kerry isn’t up for election, he already apologized for his role in this disasterous, illegal occupation. Bush has yet to apologize for lying to the world and joking while thousands of Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis die.
The media should report the real controversy, not a pathetic attempt at parroting supermarket aisle tabloid trash.
MDP,
Glad you made it back man.
Hey you Army grunts never thought us Air Force weenies were worth the lead and powder to blow us up with, so your comments about me and my assignment is nothing new.
Of course, you can categorize those FT Mechanics that went out in the field to recover classified equipment or fix/scavenge downed aircraft as weenies. Some of those guys didn’t make it back in one piece or just didn’t make it back.
A Huey (slick) is hardly a jet aircraft and the operating system to fly one of those puddle jumpers is entirely different from a stick, couple of blades and some foot peddles.
And yeah, the Air Force, Air Guard are and were much different from the Army way of doing things.
The Army assigned personnel by units and used relocation centers to relocate the cannon fodder (enlisted) to their final assignments. My buddies that went in the Army said sometimes they got assigned to several different platoons in a day, depending on who had the biggest hoohaa, if you know what I mean.
The Air Force assigned each person regardless of rank to a unit. When you got a set of orders, you knew exactly where you were gonna go and what you were gonna do.
And yeah, when ‘Nam wound down, there was a mass exit and people didn’t care if they exited properly or not.
You may have went to Thailand for a vacation, but I’m pretty sure you didn’t come to Udorn. It was a restricted base as it had classified flights and etc. You would have gotten and M16 escort though if you did decide to show up at the gate though. :)
Posted by: RD | November 02, 2006 at 11:57 PM
“I’ve seen Kerry’s DD 214 on the internet. No dishonorable anything, but keep spinning. There are plenty who want to believe you and do.”
Every DD214 used to have a code on them that showed the type of discharge. Don’t know how they do it now, but it was common for a Civilian Personnel/Human Resources Manager to have a list of codes to show exactly what type of discharege it was.
If you see some letters in a corner on Kerry’s DD214, you can probably figure it out if you get one of those code books.
On June 13 of this year, my younger brother Russ was killed in Afghanistan. There is obviously no need for me to explain the pain this caused me and my family, from my mother, to Russ’ twin brother, to his fiance.
Only one politician from outside the state contacted us, and that was John Kerry. At Russ’ funeral, the only two politicians who attended were Lynch and Kerry (no, cynics, he didn’t advertise his appearance or make any statements to the media about it, so don’t suggest he did it to win votes).
Since the funeral, a couple of our congressmen have followed up a little with our family. So has Lynch. So has Kerry. He has called my mother on multiple occaisions and offered to do anything he can to help us.
In short, he was there for my family, the family of a fallen soldier. He continues to be there for us, and has offered to do more.
What he said yesterday was clearly a slip of the tongue. He was talking about Bush, and misspoke slightly. The White House knows it, just as we know it. For cheap political gain, Bush and Co. are trying to make it sound as if he is insulting the troops, when they absolutely know that that is not the case.
As someone who has experienced Kerry’s support for the troops first-hand, and as someone who has seen him give some small amount of comfort to my griveing mother, I can’t put into words how offensive I find the false suggestion, for cheap politcal gain, that Kerry wants to insult our troops and their families.
To everyone out there trying to make that case (Bush, Cheney, Snow, McCain, among others), one simple message: Go to hell.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/10/31/175122/71
Look at the date on the Kerry discharge, on his DD 214.One thing that is funny is that the services often do not issue a DD 214 when you leave Reserve duty.Kerry’s service dates dont make much sense.Anyway, there is a group that monitors these things, and they do have a point:If Kerry is tired of all the speculation, Kerry should release his records, including any amnesty sought through the Carter program.There is no doubt that Kerry violated the rules by protesting the war and making false statements while he was still in the Reserves.Kerry never signed the form for a full release of his records.Bush did sign such a form.I did not say that I knew for sure what Kerrys ORIGINAL discharge status was, but there is ample evidence that John Kerry made use of Jimmy Carter’s amnesty program.
http://www.nysun.com/article/3107
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=41200
Posted by: CapnAmerica | November 03, 2006 at 12:49 AM
“On June 13 of this year, my younger brother Russ was killed in Afghanistan.”
CapnAmerica,
You’re Rip Russ and you live in New Hampshire?
“So you agree then G.W. Bush serving in the Texas Air National Guard was a good thing and a service to his country.
Or you gonna backpeddle”
Backpeddle on what? I gotta tell you, jm, you are your own worst idiot. There are morons arrested every day in the military. Just because someone served doesn’t mean they deserve respect. bush’s record is so blatently ragged and there are tooo many questions left unanswered to give him a commendation for serving. So wtf does his serving have to do with anything anyway?
