Kerry drapes himself in red, white and blue
Minnesota rally's patriotic display geared to veterans, but anti-war voters feel a chill
By ALAN FREEMAN
Saturday, June 5, 2004 - Page A13
MINNEAPOLIS -- On one side of the Williams Arena, a giant banner emblazoned with the words A Stronger America was draped across the rafters. As the political meeting began, a soldier just back from Iraq led the crowd in reciting the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance facing a giant flag draped on the other side of the hall.
The display of patriotism could have been taken straight out of a Republican rally. But the 5,000 people who gathered at the University of Minnesota yesterday were there to express support for John Kerry, the probable Democratic presidential candidate.
Mr. Kerry may be a much-decorated veteran of the Vietnam War, but nevertheless, he feels vulnerable to oft-repeated accusations from George W. Bush's campaign that as a Massachusetts liberal, he's somehow soft on terrorism and can't be trusted to protect the United States against enemy threats.
At the start of yesterday's rally, he introduced eight Vietnam veterans who served with him on so-called fast boats, chasing Viet Cong fighters in the Mekong Delta, and he delivered a line he has been using since the January primaries.
"We may be a little older and we may be a little bit greyer," Mr. Kerry roared. "But we still know how to fight for our country."
The meeting kicked off a massive push to get a million veterans to sign up for the Kerry campaign for the November vote. Polls show the Massachusetts senator inching ahead of Mr. Bush in the wake of the Iraq prison-abuse scandal, and he is racing to get veterans on his side.
He never misses an opportunity to praise the sacrifices of U.S. soldiers present and past, and to remind voters of his own military record. But he risks alienating anti-war voters by calling for more defence spending and an increase of 40,000 in U.S. troop levels, as well as failing to map out an alternative strategy for dealing with Iraq.
Meg Sirianni, a 41-year-old part-time yoga teacher who home-schools her four children, is such a voter. She had a John Kerry button pinned on her 'Neighbours for Peace' T-shirt yesterday but is worried about the candidate's strong pro-military position.
"It's impossible to vote for him and know exactly what you're voting for," she complained.
Minnesota is one of about 15 swing states where the vote could go either way in November.
It has a long-standing Democratic tradition, but growth in the suburbs around Minneapolis-St. Paul and other cities in the state have nudged it toward the Republicans.
According to a recent CBS opinion poll, 54 per cent of veterans say they back Mr. Bush, while 40 per cent say they are behind Mr. Kerry.
The Democratic candidate is "a real veteran versus a would-be veteran," said 58-year-old Vietnam veteran Michael Rose.
"As far as I'm concerned, Bush is a deserter -- he got favourable treatment all the way through and he still couldn't live up to his military commitment," Mr. Rose said, referring to the still-unclear duties performed by Mr. Bush while he was in the National Guard during the Vietnam War.
"Patriotism is not exclusively the province of the far right as much as they would like it to be," added Kerry volunteer Alan Lloyd, 49. "I don't think peace and [military] strength are incompatible."
Steven Schier, a political scientist at Carleton College in Northfield, Minn., said Mr. Kerry is taking a calculated risk in emphasizing his military credentials.
In attempting to win votes among conservatives who are unhappy with Mr. Bush's conduct of the Iraq war, he may lose anti-war votes to left-wing independent Ralph Nader, Prof. Schier said. That could be dangerous in Minnesota, where Mr. Nader took 5 per cent of the vote in 2000.
Mr. Kerry did not mention Mr. Bush or the Republicans by name in yesterday's speech, but he harshly criticized their approach to the war.
He got the biggest applause when he vowed to return to the "principle that we don't go to war just because we want to. We only go to war when we have to."
As for what he would do next in Iraq, he was noticeably vague, saying only that he would rely more in the future on traditional international allies.
"I'd like to learn how he would bring in all those allies to help us out," said John Slater, a 37-year-old corporate communications specialist who opposed the war from the start, but now doesn't favour an immediate pullout. "Now that we're there, we've got to finish the job." |
