Bush's record isn't his strength, and he certainly isn't running on his record. Isn't this wonderful. Less than three months until the election. Huge issues facing this country....and neither candidate is talking about any of the issues!
Nor is it a weakness, talking points boy -- which is more than we can say for Bush's RECORD AS PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
either way you look at it .....they are politicians and they do lie and promise more than they can ever deliver.....
contrast is rather striking tho, since bush highlights his record, and kerry obfuscates his. who'd you rather have as president, someone who peaked in 1969, or someone who' still...DEVELOPING...?
Are you saying Bush is a manchild? How has Bush highlighted his record. Seems like everytime they try to point to a success, it turns out they lied. Like when they claimed that there were less terrorist attacks. Oh, I almost forgot about "we're turning the corner." What corner have we turned? Seems like a turn for the worse as stocks fall, oil prices rise, and people continue to be out of work.
picking up steam, those hardned conservatives at knight-ridder had a piece picked up by several members of the conventional media last week. now the wsj editors weigh in: http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110005483 -- CAMPAIGN 2004 Holiday in Cambodia The most damning testimony on John Kerry in Vietnam has come from John Kerry. BY ROBERT L. POLLOCK Monday, August 16, 2004 12:01 a.m. John Kerry volunteered for service in Vietnam. John Kerry was wounded in Vietnam. And a number of the men with whom John Kerry served testify to acts of courage on his part. This much seems beyond question, and I see no reason to weigh in on the factual disputes surrounding Mr. Kerry's medals being waged by pro-Kerry vets like Jim Rassmann and the anti-Kerry vets of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Both sides strike me as sincere, but eyewitness accounts of fast-moving and stressful situations like combat are too unreliable for there to be much hope of getting at the "truth" here. But Americans have never accepted that a record of service, however honorable, should forever entitle a man to deference on matters of war and peace. (Ask George McGovern.) And the political uses to which Mr. Kerry would later put his Vietnam experience are certainly fair game for criticism. Which brings up Mr. Kerry's claim--repeated in at least three different decades, and on the floor of the Senate--that he spent Christmas Eve of 1968 not in Vietnam but in Cambodia. He obviously considered it a point of some significance, since he used it to impugn the integrity of those who waged the Vietnam War. This is how he described it to the Boston Herald in 1979: "I remember spending Christmas Eve of 1968 five miles across the Cambodian border being shot at by our South Vietnamese allies. . . . The absurdity of almost being killed by our own allies in a country in which President Nixon claimed there were no American troops was very real." In 1986 Mr. Kerry argued on the Senate floor against U.S. support for the Nicaraguan contras, again citing the 1968 Christmas in Cambodia and "the president of the United States telling the American people I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared--seared--in me." In a 1992 interview with the Associated Press the story came back: "By Christmas 1968, part of Kerry's patrol extended across the border of South Vietnam into Cambodia." Trouble is, the person who appears to have been wrong here about Mr. Kerry's location was not the president--who was Lyndon Johnson, not Nixon, by the way--but Mr. Kerry himself. His commanding officers all testify to this fact, as do men who were on his boat at the time. And so now, reluctantly, does the Kerry campaign. Last Wednesday Kerry spokesman Michael Meehan sent me a statement saying that "During John Kerry's service in Vietnam, many times he was on or near the Cambodian border and on one occasion crossed into Cambodia. . . . On December 24, 1968 Lieutenant John Kerry and his crew were on patrol in the watery borders between Vietnam and Cambodia deep in enemy territory." I asked for clarification as to whether the "one occasion" was Christmas Eve 1968. "No," was the reply. "Watery borders" is something of an evasion, intended to imply that Mr. Kerry's "seared" memory might have been easily confused. But according to both the maps and the testimony of swift vets, the Mekong doesn't run along the Cambodian border but bisects it, such that the coincidence between the two is obvious. In any case, Mr. Kerry's own journal, as cited in Douglas Brinkley's biography, records him being 50-some miles from the border at Sa Dec on that day contemplating visions of "sugar plums." Does this matter? Well, if President Bush was found to be using tall tales from his National Guard days to justify his policies in the war on terror it would certainly attract some attention. So the would-be commander in chief can hardly complain of being subject to scrutiny, especially since he's joined in criticism of Mr. Bush's war record and made his own a campaign centerpiece. Never mind the anti-Kerry swiftees. So far the veteran whose testimony is doing John Kerry the most damage is . . . John Kerry. Mr. Pollock is a senior editorial page writer at The Wall Street Journal.
I like the backhanded, gratuitous swipe at McGovern in there: Yeah, McGovern, you f-king p***y! You can take your 25 bomber misssions and your distinguished Flying cross and shove it up your p***y, peace loving ass! Thank f-king god Richard M. Nixon won a second term, so what if he resigned in disgrace, at least he didn't lose the war in Vietnam and withdraw like that p***y McGovern! yeah basso, this story is getting huge, talk around the water cooler was rampant this morning, I only predict it getting more rampanter, I heard soccer moms from swing states who frequent Basketball BBS political fora are very, very interested in this. Seriously, running against McGovern? trying to question Kerry's war record? -- that is a searing indictment of the weakness and unappealing nature of Bush's last four years.