As for your “love my President. He is the right man at the right time and history will demand that his face be placed on Mt. Rushmore. This is because I unlike Kerry and you libs am a patriot. God himself has chosen George W Bush for us. If God is with us, who can be against us?My country right or wrong my country.”
Keep on loving the idiot. You two seem to have no concept of what a free country is, but you go on ahead and follow him all you want. Me? I’ll wait and vote for someone who isn’t going to send our troops in harms way to appease his daddy, make money off the oil they then control and overthrow some tin-pot dictator, when there are major problems right here at home to be solved.
Iraq never was a threat to this country. We did right in throwing them out of Kuwait; we did wrong invading them. And the mistake continues. What’s your exit stratagy and how many american lives are you willing to sacrafice to accomplish it? And don’t give me the rush coulter song and dance about democracy. It will never happen there.
I have all the respect in the world for our troops. What I have NO respect for are morons who are willing to throw the same troops lives into some war that should never have happened.
Like the Republicans who were so quick to jump on Kerry’s recent misfire, I found Kerry’s comments stupid. At least the comments did not kill anybody. It is time to take a closer look at the real issues in Iraq. Reality bites.
Posted by: J M Walker | November 03, 2006 at 06:24 AM”Keep on loving the idiot. You two seem to have no concept of what a free country is, but you go on ahead and follow him all you want. Me? I’ll wait and vote for someone…”
I’ve already voted. Guess you might get to the polls if you feel like it right? Is that what someday means?
Since Clinton never served a day in the military, he deserves no respect right? I mean he sat out the war in England.
When Bush produces all of his service documents, then Kerry should produce all of his. Or maybe they could do a 1…2…3…go. After all, this has all become a game, hasn’t it?
Bottom line: if this Republican-manufactured and media-peddled ‘controversy’ sways your vote, you’re a moron. Just forget about the list of Republican failures and scandals of the last five years (enough to fill ten volumes, let alone post them on a blog) and worry about John Fucking Kerry giving a speech. I know Republicans/fascists on this board think this ’scandal’ will help their machine retain power – I’ve got news for you: a verbal gaffe (which anyone with a shred of intellectual honesty will admit was directed towards Bush) is not going to outweigh the fact that it has been BUSH AND HIS GOP SYCOPHANTS IN POWER, AND IT IS THEY WHO HAVE GOTTEN US STUCK IN IRAQ. Soldiers are dying because of this, not because of what John Fucking Kerry said. Republican politicians are a cancer on this nation, and their followers? I’ll leave that one alone.
Posted by jm: “I’ve already voted. Guess you might get to the polls if you feel like it right? Is that what someday means?
Since Clinton never served a day in the military, he deserves no respect right? I mean he sat out the war in England.”
What do you have, jm, a second grade education? What does your little spout have to do with anything? Your ramblings are typical of the rush-brained, neo-con morons who lack the ability to think in a straight line with any sort of sense whatsoever. Follow the yellow brick road and hope there’s a brain for you at the end, but I doubt it. Hell, toto has more intelligence than you.
Posted by: dusty chaps | November 03, 2006 at 03:32 PM
“What do you have, jm, a second grade education? What does your little spout have to do with anything?”
If you would have read the topic, the logic of some was that Bush deserves no respect even though he served in the Air National Guard during the the time of war.
I just used the Democrats logic and said since Clinton fled to England during the Vietnam war, he doesn’t deserve any respect at all .
Of course, I expected a personal attack from someone who makes assumptions.
I have my degrees and they are franed and hanging up on the wall. I’m not going to hold my formal education up as some sort of superiority, I’m just here to discuss.
But alas, some like Dusty Chaps would rather insult, no thinking at all involved.
JM,The topic is about the repukes using kerry’s statement to their advantage, not about bush serving in the service, or certainly not about clinton. So if you consider throwing your own convoluted logic up in your face as an insult, well, hey, wtf do I care? Your politics still sucks, bush still got us locked in a war we can’t win, you still can’t get over clinton, our soldiers are still dying, and your still a moron.
Posted by: J M Walker | November 03, 2006 at 04:15 PM
“and your still a moron.”
Oh I get it now!
If you want to win an argument you call names. Okay let’s try that.
Whatever J M Walker puts on the blog is incorrect because he is a bedwetting, tree-hugging moron.
Oh yeah! I feel superior now! I can insult just like a demotrash.
JM? J M Walker is a poster here with a respected record. YOU are new. Thus far, your posts betray you as no more than an apologist for the bush administration. “demotrash” ? Well our new high handed right winger who pretends at discussion just reavealed himself huh? Sucks to be you bushbot JM.You add little more than prattle to this forum. We have our prattle quota filled thanks. You are excused and dismissed
JM,
“No, I don’t know, so explain. I’m guessing that’s when he went to college?”
Nope!
BTW: Before intelligent, non-”moron” people praise someone, they first do some research. They do NOT “guess”.
“If you want to win an argument you call names. Okay let’s try that.”
I just call them as I see them. jm, you’re still a moron. And you are correct: There is no thinking required when responding to your posts as there is nothing substantial to your posts, other than the fact they were originally spoken by rush coulter, or one of that neo-moron clique. So if the shoe fits . . .
Posted by: J R | November 04, 2006 at 01:12 AM
“J M Walker is a poster here with a respected record. YOU are new. Thus far, your posts betray you as no more than an apologist for the bush administration.”
Oh, I didn’t know we have stars by our name in this blog. How about I started posting online in discussion groups since 1982. That was years before you rookies even heard of computer.
Posted by: cosmos | November 04, 2006 at 01:47 AM
“BTW: Before intelligent, non-”moron” people praise someone, they first do some research. They do NOT “guess”.”
I didn’t want to play guessing games and you posed a question in a way that could have had a number of answers. I didn’t know I was supposed to be psychic as well.
Posted by: J M Walker | November 04, 2006 at 06:40 AM
“I just call them as I see them. jm, you’re still a moron.”
Still beating your wife?
jm posted: “Still beating your wife?”
Nope, never did; I’m divorced. I’m actually doing yours.
jm posted: “Still beating your wife?”
Nope, never did; I’m divorced. I’m actually doing yours.
Posted by: J M Walker | November 04, 2006 at 09:00 AM
Flying 2000 miles to ‘do’ my ex must get expensive.
Actually, she flies out here and charges it to your credit card.
JM
“I didn’t know I was supposed to be psychic as well.”
Sorry. I assumed you’d connect it the relevant point we were talking about earlier — failing to take the required medical, and being grounded.
“Sorry. I assumed you’d connect it the relevant point we were talking about earlier — failing to take the required medical, and being grounded.”
Posted by: cosmos | November 04, 2006 at 12:42 PM
Not a problem…I really didn’t know what you were referring to, so I asked.
Ask any Flight Surgeon, Military or Civilian on how difficult it is to get a Pilot in to get their flight physical. It’s worse than pulling teeth on a galloping horse.
JM,
“Ask any Flight Surgeon, Military or Civilian on how difficult it is to get a Pilot in to get their flight physical. It’s worse than pulling teeth on a galloping horse.”
Are you saying it was common for pilots to be grounded, (like Bush was) because they didn’t want to take the physical?
Did they not know, before making the committent to become pilots, that an annual physical was required?
Bush just didn’t want to fill that little bottle!
Are you saying it was common for pilots to be grounded, (like Bush was) because they didn’t want to take the physical?Posted by: cosmos | November 04, 2006 at 01:34 PM
I don’t know about common, but yeah it happens. There was an article about AF Pilots who wanted to get in the Space Shuttle program but were dragging their feet about getting the intensive physicals required for Shuttle Pilots.
They were concerned that the physical might ‘find something’ a normal flight physical doesn’t and disqualify them from their normal flying duties.
After getting way behind schedule, the Director of the Shuttle program more or less implied that anyone wanting to be a shuttle pilot and gets their physical done in a timely manner will be given first consideration for the job.
The phones at the Space Flight Surgeon (whatever they call thos docs) was off the hook after that.
Bush just didn’t want to fill that little bottle!
Posted by: hmmm … | November 04, 2006 at 01:45 PM
That I can believe, there was a huge drug/marijuana use back then in the military.
As you may know G.W. had a problem with drinking and supposably some drug use. Not for sure about the drug use, but it’s possible he took a toke.
Unless he didn’t inhale like Clinton. heh
By the way – the difference between Clinton and former CA Gov Jerry Brown: Clinton didn’t inhale; Brown never EXHALED!
Meanwhile, evangelist Terry Haggard didn’t swallow:
Evangelical leader says he bought drugsCATHERINE TSAIAssociated Press
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. – The Rev. Ted Haggard said Friday he bought methamphetamine and received a massage from a male prostitute. But the influential Christian evangelist insisted he threw the drugs away and never had sex with the man.
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/breaking_news/15924607.htm
More like a snort JM. MANY snorts!
If you don’t do your homework, you get “stuck in Iraq”.
‘War simulation in 1999 pointed out Iraq invasion problems’ http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/11/04/war.games.ap/” A series of secret U.S. war games in 1999 showed that an invasion and post-war administration of Iraq would require 400,000 troops, nearly three times the number there now.
And even then, the games showed, the country still had a chance of dissolving into chaos.”…Some of the conclusions are similar to what actually occurred after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003:”
See the list of 6 conclusions.