Ad hominem? No, ad hominem means to attack the speaker. I attacked the speech -- which in turn took a gratuitous dump on McGovern for no explicit reason, though the implicit reason was so that armchair veteran WSJ prick could imply that Kerry was a McGovernite f*****. Ad hominem is actually the guiding principle of the Republican party platform this year, and for the last decade. But anyway, I agree with you, this post was pointless, as was that editorial, as is this thread, as is this issue -- pointless distractions all to distract from four years of prominent failures.
well, kerry's hometown paper, the extreme hard-right boston globe, doesn't agree: http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ed...les/2004/08/17/speak_for_yourself_john_kerry/ -- Kerry's statements about Cambodia do have traction for opponents. He has referred to spending Christmas or Christmas Eve 1968 in Cambodia and coming under fire. At the time Cambodia was neutral and supposedly off-limits to US troops. "I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia," Kerry said in 1986 at a Senate committee hearing on US policy toward Central America. "I remember what it was like to be shot at by the Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge and Cambodians and have the president of the United States telling the American people that I was not there, the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared -- seared -- in me." The Kerry campaign now says Kerry's runs into Cambodia came in early 1969. "Swift boat crews regularly operated along the Cambodian border from Ha Tien on the Gulf of Thailand to the rivers of the Mekong south and west of Saigon," Michael Meehan, a Kerry adviser, said in a statement last week. "Many times he was on or near the Cambodian border and on one occasion crossed into Cambodia at the request of members of a special operations group." Answers like that aren't good enough. Kerry put his Vietnam service before voters as the seminal character issue of his presidential campaign. He should answer every question voters have about it -- and he should answer them himself.
more in the chronicle: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/editorial/outlook/2740155 -- The same news media that demanded George W. Bush release his National Guard records — and went over them with a microscope — have shown an appalling lack of interest in John Kerry's military service. And as it turns out, there are far more legitimate questions about the latter than the former. . . . To those of you who say such questions are unseemly, consider that John Kerry's principal claim on the presidency is that he served four months and 11 days in Vietnam. OK, fine. Let's examine the records — all the records, which, unlike Bush and contrary to popular perception, Kerry has not released — and have a debate. We would be if it were George W. Bush. The media would see to it. -- wonder why the double standard? The media “wants Kerry to win” and so “they’re going to portray Kerry and Edwards as being young and dynamic and optimistic” and “there’s going to be this glow about” them, Evan Thomas, the Assistant Managing Editor of Newsweek, admitted on Inside Washington over the weekend. MR. THOMAS: There's one other base here, the media. Let's talk a little media bias here. The media, I think, wants Kerry to win and I think they're going to portray Kerry and Edwards I'm talking about the establishment media, not Fox. They're going to portray Kerry and Edwards as being young and dynamic and optimistic and there's going to be this glow about them, collective glow, the two of them, that's going to be worth maybe 15 points.
Are you ****ing kidding me? Have the idiots who write the chronicle not seen Nixonite John O'Neill and the rest of those idiots on every single ****ing news talkshow for the past month? The cable media has given free rein to this sideshow. Oh, and by the way, can you or the chronicle please tell me which part of Kerry's millitary record is unreleased? This allegation that it is unreleased is propagated by right wing drones-- yet no substance is ever given to the charge. I enjoy how it talks about Bush's records -- which is indeed released, save for the parts that are missing as they were deliberately destroyed. WHere's the Chron's outrage at that? Only 15 points? Damn, I was counting on the media giving us at least 30 or 40 points -- I mean if they can make Edwards look younger and more optimistic than Cheney -- there's no telling what those geniuses can do! Keep bumping this thread once a week till November. I'm having a blast.
well, to start with, where are the after-action reports for december 1968 and january 1969? they're certainly not here. you'd think there'd be one from christamas eve, since the experience was seared--braised-- into his memory...
SUUUUURE... Yeah, there will be reports from actions that happened in Cambodia, especially considering that nobody was supposed to be there. Those records got cleansed more than 30 years ago and it had NOTHING to do with either Kerry or Bush, it was all about RMN.
To watch your mounting frustration as the national media "burys" this story? Yup. I prescribe another few weeks of bumping as therapy.
dude, learn your history. nixon wasn't inaugurated until jan 20, 1969. what does he have to do w/ the christmas in cambodia fantasy from 1968? moreover, the kerry campaign has admitted he wasn't there, so why did he lie about, not once, not twice, but several times and over a period of 25 years? lastly, if, as the kerry campaign has acknowledged, kerry wasn't in cambodia on christmas 1968, or at anytime in december of 1968, why hasn't he released the records?
